Description
It is wonderful the interest that is taken in the peccadilloes and sins of “the cloth” and were it the custom to charge admission into our law courts, on such occasions, I am satisfied that the prices might be doubled when a clergyman is the defendant. A contemporary quote, 1854
The image of the Victorian country clergyman is that of a man pottering about with his books, bees and bells. They are the stock characters of countless novels and films. What are not as familiar are the stories of the remarkable number of vicars, rectors, and curates – not to leave out the odd canon or dean – who found themselves enmeshed in scandal. Be it an elopement, an adulterous divorce, a pregnant servant, an assault, a slander. Whatever it was, the papers of the day loved it.
A really good clerical scandal, well-spiced and judiciously prolonged in the months of September & October, is worth fifty pounds a week to the The Times. A contemporary quote, 1863
And the media love it still – although today a good spicy story of a cleric gone wrong is worth considerably more than fifty quid.
The stories contained in this book, besides being highly entertaining, are a greatly overlooked aspect of local history. Here is a selection of the most interesting, some might say sensational, of those really good clerical scandals and cause celebres that have occurred in Norfolk.
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