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The Penny Dreadful Hour: A Feast of Early-Victorian Street Literature and StoriesAuthor: Finn J.D. John/ Pulp-Lit Productions
This is the podcast that carries you back to the sooty, foggy streets of early-Victorian London when a new issue of one of the "Penny Dreadful" blood-and-thunder story paper comes out! It's like an early-Victorian variety show, FEATURING ... Sweeney Todd ... Varney, the Vampyre ... Highwayman Dick Turpin ... Spring-Heel'd Jack ... mustache-twirling villains ... virtuous ballet-girls ... wicked gamblers ... ... and more! Spiced with naughty cock-and-hen-club songs, broadsheet street ballads, and lots of old Regency "dad jokes." Join us! Language: en Genres: History Contact email: Get it Feed URL: Get it iTunes ID: Get it Trailer: |
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5.08: Sweeney Todd stalks abroad with a murder-list in his pocket! — The highwaymen investigate the secret of the old mansion. — 'Swift Nick' Nevison, the gentleman-robber friend of King Charles II!
Episode 8
Wednesday, 28 January, 2026
Join host Corinthian Finn, a.k.a. Finn J.D. John 18th Baron Dunwitch,* for a one-hour-long spree through the scandal-sheets and story papers of old London!PART I: "THE HA’PENNY HORRIDS”:01:20: HANGED TODAY IN HISTORY: The story of a colonial governor hanged in 1803 for murder after he had seven employees whipped so severely that three of them died. If you’re into schadenfreude, this is your week.06:50: SWEENEY TODD, THE BARBER OF FLEET-STREET, Chapter 83-84: The two ladies, Mrs. Ragg and her friend (Martha Jones), bustle back to the Temple and set themselves up in the office of Martha’s employer, an attorney named Mr. Juggas, and starts plying Mrs. Ragg with Mr. Juggas’ old ale. Todd follows them up the stairs, listens at each door till he finds the right one, and overhears some very interesting news ….35:00: BROADSIDE BALLAD: A sad account of a pair of convicts sacrificed to the old English “bloody code” on the scaffold, one for burglary and one for arson. Reading this one, I had to wonder if the spectacle the arsonist made in struggling for his life helped turn public opinion against this barbarity.PART II: "THE TWOPENNY TORRIDS”:43:50: THE LIVES OF THE HIGHWAYMEN: Meet William “Swift Nick” Nevison, one of the northlands’ most notorious high spicers. The tale is that he was friends with King Charles II himself.50:30: BLACK BESS; or, THE KNIGHT OF THE ROAD (starring HIGHWAYMAN DICK TURPIN), Chapter 49-50: Dick picks the lock on the front gate and the two bandits make their way through the park and up to the front door of the house. There they find it’s very secure; heavy shutters cover all the windows, the door is fast as a rock. But, of course, no place is burglar-proof to a sufficiently resourceful burglar, right?1:19:00: SOME STREET POETRY from an 1830s “broadside”: "The Bonny Blue Handkerchief” and “The Jolly Rover.”1:23:00: A SUBTLY NAUGHTY COCK-AND-HEN-CLUB SONG: "Cowslip and the Gardener’s Leek.” (about a little misunderstanding of what was meant by “prithee sow your seed in my bed, kind sir.”)1:27:00: A FEW MILDLY DIRTY JOKES from what passed in 1830 for a dirty joke book: "The Joke-Cracker."*The Barony of Dunwitch is located in a wood west of Arkham (where, as H.P. Lovecraft put it, “the hills rise wild, and there are valleys with deep woods that no axe has ever cut; there are dark narrow glens where the trees slope fantastically, and where thin brooklets trickle without ever having caught the glint of sunlight.”) Actually it is a good 3,000 miles west of Arkham. It is not to be confused with Dunsany, the home until 1957 of legendary fantasy author Edward J.M.D. Plunkett, 18th Baron Dunsany.GLOSSARY OF FLASH TERMS USED IN THIS EPISODE:• COUNT CARDS: Fine fellows. • FAMILY COVES: Members of the “family” of thieves and other cross-men (criminals). • KNIGHTS OF THE BRUSH AND MOON: Drunken fellows wandering amok in meadows and ditches, trying to stagger home. • CORINTHIAN: A fancy toff or titled swell. Used here as a reference to Corinthian Tom, the quintessential Regency rake depicted in Pierce Egan's "Life in London" (usually referred to as "Tom and Jerry"). • CHAFFING-CRIB: A room where drinking and bantering are going on. • HIGH SPICERS: Well-mounted highwaymen. • SHERRY OFF: To run away at top speed. Adopted from the nautical term "to sheer off."• FLATS: Suckers. • FLY TO: Wised-up about, aware of.• FAKEMENT: Plot or scheme.• BUMS: Bailiffs.• CRAPPING COVES: Pronounced "crêpe-ing," it means hangmen, who cause the widows of the criminals they execute to wear crêpe in mourning.• THE OLD STONE JUG: Newgate Prison, or prisons in general.• PADDINGTON FAIR: Execution day at Tyburn Tree gallows, which was in Paddington parish; during the years when the “Bloody Code” was in effect, and one could get “scragged” for stealing less than 10 modern dollars’ worth of goods, it was also a blackly humourous pun, as “pad” was Flash slang for “thief” or “robber.”
