Fradulent Claim About Wallace

I have asked several times for evidence that Wallace was deemed to be a fraud by a court of law and have been told that the evidence is on this website in the form of a court transcript of a suit between Hambden and Wallace.  I had seen the transcript (not really a transcript, but a summation of the decision and found here) and thought that there must be more evidence.  There is none apparent, available or forthcoming.

Indeed if you look at the document linked to below you will not find a single mention of fraud or anything remotely close to being construed as fraud.  Instead what you will find is that a court ruled that the 500 pounds were payed to Wallace after Hambden's request that money be returned to himself, that they indeed had a wager, not a contract, and that because of these two facts, Hambden was entitled to repayment of the money.  It cites the relevant statutes, and the difference between money willfully given in a wager and money unwillfully given.  So the issue of the suit was not the validity of Wallace's execution of the Bedford Level Experiment, an issue which had already been contested in court, and upon which issue Hambden was found to have made libelous comments about Wallace, but rather whether or not Hambden was entitled to his money back.

Based on this, it cannot be rightfully asserted that Wallace's execution of the Bedford Level Experiment was ruled fraudulent as has been done here and here.  I would be very interested in seeing how else fraudulence could be factually asserted, and hope very much that a propoenent of this view does so.

 Wallace's referee (Walsh) did not even deign to arrive at the demonstration. He had to be replaced by a friend of Wallace's -- one Martin Coulcher. Coulcher declared that he saw convexity, while the other witness/referee William Carpenter saw no signs of convexity. John Henry Walsh -- Wallace's original referee was the "tie-breaker".  A judge later declared that Wallace must return the ₤500 to Hampden though he was unable to restore Hampden's reputation or save him from bankruptcy. Hampden rightly protested though the money was taken by Wallace nonetheless. The court upheld all of this, as you said. It's easy to believe in light of Wallace's horrendous monetary (mis-)management that he and his referees conspired to defraud Hampden and besmirch the movement.

It is plausible but it is far from saying he was proven to be a fraud in a court of law. However the fraudulence hypothesis is lessened, in my mind, when reading the published letters rebutting the fraudulent claims made by Hambden's camp. Wallace had dialogue's where he goes through the points of confusion and contention and answers their challenge. This combined with the courts finding that Hambden's claims of fraud were libelous and the publishing of his experimental results strongly supports that Wallace was not a fraud.

Wallace won the bet without question. Here is a thread showing his account of proceedings: Wallace account of Bedford Level

Of particular interest are the sketches made by the two referees:



Please read the explanation in the thread if you do not understand why these sketches show the curvature of the earth. This diagram may also help:



If anyone was defrauded in this episode, it was most certainly Wallace. He won the bet fair and square, but was denied his winnings by a technicality of the law, and the ungentlemanly behaviour of Hampden.

I found a narrative made by Wallace about the circumstances: Reply to Mr. Hampden's Charges Against Mr. Wallace. It would be very interesting to see a similar document from Hampden's perspective too

And this is the full-text of (almost all of) Wallace's published writings. It contains two letters about the Bedford Canal Experiment http://people.wku.edu/charles.smith/wallace/S162-163.htm

Hampden got so exasperated with Wallace, that he ended up sending letters to Wallace's wife in the hope she might persuade her husband to resolve matters.

Mrs. Wallace,

Madam — If your infernal thief of a husband is brought home some day on a hurdle, with every bone in his head smashed to pulp, you will know the reason. Do you tell him from me he is a lying infernal thief, and as sure as his name is Wallace he never dies in his bed.

You must be a miserable wretch to be obliged to live with a convicted felon. Do not think or let him think I have done with him.

John Hampden

One of many sources

I know just how he feels. Round Earthers are such a pain.

Round Earthers are such a pain.

The truth will set you free, but first it will piss you off

Hampden got so exasperated with Wallace, that he ended up sending letters to Wallace's wife in the hope she might persuade her husband to resolve matters.

Quote from: Letter from Hampden to Wallace's wife

Mrs. Wallace,

Madam — If your infernal thief of a husband is brought home some day on a hurdle, with every bone in his head smashed to pulp, you will know the reason. Do you tell him from me he is a lying infernal thief, and as sure as his name is Wallace he never dies in his bed.

You must be a miserable wretch to be obliged to live with a convicted felon. Do not think or let him think I have done with him.

John Hampden

One of many sources

I know just how he feels. Round Earthers are such a pain.

You feel like my wife

If anyone was defrauded in this episode, it was most certainly Wallace. He won the bet fair and square, but was denied his winnings by a technicality of the law, and the ungentlemanly behaviour of Hampden.

Just so I'm clear, if the two of us establish a bet and then I change my choice for arbiter and elect my good friend(s) as the decision makers and you refuse that condition and I hold your money anyway, I hope you will allow me to keep it and allow me to describe your complaints as "ungentlemanly"...

Select quotes from the thread I linked to earlier:

"Mr. Hampden proposed the Old Bedford canal in Norfolk, which, near Downham Market, has a stretch of six miles quite straight between two bridges. He also proposed a Mr. William Carpenter (a journeyman printer, who had written a book upholding the "flat earth" theory) as his referee..."

"When the pole was set up and the mark put upon the bridge, Mr. Carpenter accompanied me, and saw that their heights above the water were the same as that of the telescope resting on the parapet of the bridge. What was seen in the large telescope was sketched by Mr. Coulcher and signed by Mr. Carpenter as correct, and is shown in the following diagram..."



So Hampden's referee confirmed the accuracy of a sketch showing the convexity of the water in the Bedford canal, therefore admitting the earth to be round, and showing Wallace to be the winner of the bet. Correct me if I am mistaken.