Jewish Pedlar - An Untold Criminal History

An imaginative investigation into a historical crime that sheds new light on Jewish history.In 1734 a pedlar turned smuggler named Jacob Harris slit the throats of three people in a pub in Sussex. This triple-murder, for which he was hanged and gibbeted, remains the most violent crime ever committed by a British Jew. Yet today it is all but forgotten.In The Jewish pedlar, Tony Kushner goes in search of the enigmatic Harris. Digging into a remarkable range of sources, from law records and newspaper reports to ballads and folktales, he follows the traces of Harris's legend across three hundred years of British history. In doing so, he reconstructs the world of Jewish pedlars and criminals across many continents. The lives these figures eked out at the margins of society paint a picture of persistent antisemitism - but also of remarkable integration.Intellectually bold and deeply humane, The Jewish pedlar takes a new, grassroots approach to the history of Jews in the modern world, shedding light on everyday lives from the Enlightenment to the Holocaust and beyond.

Product details

• Authors: Tony Kushner
• Publisher: Manchester University Press
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Release: 20.05.2025
• EAN: 9781526178022
• ISBN: 978-1-5261-7802-2
• No. of pages: 344
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > History > Modern era up to 1918; Social sciences, law, business > Law > Criminal law, criminal procedural law, criminology; Modern history to 20th century: c 1700 to c 1900, 20th century history: c 1900 to c 2000, HISTORY / Jewish, TRUE CRIME / Murder / General, HISTORY / Europe / Great Britain / Georgian Era (1714-1837), HISTORY / Europe / Great Britain / 20th Century, HISTORY / Europe / Great Britain / Victorian Era (1837-1901), 19th century, c 1800 to c 1899, 20th century, c 1900 to c 1999, 18th century, c 1700 to c 1799, Jewish Studies, British & Irish history, The Holocaust, Social and cultural history, Crime and criminology, Crime & criminology, Relating to Jewish people and groups