Susannah Wright

Cover of the Report of the Trial of Mrs. Susannah Wright, published by Richard Carlile, 1822 Susannah Wright ( Godber; 1792 – unknown) was an English woman imprisoned on charges of Blasphemous libel for selling works from the shop of radical publisher Richard Carlile. In total, Wright served two years in Newgate and Coldbath Fields prisons, gaining a level of notoriety as the "She-Champion of Impiety". By 1815, she was living in London, where she married William Wright on 25 December. Before her arrest in July 1821, Wright was already active in radical politics, publishing a number of inflammatory works with her husband, in his name, and associating with a wide circle of radicals.

Susannah Wright was released from Coldbath Fields in July 1824, having lost the sight in one of her eyes, and with various other ailments. William Wright died eighteen months later. In 1826, she established her own radical bookshop in her native Nottingham, 'trading in politically extreme and heretical publications'.

Legacy In a biography of her father, Theophila Carlile Campbell described Susannah Wright as a "plucky little woman" to whom Richard Carlile "paid... the highest tribute for her enthusiasm, perseverance, coolness, and dauntlessness."

In a letter printed in the work, Carlile wrote that "there is scarce another woman in England who would have done for me what that woman has done, and from my knowledge of her in 1817-1819, I know that a love of principle has been her ruling motive."

Wright's date of death is unknown.