Crime City: Manchester's Victorian Underworld

by Joseph O'Neill

MANCHESTER EVENING NEWS
'A rollicking tale packed with characters and incident.'

IRISH POST
'Fascinating.'

FAMILY HISTORY MONTHLY
'A thought-provoking history and sociology punctuated by passages that would grace a well-written thriller.'

YOUR FAMILY TREE
'A a great collection of stories and fascinating social history.'

ANCESTORS MAGAZINE
'A masterly survey.'

Product Description
Victorian Manchester was once described as a 'city of two classes', a rogue's paradise where vast wealth sat beside grinding poverty. It was unique, and so was its underworld.

Historian Joseph O'Neill recreates the sights, sounds and smells of a lost milieu in all their fascinating detail. He chronicles the era's crooks, cracksmen, pimps, prostitutes, conmen, garrotters and bareknuckle fighters, and the gin palaces, dance halls and cheap brothels that were as much a part of Manchester as giant cotton mills. .

Here are legendary detective Jerome Caminada, the super-criminal Charlie Peace, street gangs like the Bengal Tigers, and myriad other characters like One-Armed Dick, the infamous fence, all denizens of a time when brutality was commonplace and death lurked down every alley.

Genres: History, Crime, Nonfiction

304 pages, Kindle Edition

First published March 20, 2008

Reviews

[Martine Bailey · Rating 3 out of 5]

Although researching a slightly earlier period, I was intrigued to read this account of Victorian Manchester - a 'city of two classes', a rogue's paradise where vast wealth sat beside grinding poverty.

On one level it does deliver rather undigested accounts of the era's crooks, cracksmen, pimps, prostitutes and conmen. But where are the sources of all this information? As a lover of the obscure footnote and peruser of bibliographies, it was incredibly disappointing.

[Trevor · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book promises so much and delivers less! I thought this was a book about crime in Manchester, that's what it purports to but it starts off so slow. You have to get 44 pages in before there's even a hint of crime and then it's just talking about categories of crime rather than the crimes themselves.

There's a few cases in there but overall it's disappointing.

[Ali · Rating 1 out of 5]

A bizarre book. Recounts endless stories and statistics with no sources, citing examples from Manchester, Greater Manchester, Liverpool, and London.

Presents a Victorian 'crime' lens of the poor, unemployment, criminals, women, and then doubles down by demonizing the poor, immigrants, the unemployed, the working class, women, and sex workers.

Don't waste your time.

[George Dean · Rating 3 out of 5]

Informative for research purposes.

[Matthew · Rating 4 out of 5]

V good

[David Fraser · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting study of crime and society in Victorian Manchester.

[Tobias Schmidt-Gönner · Rating 2 out of 5]

Hard Work to get through this book.
The Author tried to liven it up with examples, but somehow failed to make it better with this constant namedropping of people I have never heard about.