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BBC Radio 4 is a radio channel that started transmitting on the 30th September 1967. It replaced BBC Home Service.

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Serialised book readings, featuring works from various genres

Serialised book readings, featuring works of non-fiction, biography, autobiography, travel, diaries, essays, humour and history

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Book of the Week: Damn His Blood

Book of the Week: Damn His Blood: Episode 2

Damn His Blood

Episode 2

BBC Radio 4 - Book of the Week, Damn His Blood, Episode 2

True tale of murder in 1806 England. Feuds, oaths and superstition are rife in the village

Feuds, oaths and superstition are rife in the village of Oddingley. Alex Jennings continues the brutal tale of murder in 1806.

'Damn him!' he swore. 'There is no more harm in shooting him than a mad dog!' 

The brutal murder of the Reverend George Parker in the rural village of Oddingley on Midsummer's Day in 1806 gripped the nation. It was a strange and stubborn case in an isolated Worcester village still bound by superstition and folklore, involving an investigation, in a time before Robert Peel's police force, that lasted nearly a quarter of a century. It turned out to be a gripping true story of brutality, greed and ruthlessness in a rural community gone wildly astray. 

Damn His Blood is also fascinating glimpse into the darker side of English rural life at the beginning of the nineteenth century, far away from the civilised drawing rooms of Jane Austen, with a cast of characters straight out of Hardy.

Today: two months before the murder, Oddingley village is a hotbed of feuds, oaths and superstition. 

Peter Moore is a young literary historian and journalist, who is currently teaching Creative Writing at City University in London.

Abridger: Viv Beeby
Producer: Justine Willett
The Reader is Alex Jennings, who is currently appearing in The Collaborators as Mikhail Bulgakov at the National Theatre and is currently starring in Silk on BBC One.

Intelligent speech, the most insightful journalism, the wittiest comedy, the most fascinating features and the most compelling drama and readings anywhere in UK radio.

Peter Moore's true tale of brutal murder in an English village on Midsummer's Day, 1806

Alex Jennings reads Peter Moore's true tale of brutal murder in a remote English village on Midsummer's Day, 1806. A shocking case of greed and revenge that gripped the nation

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