Crimes Connected with Urbanization in the Nineteenth Century

Year 10/11 – Changes in Crime and Punishment c.1500 to present day 2. Nature of Crimes – Key Question - How has the nature of criminal activity differed and changed over time? --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Crimes connected with urbanization in the nineteenth century Industrial Revolution – A time of great change where people began to make goods in factories using machines. Urbanisation - The growth of large towns and cities. Agrarian - Agricultural - to do with farming and rural life. Victorian Rookery - term given in the 18th and 19th centuries to a city slum occupied by poor people and frequently also by criminals and prostitutes. Such areas were overcrowded, with low-quality housing and little or no sanitation. As towns and urban settlements grew rapidly, greater opportunities for crime also emerged and developed. Countryside: Industrial towns: The farm-workers had suffered through enclosures There was unemployment More and more of their jobs were being done by Wages were low machines Hours were long Wages were low Working conditions were dangerous Life was very hard Living conditions were crowded and filthy Most families lived on the edge of starvation The price of flour was constantly rising The Criminal Class • Nineteenth century writers such as Henry Mayhew identified a ‘criminal class’, who lived in criminal areas of large cities, known as rookeries. • The most notorious rookery in London was St Giles at the eastern end of Oxford Street, full of narrow alleyways and over-crowded tenement blocks. • Mayhew even classified criminals according to their crimes and identified over a hundred types. Task 1 - Research some of the different criminals and try to match the different nicknames to their correct criminal activities:- Nickname → Criminal Activity Buzzers Emptied tills of their cash while the shopkeeper was distracted. Thimble-screwers Stole goods or luggage from carts and coaches. Prop-nailers Stole handkerchiefs from gentlemen’s pockets. Till-friskers Stole pins and brooches from ladies. Drag-sneaks Waited in railway hotels to steal passengers’ luggage and property. Snoozers Stole pocket-watches from their chains. • Crimes such as highway robbery declined and new crimes such as railway crime emerged. • Over 90 per cent of crime was against property e.g. petty theft. • Pickpocketing became common especially among juveniles. • In 1876, Dr Barnardo estimated that 30,000 children were sleeping rough and many had to resort to crime in order to survive. Year 10/11 – Changes in Crime and Punishment c.1500 to present day 2. Nature of Crimes – Key Question - How has the nature of criminal activity differed and changed over time? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Source A – The Artful Dodger picking pockets in an etching by George Cruiksahnk from Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens, 1837-38 ← Oliver amazed at the Dodger’s Mode of ‘going to work’ Source B - A contemporary, John Binny, describing how children were trained in the craft of pickpocketing during the mid-19th century. A coat is suspended on the wall with a bell attached to it, and the boy attempts to take the handkerchief from the pocket without the bell ringing. Until he is able to do this with proficiency he is not considered well trained. Another way in which they are trained is this: The trainer – if a man – walks up and down the room with a handkerchief in the tail of his coat, and the ragged boys amuse themselves abstracting it until they learn to do it in an adroit manner. Task 2 Use Source B and your own knowledge to describe the nature of crime in the expanding urban settlements of nineteenth-century Britain. _________________________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________________________ Year 10/11 – Changes in Crime and Punishment c.1500 to present day 2. Nature of Crimes – Key Question - How has the nature of criminal activity differed and changed over time? --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Industrial and Agrarian disorder during the Industrial Revolution • The Industrial Revolution brought hardship for ordinary people. • Many craftsmen and farm labourers lost their jobs when they were replaced by new technology such as threshing machines. • Low wages and high food prices, especially at times of bad harvest, resulted in misery and hardship for many and some people turned to violence as a last resort. • The working class were not allowed to vote; only wealthy landowners were represented in Parliament; • There was no-one to argue for the rights of the ordinary people and between 1790 and 1840 there was a real threat of revolution. • The government responded by issuing harsh punishment for any unrest, such as the 1799/1800 Combination Acts, which made it illegal for workers to combine in order to improve their conditions. • This period saw the appearance of a number of popular protests, which resulted in anger and outbreaks of criminal activity. Protest Movements during the first half of the nineteenth century: Luddites (1812-13) Scotch Cattle (1830s) Swing Riots (1830-31) Chartists (1839) Rebecca Riots (1839-43) Industrial Disorder Luddites ← Luddites destroying a textile machine • The Luddites were skilled cloth finishers; traditional handloom weavers. • They were gradually being replaced by machinery; stocking frames, which could be operated by unskilled workers; although of inferior quality, it was much cheaper than hand woven cloth. • In the beginning they had written letters signed ‘Nedd Lud’ asking mill owners to get rid of the machines, and so they became known as ‘Luddites’. • Workers who lost their jobs ganged together and broke into the new factories, where they destroyed the hated stocking-frames. • The attacks began in Nottingham in 1812 and spread to Lancashire and Yorkshire. • In April 1812, 150 armed Luddites attacked Rawfolds Mill near Huddersfield and in Yorkshire, mill owner William Horsfall was murdered. • 12,000 troops were sent to the area and a law was passed making frame-breaking punishable by death; • The Government cracked down with harsh punishments and in 1813 Luddites 17 Luddites were executed, many were fined and others transported. • The movement died out – the tide of new machinery was unstoppable. Year 10/11 – Changes in Crime and Punishment c.1500 to present day 2. Nature of Crimes – Key Question - How has the nature of criminal activity differed and changed over time? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Source C - An account of a Luddite attack which appeared in the Manchester Gazette newspaper on 2 May 1812. Tasks On Monday afternoon a large body, not less than 2,000, commenced an attack, on the discharge of a pistol which appeared to have been the signal; vollies of stones were thrown, and the windows smashed to Watoms;hy was thethere internal a growth part in of vagrants the building during being the guarded,sixteenth acentury? musket was discharged in the hope of intimidating and dispersing the assailants. In a very short time the effects were too shockingly seen in the ______________________________________________________________________death of three, and it is said, about ten wounded. ___________________ Task 3 Use Source C and your own knowledge to fill in the following table with regard to the Luddites:- Type of protest – Main causes of the protest Summary of main events Result of the protests Industrial or agricultural? Chartist Protests in Wales, 1839 • Chartism was a movement for democratic rights started in London in 1838 with the publication of the ‘People’s Charter’. • This demanded the reform of parliament and granting the vote to all men over the age of 21. • The first Working Men’s Association, a local Chartist group, was set up in Carmarthen in 1837, and in 1839, many protests occurred across mid and south Wales. The Llanidloes disturbances, April 1839 – ↓The Trewythyn Arms, Llanidloes • During 1838, Henry Hetherington, a leading Chartist toured around mid-Wales, encouraging the setting up of Working Men’s Associations. • On 3 April 1839 Chartists in Llanidloes attacked the Trewythen Arms, where two police constables from London were staying,

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