The roughly 750 runaway notices in "When Drunk Is Very Bold" name upwards of 2,500 people in all. The transcriber has gathered this otherwise inaccessible data by combing through twenty colonial newspapers, including the Maryland Gazette. While the overwhelming majority of the runaways named were from Maryland, the author includes out-of-state fugitives when the papers refer to them. Besides the carefully transcribed ads themselves, researchers have the benefit of Mr. Boyle's introductory history of the convict trade and indentured servitude in Maryland, as well as an extensive bibliography and a comprehensive name index.
