ABSTRACT
Harbouring vagrants was one of the few offences included in the 1744 Vagrant Act but not included in the tripartite division of vagrancy offences. Since magistrates had a range of options such as master and servant law as well as vagrancy law for dealing with troublesome poor, in many cases, probably most, the matter never came to court. Middlesex justices were much concerned with illegal games, which were prosecuted both under vagrancy law and as misdemeanours. The act did not include whipping in the punishments available to the single justice for the idle and disorderly, although it did for rogues and vagabonds. Middlesex prosecuted George Graham for felony for forging the signature of one of the justices on an order for reward for apprehending vagrants. In Dorset no fewer than fifty-one people were suspected of using false papers, far more even than in populous Middlesex.
