%0 Biography
%T 'Am I mad?': the Windham case and Victorian resistance to psychiatry.
%A Degerman D
%J Hist Psychiatry
%V 30
%N 4
%D 12 2019
%M 31366245
%F 0.579
%R 10.1177/0957154X19867059
%X This article revisits the notorious trial of William Windham, a wealthy young man accused of lunacy. The trial in 1861-2 saw the country's foremost experts on psychological medicine very publicly debate the concepts, symptoms and diagnosis of insanity. I begin by surveying the trial and the testimonies of medical experts. Their disparate assessments of Windham evoked heated reactions in the press and Parliament; these reactions are the focus of the second section. I then proceed to examine criticism of psychiatry in the newspapers more generally in the 1860s, outlining the political resistance to psychiatry and the responses of some leading psychiatrists. In conclusion, I consider what this says about the politics of medicalization at the time.