Chronicles of Bow Street Police-Office
With an Account of the Magistrates, ‘Runners', and Police; and a Selection of the Most Interesting Cases

Published in 1888, this two-volume work depicts the Bow Street Runners, the London police force of the eighteenth century.

Percy Fitzgerald (Author)

9781108036948, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 8 December 2011

362 pages, 8 b/w illus.
21.6 x 14 x 2 cm, 0.46 kg

Percy Fitzgerald (1834–1925) was a prolific author, critic, painter and sculptor. He was born in Ireland and attended Stonyhurst College in Lancashire, and then Trinity College Dublin. When he moved to London, he became a contributor to Charles Dickens' periodical Household Words. This two-volume work, published in 1888, gives a stirring account of the work of London's eighteenth-century law enforcers, the Bow Street Runners. Drawing on records of criminal cases, it tells how magistrates Henry Fielding and his blind half-brother Sir John Fielding helped to set up the Runners. Their actions dramatically reduced violent crime in the city and paved the way for the modern police force. Volume 1 covers the formation of the Runners and introduces the key players in the successes that followed. It also describes a number of fascinating incidents that are variously tragic, amusing or shocking.

Preface
1. Bow Street
2. Henry Fielding and Sir John Fielding
3. Cases before Sir John
4. The Bow Street forces
5. The Police system
6. Office eccentricities
7. Morning at Bow Street
8. Eccentricity
9. Duels and gaming-house raids
Appendix.

Subject Areas: British & Irish history [HBJD1]