Joan Henry sentenced to 12 months imprisonment. She served eight months, the majority at Holloway prison, and also at Askham Grange open prison. Before her imprisonment, Henry earned a living writing romance novels. She came to prominence in 1952 with the publication of "Who Lie in Gaol" (the title was taken from a line in Oscar Wilde's "The Ballad of Reading Gaol"), based on her experiences in prison, which became a best-seller. Henry was critical of Holloway prison, giving accounts of brutal treatment and neglect she had witnessed. The book was the basis for the film "The Weak and the Wicked" (1953),
The Ballad of Reading Gaol of a steady income which he did not outlive, as he died less than four years after the Ballad first appeared. It has been suggested that Wilde was, to some degree, inspired by poem IX in A. E. Housman's "A Shropshire Lad" (1896), which alludes to the hanging of condemned prisoners: <poem>They hang us now in Shrewsbury jail: And trains all night groan on the rail Although there is no specific documentation to show Wilde's active revising after the appearance of the first edition, there were some slight changes made in the second edition, which was printed only two weeks