Dredd to Thieftakers Volume 2- VICTORIANS
Victorian Nottingham and Crime
For my first game I used a map of Nottingham from the 1820s but by 1901 the town had become a city. The map bellow shows the progress of the Victorians. The city has obviously grown with the edition of the railway and the predominant industry in textiles such as lace along with other big Nottingham employers such as Boots chemists and Players cigarettes. 
Victorian city development gives us some new locations on the map such as Arboretum parks, railway stations and gas works and water pumping stations. Lunatic asylums, prisons and police stations along with the same locations from my last game board. This new environment does reflect the crimes you would commonly see such as stealing from the new growth in shops and from employers textile mills. Theft from goods trains at the station had replaced highway robbery and drunkenness was a growing concern with violent crime growing in the home between drunk couples. Alcohol had a big part to play in violent crimes and murders. 
Between 1834 and 1878 seven men where hanged in public in Nottingham but all of them had committed murders in the county rather than in the town (City status was given in 1897) making them rural killers like an episode of midsummer murders. Killings in villages and woods around Nottingham but none in the town. In the 1880s that changed with killers originating from drunken killings of women by partners. By then the executions were private but it showed a change in crime. The biggest gap was 16 years in between executions so murder wasn't as common as people think. Despite this killings did happen in urban areas but the culprits were imprisoned usually due to mental health reasons rather than hanged. The Victorians were starting to recognize this more than their Georgian ancestors. 
Ill be making a list of "Perps" from the records giving me the best range of criminals from the era, from killers, abortionists, drunks, thieves and even a man caught having sex with a donkey. The assizes records are full of good candidates..
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