The Story of Crime and Punishment

CONTENTS 24 The surprising true story of smuggling in Bristol

37 Terrorising the nation in the 1770s

54 How the Victorians put Britain’s bobbies on the beat

imeline: Justice T through the ages

Alyson Brown charts milestones in crime and punishment

12

Medieval show trials

29

Derek Wilson investigates the case of a London merchant shot in a professional killing in 1536

33

Justice in the Middle Ages had to be seen to be done in a symbolic and very public spectacle, explains Hannah Skoda

20

The real Robin Hoods

37

Smuggling’s heyday

46

Dr Evan Jones visits Bristol to explore the city’s thriving trade in illicit goods in the 16th century

2

aptain Kidd’s C betrayal

The so-called ‘pirate’ was betrayed for crimes he did not commit, claims Angus Konstam

Britain’s first terrorist

50

A deadly obsession

Clare Walker Gore looks at how the Victorians were disgusted, yet fascinated, by public hangings

reat Victorian G swindle

Royalty, politicians and famous authors were all duped by begging letters, says Antonio Melechi

54

Policing the nation

Clive Emsley charts the creation of our modern police force

62

The dead body trade The 19th-century trade in corpses was a shadowy one but, asks Elizabeth Hurren, where would modern medicine be without it?

Jessica Warner on the Scot who terrorised Britain in the 1770s

Hugh Doherty explores the lives of medieval outlaws

24

The Tudor hitman

67

Jack the Ripper

Anne-Marie Kilday and David Nash consider five theories about the

GETTY IMAGES/ALAMY/COURTESY OF THE JOHN CARTER BROWN LIBRARY AT BROWN UNIVERSITY

6

29

The tools of a Tudor assassin 20 Forget Robin Hood, what did it really mean to be a medieval outlaw?

79 Britons’ fascination with murder

76 Shame on you: punished in the pillory

ALAMY/BRIDGEMAN/THE ROYAL PAVILION AND MUSEUMS, BRIGHTON & HOVE

104 The sad story of the last woman to be hanged visits Beaumaris Gaol to find out

Ripper’s identity

71

The wicked boy

88

Kate Summerscale talks about a case of Victorian matricide

76

Public humiliation was once a feared aspect of justice in Britain, as David Nash reveals

79

84

90

Prison reform

What was life like for convicted Victorian criminals? Alyson Brown

98

Terror on the streets

104 The hanging of Ruth Ellis

Clive Bloom on the infamous Siege of Sidney Street in 1911, a dramatic shoot-out between the police and a gang of mysterious revolutionaries

Murder obsession

Lucy Worsley selects objects that testify to Britons’ fascination with this most grisly of crimes

n going to see O a man hanged

Public executions were a gruesome spectacle enjoyed by unruly London crowds until 1868, says Stephen Halliday

unishment in P the pillory

95

rioter of the 20th century, revealed

by Alyson Brown

mash and grab S gangster

The criminal career of Ruby Sparks, an infamous burglar and prison

Criminals of the Blitz Joshua Levine on how the German bombing of British cities created new opportunities for lawlessness

A young woman’s execution set public opinion against the death penalty, explains Lizzie Seal

109 Court in the act

Drew Gray looks at 10 trials that gripped the nation, and at what they reveal about society’s fears

114

Opinion

Clive Bloom muses on our fascination with murder

3

14

BBC History August 2004