Industrial reform of crime and punishment (c.1750–c.1900)

This is the most heavily examined period for crime and punishment on Paper 1. OCR regularly sets "how significant was Robert Peel" questions or asks students to compare the causes of reform. The key theme is that Enlightenment ideas + industrialisation + political will = major change across policing, prisons and the statute book.

Why change was needed

By c.1800 the problems were acute:

• Rapid urbanisation: cities like Manchester doubled in a generation; crime rose faster than communities could handle it by traditional means.
• Bloody Code contradictions: serious under-enforcement because juries refused to convict; ineffective deterrence.
• Prison hulks (decommissioned ships used as temporary prisons) were overcrowded and disease-ridden.
• Enlightenment thinkers (Cesare Beccaria's On Crimes and Punishments, 1764; John Howard's State of the Prisons, 1777) argued punishment should be rational, proportionate and reformatory — not just brutal.

Robert Peel and the Metropolitan Police (1829)

Robert Peel was Home Secretary under Wellington's government. Key steps:

1. 1823 Gaols Act: improved conditions in local prisons; required turnkeys to be paid (not to extract money from prisoners).
2. 1829 Metropolitan Police Act: created the Metropolitan Police Service for London — the first modern professional police force.
   • Officers ("Peelers" or "Bobbies") wore a uniform (blue coat, top hat), carried only a truncheon, and were recruited from the working class.
   • Nine Principles of Policing (attributed to Peel): prevention over detection; public approval; minimum force; impartiality.
   • By the 1856 County and Borough Police Act every county in England had to create a police force.

Abolition of the Bloody Code

Between 1823 and 1837, Sir Samuel Romilly and then Sir Robert Peel removed over 100 capital offences from the statute book:

• 1832: Death penalty abolished for cattle and horse stealing.
• 1837: Death penalty restricted to murder, treason and arson in a royal dockyard.
• 1868: Public executions abolished (last public hanging 1868).
• 1965: Abolition of the death penalty for murder (suspended; permanent 1969).

Prison reform: Pentonville (1842)

John Howard (1777) and later Elizabeth Fry (1820s) campaigned for humane prison conditions. Their key arguments: prisons should reform, not just punish.

Pentonville Prison (opened 1842) used the separate system:

• Each prisoner kept in total isolation in individual cells.
• Goal: prevent criminal contamination and force reflection, leading to reform.
• In practice, solitary confinement caused mental illness.

Millbank Prison (1816) had used the silent system (prisoners together but not allowed to talk).

The principle shift: from punishment-as-deterrence to punishment-as-reform — a revolutionary idea.

Elizabeth Fry

• Quaker reformer; visited Newgate Prison 1813.
• Campaigned for: classification of prisoners (separating men, women and children); education; paid work.
• Influenced prison reforms of the 1820s–30s.

Common OCR exam mistakes

1. Saying Peel invented policing from scratch — there were earlier police forces (Bow Street Runners, 1749; Thames River Police, 1798). Peel's achievement was creating a professional, paid, uniformed, accountable force.
2. Confusing the separate system (isolation) with the silent system (together but silent).
3. Not linking reform to Enlightenment ideas — OCR AO3 questions reward context.
4. Saying the death penalty was abolished in 1868 — that was public executions. The death penalty continued until 1965.