Short History Of... - The Victorians, Part 1 of 2

Episode Date: September 21, 2025

Over the course of Queen Victoria’s reign, Britain transformed into the world's foremost industrial and imperial power. The Victorians built railways that spanned continents, invented life-changing technologies, and expanded a vast realm that stretched from the Caribbean to India. Yet, for all their achievements, they grappled with social unrest, stark inequalities between the rich and poor, and the dark side of imperialism.    So how did the Victorians justify their colonial project, while they tolerated such inequality at home? How did their moral values shape the way they treated those at the fringes of their rigid society? And how do the Victorians’ struggles with industrialisation, governance, and poverty echo in the modern world?  This is A Short History Of The Victorians, Part One A Noiser podcast production. Hosted by John Hopkins. With thanks to Dr Amy Milne-Smith, Professor of History at Wilfrid Laurier University in Ontario, Canada, and Dr Onyeka Nubia, a British historian, writer and presenter. Written by Sean Coleman | Produced by Kate Simants | Assistant Producer: Nicole Edmunds | Production Assistant: Chris McDonald | Exec produced by Katrina Hughes | Sound supervisor: Tom Pink | Sound design by Oliver Sanders | Assembly edit by Dorry Macaulay, Rob Plummer | Compositions by Oliver Baines, Dorry Macaulay, Tom Pink | Mix & mastering: Cody Reynolds-Shaw | Get every episode of Short History Of… a week early with Noiser+. You’ll also get ad-free listening, bonus material and early access to shows across the Noiser podcast network. Click the subscription banner at the top of the feed to get started. Or go to noiser.com/subscriptions Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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He is torn. This coin could buy food for his family or replace the worn boots on his feet. But it is also the gateway to a once-in-a-lifetime spectacular that is opened right here on his doorstep. With a sigh. He pockets the money and joins the animated crowd, all walking in the same direction drawn towards the same thing. Up ahead, the specially made glass and iron structure, the Crystal Palace, stretches high into the sky. Glittering in the sunlight, its footprint is the size of 10 football pitches, the biggest enclosed space ever to be built. Now it houses the wonders of the world in one place.

The Great Exhibition. The buzz of eager voices rising around him, after the man parts with his shilling, he passes into the entrance hall. Here he is buffeted by the crowd, his mouth hanging open in slack-jawed wonder. A cacophony of steam whistles, clanking gears, and automated clicks assaults his ears

as he is carried inside by the impatient throng. He passes a mechanical loom. It's rapid movement fascinating, the threads flowing through it faster than he can blink. Now, he pauses to watch as a telegraph ticks away in its glass case, sending messages between distant places with a tap of a key. Stepping closer, he listens to the machine, wondering what it would be like to get a message from the other side of the world. Across the aisle, a steam-powered printing press churns, pushing,

sheets of printed newspaper through its giant rollers at an impressive speed. He smiles, shaking his head in disbelief. Other rooms house inventions designed to make people's lives easier, better, more productive. All of them as alien to him as the last, but no less fascinating. He pauses in front of one curious-looking machine. A large wooden frame with iron handles turning in a circular motion. It looks like a barrel, but with a purpose he can't quite understand. Peering at the sign, he discovers it is a washing machine,

designed to take the back-breaking work out of scrubbing clothes. His wife would give her eye teeth for a contraption like that. Hall after hall is filled with marvels from around the world, 13,000 exhibits in all. As well as machines, instruments from the scientific to the musical, even flushing toilets one can pay a penny to use. There are exotic fabrics, glassware, spices, the rarest of jewels. And all of it gathered from Britain's growing empire.

Excited voices rise around him as people crowd the exhibits, pointing, discussing, laughing. Here at the Great Exhibition, they stand on the threshold of a new world, and for the first time, he feels like he's part of it. In the early 19th century, a young Queen Victoria ascended to the throne of a rapidly changing empire. But while her reign would mark an era that became synonymous, with progress and prosperity, it was also a time of great moral and social contradictions. Over the course of her 63 years as sovereign, Britain transformed into the world's foremost industrial and imperial power. The Victorians built railways that spanned continents, invented life-changing technologies and expanded a vast realm that stretched from the Caribbean to India.

Yet, for all their achievements, they grappled with social unrest. stark inequalities between the rich and poor and the dark side of imperialism. So how did the Victorians justify their colonial project while they tolerated such inequality at home? How did their moral values shape the way they treated those at the fringes of their rigid society? And how do the Victorian struggles with industrialization, governance and poverty echo in the modern world? I'm John Hopkins. From the Noiser Network, this is part one of a special two-part, short history of the Victorians. The Victorian era is traditionally defined as the period covering the reign of Queen Victoria, beginning as she ascends to the throne in 1837. Aged just 18, she is an untested.

She is an untested monarch, inheriting a nation exhausted by years of war and conflict. Yet beneath this weariness lies a country full of untapped potential on the brink of a transformative age, one that has been building for decades, long before her coronation. Dr. Amy Milne-Smith is Professor of History at Wilfrid Laurier University in Ontario, Canada. So the Victorian period can be defined in a number of ways. Obviously, Queen Victoria is how we get the name, but most historians usually will stretch it back a little bit. Really, it's after the Napoleonic Wars,

where society fundamentally changes from before and after that moment. And you get the beginning of what is going to define the Victorian era starting in the late teens, in the 20s, in the 1830s, as they develop into this kind of long. Victorian era that it ends, again, not with her death in 1901, but with the First World War. Though the Napoleonic Wars ended in 1815, they leave an indelible mark on Britain, reshaping its political and economic landscape. By the time Victoria takes the reins, Britain has already established colonies in India, the Caribbean, and parts of Africa, as well as key territories

in North America and the Pacific. These colonies are not just economic assets. They form the backbone of Britain's imperial power, and they shape the way the British view themselves and the world. Dr. Oneyeka Nubia is a British historian, writer and presenter. The first thing is that they had a very, very different concept of Britishness to what we have right now. Their idea of Britishness was an international idea.

So the concept that was sold to the colonies, to the territories is that they were part of Britain, that they were part of the British Empire. So a Canadian person would have regarded themselves not of the Canadian, but as a British subject. Young Victoria then finds herself as monarch not just of a small island, but of a sprawling family of nations, brought together under a single citizen. citizenship. Yet, before she can settle into her era-defining reign, she must first overcome public doubts in her ability to lead and her own fears about her aptitude for the role. Victoria's early reign is often overlooked by what she would become. We think a Victorian as the great matriarch, as the grandmother of Europe, as this force of stability, but really when she comes to the throne as still a very young woman who's been very isolated and

and sheltered, they don't know what the future holds. It's a much rockier moment. While her subjects look to her to uphold the strong moral ideal of women at the time, to be the embodiment of domestic virtue, they also expect her to be a strong figurehead. Though the country is governed by the Prime Minister and Cabinet, with decisions largely in their hands, Victoria still wields significant authority as the symbolic leader of the empire. She offers advice on matters of state and exercises her influence on diplomatic affairs through the personal relationships she establishes with key political figures both at home and abroad. But in these early years of her reign, Victoria faces several challenges.

A scandal erupts when, after she backs, false claims that a lady-in-waiting is pregnant out of wedlock. It transpires that the young woman is in fact suffering from an aggressive. ovarian cancer. Meanwhile, a dispute over the appointment of chambermaids further complicates matters as Victoria tries to assert her independence from her mother's influence and the expectations of the government. This struggle over household control threatens to tarnish her reputation as she grapples with the weight of her new role. There is goodwill towards her, certainly, but she makes a series of blunders in the first years of her reign, which perhaps demonstrate her naivete, perhaps demonstrate her age,

or perhaps even, you could argue, reflect an old way of being a monarch that is just not going to be acceptable in the 19th century. She quickly forms a close alliance with Prime Minister Lord Melbourne, who will become both a trusted advisor and a long-standing friend. With her confidence now growing, the young queen is encouraged to seek a suitable husband, to join her on the journey.

It doesn't take long to settle on her first cousin, Prince Albert of Saxe-Koburg and Gotha, despite some reservations from her family and advisors. He will become not just her husband, but also a central figure in her reign, though his secondary role in a relationship takes some getting used to. Prince Albert, certainly when he came into power,

felt that he was the spared monarch. Here, Queen Victoria is as monarch without his justification to support her status. So this was an unusual position for a male monarch in a patriarchal society. Albert, however, is keen to support his new wife. And Victoria is determined that his role will complement hers while not undermining her authority. I think in terms of education, he was much better educated to be a world leader. He was much more worldly. He had a philosophical nature.

He was interested in science and was very pragmatic. And she, when she was young at least, was much more emotional. She had been far more constrained. But it is interesting because, of course, she is still the queen, and she was very aware of that. She seeks out roles for him that take advantage of his education and interests, particularly in science and the arts, but which don't place him ahead of her in the hierarchy. of leadership. What this enabled him to do was to carve out a new space, and part of carving out that

new space was to promote technology, to promote things like the Great Exhibition, to create and sponsor scientific geographical society, to make Britain the home for the intellectual revolution. One of the key projects he champions is the Great Exhibition, a grand, display of the world's finest achievements housed in an extraordinary glass and iron building known as the Crystal Palace in Hyde Park. It's estimated that six million people visit, around a third of the total population of Britain at the time. The great exhibition wasn't just attended by the higher class. It was also attended by the lower classing, who felt that these innovations were there. They were British innovations, even though those innovations came from all over the world, and they were created by the peoples from all over the

world. They had the stamp of Britishness placed upon them. The exhibition shows the public what it is to be British, at this time of spectacular global influence, instilling an inflated sense of national pride and superiority in even the poorest worker. And at the same time, it heralds a new phase of industrialisation, which is about to grip the nation and change the lives of almost just everyone in it. Hello, I'm Greg Jenner, host of Your Dead to Me, the comedy podcast from the BBC that takes history seriously. Each week I'm joined by a comedian and an expert historian to learn and laugh about the past.

In our all-new season, we cover unique areas of history that your school lessons may have missed, from getting ready in the Renaissance era, to the Kellogg Brothers. Listen to Your Dead to Me now, wherever you can. Get your podcasts. The Industrial Revolution, which had begun in the late 18th century, blossoms during Victoria's reign, transforming Britain into a technological powerhouse. But the shift also comes with deep social change, disrupting traditional ways of life. Just a few decades before Victoria, the Luddite uprising marked an early, violent protest against industrialization.

The term Luddite originates with Ned Ludd, who destroyed a loom in protest, making his name synonymous with those opposing the rise of industrial machinery. In 1811, fearing the loss of their craftsmanship and livelihoods, the Luddites targeted the contraptions that were displacing skilled artisans, smashing factories, and destroying weaving and knitting machines. I think it's a shame the term Luddite now means this kind of unthinking, rejection of technology. It wasn't about the technology. It was about what the technology represented. I think it was a very thoughtful understanding of the long-term effects of these new machines

coming in and replacing workers and changing how work was done. While their movement was ultimately subdued by the state, their grievances and concerns are far from silenced. And now, as the machines march on, the social The divide between the wealthy factory owners and the workers made redundant only deepens. People's individual lives could absolutely be crushed by industrialization. If you are somebody who was a master weaver one day and then new machinery comes in and the boss fires you and you have no job, or he offers you a new job where you're going to make a third of the pay you once did, And it's not that you can go to the next town and find your old profession intact.

That job is just gone. And that protection of your skill is gone. And that respect of your skill is gone. At the heart of this rapid industrialization is the steam engine. Perfected by James Watt in the late 1700s, but really coming into its own now, steam power is crucial. Not just to factories, but also the same. machines, trains, and ships underpinning this revolution. Suddenly, both the mass production

and mass movement of goods is possible. The textile industry is one of the first to feel the impact. Factories driven by steam machines spring up across Manchester Leeds and other urban centres. Manchester is the first industrial city, going from a small market town in the late 18th century to what was dubbed Cottonopolis by the mid-19th century with the advent of the spinning jenny and industrialized spinning and weaving that would have transformed all elements of people's lives

not just from where you work but how you work what a work day looks like what your home life looks like all of that changes the cotton mills of Manchester churn out fabric at unprecedented speeds making clothing and textiles more affordable and accessible. As factories boom in the cities, the British economy flourishes, capitalising on the products, people and labour, at home and in the colonies. These were large industrial cities, certainly during Victoria's era,

where they were forced to work for poor wages and poor salary. These wages and this whole industrial complex was supported. by empire. Cotton is king, but cotton wasn't grown here in Britain. Tea isn't grown here. Coffee doesn't grow here. It had to be brought from elsewhere. So many of the things that we associate with the Industrial Revolution, so many of the things, the products that we associate with the Industrial Revolution came from the British Empire. And thanks to the growing railways, cities join the vast interconnected network of the realm. Goods are transported direct to major port towns from where they can be sent out to the colonies for trade,

just as more raw materials are shipped back to feed the machines. The system keeps the wheels of industry turning and fuels the empire. Soon the cities begin to swell, bringing in workers from the countryside. At the start of the 19th century, rural areas were home to around 80% of the population. population, drawn by the promise of steady wages in factories and far from the seasonal unpredictability of farm work. By 1850, around half of the British population lives in cities. Yet, while factory owners amass fortunes, the workers are left behind, toiling in unsafe conditions with long hours, poor ventilation and unsafe machinery.

Children, often no older than four or five, are also put to work. in these dangerous conditions. Their small hands are a perfect fit for the narrow gaps in factory machines, and they are tiny enough to crawl under the giant cotton looms to free trapped threads or jammed gears. It's a perilous existence, often resulting in awful, life-changing injuries and early deaths. But for many, it's the only option available.

And it's not just the conditions in the factories that cause problems. Life outside of work is equally challenging. These huge numbers of the people who began to arrive in the middle part of the 19th century in the places like Macclesfield, Sheffield, Leeds, Manchester. These people were not planned for. There was an extraordinary lack of planning in terms of sanitation, in terms of housing.

So whilst there was a desire for them to come and give their labour, there was very little being done about when that labour is finished. Where do they go back to? Where did they live? There was the construction of what became known as back-to-back housing. This was substandard for housing with often no sanitation. Inside these back-to-back houses, just two small rooms are nestled, one above the other.

They're usually shared by multiple families with little more than a single window for ventilation and no kitchen to speak of. And as the name suggests, the houses are tightly packed, backing onto each other in cramped rows. Houses crowded with each other in tenements and in estates

where the people are suffering from poverty and economic deprivation. In these slum estates, outhouses are shared between many. Human waste is dumped in pits that commonly overflow onto the streets. The lack of clean water leads to rampant disease and many thousands die in a series of cholera outbreaks. Life here is grueling, with little to no support for those who fall ill or lose their jobs. But even amid this stark inequality, reforms to public health are eventually triggered.

When you take a bird's eye view of the Industrial Revolution, everybody's life did get better from the bird's eye view. Life expectancy increases. Sanitation is improved. People's food is more nutritious. Death rates, infant mortality comes down. But that is looking from 100 years away and from 100 yards away. Yet at the other end of the economic spectrum, the improvements are clear.

With the rise of factories and entrepreneurialism, a new elite social group emerges, the industrialists. This new class is distinct from the traditional landed gentry, but they are equally wealthy and increasingly influential. Having amassed their fortunes through trade, manufacturing and industry, they form the core of a growing middle class which starts challenging deeply entrenched ideas of status and heritage. Suddenly, the class you are born into no longer entirely defines who you are, where you live, how you work, or what your future may hold.

I think what's interesting about the class structure of the 19th century is that we now are in a moment where the old forms of the class structure that it was built on, paternalism, that's gone, really. The newly acquired wealth of this burgeoning middle class now allows them to claim many of the social privileges. once reserved for the aristocracy. And by the mid-Victorian period, they become a force to be reckoned with, both economically and politically. They can send their children to school, acquire fine houses,

and enjoy leisure activities that were previously denied. As the wealth of Britain expanded, it was a wealth retained by the upper classes and the middle classes. But what is interesting about this process is that many of the middle classes became extraordinarily rich and extraordinarily famous.

And some working class people made good, became household names. The people like Isambard Kingdom, Brunel, this is a quite simple man who became the face of British industrialisation. Even so, while the Industrial Revolution creates opportunities for some to rise from the ranks of the poor, these breaks are still rare. Instead, it's the colonial empire with its immense exploitable wealth that provides the best routes for faster social advancement. Young men from middle-class families can now become merchants, military officers and businessmen, heading out to make their fortunes in the colonies. Whether they are off to run plantations in Jamaica or India or to manage gold-mining

operations in Africa. The path to fortune is already well beaten. When you arrived there, you were an explorer entering a brave new world. You were someone arriving at a place that had already been subdued, that had already been turned into a part of the empire, where the people spoke English. You could negotiate your position and your status very quickly. You could make wealth after a few years and you could return home and improve the status of your family. And that is what people do. Additionally, the army offers another avenue for advancement. Soldiers can rise through the ranks based on merit rather than birth, providing opportunities for lower class men to achieve a higher social status. But this surge of social mobility soon begins to challenge the old hierarchical

order, leading to demands for more representation and rights for the working class. During the middle part of the 19th century, a growing number of working class movements developed from trade union movements to combination movement and friendly societies which add a strong ideological part to play. But most of all, groups like the Chartists, the Chartists wanted ordinary people to have the vote. So we must remember that at this time, ordinary people People could not vote until we had the introduction of the reformer in the 19th century. The Chartists are a group of political reformers who emerge in the 1830s and 40s. In their so-called People's Charter, they push to extend voting rights to all men,

not just the property-owning classes. They also demand secret ballots to ensure that voters could cast their votes in private without fear of intimidation or coercion. In addition, they advocate relaxation of the qualifications needed to become an MP to enable working-class men without land or property to stand for Parliament. The Chartists are not just concerned with voting rights, but also with the wider conditions of democracy and representation in Britain. At the heart of their movement is the belief that the working class deserve a voice in a society

where the wealthy and aristocratic elite wield all of the power. Naturally, many in the upper classes don't quite agree. Chartist leaders are arrested, imprisoned, and even transported to Australia. But over time, the movement sparks the beginning of a wider debate about democracy and the role of the working class in society. The First Reform Act, passed in 1832, Expans the electorate by giving voting rights to more men, specifically those who own property or land valued at a certain amount. It's a step in the right direction, but the changes are still restricted along financial and gender lines.

While the act marks the beginning of political reform, full suffrage, even for working class men, let alone women, remains a distant goal. In fact, despite the emergence of social mobility, Victorian society still places a strong emphasis. on knowing one's place and sticking to it. Victorian morality, though, also was not just about self-help in the sense of social climbing. It was more this idea of knowing your place and doing the best version of that lifestyle. So working class people shouldn't try to be rich. Working class people should work hard. They should abstain from the pub.

They should come home and spend time with family. And if they do, they will be successful and not end up. up in the workhouse because, of course, poverty is a moral problem. At the very bottom of the social order are the destitute, who live in abject squalor, often in overcrowded slums, and their desperation sees them labeled as immoral or even criminal. Most Victorians thought that poverty was an individual moral failure. It was the result of improvidence, it was the result of drink, it was the result of laziness. This, This belief is entrenched, not just in social attitudes, but in Victorian law.

The poor law of 1834 discourages reliance on so-called poor relief by imposing harsh conditions on those asking for financial assistance. It reinforces the notion that only those who are seen as worthy should receive help. The idea that you were responsible for your own poverty was endemic. and even philanthropic efforts to help the poor were very cognizant of not wanting to disrupt patterns and to help out what they would call the unworthy poor. This is a very Victorian concept.

You have the deserving and the undeserving poor. Before the introduction of the poor law, someone who's fallen on hard times can ask the parish for short-term financial support. This piecemeal assistance known as outdoor relief allows recipients to remain in their homes while they try to improve their situation. For the Victorian mindset, and this starts in 1832 with this new law,

the theory was, that is terrible. You are encouraging improvidence in this family. He lost his job. He needs to find a new one tomorrow. And if you give him six months' worth of funds, he will spend six months in the pub, not looking for work. And so they really thought

that if people just buckled down and worked harder and tried harder, that was the solution to poverty. Now, for those who find they can't support themselves or their families, Victorian society provides another far bleaker option, the workhouse.

It's late November 1837 in London. The door of the workhouse canteen swings open with a loud creek and a woman steps in, a child hiding behind her skirts. They're wrapped in ill-fitting layers of anything they can find to stop the November cold biting at their skin, but still they shiver. The room is already full of women and children, sitting at long tables, scraping thin, spoonfuls of gruel into their hungry mouths. Their faces are hollowed, their eyes sunken into skin stretched tight. There is no time for talk, but then there is nothing

left to talk about. The woman clutches a metal plate in her hand, as does her young daughter at her heels. The yeasty smell of the gruel on offer barely masks the stench of sweat, decay and effluent. Her boots scrape across the worn wooden floor as she joins the food line, shuffling forward towards the great cast iron pan of the front. It's been a week since she stepped into this place, and already the empty pit in her stomach has become a constant companion. From what she's heard, though, over in the men's wing, it's even worse.

Some have been reduced to eating the very bones they're supposed to be crushing into fertiliser. She can only hope things don't become so desperate for her or her daughter. Reaching the front of the line, she encourages the child to raise her plate and watches in dismay as the thin, watery slop slides off the ladle and into the bowl. The girl waits, arms still raised, hoping for more, but the guardian behind the pan grunts her away. With their bowls as full as they'll get today, they squeeze into a spot on the end of a bench on one of the long tables, not even acknowledging the woman besides. them. The mother angles her shoulder over her bowl and begins her paltry meal, shielding her daughter from her neighbor's covetous gaze. There is no friendship here. They may all be in the

same boat, but they are not in this together. It's every woman for herself. Amendment Act of 1834 is presented as a place of relief for the needy. The belief is that providing aid in exchange for labor will stop people falling further into moral decay and encourage them to become self-sufficient again. In theory, it's a system that punishes laziness while offering a means to escape destitution through hard work. In practice, however, it is the lowest that a person can sink. Entering the workhouse is not a choice, but something that those

who can no longer support themselves or their families are forced into as the only option for survival. Precipitated by anything from loss of job to disability to simple poverty in old age, for many it becomes the final refuge. But it's one that takes with it all dignity, offering only the most basic subsistence in exchange for hard, degrading labor in notoriously harsh conditions. Even if a family enters the workhouse together, they are torn apart, with women and children separated from the men, apart from brief moments together on Sundays. For the rest of the week, the work is endless. Children in particular are used as cheap labour, working with dangerous machinery, breaking stone or carrying out mind-nummingly repetitive tasks for hours on end. For most inmates, the workhouse is worse than the streets, but despite the brutal reality of life inside, the system is seen by the broader public as a great symbol of philanthropy.

For many Victorians, it's the perfect way for the poor to redeem themselves through hard work and self-discipline. This view is starkly reflected in literature of the time, perhaps most notably in the work of Charles Dickens. We now hear Ebenezer Scrooge, and that discussion he has before he has reformed, where he explains poverty has been solved by, are there not workhouses? This is the solution we have created in the Victorian society. And if people don't want to go to workhouses and that they will die, the response is not that is terrible, we should come up with a new system.

The response is, good, it will decrease the surplus popular. abolition. Ebenezer Scrooge was a character, but he wasn't necessarily a caricature. Dickens was not speaking the normative values of his time. He was trying to get people to change their minds about poverty because Charles Dickens experienced poverty. In his other works, like Oliver Twist, Dickens directly criticizes the way workhouses treat the impoverished, particularly children. And he's not alone. Contemporaries like the Bronte sisters, George Elliott, and Thomas Hardy also explore themes of social injustice, morality, and the complexities of human nature. The growing genre of detective fiction, exemplified by

the works of Arthur Conan Doyle and others, mirrors growing public anxiety about the breakdown of order. Other famous faces have firsthand experience of the struggle to break free of the workhouses once entered. Perhaps the most famous workhouse inmate is Charlie Chaplin, who as a child, his mother had to put himself and his brother in a workhouse. And she one time checked them out of the workhouse just for the day so they could spend a day together and go to the park. And then in the evening, she had to check them all back in again. Because, of course, nothing in her life had changed. She was still destitute. She'd been abandoned by a partner. She couldn't all of a sudden turn things around. But that experience

must have been so heartbreaking for families. The decision to go into a workhouse was not taken lightly. With the workhouses acting as a means of punishment, society's most vulnerable, orphans, the elderly and the sick or disabled are victimized by the system that dehumanizes rather than helps them. To avoid entering the workhouses in the first place, some turn to more desperate measures to survive. Crime increased because people were denied the basic requirements, for human habitation, and when jobs weren't available, people were laid on. As the population swells, crime becomes endemic,

particularly in urban areas where poverty and overcrowding create fertile ground for theft, violence, and other nefarious activities. Yet, rather than understand crime as a consequence of these social conditions, the Victorian approach is grounded in the belief that deterrence is the key. The harsher the punishment, the less likely it is that others will commit the same offences. For the Victorians, punishment is not meant to rehabilitate, but to instill fear. And the penalties meted out are often extreme. A person caught stealing a loaf of bread, a crime committed out of sheer desperation,

could face flogging, imprisonment, transportation to the colonies, or even public hanging. But since the system reinforces the belief, that the poor are responsible for their own suffering, the law doesn't differentiate between crimes of necessity and those of malice. So, a simple act of survival, like stealing food or coal, is punished as harshly as murder. Crime was something that happened throughout all classes in society, but the law was focused on the working class and the law was focused

on protecting the rights of the middle and the upper class from the work. from the working class. So the development of the police service by people like Robert Peel, their prime concern was about protecting private property, protecting the means of production, protecting the wealthy and the rich from the crimes that could be committed by the poor. This view permeates the entire justice system

and leads to an imbalance of penalties levied against the poor, with wealthier individuals rarely held, to the same standards. The rise in crime, especially in the cities, creates a sudden need for organized policing. In London, Sir Robert Peel establishes the first modern police force in the world. His officers are known informally as Bobbys or Peelers, both derivatives of his name, and they take on the work previously conducted by parish constables, watchmen or volunteers. Soon they become an organized crime prevention unit, patrolling the streets,

maintaining order and investigating misdeeds. By the 1830s, the idea of organized police forces has spread to other large cities like Liverpool and Manchester, with more and more people hauled up in front of the ballooning justice system. The number of executions reaches its peak around this point, with well over 100 a year taking place, nearly double the figure of the early 1800s. Meanwhile, transportation sentences see 3,000.

thousands of people sent to the colonies each year, often for very petty crimes like pig-pocketing or vagrancy. Yet as the years pass, the gruesome spectacle of public executions begins to have the opposite effect of its intended purpose. It had the effect of increasing sympathy and of spreading lawlessness because people would say, well, if I'm going to be executed, if I'm caught, then I will exert exercise. extraordinary violence in pursuit of my action. Because if I'm arrested, then it's over.

So the increasing violence by members of the state produce increasing violence on the part of the criminal groups and gang. At the same time, though, a broader wave of discontent begins to stir. The masses, once spectators in this brutal theatre, now see the system as stacked against them. against them. As the working class grows restless, the cries for political and social reform grow louder. What starts as discontent with unfair punishment turns into a broader questioning of the whole Victorian system itself. While those at the top continue to enforce strict

societal control, working class movements start to gain momentum, driven by anger at the treatment of the poor and the lack of political representation. When a group of of farm laborers known as the Toll Puddle Martyrs are sent to Australia for trying to form a trade union. The backlash is swift and widespread. Thousands of workers across the country rally in support, protesting, demonstrating, and petitioning, until the authorities are finally forced to pardon the men and allow them to come home. But the touch paper has been lit on the idea of political reform, and it's not just for the workers or the poor.

This is especially the case in Ireland, by now having been under colonial rule for centuries. The Great Famine, a devastating period of mass starvation triggered by a potato blight, but exacerbated by enforced exports to Britain, and the ongoing, relentless emigration see a rise in nationalism and a desire for an independent Irish Republic. The Fenian Brotherhood is an Irish nationalist, group that seeks to end British rule in Ireland through any means necessary. They believe that by targeting British institutions and symbols of imperial power, they can force the government to address the issue of Irish independence. The violent tactics of these revolutionary groups are aimed at empire itself, challenging

British control not only in Ireland but across the colonies. When a gang of these nationalists carry out a bombing in Clarkinwell in 1867, intended to free Irish inmates from the local prison, the explosion kills 12 innocent civilians and injures over 100, all in an area that had previously been sympathetic to the Irish cause. The authorities respond swiftly, drafting in 65,000 Londoners from a city of around 3 million people to act as special constables to avert any further attacks, and they bring with them the full weight of the law. It is May 26, 1868, outside Newgate Prison, London. It's just after dawn, and the crowd where the prison is filling out, as more people take up their places at the barricades. Those in the prime spots at the front have been here since last night,

eager to secure a good view for the macabre spectacle to come. A man in his mid-30s, an ironmonger wearing a threadbare coat and a faded cap, stands amid the growing mass of humanity. His eyes, tired but alert, scan the crowd, fearful that among them sympathizers of the condemned man may be planning trouble. He looks up as the deal frame, the platform that forms the base of the gallows is wheeled into place. The sight of it sends a wave of excited murmurs through those assembled. A few cheer as the blackened frame is locked in place, but the ironmonger doesn't join in. He, like many here, is not fully convinced of Michael Barrett's part in the Clarkinwell bombing. But though Barrett It produced witnesses claiming he was in Scotland at the time of the explosion.

The authorities needed a scapegoat. So, guilty or not, his fate is sealed and he's to hang here today. By about 7 a.m., the crowd is immense, and police, with swords raised, form a further barricade to keep the space around the gallows clear. Eventually, they catch sight of the condemned man, as he is led from a dive. darkened gate in the prison wall into the harsh daylight. With a shout, the crowd surges forward, carrying the ironmonger with it, pressing him tight to the bodies around him. He watches as Barrett is led towards the gallows.

He's dressed in the same short, claret-coloured coat and grey striped trousers that he wore during his trial. His face now, though, is ghostly pale. The bell begins to toll, and the crowd falls silent. Despite his hands and legs being shackled, Barrett climbs the ladder to the scaffold with firm, deliberate movements. As he reaches the top, a small cheer goes up from those keen to show their support for him and his cause in these final moments. The ironmonger straightens, vigilant for any signs of disruption to the events at hand, despite

his ambivalence. But the cheering is soon drowned out by furious hissing, as other onlookers show their contempt. Barely has the noose been lowered, then the trapdoor opens with a sudden crack, and the body falls. A collective breath is held, then released, neither a cheer nor a scream. And then, from somewhere at the back, a chorus of Rule Britannia strikes up, as the body is lowered and the noose removed. The crowd disperses, some jostling for a view of the pronouncement of death, some already turning to leave. The ironmonger lingers, watching as the sheriff and his deputies carry the body away, their faces solemn and holler. It is over. Td Bank knows that running a small business is a journey,

from startup to growing and managing your business. That's why they have a dedicated small business advice hub on their website, to provide tips and insights on business banking to entrepreneurs, no matter the stage of business you're in. Visit td.com slash small business advice to find out more or to match with a TD small business banking account manager. The execution of Michael Barrett is the last public hanging in Britain. Fearing that the public spectacle is making heroes of criminals

and actually encouraging worse crimes to be committed by those sure they'll be hanged for less, the decision is made to remove them from the public gaze. From this moment on, for the next almost 100 years, hangings will take place inside prison walls. But the growing social, political and ideological fractures that Barrett and other outspoken protesters symbolize continue to widen. Beneath the surface of industrial progress and empire, the widespread poverty, labor exploitation, high crime rates,

and simmering discontent with the rigid class system are only getting worse. The key thing about empire is that even though it may have its protestations of equality and justice, It is primarily built on inequality, and those aspects of inequality will rise to the surface without authority. People will begin to question, why can I not now use those same mechanism to remove myself from your authority and power and to develop my own? Why can't I have my own place in the sun? Growing demands for women's rights challenge the very foundations of Victorian gender norms.

Meanwhile, discontent in the colony's swells and control becomes harder to maintain, leading to increasing violence and resistance. Technological advancements will continue to transform society, but those in the scientific fields shift how people view the world and their place in it, challenging religious order and the faith of the nation. And even as Victoria attempts to unite Europe through her family ties, the balance of power on the continent begins to crack, heralding a new era of political and global unrest.

But that's in part two, where we continue exploring what the Victorian era brought us and why it lingers in the modern mind. I think the appeal of the Victorians is they are the germ of the ideas that we live with now and a lot of the debates that we have now you can find an earlier incarnation in the 19th century. But they're also just different enough to be fascinating

with their corsets and their funny gloves and hats and veils and rules about everything and anything. So I think a lot of people see them as modern enough to be relatable, but also strange enough to have a nostalgia for. If you can't wait a week until the next day, episode, you can listen to it right away by subscribing to Noyser Plus. Head to www.noyser.com forward slash subscriptions for more information. Hungry now. Now? Now?

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