John William Gott
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John William Gott was the last person in Britain to be sent to prison for blasphemy. A trouser salesman from Bradford, he led the Freethought Socialist League.
In 1911, Gott was sentenced to four months in jail for publishing attacks on Christianity. Further punishment followed in 1916, 1917 and 1918. He was tried again for blasphemy at the Old Bailey in London in 1921, found guilty and sentenced to nine months' imprisonment. The Lord Chief Justice dismissed an appeal with the observation: “It does not require a person of strong religious feelings to be outraged by a description of Jesus Christ entering Jerusalem ‘like a circus clown on the back of two donkeys’.” [1]
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