Bedlam gemicide eulogy for squirrels to exhibit –

An illustrated poem by James Hadfield about the deceased squirrel was imprisoned at the Bertleme Mental Hospital after attempting to assassinate King George III, for the first time. Hadfield’s epitaph, his squirrel friend Jack, is on display with other previously invisible works from the Bedlam Archives in the Bethlem Mind Museum.

My poor Jack’s epitaph. squirrel.

This is the remains of my poor little Jack
Who fell, almost broke
That’s what I am
By making him a frigthen’d
Then, I picked him up from the floor.
But he, unfortunately, “never danced the horn again.
I laughed for a lot of time and saw him like this cunning
Sit down and cracked, I gave him so much fun.
Now commemorate his beautiful skills
I have his stuff and I probably won’t forget him.
So he left. I have to be like him.
Pray to God, send me maybe to it, but there is almost no sin.
So this is the ending of my little dance Jack
That will never be scared by cats.
Died on Sunday morning, July 23, 1826.

James Hadfield was the dragon team of Frederick Augustus, Duke of York and Albany’s second son, King George III, when he suffered a huge injury in the Battle of Lincelles in Flanders in 1793. He managed to hold a job at a Silversmith Shop, but he lost control of reality increasingly, and by 1800 he was convinced that the end of the world was near and that God was chosen by God to die for the salvation of mankind.

He couldn’t commit suicide, and he decided to do something certain to kill him: assassinate the British king. On May 15, 1800, he fired a pistol at the king in the royal box at the Drury Lane Theater. He missed it. He was immediately resolved and disarmed. When he saw his former boss, Duke of York, he was dragged away and told him, “God bless your Royal Highness; I like you very much; you are a good man.”

He was tried for treason, and although he had no doubt actually committed the crime, his barrister Thomas Erskine succeeded in arguing that Hadfield was suffering from religious mania and was crazy. Even though he usually acts pleasantly and is able to think clearly, the doctor testifies to the constant delusions caused by his war wounds. Therefore, Hadfield was acquitted for reasons of insanity. This prompted Parliament to quickly scare up the Criminal Lunatics Act which passed on July 23rd, 1800. The new law, specifically made retroactive so that Hadfield couldn’t just walk away from having shot at the king, required that anyone acquired of “Treason, Murder, Felony” on the grounds of having been “’insane at the Time of the Commission of such Offence” shall be “kept in strict custody, in such Place and in such Manner as to the Court shall seem to fit until the pleasure under Ma.”

The court found it appropriate to imprison Hadfield at the Royal Hospital of Burslim. After a brief escape in 1802, he spent 14 years in Newgate prison, but then returned to Bedlam until his death in 1841. He allegedly lived a pretty stable life there. He was allowed to keep pets (cats, dogs and birds, not just squirrels) and become a sheltered celebrity. He exchanged his poems and drawings to many tourists in exchange for snuff and tobacco. The surviving doctor’s notes describe his old delusions manifested in his writing.

Hadfield’s assassination attempt will have a long-term impact on the way in which deranged laws are defined. Before the passage of the Criminal Madness Act, people who plead guilty on insanity must prove with certainty that they cannot speak good things from evil, and that they have no understanding of crime. It is hard to prove that between 1740 and 1800, there were only 100 insane pleas, half of which resulted in acquittal. Accusations are handled in different ways – sometimes released to families, sometimes locked in mental hospitals – but due to strict laws, no matter how threat they may pose to themselves or others, or even to King Je, no one can be detained at a certain time or indefinitely.

Hadfield’s verdict caused the first state funding for the “crime madman” facility in Bedlam, and when Bethlem opened a new facility in Southwark in 1814, they expanded the state-supported criminal criminal lunatic ward to dedicated male and female criminal acts. Other hospitals and shelters also have funds for housing crime killings.

James Hadfield made several regrets for Jack, and these copies were kept in the Bedland Archives. A copy is regularly exhibited in the museum, but the second version, he illustrates this version nicely with a portrait of Jack eating nuts next to a palatial cage filled with canaries, never shown. You can see now Sleeping and Waking Up: Dreams and Visions of the HospitalThis function is worked by former patients in hospital archives.