The Ballad of Reading Gaol The Ballad of Reading Gaol The Ballad of Reading Gaol is a poem by Oscar Wilde, written in exile in Berneval-le-Grand, after his release from Reading Gaol () on 19 May 1897. Wilde had been incarcerated in Reading after being convicted of homosexual offences in 1895 and sentenced to two years' hard labour in prison. During his imprisonment, on Tuesday, 7 July 1896, a hanging took place. Charles Thomas Wooldridge had been a trooper in the Royal Horse Guards. He was convicted of cutting the throat of his wife, Laura Ellen, earlier that year at Clewer, near Windsor. He was
Wentworth Gaol Sheringham, who was appointed as Acting Matron on the same day. With the erection of other gaols at Silverton (1889), Broken Hill (1892) and Goulburn (1884) the need for a gaol at Wentworth declined. The gaol closed in 1928 after the two final prisoners, who had been sentenced on 9 February 1928, were transferred to the Broken Hill Gaol on 27 February 1928, which is possibly the official date of closure. When the was enacted, Wentworth Gaol was one of those listed in the second schedule as existing 'public gaols, prisons or houses of correction'. The gaol was officially de-established