Civil parish
Smallest administrative unit in England.
Herring girls
Women and girls who travelled across Scotland to gut and pack fish in the fishing ports on the east coast of Britain.
Sponging house
A sponging house was a place of temporary confinement for those arrested for non-payment of a debt.
Harris’s List of Covent Garden Ladies
Annual directory of prostitutes working in Georgian London, published from 1757 until 1795.
Imperial War Museum North
Museum in the Metropolitan Borough of Trafford in Greater Manchester, England. One of five branches of the Imperial War Museum, it explores the impact of modern conflicts on people and society.
Eastbourne manslaughter
1860 legal case concerning the death of 15-year-old Reginald Cancellor at the hands of his teacher, Thomas Hopley.
James Humphreys (pornographer)
English business and criminal who ran a chain of adult book shops and strip clubs in London. He was able to operate his business by bribing serving police officers.
Act of Uniformity 1558
One of the Acts of Parliament collectively known as the Elizabethan Religious Settlement. It introduced a Common Book of Prayer, and obliged everyone to attend their parish church every Sunday and on holy days. Those who refused were known as recusants.
Society for Psychical Research
Registered charity founded in 1882 to conduct scientific investigations into psychic and paranormal phenomena.
Byrom, Allen, Sedgwick and Place
The first bank in Manchester, founded in 1771. It collapsed in 1788 when one of its major borrowers declared bankruptcy.