ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the great William Charles Macready, the Eminent Tragedian', set off from London for his second tour of the United States in 1848 he seriously intended that his visit would be a prelude to settling in America for good. Macready loathed the social injustices of Victorian England and personally despised its aristocracy. But the tour was to end with Macready smuggled out of the country, his life in danger from angry men who regarded themselves as true American patriots. Macready also left behind at least thirty dead and over 150 wounded New Yorkers, the result of a savage disturbance at the Astor Place Opera House on the evening of 10 May 1849, in what was the bloodiest episode of civil unrest since the foundation of the United States of America. Macready never returned to America and retired from the stage three years later.
