# The Ballad of Reading Gaol is issued as a public poem against the prison hanging

Date: 1898

## The fact

In 1898 C.3.3. issued The Ballad of Reading Gaol, a public poem on the hanging of Charles Thomas Wooldridge.

It is one event.

## Context

A ballad is not a repeal.

[Oscar Wilde](/people/oscar-wilde)’s documented role is bounded by other offices and collaborators named in the sources below. Sharing a field with them is not a reason to drop a documented act, and it is not a reason to assign later consequences done in the name after death.

Named person as heading of the dated public instrument. Later editors, museums, printers, or offices share publication. Complex where later carriers date the row.

## Evidence and sources

Gutenberg’s Ballad and the British Library independently date the 1898 public poem.

Official or archival record: The Ballad of Reading Gaol — public-domain English (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/301; Project Gutenberg).

## Significance

A public gallows-poem is a documented check on punitive justice.

1898 is not 1905 De Profundis.

A public gallows-poem is a documented check on punitive justice.

## What is established and what is not

Established: 1898 public Ballad. Not established: that 1898 ended hanging.

What would change the picture: a contradictory original with a different date or name, or a measured series that can be argued, with lag and alternatives, as a consequence of this instrument rather than of later institutions.

The date is the date of this instrument, not a licence to back-date every later harm or benefit.

Established here: a sourced, dated public instrument with a named contribution by Oscar Wilde.

What would change the picture: a contradictory original with a different date, signatory, or non-occurrence; a demonstrated forgery; or a measured series that can be argued, with lag and alternatives, as a consequence of this instrument rather than of other causes.

Contribution type is direct. They are not a public rating.

The attached driver is justice-[judicial-independence](/drivers/justice-judicial-independence-erosion)-erosion. Later museums, UNESCO listings, Loeb reprints, and 2024–2025 COP or NATO rows are not this event. Responsibility 0.55 and influence 0.55 bound the path; they are not a personality score. If a number is not in the two records named above, it is not supplied here. Readers should open both named URLs.

## People

- Oscar Wilde: https://factrail.ai/people/oscar-wilde

## Drivers

- Judicial independence erosion (court capture): https://factrail.ai/drivers/justice-judicial-independence-erosion

## Sources

- https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/301
- https://www.bl.uk/

## Methodology

https://factrail.ai/methodology

Canonical: https://factrail.ai/facts/wil-reading-ballad-1898