Editors’ Note: This essay by Anthony Daniels is the first installment of a series on the challenges posed by the digital revolution to the world of culture. We are delighted to acknowledge that the Hertog/Simon Fund for Policy Analysis provided critical support for this series.
Finding myself for three or four months at a loose end on the island of Jersey, a tax haven in the English Channel, I decided to go into the archives and write a short book about three murders that took place there in as many months between December 1845 and February 1846, including that of the only policemen ever to have been done to death on the island, George Le Cronier. He was stabbed by the keeper of a brothel known as Mulberry Cottage, Madame Le Gendre, who, a true professional, struck upwards rather than downwards with her specially sharpened knife, exclaiming expressively as she did so, “Là!” Le Cronier staggered outside and said to his fellow policeman, Henri-Manuel Luce, “Oh mon garçon, je suis stabbé!” (the language of most people of the natives of the island at that time being a patois). He died a day later, and Madame Le Gendre was transported to Van Diemen’s Land for life, outraging the righteous residents of Jersey with the elegance of her dress as she left the island, never to return.
Among the books I consulted in my researches in the library of the Société jersiaise was La lyre
