Send Her to the Island

When a young woman showed up at a boarding house in Manhattan, she said her name was Nellie Brown – but that was all she seemed to remember about herself. Soon, people became scared of her. Someone went to the police: "I want you to take her quietly." Stacy Horn's book is Damnation Island: Poor, Sick, Mad, and Criminal in 19th-Century New York. Travis Russ' upcoming play is The Gorgeous Nothings.