From the Boxing Day Riot of 1879, when a parade of Orange Lodge members was attacked by a mob of Irish Catholic navvies swinging axe handles, to a slander case involving one of the city’s richest merchants and the famous Severed Hand Mystery of 1885, historian Geoffrey Rice presents another fascinating collection of Christchurch crimes and scandals culled from 19th-century newspaper court reports covering the Victorian period from 1876 to 1899. Some of the most notorious citizens of the period parade through the pages of this history, including the photographer Eden George and the preacher-fraudster Arthur Bently Worthington - to date the only individual to have the Riot Act read to him in Christchurch - as well as a motley crew of apologetic drunks, brazen prostitutes, shifty forgers, brutal thugs, rapists, arsonists, embezzlers, desperate women charged with infanticide and stony-faced men accused of murder. The study also examines the lawyers who had the unenviable task of defending these perpetrators, highlighting a cadre of men who had the gift of persuasion. An engaging, storytelling style and the author’s genuine enthusiasm for and knowledge of the subject bring a rich, colorful, and intriguing chapter of Christchurch’s past to life.