Vagrancy in Law and Practice under the Old Poor Law
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A01=Audrey Eccles
Author_Audrey Eccles
Bastard Bearer
bridewell
Bridewell Keepers
Category1=Non-Fiction
Category=NHD
Category=NHTB
Category=NL-HB
Category=NL-LA
clerkenwell
Clerkenwell Bridewell
COP=United Kingdom
criminalisation of poverty
Dorchester Gaol
Dorset History Centre
Edward III
eighteenth-century social policy
eq_bestseller
eq_history
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
Format=BB
HMM=234
IMPN=Ashgate Publishing Limited
incorrigible
Incorrigible Rogue
ISBN13=9781409404873
Language_English
legal responses to migration
lma
London Metropolitan Archives
Middlesex Bench
officers
PA=Available
parish
parish administration
Parish Apprenticeship
pass
Pauper Apprentices
PD=20121018
poor relief history
Poor Travellers
Price=€100 to €200
Privy Searches
provincial England vagrancy cases
PS=Active
PUB=Taylor & Francis Ltd
quarter
rogue
Rough Sleepers
settlement law
Sick Vagrants
St George Hanover Square
St Paul Covent Garden
Subject=History
Subject=Jurisprudence & General Issues
Tothill Fields Bridewell
Vagrancy Cases
Vagrancy Law
Vagrancy Offences
vagrant
Vagrant Act
Vagrant Contractor
Vagrant Pass
WG=635
WMM=156
Young Man
Product details
- ISBN 9781409404873
- Weight: 635g
- Dimensions: 156 x 234mm
- Publication Date: 18 Oct 2012
- Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd
- Publication City/Country: GB
- Product Form: Hardback
- Language: English
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In eighteenth-century England, the law surrounding vagrancy was complicated, and practice stood in complex relationship to law. Drawing on extensive archival research and in-depth study of both statute law and local administrative records, this book examines the complexities of vagrancy law and the realities of its practice during the long eighteenth century. It shows how settlement law and poor law provision failed to address both the changing demographic situation and the impact of wars, leaving significant numbers without support. Focusing on the 1744 Vagrant Act, the study traces how and why the law evolved, from 1700 when vagrancy was first made a county charge, and what changes followed in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. It explores how vagrancy law was used and to what effect, how it was extended and adapted to plug gaps in both poor law provision and in dealing with petty crime not covered by statute law, and how law and practice intersected with social reality. Using the Quarter Sessions records of six counties: Westmorland, Cambridgeshire, Dorset, Hampshire, Lancashire and Middlesex, the book is able to give the first account of vagrancy law in provincial England, rather than focusing on metropolitan areas, thus also demonstrating the tensions between parishes, justices and counties over the use of law and its financial impact. By detailed reference to cases of individual vagrants, the book also shows what sorts of people were dealt with under vagrancy law, what happened to them, and how and why the justices discriminated between the unfortunate and the criminal elements among them. This analysis reveals the principal causes of the vagrancy problems and the misfit between the law and social reality, with particular emphasis on the impact of wars and immigration from Ireland and Scotland. As the first full-length study of vagrancy law and practice in the eighteenth century, this book will constitute an essential item in any collection of books on the old poor law.
Audrey Eccles, a retired archivist, gained her PhD in 1974 for work on the history of obstetrics, published in 1982 by Croom Helm. She began working on vagrancy while calendaring the eighteenth century Quarter Sessions rolls at Kendal Record Office, Cumbria, and has subsequently researched the subject in five other counties. Her pilot study was published in 1989 and she has written a number of papers on vagrancy since.
