Bidwell's Travels, from Wall Street to London Prison. English-only reading by default; switch among English, Chinese, and Spanish, or compare languages side by side.
This chapter develops the memoir’s account of Chapter XXV. THE IRONY OF FATE., connecting personal narrative with the financial, legal, and prison-world setting of the period. The chapter’s opening perspective is: In this chapter I give in his own words George’s account of his flight from London and his arrest. “Without the remotest suspicion that my right name was known or that anything had been discovered to show my connection with the fraud, I resolved to take the steamer Atlantic of the White Star line at Queenstown for New York.
This chapter is for readers following Bidwell’s memoir chapter by chapter, especially the section titled “Chapter XXV. THE IRONY OF FATE..” It is most useful for readers interested in financial crime history, nineteenth-century banking culture, criminal justice, prison memoir, and the social setting of the period.
Read “Chapter XXV. THE IRONY OF FATE.” as a historical memoir rather than guidance. The banking procedures, legal assumptions, public reputation, social judgments, travel conditions, and prison practices described belong to Bidwell’s nineteenth-century setting and may not match modern institutions.