Cato Street Conspiracy and Consuming Crime: How Radical Politics Fed into the Public's Passion for Violent Media Coverage*

Abstract

The Cato Street Conspiracy ended in failure, with its five leading radicals executed. This conspiratorial insurrection caught the media's attention, creating a vibrant visual culture of the stable and execution. Arguably, the conspiracy's treason was not directed at the king but rather parliament and government through its aim to assassinate the cabinet. Although usually considered as an end point to Regency radicalism, Cato Street provides the opportunity to explore how radicalism was covered and consumed as part of the growing passion for crime reporting. Using the framework of wound culture, which highlights the centrality of consuming violence in contemporary society, this article demonstrates how the Cato Street stable and execution were fervently consumed through the visual culture generated to disseminate the conspiracy. Here, radicalism, treason and violence collided, demonstrating the passion of the conspirators but also the passion of the public who voraciously devoured the coverage.