Synopsis

Historian Simon Schama, author of *A History of Britain*, adopts the role of investigator, seeking, as he puts it, "not literal truth, but poetic truth," as he considers whether an innocent man was executed for a crime that occurred 154 years prior. The victim was George Parkman, a respected Boston physician who had transitioned to business, and who vanished on November 23, 1849. A week later, remains believed to be his were discovered in the basement of Harvard Medical College, leading to the c