ABSTRACT
The historian who interests himself in the forms, causes and extent of juvenile delinquency in the period between the Wars must take all of them into account. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, when, after the Napoleonic Wars, crime among children went up appallingly, one of the principal remedies adopted by the authorities was the shipping of juvenile delinquents overseas. The Education Act, 1918, completely prohibited the employment of children under 12 years, with the exception that employment of children by their parents could be permitted. Street trading by children under 14 became unlawful. These provisions could be supplemented by By-Laws under the Act of 1903, and the Secretary of State, in a circular letter of July 1919, proposed by means of model By-Laws to prohibit street trading for boys under 15 and for girls under 16.
