The London Underworld in the Victorian Period

Authentic First-Person Accounts by Beggars, Thieves and Prostitutes

Henry Mayhew

• Publisher: Dover Publications
• Year: 2012
• eBook ISBN: 9780486130842
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: British History
• Index: History

The first and possibly the greatest sociological study of poverty in 19th-century London, this survey by a journalist invented the genre of oral history a century before the term was coined. Henry Mayhew vowed "to publish the history of a people, from the lips of the people themselves — giving a literal description of their labour, their earnings, their trials and their sufferings, in their own 'unvarnished' language." With his collaborators, Mayhew explored hundreds of miles of London streets in the 1840s and 1850s, gathering thousands of pages of testimony from the city's humbler residents. Their stories revealed aspects of city life virtually unknown to literate society.
A sprawling, four-volume history resulted from Mayhew's investigations. This extract focuses on the criminal class--pickpockets, prostitutes, rag pickers, and vagrants, whose true stories of degradation, horror, and desperation rival Dickensian fiction. A classic reference source for sociologists, historians, and criminologists, Mayhew's work is immensely readable. As Thackeray wrote, these urban vignettes conjure up "a picture of human life so wonderful, so awful, so piteous and pathetic, so exciting and terrible, that readers of romances own they never read anything like to it."

THIEVES AND SWINDLERS

INTRODUCTION

IN TRACING the geography of a river it is interesting to go to its source, possibly a tiny spring in the cleft of a rock in some mountain glen. You follow its windings, observing each tributary which flows into its gathering flood until it discharges its waters into the sea. We proceed in a similar manner to treat of the thieves and swindlers of the metropolis.

Thousands of our felons are trained from their infancy in the bosom of crime; a large proportion of them are born in the homes of habitual thieves and other persons of bad character, and are familiarized with vice from their earliest years; frequently the first words they lisp are oaths and curses. Many of them are often carried to the beershop or gin palace on the breast of worthless drunken mothers, while others, clothed in rags, run at their heels or hang by the skirts of their petticoats. In their wretched abodes they soon learn to be deceitful and artful, and are in many cases very precocious. The greater number are never sent to school; some run idle about the streets in low neighbourhoods: others are sent out to beg throughout the city; others go out with their mothers and sit beside their stalls; while others sell a handful of matches or small wares in our public thoroughfares.

One day, in going down a dark alley in the Borough, near Horsemonger Lane Gaol, we saw a little boy—an Irish cockney, who had been tempted to steal by other boys he was in the habit of associating with. He was stripped entirely naked, and was looking over a window on the first floor with a curious grin on his countenance. His mother had kept his clothes from him that day as a punishment for stealing, and to prevent him getting out of the house while she went out to her street-stall.

In our brief sketch of the criminals of the metropolis, we have in the outset directed our attention to the sneaks or common thieves—by far the larger number of our criminal population—from whose ranks the expert pickpockets and the ingenious and daring burglars in most cases emerge. We have treated of the incipient stage of thieving, when the child of five or six years of age steals an apple, or an orange, or a handful of nuts from a stall, or an old pair of boots from a shop door, and then traced the after-stages of more daring crime.

There are thousands of neglected children loitering about the low neighbourhoods of the metropolis, and prowling about the streets, begging and stealing for their daily bread. They are to be found in Westminster, Whitechapel, Shoreditch, St. Giles’s, New Cut, Lambeth, the Borough, and other localities. Hundreds of them may be seen leaving their parents’ homes and low lodging-houses every morning sallying forth in search of food and plunder. They are fluttering in rags and in the most motley attire. Some are orphans and have no one to care for them; others have left their homes and live in lodging-houses in the most improvident manner, never thinking of to-morrow; others are sent out by their unprincipled parents to beg and steal for a livelihood; others are the children of poor but honest and industrious people, who have been led to steal through the bad companionship of juvenile thieves. Many of them have never been at a day-school nor attended a Sunday or ragged-school, and have had no moral or religious instruction. On the contrary, they have been surrounded by the most baneful and degrading influences, and have been set a bad example by their parents and others with whom they came in contact, and are shunned by the honest and industrious classes of society. The chief agencies which have tended to ameliorate their condition are the ragged-schools, where they receive sound secular and religious instruction; the shoeblacks’ brigades, where they are trained in habits of honest industry; and the juvenile reformatories, which have been instituted for their moral and social elevation.

Many of them are hungry, and have no food to eat nor money to purchase it, and readily steal when they find a suitable opportunity. Not having received the benefit of a sound moral training, they have not the conscientious scruples possessed by the children of honest parents; their only care is to avoid being detected in their felonies. When they successfully steal some article from a stall or shop-door, or rifle a till by entering the shop, they are congratulated on their expertness by their companions, and enjoy a larger share of plunder.

The public streets of the metropolis are regarded by these ragged little felons and the children of honest industrious parents in a very different aspect. The latter walk the streets with their eyes sparkling with wonder and delight at the beautiful and grand sights of the metropolis. They are struck with the splendour of the shops and the elegance and stateliness of the public buildings, and with the dense crowds of people of various orders, and trains of vehicles thronging the streets. These little ragged thieves walk along the streets with very different emotions. They, too, in their own way, enjoy the sights and sounds of London. Amid the busy crowds many of them are to be seen sitting in groups on the pavement or loitering about in good-humour and merriment; yet ever and anon their keen roguish eyes sparkle as they look into the windows of the confectioners’, bakers’, and greengrocers’ shops, at the same time keeping a sharp eye on the policeman as he passes on his beat.

These juvenile thieves find an ample field for plunder at the stalls and shop-doors in Whitechapel, Shoreditch, Edgeware Road, and similar localities, where many articles are exposed for sale, which can be easily disposed of to some of the low fences. In this manner thousands of our felons are trained to be expert and daring in crime, and are frequently tried and convicted before the Police Courts.

This is the main source of the habitual felons of the metropolis. As these boys and girls grow up they commence a system of sneaking thefts over the metropolis, some purloining in shops, others gliding into areas and lobbies on various pretences, stealing articles from the kitchen, and when opportunity occurs carrying off the plate.

As these young felons advance in years they branch off into three different classes, determined partly by their natural disposition and personal qualities, and partly by the circumstances in which they are placed. Many of them continue through life to sneak as common thieves, others become expert pickpockets, and some ultimately figure as burglars.

A vast number of juvenile thieves as they grow up continue to carry on a system of petty felonies over the metropolis, and reside in the lowest neighbourhoods. Some pretend to sell laces and small wares to get a pretext to call at the houses of labouring people and tradesmen, and to go down the areas and enter the lobbies in fashionable streets. In addition to the paltry profits arising from these sales they get a livelihood by begging, and as a matter of course do not scruple to steal when they can find an opportunity.

These common thieves are of both sexes, and of various ages, and are often characterized by mental imbecility and low cunning. Many of them are lazy in disposition and lack energy both of body and mind. They go out daily in vast shoals over the metropolis picking up a miserable and precarious livelihood, sometimes committing felonies in the houses they visit of considerable value.

The pickpockets are of various ages and of different degrees of proficiency, from the little ragged urchin in St. Giles’s stealing a handkerchief at the tail of a gentleman’s coat, to the elegantly dressed and expert pickpocket promenading in the West-end and attending fashionable assemblies. Some are dressed as mechanics, others as clerks, some as smart business men, and others in fashionable attire. They are to be found on all public occasions, some of them clumsy and timid, others daring and most expert. Many of them continue to pursue this class of felonies in preference to any other. They receive a considerable accession to their numbers by young women, frequently servants who have been seduced, and cohabit with burglars, pickpockets, and others, and who are trained to this infamous profession, and in many cases are shoplifters.

Many are trained to commit housebreaking and burglaries from fourteen to fifteen years of age. Boys are occasionally employed to enter through fanlights and windows, and to assist otherwise in plundering dwellings and shops. Some of them commit burglaries of small value in working neighbourhoods, where comparatively little ingenuity and skill are required, others plunder shops and warehouses and fashionable dwellings, which is generally done with greater care and ingenuity, and where the booty is often of higher value.

In addition to the three classes we have named, the common thief, the pickpocket, and the burglar, there is another class of low ruffians who frequently cohabit with low women and prostitutes, and commit highway robberies. They often follow these degraded females on the streets, and attack persons who accost them, believing them to be prostitutes. At other times they garotte men on the street at midnight, or in the by-streets in the evening, and plunder them with violence. This class of persons are generally hardened in crime, and many of them are returned convicts.

The habitual crime of the female portion of the community is in most cases associated with prostitution. We learn from statistics collected by the metropolitan constabulary for 1860, that there are nearly 7,000 open prostitutes or street-walkers in London, three fourths of whom we have reason to believe are addicted to stealing. While many of these belong to our native-born felon population, a large proportion have been seduced from the ranks of honest and industrious people in London, or have come up from the provinces, while a few of them are from the Continent.

We believe that the most effective means of checking the crime of the metropolis is to have an efficient machinery of ragged schools in those low neighbourhoods, where neglected children are to be found, similar to the ragged school in George’s Yard, and to train them in honest employment, as in the shoeblack brigades or industrial schools.

We learn from the statistics of the constabulary of the metropolis that juvenile crime has been considerably reduced within the past ten years. Several of our police inspectors have laboured with untiring industry to reform the lodging-houses and to introduce cleanliness and decency, where immorality and filth formerly prevailed. And noble exertions have been made by Christian societies to illumine these dark localities with the light of Christian truth.

Yet much still remains to be done. And it is a problem worthy of our highest and wisest statesmen to consider whether adequate means to elevate this abandoned class are to be provided by voluntary effort, or by the paternal care of our Government from the public treasury.

It is far easier to train the young in virtuous and industrious habits, than to reform the grown-up felon who has become callous in crime, and it is besides far more profitable to the State. To neglect them or inadequately to attend to their welfare gives encouragement to the growth of this dangerous class. On the other hand how noble the aim, to adopt wise and vigorous measures to provide for these children of adversity and misfortune, and to transform them into useful members of society!

Our national reformatories are very useful in reclaiming those juveniles who have fallen into crime; but ragged schools efficiently conducted would be of still higher value—as prevention is better than cure. In providing those noble machineries by voluntary effort, or by the State, we would wisely act as the minister of Divine Providence, and would thereby promote the best interests and prosperity of our country.

We have also endeavoured to give a cursory sketch of the swindlers of the metropolis, who are generally of a different class from our felon population. They consist of persons embezzling the property of their employers; of sharpers plundering their dupes by tricks at card-playing, skittles, or otherwise; and of rogues abstracting the property of the public by false pretences. Many of these formerly belonged to the ranks of the honest and industrious working and middle-classes, and not a few of them are well connected, and have lived in fashionable society. By improvidence, extravagance, or dissipation, they have squandered their means, and have now basely adopted a course of systematic dishonesty rather than lead an industrious life. Some of them have led a fast life in the metropolis, and are persons of ruined fortune. Others are indolent in disposition, and carry on a subtle system of public robbery rather than pursue some honest occupation or calling.

It may throw considerable light on the crime of London to look to the criminal statistics of the Metropolitan Police Force. We find a statement of those who were apprehended or proceeded against in the year ending 29th September, 1860.

Under the class of persons proceeded against on indictment there are:—

Known thieves	813
Prostitutes	159
Suspected characters	1,440
	2,412

Under the class of persons proceeded against summarily there are:—

Known thieves	2,850
Prostitutes	7,381
Vagrants, tramps, &c	2,888
Suspicious characters	7,044
Habitual drunkards	3,661
	23,824

A number of these parties have appeared repeatedly before the Police Courts during the year.

In the return for the month of September, 1860, we find the following statement of depredators, offenders, and suspected persons at large within the districts of the police:—

Known thieves and depredators	2,906
Prostitutes	6,881
Suspicious characters	1,770
Vagrants and tramps	1,461
In all,	13,018

The average number of persons roaming as thieves over the metropolis committing depredations may be safely estimated at from 12,000 to 15,000; a huge army living on the industry of the community.

The amount of property abstracted in the Metropolitan districts for the year 1860	£62,095
Ditto ditto in the City	9,508
	£71,603

This does not give the full amount of the depredations committed by the robbers of the metropolis, as many felonies are not included in the police returns.

In writing this account of the state of crime in London, we have received valuable assistance throughout from the city and metropolitan police force. We have to acknowledge our obligations generally to Sir Richard Mayne and Mr. Yardley at Scotland Yard, and specially to Mr. Jones, of Tower Street Police Station, Lambeth, for information on common thieves; to Mr. Whyte of Marylebone Station on skeleton-key and attic thieves; to Serjeant McVitti of Hoxton; Mr. Ackrill of Fleet Street, and Mr. Jones of Tower Street on pickpockets; to Inspector Foulger of the City police; Mr. Knight, of Fleet Street, and Serjeant Potter of Paddington Station on burglars, forgers, magsmen and skittle-sharps; to Mr. Brennan on coiners; to Inspector Broad of Spitalfields Station on highway robbers; to Inspector Hunt on embezzlers; to Mr. Stubbs on swindlers; and to numerous other officers of the city and metropolitan police for their generous and cordial aid.

THE SNEAKS, OR COMMON THIEVES.

THE COMMON thief is not distinguished for manual dexterity and accomplishment, like the pickpocket or mobsman, nor for courage, ingenuity, and skill, like the burglar, but is characterized by low cunning and stealth—hence he is termed the Sneak, and is despised by the higher classes of thieves.

There are various orders of Sneaks—from the urchin stealing an apple at a stall, to the man who enters a dwelling by the area or an attic window and carries off the silver plate.

In treating of the various classes of common thieves and their different modes of felony, we shall first treat of the juvenile thieves and their delinquencies, and notice the other classes in their order, according to the progressive nature and aggravation of their crime.

Street-stalls.—In wandering along Whitechapel we see ranges of stalls on both sides of the street, extending from the neighbourhood of the Minories to Whitechapel church. Various kinds of merchandize are exposed to sale. There are stalls for fruit, vegetables, and oysters. There are also stalls where fancy goods are exposed for sale—combs, brushes, chimney-ornaments, children’s toys, and common articles of jewellery. We find middle-aged women standing with baskets of firewood, and Cheap Johns selling various kinds of Sheffield cutlery, stationery, and plated goods.

It is an interesting sight to saunter along the New Cut, Lambeth, and to observe the street stalls of that locality. Here you see some old Irish woman, with apples and pears exposed on a small board placed on the top of a barrel, while she is seated on an upturned bushel basket smoking her pipe.

Alongside you notice a deal board on the top of a tressel, and an Irish girl of 18 years of age seated on a small three-legged stool, shouting in shrill tones “Apples, fine apples, ha’penny a lot!”

You find another stall on the top of two tressels, with a larger quantity of apples and pears, kept by a woman who sits by with a child at her breast.

In another place you see a costermonger’s barrow, with large green and yellow piles of fruit of better quality than the others, and a group of boys and girls assembled around him as he smartly disposes of penny-worths to the persons passing along the street.

Outside a public-house you see a young man, humpbacked, with a basket of herrings and haddocks standing on the pavement, calling “Yarmouth herrings—t...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• PROSTITUTES
• THIEVES AND SWINDLERS
• BEGGARS AND CHEATS
• DOVER BOOKS
• A CATALOG OF SELECTED DOVER BOOKS IN ALL FIELDS OF INTEREST