An A -Z of Victorian Crime and Culture - P is for...



P is for - Peelers... the slang name given to Sir Robert Peel's new Policemen - one of the nicer slang names!  How could I not start off this selection without the originals of Leicester, with Robert Charters sitting front row, middle, surrounded by his men, in front of the Mayor's parlour at Town Hall Lane.

 P is for - Punishers... the hardest of the bruisers - men who were employed to dish out the severest of beatings. Many feature in Jack Ketch's Puppets and Death lurks in Cock Muck Hill.

 P is for - Perpendicular... a meal eaten standing up - often at a bar - something I spent years mastering in CID.

 P is for - Palmer... a shoplifter, concealing or 'palming' his rewards from prying eyes.

 P is for - Pack... a cheap and nasty lodging house. A particularly grotty one is a key feature in book three, deep in the heart of London's canal basins. London? The Borough Boys may have ventured into dangerous territory in book three!


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