Melancholy Accidents: Three Centuries of Stray Bullets and Bad Luck by Peter Manseau
Melancholy Accidents contains reprinted newspaper notices of unintentional shootings, then known as “melancholy accidents,” from 1739-1916, in chronological order. There is no single narrative, but many examples that illustrate the long history of unintentional shootings in the U.S.
“In Melancholy Accidents, Manseau collects and annotates a wide-ranging assortment of these woebegone and oddly intimate reports, with numerous illustrations, photos, and visuals from original period newspapers. It makes for a wholly unique contribution to the ongoing consideration of—and the recent heated discussion about—the historic place of firearms in American society.” ~Melville House Publisher