ABSTRACT
Brighton's reputation as a town which accommodated both the wealthy and the poor, both the upright industrial bourgeoisie and the prostitutes and hucksters living by their wits, contributed to a lasting aura of petit-criminality. Extortion and protection rackets persisted into the 1930s, giving Brighton an unpleasant reputation as a 'nice place to visit' on a day-trip but not a nice environment to live in. It became dangerous to walk on the sea-front with assaults taking place even in broad daylight. These gangs reached their apogee in June 1936 when a gang of thirty men, the 'Hoxton Mob', attacked a bookmaker and his clerk but were detained after a mêlée with the police, who had anticipated violence. The status of Brighton as a liminal zone made any and all rumours of transgression, decadence, crime, and degeneration the basis for sensational newspaper reporting, which formed a staple diet of 'Brighton stories' which have circulated in the British press for almost two centuries.
