Oscar Wilde in one of the most famous trials in British history led to the Irish dramatist’s imprisonment for homosexuality, and to his ultimate ruin.
Now a previously unpublished letter reveals that Sir Edward Carson’s attack on Wilde in the Old Bailey was partly personal – a loathing that went beyond his job in defending the Marquess of Queensberry in the ill-fated libel case.Long after Carson’s death in 1935, the son of one of his friends confided in a 1950 letter: “I was never able to get Carson to admit that Wilde possessed any ability at all.