Mercy

by Emma Woodhouse

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Pub Date Jul 29 2025 | Archive Date Jul 14 2025

Cranthorpe Millner Publishers

Biographies & Memoirs | Historical Fiction | History

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Description

“A Newton takes their own life, or that of another.”

So says the curse of the Newtons.

As the river rises and rain lashes down, The Watering is filled with smoke. In the early hours, a charred corpse is found in the brew house. Mercy Newton is arrested and sent to Shrewsbury assizes.

But is she guilty?

Pieced together from historical records, the life of the nationally notorious Mercy Newton is presented for the first time. Lost to history, this real-life story of a family curse, a jealous daughter and a suspected murder has been forgotten for over 100 years.

Until now.

“A Newton takes their own life, or that of another.”

So says the curse of the Newtons.

As the river rises and rain lashes down, The Watering is filled with smoke. In the early hours, a charred...

A Note From the Publisher

The author says:

“I first discovered Mercy Newton when I was looking through the British Newspaper Archives, searching for a real Victorian murder story based around the River Severn for my next book. Mercy Newton’s story just kept rearing itself over and over again, and I realised, quite quickly, that there was more to her story than just her arrest and trials. Soon, it became like my own Da Vinci Code – trails of paperwork unfolded, the story of not just her life, but those around her, and I realised that this was what I’d been looking for."

Advance Praise

"A hard, relentlessly gritty true crime tale of inequality, hardship, codependency, deprivation and substance abuse in industrially rural 19C England." - DJG Palmer, author of the Babanango trilogy

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