A Debate from beyond the Grave: James Annesley was a Villain not a Victim

After two hundred and fifty years, I am awoken from my peaceful rest with the dreadful noise of slander. I am the ghost of James Annesley, rightly known as Lord Altham, writing through possession of "ApostateAbe." I receive no joy in the piracy of the body of a gentleman such as he, but I knew that his body could be put to far better use through the command of a defter intellect. I wish to correct the slurs of the ghost of that filthy macer, who has undoubtedly spent the preceding two hundred and fifty years, not at rest in his grave, but amusing himself by frightening his fellow rats in the River Thames and the London sewer passages. This wisp has now chanced on a new method to amuse himself.While he still had flesh that could be properly beaten, Thomas Egglestone was a thief. The affair of his timely death was instigated by his pilfery of my casting net, only the last of a long series of stolen items. My net sat with the remainder of my fishing belongings, and Mr. Egglestone, per his usual character, decided to claim it for himself while I had my back turned. When I turned toward, I saw Mr. Egglestone carrying it away. I confronted him, I demanded my net back, I bared my pistol, he threw the net into the water, inciting my anger, the same as for any affronted Irishman, and I accidentally shot him. I was found guilty in the county criminal court of chance medley, for that is precisely what it was. The court, seeing that Mr. Egglestone perfectly deserved his exit from life, allowed my freedom.But, now this mad spirit dares to befowl my name by accusing me of an evil deed well beyond mere murder. He has forgiven my dastardly uncle, and he has accused me of fashioning an elaborate lie about the stealing of my inheritence! By every known account, Uncle Dick is the most sinister and barbaric human life to ever set an infant foot in Ireland. One needs only to consult the cur's own witness, the Guardian newspaper (1), to find confirmation of that point plainly:"Uncle Dick is the most sinister person I've ever encountered. His chaplain said of him later that no man was more penitent at the time of his death. Frankly, few men had more to be penitent about.""Indeed, Ekirch is now more or less sure that Richard, a serial bigamist, did Altham in. 'I've become progressively convinced he poisoned his brother,' the historian says. 'He had the ­motive. The symptoms Altham displayed strongly suggest poisoning. And from later court documents we know that Richard visited the butcher Purcell just three weeks before Altham's death - plainly to find out whether Jemmy was ever likely to claim his title. The butcher told him he hoped Jemmy would be reunited with his father: the last thing Richard wanted to hear.'""And after seven years spent with trial transcripts, family documents, newspaper reports, House of Lords records and a treasure trove of nearly 400 legal depositions unearthed in Dublin and at the National Archives in Kew, it is now clear to Ekirch that those Memoirs are, essentially, true."Those true Memoirs being: "Return'd from Thirteen years Slavery in America, where he had been sent by a Wicked Contrivance of his Cruel Uncle; A Story founded on Truth, and address'd equally to the Head and Heart"Before Mr. Eggleston's ghoul proceeds further with his defamation, I will grant him an opportunity to provide some veneer of credibility to his greater accusation, not of murdering him, but of weaving an elaborate falsehood about my uncle, which, by all seeming, assuming the improbable truth of Mr. Eggleton's slander, must have thoroughly fooled the best historians of the 21st century. Does he wish to propose that I forged the trial transcripts? The diary of the Somerset rector? The family documents? The newspaper reports? The House of Lords records? The legal depositions?Or perhaps this evil sprite should pursue the nobler activity of haunting an orphanage.(1) http://www.guardian.co.uk...