Category Archives: Uncategorized

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Alice Glaston
Probably the youngest female to be legally executed in England, in 1546.

Buttock Mail
Fine payable to the ecclesiastical courts for the crime of fornication, as an alternative to a session on the stool of repentance.

Gropecunt Lane
Street name found in English towns and cities during the Middle Ages, believed to be a reference to the prostitution centred on those areas; it was normal practice for a medieval street name to reflect the street’s function or the economic activity taking place within it.

Henry Goodcole
Chaplain of Newgate Prison and author of criminal biographies, the most important of which is that of Elizabeth Sawyer.

Leigh silk industry
Leigh’s silk industry grew after 1827 in and around the area of the old parish when silk was woven on domestic hand looms and later in weaving sheds using silk yarn supplied from Macclesfield by agents from Manchester.

Margaret Clap
Owner with her husband of a notorious molly house in 18th-century London.

North Western Gas Board
Former state-owned utility area gas board providing gas for light and heat to industries and homes in the north-west of England.

Pedrail Wheel
Type of all-terrain wheel developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries by Bramah Joseph Diplock.

Pinfold
Enclosure in which stray domestic animals, cattle, sheep, pigs, geese were kept until their owners paid a fine to collect them.

Plague stones
Hollowed out stones or boulders containing vinegar to disinfect coins, usually placed at or near parish boundaries, relics of medieval plagues.

Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge
Society founded in London in 1826 to publish cheap and accessible works on scientific and artistic subjects.

Whipping Tom
Name given to two sex offenders, one in London and the other in the nearby village of Hackney, active in 1681 and 1712 respectively.

White Cross Army
Organisation set up in 1883 by the social campaigner and author Ellice Hopkins, together with the Bishop of Durham, to promote “social purity”.