THE MAN THEY COULD NOT HANG The Life Story of John Lee ('Babbacombe Lee') / Told by Himself

Cleveland, OH: Arthur Westbrook Company, 1908. 1st edition. Wraps. black-&-white illustrations. pp. 94. Small 8vo. Bound in original illustrated paper wrappers. Our copy was published shortly after Lee's release, and is supposedly written by Lee himself. It is well-worn, with chipping to the covers and some soiling. The rear cover is detached but present. It was a very cheaply-produced book, the text printed on newsprint, which has now age-toned, but is still perfectly readable. The first printing, with the date of publication shown at the bottom of the contents page. Reprinted in 1925 and 1930. John Henry George Lee (1864-1945), better known as John 'Babbacombe', was an Englishman famous for surviving three attempts to hang him for murder. In 1885, he was convicted of the brutal murder of his employer, Emma Keyse, at her home in Baddacombe Bay, near Torquay, on November 15, 1884. The evidence was weak, and circumstantial, amounting to little more than Lee having been the only male in the house at the time of the murder, his prior criminal record, and being found with an unexplained cut on his arm. Despite this, and his claim of innocence, he was sentenced to hang. The execution was attempted on February 23, 1885 at Exeter Prison. Three attempts were made, and all were unsuccessful, as the trapdoor failed to open (despite having been carefully tested beforehand, as was the customary precaution). As a result, the Home Secretary commuted Lee's sentence to life imprisonment. Lee was finally released from prison in 1907, after which he exploited his notoriety by giving lectures, until he gradually disappeared from the public consciousness. His date and place of death are uncertain. The authors of a much later book on Lee, than our offering, suggest he died in Milwaukee and that he is buried there at the Forest Home Cemetary.