Legal History: Crime and Punishment Research Guide

Illuminates the nature and social significance of crime in eighteenth-century England and reveals attitudes toward public hangings in London.

As this account of crime patterns in medieval England shows, crime can perhaps tell us more about a society's dynamics, tensions, and values than any other single social phenomenon. And Barbara Hanawalt's approach is particularly enlightening because it looks at the subject not from the heights of the era's learned opinion, but from the viewpoint of the people participating in the criminal dramas and manipulating the law for their own benefit. Throughout, Hanawalt carefully places the crimes and their participants within the context of village life in the later middle ages. Along with a description of the social and legal setting of criminal acts, she includes a discussion of the influence of war, politics, and economic, social, and demographic changes on the patterns of crime.

Tells the story of crime and its prevention in England during a period when the country was suffering the strains of rapid economic and social change. Explores the opportunities provided to wrongdoers by the Industrial Revolution and increasing wealth. Likewise, the book shows how the methods of dealing with criminals changed and evolved.

First published in 1996. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Crime has been present in all cultures and societies, since the beginning of time. This work focuses on the punishments common in England around the time of Shakespeare and Milton, presenting descriptions of more than fifty criminal cases. Information comes from narratives printed for the popular news media at the time of the event. Details of everyday life in England and facts about the English legal environment of the era are brought to light. Also revealed through the narratives are issues present in society today--i. e., the status of women, poverty, and corruption. Individual cases are discussed under chapters devoted to specific types of crimes.

This comprehensive work explores the broad question of how the English courts dealt with crime in the period during which the foundations of modern forms of judicial administration were being laid.

The history of crime is becoming an increasingly popular area of social history and has already produced some notable contributions in the way of books and articles ranging from the medieval period to modern America. The present collection of essays will be of interest not only to those who study seventeenth- and eighteenth-century English history, but to people working in social and legal history in general. The authors used a variety of approaches to their subject. Traditional legal history essays are mixed with more quantitative ones. The excellent articles fall within both the traditional and the newer approaches, showing, at least, that there is not an exclusive methodology for the study of crime.

This social history not only studies crime and punishment in early 19th-century England, but also draws on higher court records to reconstruct case histories of the actual people involved in crime: the prisoners and the victims. The book focuses on Sussex, Gloucester, and Middlesec counties, each in its own way typical of developments in early British industrial society between 1800 and 1850. By examining crime as a social as well as a legal phenomenon, the book casts new light on the different urban and rural patterns of crime, the influence of economic and political factors, and the social profiles of both criminals and victims.

Some thirty-five thousand people were condemned to death in England and Wales between 1770 and 1830, and seven thousand were ultimately executed, the majority convicted of crimes such as burglary, horse theft, or forgery. Drawing on letters, diaries, ballads, and poignant appeals for mercy, V.A.C. Gatrell vividly recreates the social atmosphere and heated debate swirling about these cruel spectacles. Taking up the plight of those who felt the hand of justice at its heaviest, he recaptures the lived experience of people poorly served by their own criminal law.

Full title: Historia placitorum coronae: The history of the pleas of the crown / Now first published from his lordship's original manuscript, and the several references to the records examined by the originals, with notes.
Georgetown Law Library's Special Collections also has the 1778 and 1847 editions.

Illustrates the changes of the laws in the progress of civilization; written from the public records & other contemporary evidence. I: From the Roman Invasion to the accession of Henry VII. II: From the accession of Henry VII to the present time.

The 1875 New York: J. Cockcroft ed. is on microfiche in Media [K150 .N45 Mfiche] (19th Century Legal Treatise, no. 57560-57564). Forsyth's History of Trial by Jury is the first full-scale historical account of the rise and growth of the jury system in England. Highly regarded, this book went through 37 editions. The first American edition, the source of this reprint, adds a number of notes and corrections to American references in previous editions.

This collection of original essays is designed to explore the relationship between labour, law and crime in European and Third World countries and brings together work from a variety of disciplines from law to African history.

This book examines how the law was made, defined, administered, and used in eighteenth-century England. A team of leading international historians explore the ways in which legal concerns and procedures came to permeate society and reflect on eighteenth-century concepts of corruption, oppression, and institutional efficiency. These themes are pursued throughout in a broad range of contributions which include studies of magistrates and courts; the forcible enlistment of soldiers and sailors; the eighteenth-century 'bloody code'; the making of law basic to nineteenth-century social reform; the populace's extension of law's arena to newspapers; theologians' use of assumptions basic to English law; Lord Chief Justice Mansfield's concept of the liberty intrinsic to England; and Blackstone's concept of the framework of English law. The result is an invaluable account of the legal bases of eighteenth-century society which is essential reading for historians at all levels.

Law, Magistracy, and Crime in Old Regime Paris, 1735-1789 is the first of two volumes centred around the two great courts of Paris, the Châtelet and Parlement, and their criminal defendants in the eighteenth century. Richard Andrews seeks to refute the 'black legend' of revolutionary propaganda and its modern historical successors, which hold that the Old Regime courts were cruel and arbitrary. These courts are shown rather to be thoroughly rule-bound and consisting of strict judicial procedure derived from royal statutes. Rule of and by the law is shown to be the most substantial legacy of the Old Regime. This volume places the courts of Old Regime Paris in the context of French society and the state. The practices and doctrines of punishment are examined, along with the jurisprudence of moral and criminal behaviour.

Reprint of 6th London ed.: A Methodical Summary of the Law Relating to the Pleas of the Crown. 2 vols. London: J. Worrall, 1759, in Special Collections. [SPECL S-1149. S-1150].
The 18th century was a wealth of knowledge, exploration and rapidly growing technology and expanding record-keeping made possible by advances in the printing press. Now for the first time these high-quality digital copies of original 18th century manuscripts are available in print, making them highly accessible to libraries, undergraduate students, and independent scholars. This collection reveals the history of English common law and Empire law in a vastly changing world of British expansion. Dominating the legal field is the Commentaries of the Law of England by Sir William Blackstone, which first appeared in 1765.

Full title: Pleas of the Crown: in two parts: or, a methodical summary of the principal matters relating to that subject. With several hundred references, never before printed, to the ancient and modern books of the law. And likewise three other treatises by Sir Matthew Hale; viz. Of Sheriffs accompts, Trial of witches, and Provisions for the poor

Georgetown Law Library's Special Collections also has the 1819 and 1847 editions.

Special Collections also has the 1824 and 1825 editions. There are more modern continuations of this title in International and Foreign Law, under the title: Archbold's Pleading, Evidence, and Practice in Criminal Cases.

Because the laws and customs were never complied in one source, it was Jeudwine's belief that this work would be valuable to anyone studying in this area. The work provides a unique look at the various laws and customs that molded mediaeval Britain.

Special Collections also has the 1724, 1739, 1788, 1795 and 1824 editions.

Includes: John H. Langbein's The English Criminal Trial Jury on the Eve of the French Revolution, and Thomas A. Green's The English Criminal Trial Jury and the Law-Finding Traditions on the Eve of the French Revolution.

Twelve Good Men and True brings together some of the most ambitious and innovative work yet undertaken on the history of an English legal institution. These eleven essays examine the composition of the criminal trial jury in England, the behavior of those who sat as jurors, and popular and official attitudes toward the institution of jury trial from its almost accidental emergence in the early thirteenth century until 1800. The essays have important implications for three problems central to the history of criminal justice administration in England: the way in which the medieval jury was informed and reached its verdict; the degree and form of independence enjoyed by juries during the early modern period when the powers of the bench were very great; and the role of the eighteenth-century trial jury, which, although clearly independent, was, by virtue of the status and experience of its members, arguably a mere extension of the bench.

Contents: Observations on the criminal law of England, as it relates to capital punishments, and on the mode in which it is administered / Samuel Romilly -- Genuine copies of all the letters which passed between the Right Honourable the Lord Chancellor, and the sheriffs of London and Middlesex, and between the sheriffs and Secretary of State, relative to the execution of Doyle and Valine / John Horne Tooke -- The opinions of different authors upon the punishment of death / Basil Montagu.