On Saturday, March 14, 1846 a mob led by some of Nashville’s most elite citizens dragged Edward Z. C. Judson out into the Public Square, looped a rope around his neck, and ran him up an awning post, his feet dangling in the night air. Judson was a popular but scandalous figure. He was a leading writer for the nation’s elite literary publication, The Knickerbocker, and he was the editor of the region’s first literary magazine, The Western Literary Journal & Monthly Review. He was also alleged to have had an affair with a local young woman, and he had certainly shot and killed her hot-headed husband who had attacked him, but larger issues were also at play. While such vigilante justice was not unknown at this time, this particular incident is unique because Judson not only survived, but was reborn as one of the most prolific and influential authors of mid-19th century America, Ned Buntline. A close examination of the months immediately before and after this violent incident tells an important story about the dynamic cultural and publishing realities that altered mid-1840s America, and illustrates how one member of America’s literary elite was reborn as an innovative and controversial leader of the nation’s newly emerging popular press.
About the presenterMark Metzler Sawin
Mark is professor of history and director of the honors program at Eastern Mennonite University. His research interests include 19th-century cultural & literary history, and 21st-century issues of race and masculinity. He has a PHD in American Studies from the University of Texas and was a Fulbright scholar in Croatia.