Summary:
On news reporting of petty crimes – and attempts to combat it. Sources are from the British Newspaper Archive.
Today it almost reads as if some of these were written for drama scripts – or certainly for public reading.
The police courts were predecessor courts to magistrates courts. Much of the fun and games if I can call it that was happening in the slums of Barnwell – one of the reasons why it makes for a fascinating place to study for local social history. My part of town – the borderlands between Coleridge and Queen Edith’s wards, were fields at the time.
“What are rogues and vagabonds?”
It’s set out in the Vagrancy Act of 1824, which effectively consolidated previous legislation in this area.
“And be it further enacted, That every Person committing any of the Offences herein-before mentioned, after having been convicted as an idle and disorderly Person:”
The list is quite long – and I quote:
- “every Person pretending or professing to tell Fortunes, or
- using any subtle Craft, Means, or Device, by Palmistry or otherwise, to deceive and impose on any of His Majesty’s Subjects;
- every Person wandering abroad and lodging in any Barn or Outhouse, or in any deserted or unoccupied Building, or in the open Air, or under a Tent, or in any Cart or Waggon, not having any visible Means of Subsistence, and not giving a good Account of himself or herself;
- every Person wilfully exposing to- view, in any Street, Road, Highway, or public Place, any obscene Print, Picture, or other indecent Exhibition;
- every Person wilfully, openly, lewdly, and obscenely exposing his Person in any Street, Road, or public Highway, or in the View thereof, or in any Place of public Resort, with Intent to insult any Female;
- every Person wandering abroad, and endeavouring by the Exposure of Wounds or Deformities to obtain or gather Alms;
- every Person going about as a Gatherer or Collector of Alms, or endeavouring to procure charitable Contributions of any Nature or Kind, under any false or fraudulent Pretence;
- every Person running away, and leaving his Wife or his or her Child or Children chargeable, or whereby she or they or any of them shall become chargeable to any Parish, Township, or Place;
- every Person playing or betting in any Street, Road, Highway, or other open and public Place, at or with any Table or Instrument of gaming, at any Game or pretended Game of Chance;
- every Person having in his or her Custody or Possession any Picklock Key, Crow, Jack, Bit, or other Implement, with Intent feloniously to break into any Dwelling House, Warehouse, Coach-house, Stable, or Outbuilding, or being armed with any Gun, Pistol, Hanger, Cutlass, Bludgeon, or other offensive Weapon, or having upon him or her any Instrument, with Intent to commit any felonious Act;
- every Person being found in or upon any Dwelling House, Warehouse, Coach-house, Stable, or Outhouse, or in any inclosed Yard, Garden, or Area, for any unlawful Purpose;
- every suspected Person or reputed Thief, frequenting any River, Canal, or navigable Stream, Dock, or Basin, or any Quay, Wharf, or Warehouse near or adjoining thereto, or any Street, Highway, or Avenue leading thereto, or any Place of public Resort or any Avenue leading thereto, or any Street, Highway, or Place adjacent, with Intent to commit Felony;
- and every Person apprehended as an idle and disorderly Person, and violently resisting any Constable or other Peace Officer so apprehending him or her, and being subsequently convicted of the Offence for which he or she shall have been so apprehended… shall be deemed a Rogue and Vagabond, within the true Intent and Meaning of this Act.”
So…that’s quite comprehensive then.
“…and it shall be lawful for any Justice of the Peace to commit such Offender (being thereof convicted before him by the Confession of such Offender, or by the Evidence on Oath of One or more credible Witness or Witnesses,) to the House of Correction, there to be kept to Hard Labour for any Time not exceeding Three Calendar Months; and every such Picklock Key, Crow, Jack, Bit, and other Implement, and every such Gun, Pistol, Hanger, Cutlass, Bludgeon, or other offensive Weapon, and every such Instrument as aforesaid, shall, by the Conviction of the Offender, become forfeited to the King’s Majesty.”
Three months hard labour.
A number of the offences have since been superseded and covered in subsequent legislation in the decades and centuries that followed.
So what is not always clear in the newspaper articles is what the actions of the convicted person was that led to them being designated a rogue and a vagabond.
Ordered to leave town. A sort of mid-19thC ASBO? (Anti-Social Behaviour Order – a civil order, restricting where an individual can go, breach of which can lead to a criminal conviction of breaching an ASBO).
Three weeks hard labour for gown-pulling?!?!
Or rather, given the caution, aggravated gown-pulling? Remember this was at the time when University authorities were throwing women they suspected of being sex workers into the Spinning House.
It wasn’t all punishment and hard labour
…even though Part X of the 1824 Act allows for males to be whipped in prison. There were moves in Cambridge to rehabilitate juvenile offenders. There was a growing movement in religious circles about a more compassionate and liberal response to the problem of petty crime – in particular such crimes committed by children. The National Archives summarise the background here, and the British Library here.
The Juvenile Offenders Act 1847 gave local councils new powers and responsibilities regarding young offenders, and it was under those provisions that the great and the good proposed creating a new school to deal with the problem.
Some huge civic names signed the above petition to the Mayor, including Rowland Morris Fawcett, Charles Henry Cooper and Robert Sayle.
After a three hour meeting at The Guildhall in February 1856, a committee was formed for the purposes of delivering the project. Note the list of names below.
Repeat offenders remained a problem
Think it’s a modern day thing as a result of soft sentencing?
“Three Notorious Scoundrels — As our readers perceive from our police report, those notorious housebreakers Pickle Bell, Paddy Groves, and Doddy Shadbolt were committed for trial at the ensuing Quarter on a charge of robbing the house of Mr John Hagger, of Shelford. During the two months previous to their arrest they had visited almost every village in the neighbourhood, no doubt laying plans to be carried into execution in these long dark nights.
It is a great blessing to the community that they are laid up for a time; for, they had been at large, some farmer’s yard would have suffered to supply them with Christmas fare. Just let the public read the following appalling catalogue of their offences, and then they will be able to form an idea what kind of characters they are”
Lost Cambridge 