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The Boston Daily Advertiser - Monday, May 27, 1895
London, May 25. -- Oscar Wilde was today found guilty.
The judge sentenced Wilde and Taylor, the latter's sentence having been suspended pending the result of the trial of Wilde, to two years at hard labor each.
The judge finished his charge at 3 o'clock and the jury retired.
Before the jury retired the foreman asked the court if a warrant had been issued for the arrest of Lord Alfred Douglas.
The judge said that no warrant had been issued, whereupon the foreman said: "But if we must consider these letters as evidence of guilt they surely show that Lord Douglas's guilt is equal to that of Wilde."
The Boston Post - Sunday, May 26, 1895
LONDON, May 25. - Oscar Wilde was today found guilty of the charges against him, and, with Alfred Taylor, sentence to two years at hard labor.
Sir Frank Lockwood, in summing up for the crown, denounced Wilde's "prose poems," asking that the jury consider them at their proper level.
The judge, in summing up, said that Wilde had confessed that his conduct in regard to Lord Alfred Douglas had been such that he (the judge) could not ask the jury in the previous trial to say that there was no ground for charging him with having posed as a criminal.
The judge, in the course of his remarks to the jury, dealt with each of the charges contained in the indictment, his opinion being plainly and strongly against the prisoner. In regard to Wilde's letters to Lord Alfred Douglas, he said they might be "prose poems," but they were nonetheless poison to a young man's mind, and the writer was clearly not a desirable companion for the young.
The judge finished his charge at 3 o'clock and the jury retired.
Before the jury retired the foreman asked the court if a warrant had been issued for the arrest of Lord Alfred Douglas.
The judge said that no warrant had been issued, whereupon the foreman said: "But if we must consider these letters as evidence of guilt, they surely show that Lord Alfred Douglas’s guilt is equal to that of Wilde."
After the verdict had been rendered, Sir Edward Clark, on behalf of Wilde, and counsel for Alfred Taylor, made application for a postponement of sentence.
The judge peremptorily refused to grant the application, and in his remarks described the offences of which the prisoners were guilty as the most heinous that had ever come to his notice. The judge then sentenced Wilde and Taylor to two years’ imprisonment at hard labor, the maximum penalty.
When the sentence was pronounced Wilde appeared to be stunned.
As the last word of the sentence was uttered the apostle of estheticism was hurried to his cell, a felon.