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 7000
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, 3,018
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
pennyworths 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--three a-penny!” and at the door of a beershop with the sign
of the “Pear Tree” we find a miserable looking old woman selling
cresses, seated on a stool with her feet in an old basket.
As we wander along the New Cut during the day, we do not see so many
young thieves loitering about; but in the evening when the lamps are
lit, they steal forth from their haunts, with keen roguish eye, looking
out for booty. We then see them loitering about the stalls or mingling
among the throng of people in the street, looking wistfully on the
tempting fruit displayed on the stalls.
These young Arabs of the city have a very strange and motley
appearance. Many of them are only 6 or 7 years of age, others 8 or 10.
Some have no jacket, cap, or shoes, and wander about London with their
ragged trowsers hung by one brace; some have an old tattered coat, much
too large for them, without shoes and stockings, and with one leg of
the trowsers rolled up to the knee; others have on an old greasy grey
or black cap, with an old jacket rent at the elbows, and strips of the
lining hanging down behind; others have on an old dirty pinafore; while
some have petticoats. They are generally in a squalid and unwashed
condition, with their hair clustered in wild disorder like a mop, or
hanging down in dishevelled locks,--in some cases cropped close to the
head.
Groups of these ragged urchins may be seen standing at the corners of
the streets and in public thoroughfares, with blacking-boxes slung on
their back by a leathern belt, or crouching in groups on the pavement;
or we may occasionally see them running alongside of omnibuses, cabs,
and hansoms, nimbly turning somersaults on the pavement as they scamper
along, and occasionally walking on their hands with their feet in the
air in our fashionable streets, to the merriment of the passers-by.
Most of them are Irish cockneys, which we can observe in their features
and accent--to which class most of the London thieves belong. They are
generally very acute and ready-witted, and have a knowing twinkle in
their eye which exhibits the precocity of their minds.
As we ramble along the New Cut in the dusk, mingled in the throng on
the crowded street, chiefly composed of working people, the young
ragged thieves may be seen stealing forth: their keen eye readily
recognizes the police-officers proceeding in their rounds, as well as
the detective officers in their quiet and cautious movements. They
seldom steal from costermongers, but frequently from the old women’s
stalls. One will push an old woman off her seat--perhaps a bushel
basket, while the others will steal her fruit or the few coppers lying
on her stall. This is done by day as well as by night, but chiefly in
the dusk of the evening.
They generally go in a party of three or four, sometimes as many as
eight together. Watching their opportunity, they make a sudden snatch
at the apples or pears, or oranges or nuts, or walnuts, as the case may
be, then run off, with the cry of “stop thief!” ringing in their ears
from the passers-by. These petty thefts are often done from a love of
mischief rather than from a desire for plunder.
When overtaken by a police-officer, they in general readily go with
him to the police-station. Sometimes the urchin will lie down in the
street and cry “let me go!” and the bystanders will take his part. This
is of frequent occurrence in the neighbourhood of the New-cut and the
Waterloo-road--a well-known rookery of young thieves in London.
By the petty thefts at the fruit-stalls they do not gain much
money--seldom so much as to get admittance to the gallery of the
Victoria Theatre, which they delight to frequent. They are particularly
interested in the plays of robberies, burglaries, and murders performed
there, which are done in melodramatic style. There are similar
fruit-stalls in the other densely populated districts of the metropolis.
In the Mile-end-road, and New North-road, and occasionally in
other streets in different localities of London, common jewellery
is exposed for sale, consisting of brooches, rings, bracelets,
breast-pins, watch-chains, eye-glasses, ear-rings and studs, &c. There
are also stalls for the sale of china, looking-glasses, combs, and
chimney-ornaments. The thefts from these are generally managed in this
way:--
One goes up and looks at some trifling article in company with
his associates. The party in charge of the stall--generally a
woman--knowing their thieving propensity, tells them to go away; which
they decline to do. When the woman goes to remove him, another boy
darts forward at the other end of the stall and steals some article of
jewellery, or otherwise, while her attention is thus distracted.
These juvenile thieves are chiefly to be found in Lucretia-street,
Lambeth; Union-street, Borough-road; Gunn-street, and Friars-street,
Blackfriars-road; also at Whitechapel, St. Giles’s, Drury-lane, Somers
Town, Anderson Grove, and other localities.
The statistics connected with this class of felonies will be given when
we come to treat on “Stealing from the doors and windows of shops.”
_Stealing from the Tills._--This is done by the same class of boys,
generally by two or three, or more, associated together. It is
committed at any hour of the day, principally in the evening, and
generally in the following way: One of the boys throws his cap into the
shop of some greengrocer or other small dealer, in the absence of the
person in charge; another boy, often without shoes or stockings, creeps
in on his hands and knees as if to fetch it, being possibly covered
from without by some of the boys standing beside the shop-door, who
is also on the look-out. Any passer-by seeing the cap thrown in would
take no particular notice in most cases, as it merely appears to be a
thoughtless boyish frolic. Meantime the young rogue within the shop
crawls round the counter to the till, and rifles its contents.
If detected, he possibly says, “Let me go; I have done nothing. That
boy who is standing outside and has just run away threw in my bonnet,
and I came to fetch it.” When discovered by the shopkeeper, the boy
will occasionally be allowed to get away, as the loss may not be known
till afterwards.
Sometimes one of these ragged urchins watches a favourable opportunity
and steals from the till while his comrade is observing the movements
of the people passing by and the police, without resorting to the
ingenious expedient of throwing in the cap.
The shop tills are generally rifled by boys, in most cases by two or
more in company; this is only done occasionally. It is confined chiefly
to the districts where the working classes reside.
In some cases, though rarely, a lad of 17 or 19 years of age or
upwards, will reach his hand over the counter to the till, in the
absence of the person in charge of the shop.
These robberies are not very numerous, and are of small collective
value.
_Stealing from the Doors and Windows of Shops._--In various shopping
districts of London we see a great variety of goods displayed for sale
at the different shop-doors and windows, and on the pavement in front
of the shops of brokers, butchers, grocers, milliners, &c.
Let us take a picture from the New-cut, Lambeth. We observe many
brokers’ shops along the street, with a heterogenous assortment of
household furniture, tables, chairs, looking-glasses, plain and
ornamental, cupboards, fire-screens, &c., ranged along the broad
pavement; while on tables are stores of carpenters’ tools in great
variety, copper-kettles, brushes, and bright tin pannikins, and other
articles.
We see the dealer standing before his door, with blue apron, hailing
the passer-by to make a purchase. Upon stands on the pavement at each
side of his shop-door are cheeses of various kinds and of different
qualities, cut up into quarters and slices, and rashers of bacon lying
in piles in the open windows, or laid out on marble slabs. On deal
racks are boxes of eggs, “fresh from the country,” and white as snow,
and large pieces of bacon, ticketed as of “fine flavour,” and “very
mild.”
Alongside is a milliner’s shop with the milliner, a smart young woman,
seated knitting beneath an awning in front of her door. On iron and
wooden rods, suspended on each side of the door-way, are black and
white straw bonnets and crinolines, swinging in the wind; while on
the tables in front are exposed boxes of gay feathers, and flowers of
every tint, and fronts of shirts of various styles, with stacks of
gown-pieces of various patterns.
A green-grocer stands by his shop with a young girl of 17 by his side.
On each side of the door are baskets of apples, with large boxes of
onions and peas. Cabbages are heaped at the front of the shop, with
piles of white turnips and red carrots.
Over the street is a furniture wareroom. Beneath the canvas awning
before the shop are chairs of various kinds, straw-bottomed and seated
with green or puce-coloured leather, fancy looking-glasses in gilt
frames, parrots in cages, a brass-mounted portmanteau, and other
miscellaneous articles. An active young shopman is seated by the
shop-door, in a light cap and dark apron--with newspaper in hand.
Near the Victoria Theatre we notice a second-hand clothes store. On
iron rods suspended over the doorway we find trowsers, vests, and coats
of all patterns and sizes, and of every quality dangling in the wind;
and on small wooden stands along the pavement are jackets and coats of
various descriptions. Here are corduroy jackets, ticketed “15_s._ and
16_s._ made to order.” Corduroy trowsers warranted “first rate,” at
7_s._ 6_d._ Fustian trowsers to order for 8_s._ 6_d._; while dummies
are ranged on the pavement with coats buttoned upon them, inviting us
to enter the shop.
In the vicinity we see stalls of workmen’s iron tools of various
kinds--some old and rusty, others bright and new.
Thefts are often committed from the doors and windows of these shops
during the day, in the temporary absence of the person in charge. They
are often seen by passers-by, who take no notice, not wishing to attend
the police court, as they consider they are insufficiently paid for it.
The coat is usually stolen from the dummy in this way: one boy is
posted on the opposite side of the street to see if a police-officer
is in sight, or a policeman in plain clothes, who might detect the
depredation. Another stands two or three yards from the shop. The third
comes up to the dummy, and pretends to look at the quality of the coat
to throw off the suspicion of any bystander or passer-by. He then
unfastens the button, and if the shopkeeper or any of his assistants
come out, he walks away. If he finds that he is not seen by the people
in the shop, he takes the coat off the dummy and runs away with it.
If seen, he will not return at that time, but watches some other
convenient opportunity. When the young thief is chased by the
shopkeeper, his two associates run and jostle him, and try to trip him
up, so as to give their companion an opportunity of escaping. This
is generally done at dusk, in the winter time, when thieving is most
prevalent in those localities.
In stealing a piece of bacon from the shop-doors or windows, they wait
till the shopman turns his back, when they take a piece of bacon or
cheese in the same way as in the case alluded to. This is commonly done
by two or more boys in company.
Handkerchiefs at shop-doors are generally stolen by one of the boys and
passed to another who runs off with it. When hotly chased, they drop
the handkerchief and run away.
These young thieves are the ragged boys formerly noticed, varying from
9 to 14 years of age, without shoes or stockings. Their parents are of
the lowest order of Irish cockneys, or they live in low lodging-houses,
where they get a bed for 2_d._ or 3_d._ a night, with crowds of others
as destitute as themselves.