Breach of Promise to Marry: A History of How Jilted Brides Settled Scores

Bibliography and Sources

Statutes and Official Reports

Evidence Act 1843

Evidence (Further) Amendment Act 1869

Law Commission Report No 26 Breach of Promise of Marriage 1969

Legal Reform (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1970

Marriage Act 1754

Printed Sources

Chitty, Joseph, A Practical Treatise on the Law of Contracts (Section 111 Of a Contract to Marry), (London, 1841)

Frost, Ginger S, Promises Broken-Courtship, Class and Gender in Victorian England, (University of Virginia Press, 1995)

Lettmaier, Saskia, Broken Engagements-The Action for Breach of Promise of Marriage and the Feminine Ideal, (Oxford University Press, 2010)

McColla, Charles J, Breach of Promise Its History and Social Considerations, (Pickering and Co, 1879)

Steinbach, Susie Women in England 1760-1914 A Social History, (Orion, 2005)

Novels and Plays

Austen, Jane, Sense and Sensibility (1811)

Austen, Jane, Pride and Prejudice (1813)

Bronte, Charlotte, Jane Eyre (1847)

Dickens, Charles, The Pickwick Papers (1837)

Dickens, Charles, Great Expectations (1861)

Gilbert, William, Trial by Jury (1875)

Thackeray, William, Vanity Fair (1847)

Trollope, Anthony, The Last Chronicle of Barset (1867)

Pamphlets and Periodicals

Annual Register 1780

Edinburgh Annual Register 1808-26

Maria Foote v Joseph Hayne 1824

Mary Elizabeth Smith v Earl Ferrers 1846

Edith Barber v Robert Fenton 1863

Principal Newspapers

The Guardian

The Observer

The Times

Principal Web Sites

Other Online Sources (various providers)

Birth, Marriage and Death Registers

Census Returns 1841-1911

Parish Records

British Newspapers