<p>In 1724 Margaret Dickson was sentenced to death for alleged infanticide, hanged from a gibbet in the Grassmarket in Edinburgh, pronounced dead—and then woke up a few hours later complaining of a sore neck. She was scorned in street ballads and cheap printed broadsides, only to be celebrated in verse in our own time. She was known as “Half-Hanged Maggie.”</p>

In 1724 Margaret Dickson was sentenced to death for alleged infanticide, hanged from a gibbet in the Grassmarket in Edinburgh, pronounced dead—and then woke up a few hours later complaining of a sore neck. She was scorned in street ballads and cheap printed broadsides, only to be celebrated in verse in our own time. She was known as “Half-Hanged Maggie.”

Half-Hanged

<p>Gather around as poet MJ Millington tells remarkable tales from the history of poetry. Wizard battles, time capsules, opium dreams, prophecies, witches and wombats—you name it, there’s a poem about it, and a good story to go with it.</p>

History

Gather around as poet MJ Millington tells remarkable tales from the history of poetry. Wizard battles, time capsules, opium dreams, prophecies, witches and wombats—you name it, there’s a poem about it, and a good story to go with it.

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Half-Hanged

Half-Hanged