ABSTRACT

‘Law and order’ is a phrase much in vogue with politicians of all parties today, and represents a major concern of the British public. Just as crime was under-reported in the 1990s, so it was, though to an unknown degree, in the nineteenth century, more particularly in the earlier years when the severity of the punishments meted out for what now appear very trivial offences deterred the more humane members of the public from cooperating in prosecutions. If necessity were the driving force behind crime, then it would be natural for rates to fall when the standard of living was rising, and to rise when depression intervened. Drunkenness was a thread running through all types of male adult crime in Colyton, with the exception of poaching, which needed a clear head to be successful. Magistrates were frequently told that the offender was tipsy when committing a misdemeanour.