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The Whole Damn Lot
A Play in Two Acts
by John Ward
All rights in this
play are reserved by the Proprietor.
All applications for professional and
amateur rights should be addressed to
John Ward, whose e-mail address is jward@magmacom.com
The Whole Damn Lot © J. Ward 1999
To Brandon my Grandson on his First
Birthday
with one smile he closes the gap in
a flash.
Preface
Recent killings, kidnappings, and the incarceration
of media personnel around the globe,
vividly illustrate that journalists
in all media face prosecution and persecution,
and that freedom of the Press can never
be taken for granted. Despite the all
too apparent appetite displayed by journalistic
scumbags savouring vicariously every
detail of scandals in the United States
and England, not to mention downright
lying due to inadequate verification,
Press freedom must be cherished. The
worst excesses of hired hacks and media
moguls must be placed in the proper
context. They merely serve to jade,
and make the thinking public relish
good journalism all the more.
The origins of freedom of the Press
differ in many realms. Early publishers
of newspapers were viewed by governing
authorities as dangerous radicals bent
on undermining the privileged few. Many
and various were the stratagems used
to harass, intimidate, and ultimately
halt their efforts to give a voice to
the voiceless and freedom to choose
their own rulers. Yes, and freedom to
sack those rulers when they chose to
do so.
The present offering is a modest attempt
to remind both Press and public of the
hardships faced by those who fought
for freedom of speech, freedom of opinion,
and the right to expand those freedoms
when and where they could. It is a two-act
play, its story based on the trials
and tribulations of a nineteenth century
pioneering Irish newspaperman in Canada.
At the time, Upper Canada, now represented
mainly by the Province of Ontario, was
governed by what became known as the
Family Compact, a close association
of prominent families, and by a Lieutenant-Governor
sent out from England, whose principal
purpose was to ensure for ever the subservient
status of Canada as a colony of England.
Not until 1952 was a Canadian appointed
to represent England as Governor General
of the entire dominion. In 1999, an
Irish born lady, Hillary Weston, was
the Lieutenant-Governor of Ontario,
a for cry from the time when Canada
was a colony of England.
Francis Collins, a native of Newry in
Ireland, is the main character in the
play. His newspaper, the Canadian Freeman,
published in Toronto from 1825 until
Collins's death in 1834, inflamed the
Family Compact into a judicial prosecution
of Collins in a case lacking all vestige
of impartiality, with a hostile Bench,
a packed Jury, and gaol sentence that,
in effect, amounted to life imprisonment.
It remains a stain on the Canadian conscience.
Since the above was first written, many
more journalists have suffered persecution,
even death, in various parts of the
world. Two of the courageous ones whose
names head a lengthening honour roll
are Veronica Guerin, Irish journalist,
who was murdered following her exposé
of drug dealers in Ireland, and Daniel
Pearl, an American journalist kidnapped
and murdered in Pakistan.
Conditions in York Gaol, 1830
"In the cells below the ground floor, your committee found three female
lunatics confined, one of them from England, and who is understood to be the
mother of a family, who became deranged on her husband leaving her; another
from Ireland, a young woman, and the third a native of Canada....they are lodged
in locked up cribs, on straw, two in one crib, and the other by herself; one
of them contrived to set fire to the jail some time ago, but it was providentially
discovered in time to save the building....A gentleman confined for debt complained
that the smell from the dungeon in which these poor lunatics are confined....was
almost insupportable, and that their incessant howlings and groans were annoying
in the extreme....our committee found 25 persons in this prison, twelve criminals
on the ground floor, one criminal sick upstairs, one vagrant, the three lunatics
above mentioned, and nine debtors...The debtors are, with one exception, all
on the upper floor, apart from the other prisoners....There are six debtors
confined on executions issued out of the Court of King's Bench. One debtor is
in jail together with his wife and a family of five children...."
(Extract from a report of a Committee of the House of Assembly, dated February,
17 1830.)
Cast
FRANCIS COLLINS Editor and Proprietor of the Canadian Freeman
ANN COLLINS His wife
SHERWOOD Chief Justice
ROBINSON Attorney General
BOULTON Solicitor General
JARVIS Sheriff and Jailer
BALDWIN Lawyer
ROLPH Lawyer
WILMOT Witness
DAVENISH Juror
HAYDEN Juror
HAGERMAN Judge
LUNATICS and
BALLADEER
There is an interval between Acts I and II, and a brief curtain between Scenes
in both Acts.
ACT ONE
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Courtroom; York, Upper Canada |
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5 Hours Later |
ACT TWO
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York Gaol |
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Collins's Cell |
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