Portland State Magazine Winter 2007

William Corder shot his fiancee in a rented red barn (top), where he buried her. Three days after he was found guilty of the murder, thousands gathered to watch him hang (bottom). James Curtis wrote about it in great detail, which was unusual, according to Paul Collins, PSU English faculty. 12 PORTLAND STATE MAGAZINE WINTER 2007 almost five years of persistence before he had unearthed enough on the long– forgotten reporter to compile a portrait of the times and the man. Published in the November 2006 issue of 1he Believer magazine, the professor's article brings to life a man who was a reporter's reporter even by today's standards. Curtis was fascinated by many trials at London's Old Bailey court and missed only two in 25 years, when he was attending court cases in outlying areas. A reporter for 1he Times of London, he wrote verbatim records of every trial for his own amusement and developed his own form of shorthand described in his book, Short-handMade Shorter, so he could keep up with the witnesses, defenders, prosecutors, and judge. Executions in particular fascinated Curtis. He told contemporaries that in one 25-year stretch he atrended every public hanging in the London area. He slept a mere four hours a night and arose at 4 a.m. daily to hobnob his way through the colorful flower, fish, and farmers markers of greater London, gathering stories as he strolled. He refused to ride in wheeled vehicles and instead walked everywhere, includ– ing-when a particularly interesting trial took place-to outlying villages 20 miles from London or farther. Collins learned that Curtis was an insomniac whose odd sleeping habits and passion for his work helped him stay up all night with men condemned to hang in the morning. He heard from these rormented souls an outpouring of remorse and terror at the prospect of the dawn. But it was the grisly murder trial ofMaria Marren that brought every one of che reporter's peculiarities and talents inro focus. IN 1827, in the tiny hamlet of Polsread-population 900-Marten was shot and perhaps stabbed by her lover on the night they were to elope to nearby London. The murderer, William Corder, buried her body under the din floor of a red barn. For 10 long months, Corder wrote letters to his "intended" father-in-law with excuses as co why Maria could not visit or write. "She is," he wrote, "so busy looking after me." Then one day, the young woman's father dug up the grisly truth. Corder was promptly arrested and dragged before the court. Fanned by heated accounts in London newspapers, the trial created a sensation. Some 10,000 people crowded into the village where the proceedings w1folded. Women were barred from the courtroom so as not to shock their delicate sensibilities with the macabre derails, which included che display of Maria Marten's skull.