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Home » Law and Order » Crime » Infanticide

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  • Oblong gravestone from the grave of Mary Morgan who was tried and hanged for murder in Presteigne. The inscription reads as follows: 'To the memory of Mary Morgan, who young and beautiful, endowed with a good understanding and disposition, but unenlightened by the sacred truths of Christianity become the victim of sin and shame and was condemned to an ignominious death on the 11th April 1805, for the murder of her bastard child. Rous'd to a first sense of guilt and remorse by the eloquent and humane exertions of her benevolent judge, Mr. Justice Hardinge, she underwent the sentence of the Law on the following Thursday with infeigned repentance and a furvent hope of forgiveness through the merits of a redeeming intercessor. This stone is erected not merely to perpetuate the remembrance of a departed penitent, but to remind the living of the frailty of human nature when unsupported by Religion. Thomas Bruce Brudenell Bruce, Earl of Ailesbury.'
Gravestone of Mary Morgan, tried and hanged for murder (infanticide), Presteigne, c. 1806
  • Transcription: Partitions formed by articles of furniture as Chests of Drawers, Kitchen Dressers and Wardrobes. When the Female becomes pregnant by this immoral practice of Bundling the Man to whom she swears the Child is expected to marry Her but as this formerly sacred obligation is not now in modern days always performed the natural consequence is that more illegitimate Children are born in Wales than in any other part of the Kingdom. When a Marriage is decided upon that good old usage the Bidding still prevails and is attended with the most happy and beneficial effects. Notwithstanding the too frequent occurence of illegitimate Birth Instances of Infanticide are extremely rare so much so that during a very long and extensive acquaintance with this part of Wales I have not known of more than four or five suspected cases at the time written. This fact may be easily accounted for on the Principle ...
An essay on childbirth amongst the poor of north Cardiganshire, c. 1837, folio 13r [image 8 of 23]
  • David Williams writes of a case of possible infanticide.
Work diary of David Williams of the Carmarthenshire Constabulary, 1859 [image 11 of 221]