The Wicked Lady

It was one of the Gainsborough melodramas, a sequence of very popular films made during the 1940s.


The story was based on the 1945 novel Life and Death of the Wicked Lady Skelton by Magdalen King-Hall which, in turn, was based upon the (disputed) events surrounding the life of Lady Katherine Ferrers, the wife of the major landowner in Markyate on the main London–Birmingham road.


The film was loosely remade by Michael Winner as The Wicked Lady in 1983.

Plot[edit]

In rural England in the late 1600s, Caroline invites her beautiful friend Barbara to attend her marriage with wealthy landowner and local magistrate Sir Ralph Skelton. But the scheming Barbara soon has Skelton entranced, and it is Barbara who becomes Lady Skelton, as Caroline looks on. At the wedding reception, however, Barbara meets a handsome stranger, Kit Locksby. It is love at first sight for both, but it is too late.


Married life in the country becomes a bore for Mrs. Skelton—that is, until a visit from her detested sister-in-law Henrietta. In a game of Ombre, Henrietta wins Barbara's prized jewels, including her late mother's ruby brooch. A chance remark about a notorious highwayman, Jerry Jackson, gives Barbara an idea. Masquerading as Jackson, Barbara stops Henrietta's coach and retrieves her brooch and the rest of her jewels. Intoxicated by the experience, she continues to waylay coaches until one night, she and the real Jerry Jackson finally meet. Jackson is amused to find his imitator a beautiful woman. They become lovers and partners in crime. Yet at the same time, she warns him never to be unfaithful to her with another woman. Together, they profit off of unfortunate travellers. But their plot to rob a huge gold shipment goes awry, resulting in the death of one of Sir Ralph Skelton's tenants. Skelton offers a handsome reward to anyone who can assist in Jerry Jackson's capture. So one evening, when Barbara finds Jackson in bed with another woman, she anonymously betrays his whereabouts to her husband. Jackson is captured and sentenced to be hanged.


In London, Barbara views the execution with Caroline. In his speech from the scaffold, Jackson talks only of faithless women but does not refer specifically to Barbara. Then a riot breaks out. The two ladies are rescued by Kit Locksby, who has recently become engaged to Caroline. After the hanging, Jackson's accomplices cut him down and revive him. He later breaks into Barbara's bedroom at the estate and rapes her. Fearing his next move, she begs Kit to marry her. But he will not betray Caroline. Late one evening, Barbara, in highwayman's gear, awaits her husband's coach with a loaded pistol. Jackson shows up and realizes Barbara's scheme. He plots to warn Skelton, but Barbara kills him. When the coach with Caroline, Ralph, and Kit arrives, Barbara, still in disguise, hijacks it and attempts to shoot her husband—not knowing the three have agreed to find a way for both couples to be together. Kit shoots her, but she escapes. Back at the estate, a mortally wounded Barbara confesses all to Kit, pleading he stay with her until the end. After her death, Caroline and Skelton reunite, determined to put the past behind them.