Perfect freedom of action

Lively St. Lemeston, the small Sussex market town at the heart of my next two (at least) books, is the first town I've written about. In for a Penny takes place on a country estate, and A Lily Among Thorns is set in London. But towns were becoming more and more important in England during the Regency as the balance of the economy shifted, with more jobs being created in industries and jobs in agriculture being lost. Of course there were the great factory towns (most of them in the North of England) like Manchester, and London itself increased greatly in size in the period, but even small towns saw growth and change.

One thing I learned was that "town" covered a huge range of sizes. ("City" had a pretty specific meaning in period: a town with a cathedral, that is, the center of a Church of England see, and didn't really denote anything in terms of size.) I imagine Lively St. Lemeston having a population of about 1500. But what I have to remember is that that sounds a lot smaller to me (my high school was bigger than that) than it would have to a Regency English person. Because there were many fewer urban areas and long-distance travel was fairly impractical for most people, even a town of that size could have a very well-developed social and political life, with its own Assembly Rooms, clubs, theatres, libraries, workhouses, jails, newspapers, &c. &c.

But one thing a lot of towns lacked was effective infrastructure. Most towns had very low taxation, in some cases only enough to pay for an annual feast for the town councilmen. The primary taxes were the poor rates, which paid for whatever form of welfare the town provided and which were administered through individual parishes (of which some towns had several, and some towns had too few to actually service the potential congregation, since the parish boundaries were usually hundreds of years old). There was no income tax, and even though a national one was briefly passed during the Napoleonic Wars to fund the army, it was immediately repealed when peace came. Any new expenses, such as streetlights or improving the roads, often had to be provided for in an Act of Parliament, and they could be difficult to get passed if the measure was controversial in the town.

One measure that was almost always contoversial in England at this period was an expanded police force. It's hard for me to wrap my head around how people in the eighteenth century thought about government. Growing up in the United States of the present day, I take it for granted that I pay taxes to the government and in return, they maintain the roads, provide public schools, have fire and police departments, run community centers, fund social programs like Medicaid, SSI, and welfare, and make laws that regulate my day-to-day life.

In eighteenth century England, that simply wasn't the case. Furthermore, crime was very different. Before mass production and the relative cheapness of consumer goods that industrialization brought about, all personal property was extremely valuable. It was possible to make a living only stealing handkerchiefs. (Sorry, I've mentioned that before, but it really blew my mind.) The most common form of crime was non-violent property theft. (Compare pickpocketing, relatively rare now, to mugging, relatively rare then.) In rural areas, where people knew their neighbors, anonymous crime was so difficult as to be almost non-existent. People just didn't see the need for any larger police force than the parish constable. And huge numbers of people financially benefitted from the constant organized theft, poaching, and smuggling going on all around them, so it was hard to muster public support for stopping it.

(I know I'm ignoring sexual assault and child abuse, probably a form of crime that was as endemic then as it is now. But it's hard to talk about that in this context because the laws and attitudes around it were so different that I'm not sure how much it would have entered people's minds when thinking about the advantages or disadvantages of policing.)

In 1822, a Parliamentary Select Committee on Policing the Metropolis concluded that, "It is difficult to reconcile an effective system of policing with that perfect freedom of action and exemption from interference, which are the great blessings and privileges of this country."

Perfect freedom of action and exemption from interference. Definitely not something most modern people expect.

Of course, it didn't help that the police forces that did exist were either ineffectual or corrupt or both. This was largely due to the extremely low pay of the officers (parish constables were not paid at all), who were generally obliged to personally pay the costs of prosecuting any criminal they brought charges against, and received a monetary reward on a successful conviction. This led to a situation where the police forces were as notoriously corrupt as the Gotham Police Department.  Whether the average citizen knew it, I can't say, but criminals certainly did. Bribery was common, streetwalkers paid night watchmen for protection, police swore under oath to Parliamentary Committees that "flash houses" (basically headquarters for London criminal activity, sort of combination brothel/fence/boarding house/gaming dens/you name it)  did not exist even though it was public knowledge that they did.

You can see something of the public attitude toward night watchmen in this Cruikshank illustration for Life in London, entitled "Tom Getting the best of a Charley." ("Charley" was a nickname for the night watchman.)

Image copyright The Museum of London. (Of course, rich young men being rude to cops continues to be a popular subject for fiction, but they don't get away with it much anymore. I still fondly remember that time on Smallville that Lex Luthor had to attend anger management seminars after smashing up a traffic cop's car with the golf clubs he was planning to donate to a charity auction. And didn't Logan Echolls do something similar on Veronica Mars?)

Here is another entry from James Hardy Vaux's Dictionary:

WEIGH FORTY: term used by the police, who are as well versed in flash as the thieves themselves. It is often customary for the traps, to wink at depredations of a petty nature, and for which no reward would attach, and to let a thief reign unmolested till he commits a capital crime. They then grab him, and, on conviction, share (in many cases) a reward of 40l., or upwards; therefore these gentry will say, Let him alone at present, we don't want him till he weighs his weight, meaning, of course, forty pounds.

And don't even get me started on some of the really shocking cases of entrapment I've read about--that's another whole post!

But crime got worse and worse, and public opinion was turning against capital punishment, the traditional deterrent of crime (partly, of course, because it was fairly ineffective as a deterrent, and made juries reluctant to convict anyway). Clearly something had to be done, and many towns did pass Policing Acts. One alternative that great numbers of towns tried were prosecution associations, which raised money through member subscriptions to pay for the prosecution of criminals.

A Policing Act is one of the biggest local political issues in Lively St. Lemeston, and most of my characters have an opinion of one kind or another (my Sweet Disorder heroine's mother will bore you for hours with hers). But for now, they just have a constable and a paid night watchman. This makes it an interesting place for the hero of my next book, Crimson Joy, since he's a con artist with a London background...

I'll probably be posting more about this, but in the meantime, a few links to further reading if you're interested:

"The Origins of Policing and Law Enforcement in England," by Stevie Woods at The Macaronis historical romance blog.

"Night Watchmen Through the Ages (with a little help from Richard Armitage)," by Cheryl Leigh at Historical Hearts.

An extended quote from Government and Community in the English Provinces, 1700-1870 by David Eastwood at my tumblr; it was too long to include here but it has some great insights into the whole context of how people were thinking about crime, private property, and public spaces in this period and how that was shifting.

A couple of other great sources on the topic are The English Town, 1680-1840: Government, Society and Culture by Rosemary Sweet and The Regency Underworld by Donald A. Low (although that one mostly deals with London).

The House of Commons opera hat

Rose here! My next book, Sweet Disorder, is set during a Parliamentary election in a small town. The Regency political system is so different from the modern one that I wanted to do plenty of research to make sure I didn't mess it up (for example, one thing that consistently confused my beta readers was that each voter got two votes!). Luckily I'd already done a little research on Parliament for a book proposal that didn't go anywhere (although I haven't given up hope for the future).

One book I read was The Great Palace, by Christopher Jones, about the Houses of Parliament themselves. It was published in 1985 so not up to date, but that didn't matter for my purposes! Some things I learned:

"The Mace, the symbol of Royal authority, must always be present when the House is sitting. Without it, the House is totally powerless."

"The Lord Speaker, accompanied by the mace and doorkeepers, makes her way to Sovereign’s Entrance to await the arrival of the Queen." Image: Parliamentary copyright/ Catherine Bebbington.

More on the Mace from Wikipedia.

"The Serjeant at Arms, Jill Pay, places the mace on the Table to signal that the House is sitting. May 18 2010." Image: Catherine Bebbington. Parliamentary Copyright.

On the next page:

"The Serjeant-at-Arms[...]is the only person in the Chamber allowed to wear a sword." This doesn't make clear to me whether s/he actually wears a sword--I can't see one in the above picture. (But is that a change since 1985?)

Two pages later:

"The House of Commons snuffbox. It is kept by the Principal Doorkeeper. Any Member may ask for a pinch of snuff before going into the Chamber."

According to Wikipedia, "A floral-scented snuff called 'English Rose' is provided for members of the British House of Commons at public expense due to smoking in the House being banned since 1693. A famous silver communal snuff box kept at the entrance of the House was destroyed in an air raid during World War II with a replacement being subsequently presented to the House by Winston Churchill." (The new box was made from the timber recovered from the damaged Chamber.) Nicholas Fairbairn, an MP until 1995, was known during his tenure for being the only person to actually use the snuff.

I'm not sure the snuff is English Rose anymore, though, because check out this 2010 Freedom of Information request I found! The respondent states, among other things, that "The cost of the snuff is approx £6 per tin and the House has purchased 4 tins in 8 years, the cost is paid from Serjeant at Arms' petty cash. There is no specific company make and the House just purchases it from a local tobacconist," and that "Members who have taken snuff in the past year numbered perhaps less than five, Members taking snuff in the present Parliament has yet to occur."

And guess what: it turns out the US Senate has ceremonial snuffboxes too!

But my very, very favorite is this:

"The House of Commons opera hat. The collapsible top hat which Members must wear if they want to raise a point of order during a division [their word for a vote]."

And there's a little picture of an old top hat sitting on a bench.

I was desperately sad to discover that this custom had been discontinued following a recommendation of the Select Committee on the Modernization of the House of Commons:

"64. At present, if a Member seeks to raise a point of order during a division, he or she must speak 'seated and covered'. In practice this means that an opera hat which is kept at each end of the Chamber has to be produced and passed to the Member concerned. This inevitably takes some time, during which the Member frequently seeks to use some other form of covering such as an Order Paper. This particular practice has almost certainly brought the House into greater ridicule than almost any other, particularly since the advent of television. We do not believe that it can be allowed to continue."

Another beautiful image was provided by Hansard's record of the discussion on the issue:

"We recommend a new procedure for raising points of order during a Division. At present, we have the opera hat, and, although some Members may feel that they look particularly fetching in it, it makes the House of Commons look ridiculous when someone wearing the hat is trying to raise a point of order from a seated position while everyone else is milling around and going to vote."

(Sidenote: If anyone writing historical romance with a political dimension doesn't already know about the online Hansard's, here it is! It is saving my life with things like dates of parliamentary recesses, when bills were proposed, &c.)

Can anyone find a picture of the opera hat? Preferably being worn. My Google-fu is failing me.

"Where they lived in an expensive Manner"

I've been doing a lot of reading about early newspapers for the WIP (my heroine's first husband was a provincial newspaper editor and his little brother, who runs the paper now, is a major character), and in From Grub Street to Fleet Street: An Illustrated History of English Newspapers, by Bob Clarke, I came across something fascinating: an account of an eighteenth century conwoman!  She'd make a great heroine, I think, if you played it right.  The first part of her story (at least, Clarke believes it's the same woman, and it does seem likely but not 100% conclusive unless you see something I don't) appears in the January 10th, 1765 St. James Chronicle:

"A few Weeks ago a genteel Woman, about 25 Years of Age, applied to a Farmer and Broom-Maker, near Hadleigh in Hants for a Lodging; telling him that she was the Daughter of a Nobleman, and forced from her Father's House by his ill Treatment. Her Manner of relating the Story so affected the Farmer, that he took her in and kindly entertained her.  In the Course of Conversation, she artfully let drop that she had a Fortune of 90,000l. of which she should be possessed as soon as her Friends in London knew where she was.  After some Days Stay, she told the Farmer, that the best Return in her Power for his Favours, would be to marry his Son Thomas (a lad of about 18) if it was agreeable to him.  The poor old Man was overjoyed at the Proposal, and in a short Time they were married; after which she informed her Father-in-Law she had great Interest at Court; and if he could for the present raise Money to equip them in a genteel Manner, she should procure a Colonel's Commission for her Husband. The credulous Farmer thereupon mortgaged his little estate for 100l. and every Thing necessary being bought for the new-married Couple, they took the rest of the Money and set out for London, accompanied by three of the Farmer's Friends, and got to the Bear Inn in the Borough on Christmas Eve; where they lived in an expensive Manner; and she went in a Coach every Morning to St. James's End of the Town, on Pretence of Soliciting for her Husband's Commission, and to obtain her own Fortune: but it was at length discovered that the Woman was an Impostor; and the poor Country People were obliged to sell their Horses by Auction, towards defraying the Expenses at the Inn, before they could set out on their Return Home, which they did on Foot last Saturday Morning.  Before the fatal Discovery, the Company were greatly pleased with the Woman's behavior, as she was not only very sprightly and engaging in Conversation, but sang and played on the Guitar to Perfection.  By the Description given, she is supposed to be the same Woman who has for near two Years past obtained Money, by imposing on the Compassion and Credulity of different Persons in Town and Country."

 The second article is in Say's Weekly Journal, October 24th 1767:

"At the general quarter sessions held for the borough of Devizes, on the 9th instant, one Sarah Boxall was convicted upon the vagrant act, and adjudged a vagabond: She declared her maiden name was Wilson, and that about two years since she was married to Farmer Boxall, of Frensham in Surrey, her own relations living in London.--It seems this woman has for some time past been travelling through almost all parts of the kingdom, assuming various roles and characters. At different times and places she has pretended herself to be of high birth and distinction, as well foreign as English, and according stiled herself a Princess of Mecklenbourg, Countess of Normandy, Lady Vicountess Wilbrahammon, &c., and under some or other of such names made promises of providing, by means of her weight and interest, for the families of the lower class of people, at the same time borrowing money from them, and giving notes in payment. Unto those of higher rank she has represented herself to be in the greatest distress, abandoned by her parents and friends of considerable family, either on account of an unfortunate love affair, or of religion, pretending to be Protestant against the will of her relations, Roman Catholicks, and always varying the account of herself, as she chanced to pick up intelligence of the characters and connections of those she intended to impose upon.--A description of the person of this woman was published in the evening posts of July 1, and July 15, 1766, dated from Coventry, and Great Budworth in Cheshire. Since that she has been mostly in the North of England upon the like errand, till July last, when she thought proper to direct her travels for the Western counties, and in these parts gone about to the houses of divers families; among other, she had the impudence to visit Lord Bottetourt, in Gloucestershire, and attempted the like civility to the Countess of Shelbourne, while in Wiltshire, but endeavouring to impose false and crafty representations of her distress on sundry person in the Devizes, information thereof was made before Charles Carth, Esq.; who issued a warrant for her apprehension; in consequence whereof, she is to be conveyed, by a pass, to Frensham (sworn by her to be the place of her husband's settlement [RL: I've come across "settlement" before as a legal term, meaning the parish of which you are a resident and from which you're entitled to poor relief should you become insolvent] after the time of her punishment ordered upon her conviction is expired.--She is a short, slender woman, of a pale complexion, somewhat deformed, has a speck or kell over one eye, and dresses in a lightish coloured riding habit."

On the one hand, I love con artists (Welcome to Temptation and Faking It are two of my favorite romances EVER, and I also adore the British TV series Hustle--and I loved A Most Lamentable Comedy by fellow Hoyden Janet Mullany, in which two fortune hunters pretending to be wealthy try to marry each other for money); on the other hand, it's hard to feel good about taking advantage of poor people's ignorance and talking them into mortgaging their homes.

On the other other hand, I tend to get annoyed when criminals are set up to do crime for a good cause and only target evil schmucks, because I think, you know, being a con artist is unethical. And I can enjoy the fun of it as long as the narrative knows it's unethical (I mean, I can enjoy heroes who've murdered people, why should a little con artistry be a deal breaker?), but once the narrative starts telling me, "No, it's 100% okay to completely ruin this guy because he's ugly and mean," I get antsy about it.

I'm also, to be honest, not a big fan of stories about cops who "don't mind getting their hands dirty when someone really needs to go down." I like my criminal and law enforcement Venn diagram not to intersect, I guess!

One of the things I loved about Courtney Milan's latest, Unraveled, was how the legal plotline was dealt with: the hero is a magistrate and the heroine works for the local mob doing small con jobs.  Courtney Milan never shied away from the abuses and problems within the legal system, and the mob did serve a valuable function, but at the same time she really resisted the urge to romanticize vigilantism.

So what do you think? Is Sarah Boxall heroine material? If you were going to adapt her story for a romance, how would you do it?

I have a touch of the Lawrence today

Sweet Disorder, my current WIP, is set in Sussex. As part of my research I read A Glossary of the Provincialisms in Use in the County of Sussex by William Durrant Cooper, first published in 1834. I had it printed at Third Place Books on their espresso machine. The guy who worked there did a whole comedic bit: "Why don't we stock this all the time? We really didn't have this on the shelves?"


The quote says "Juvat haec obsoleta servari, aliquando profutura. --WACHTER." Any Latin speakers out there want to translate?

 Language is obviously one of my favorite things (as I suspect it is for a lot of you) so I was absolutely fascinated! (And incidentally I was able to understand some dialogue in the Cold Comfort Farm movie that previously eluded me.)  

Many of them are very specific and have to do with farming, wildlife, and the Sussex landscape, like: 

"BACKSTERS, s. Wide, flat pieces of wood, shaped to the feet, to walk over loose beach." (s. means noun, presumably short for "subject"?)

"DALLOP, s. A packet or lump of tea, weighing from six to sixteen pounds, so packed for the convenience of smuggling."

"JUG, s. A nickname given to the men of Brighton." 

 And look at this:  "BARTON, s. A yard or enclosure near a house." Barton Cottage, anyone? 

 There are a lot of words, too, which were regionalisms at the time and have now entered into the common language: "bosky," "bumptious," "cosy," "fogey," "frumpy," "gallivanting," "grumpy," "moonshine," "nudge," "ramshackle," "skinflint," "slam," "a to-do," "transmogrify" (!), and more. And look at this: "DIBS, s. The small bones in the knees of a sheep or lamb, uniting the upper and lower bones of the leg: a game is played with five of these bones." Is this the origin of "I call dibs"? 

Apparently there are also many similarities linguistically between Sussex dialect and the English of the American South! Cf. the use of "be" as the conjugated form of "to be" or "CRACKLIN, s. The hard skin of roast pork."

But some of them are just great words that I think it is a shame are NOT in common usage! Here are a few of my favorites, which I would like to reintroduce into the language: 

"ARGUIFY, v. and adj. Signify, argue. To import, have weight in an argument." I really wish there were more usage examples in this book! I imagine this being used in a sentence something like this: "Clark Kent wears glasses, which arguifies that he cannot be Superman." 

"BAIT, s. Luncheon." 

"BARNACLES, s. Spectacles." 

"BONKER or BUNKER, v. [Bon coeur, Fr. Good heart.] To outdo another in feats of agility, such as to jump better over a gate, ditch, wall, or hedge, a good heart or courage being neceassary." I'm glad he gave so many examples of things you can jump over! 

"CARP-PIE, s. To eat carp-pie, is to submit to another person's carping at your acts, &c." 

"CHAVISH, s. A chattering of many birds or noisy persons." 

"DUNNAMANY and DUNNAMUCH. [Corruptions of I don't know how many or much.]" 

"FLUTTERMOUSE, W.; FLINDERMOUSE, E.; FLITTERMOUSE, E., s. [Fledermaus, G.; Vliddermuys, Du.] A bat." The W means West Sussex and the E means East. I know that Fledermaus is just the German word for bat but I still find the word "fluttermouse" so precious. 

"GAPESEED, s. A passing object to stare at. A servant staring from a window is said to be 'sowing gape-seed.'" 

"LAWRENCE, s. A kind of imaginary saint or fairy, whose influence produces indolence, thus, 'I caunt get up, for Lawrence ha'e completely got holt an me,'--"I ha'e got a touch o' ol' Lawrence to-dee; I be troubled to git ane wud me work.' This person is also known in Dorsetshire, &c." 

"MOCK-BEGGAR HALL, s. A house which[...]has an inviting external aspect, but within is poor and bare, dirty and disorderly, disappointing to those who beg alms at the door." 

"MUCH-OF-A-MUCHNESS, and MUCH ONE. Much the same; with little or nothing to choose between." 

"SLAPPEL, or SLAVVEN, s. A large piece. Synonymous with hunk." 

"SNACK, v. [Snacken, Du., a match.] To share or be in partnership with. 'We'll go snacks;' i.e., 'We will divide.'" 

"SNOOZLE, v. To lie close together; to nestle; to cuddle; to hide the face in the bosom, as children do." 

"TOL-LOL, adj. Tolerably well." 

"WHILK, v. To howl like a dog, S. To mutter to one's self, as a person does when offended. E."

 If you could bring one word or phrase into common usage, what would it be?