A Spectacle of Corruption

London, 1722. Benjamin Weaver is convicted of murdering dockworker Walter Yate after a corrupt trial and sentenced to hang. A stranger provides the means to escape Newgate, but freedom leaves Weaver hunted and unable to clear his name through courts that have already been manipulated against him. Disguised as a wealthy colonial merchant, he enters political society to discover who arranged the prosecution and why.

The investigation converges on Britain’s general election, where Whigs and Tories employ bribery, intimidation, hired violence and propaganda while Jacobite agents hope to overturn the Hanoverian settlement. Dockside labour disputes, clerical extortion and the criminal influence of Jonathan Wild reveal a political system in which representation is inseparable from patronage and coercion, forcing Weaver to pursue justice outside institutions designed to protect wealth and power.