Thief-Taker General

Thief-Taker General PDF Author: Gerald Howson
Publisher: Transaction Publishers
ISBN: 9781412839884
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 390

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Book Description
The historical literature of political deviance is sparse. This unusual work, chronicling the history of Jonathan Wild, represents an effort to come to terms with one of the more amazing characters of English social history. Wild was both part of the policy system in eighteenth-century England, and also one of the most adroit criminals of the age. In the 1720s, London suffered the worst crime waves in its history. Civic corruption took place on a staggering scale. The government's answer was to pay a bounty for the capture of robbers, thus creating a class of professional informers. Wild was applauded as the most efficient thief hunter and gang breaker in British society; but his own posse of thief catchers was basically a front behind which he was able to control the underground world, through a complex system of blackmail, perjury, and terror which the book details. All who opposed him were betrayed to the law, and in the struggle for power Wild sacrificed several hundred of his own people to the hangman. No one since his time, with the exception of Lavrenti Beria of the late Stalin era GPU so nearly succeeded in bringing the underworld under the control of one system of power. At one level, this is a biography of the world's first supercriminal. At another, it is a sociology of criminal behavior and its political consequences. Howson sheds fresh light, not only on a figure who has become famous in literature, but more important, on the entire structure of gang life. The book is written "as a "terrifying and fascinating study of a historical epoch; it also offers a completely fresh picture of the birth of modern organized-crime families as part of modern organized political systems.

Thief-Taker General

Thief-Taker General PDF Author: Gerald Howson
Publisher: Transaction Publishers
ISBN: 9781412839884
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 390

Get Book Here

Book Description
The historical literature of political deviance is sparse. This unusual work, chronicling the history of Jonathan Wild, represents an effort to come to terms with one of the more amazing characters of English social history. Wild was both part of the policy system in eighteenth-century England, and also one of the most adroit criminals of the age. In the 1720s, London suffered the worst crime waves in its history. Civic corruption took place on a staggering scale. The government's answer was to pay a bounty for the capture of robbers, thus creating a class of professional informers. Wild was applauded as the most efficient thief hunter and gang breaker in British society; but his own posse of thief catchers was basically a front behind which he was able to control the underground world, through a complex system of blackmail, perjury, and terror which the book details. All who opposed him were betrayed to the law, and in the struggle for power Wild sacrificed several hundred of his own people to the hangman. No one since his time, with the exception of Lavrenti Beria of the late Stalin era GPU so nearly succeeded in bringing the underworld under the control of one system of power. At one level, this is a biography of the world's first supercriminal. At another, it is a sociology of criminal behavior and its political consequences. Howson sheds fresh light, not only on a figure who has become famous in literature, but more important, on the entire structure of gang life. The book is written "as a "terrifying and fascinating study of a historical epoch; it also offers a completely fresh picture of the birth of modern organized-crime families as part of modern organized political systems.

Thief-Taker General

Thief-Taker General PDF Author: Gerald Howson
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Criminals
Languages : en
Pages : 338

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Book Description


Thief-Taker General

Thief-Taker General PDF Author: Gerald Howson
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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The Thief-Taker Hangings

The Thief-Taker Hangings PDF Author: Aaron Skirboll
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1493014234
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 325

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Book Description
After the Glorious Revolution, a not so glorious age of lawlessness befell England. Crime ran rampant, and highwaymen, thieves, and prostitutes ruled the land. Execution by hanging often punished the smallest infractions, and rip-roaring stories of fearless criminals proliferated, giving birth to a new medium: the newspaper. In 1724, housebreaker Jack Sheppard—a “pocket Hercules,” his small frame packed with muscle—finally met the hangman. Street singers sang ballads about the Cockney burglar because no prison could hold him. Each more astonishing than the last, his final jailbreak took him through six successive locked rooms, after which he shimmied down two blankets from the prison roof to the street below. Just before Sheppard swung, he gave an account of his life to a writer in the crowd. Daniel Defoe stood in the shadow of the day’s literati—Swift, Pope, Gay—and had done hard time himself for sedition and bankruptcy. He saw how prison corrupted the poor. They came out thieves, but he came out a journalist. Six months later, the author of Robinson Crusoe and Moll Flanders covered another death at the hanging tree. Jonathan Wild looked every bit the brute—body covered in scars from dagger, sword, and gun, bald head patched with silver plates from a fractured skull—and he had all but invented the double-cross. He cultivated young thieves, profited from their work, then turned them in for his reward—and their execution. But one man refused to play his game. Sheppard didn’t take orders from this self-proclaimed “thief-taker general,” nor would he hawk his loot through Wild’s fences. The two-faced bounty hunter took it personally and helped bring the young burglar’s life to an end. But when Wild’s charade came to light, he quickly became the most despised man in the land. When he was hanged for his own crimes, the mob wasn’t rooting for Wild as it had for Sheppard. Instead, they hurled stones, rotten food, and even dead animals at him. Defoe once again got the scoop, and tabloid journalism as we know it had begun.

Thief-Taker General

Thief-Taker General PDF Author: Gerald Howson
Publisher: Transaction Publishers
ISBN: 9780887380327
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 338

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Book Description
The historical literature of political deviance is sparse. This unusual work, chronicling the history of Jonathan Wild, represents an effort to come to terms with one of the more amazing characters of English social history. Wild was both part of the policy system in eighteenth-century England, and also one of the most adroit criminals of the age. In the 1720s, London suffered the worst crime waves in its history. Civic corruption took place on a staggering scale. The government's answer was to pay a bounty for the capture of robbers, thus creating a class of professional informers. Wild was applauded as the most efficient thief hunter and gang breaker in British society; but his own posse of thief catchers was basically a front behind which he was able to control the underground world, through a complex system of blackmail, perjury, and terror which the book details. All who opposed him were betrayed to the law, and in the struggle for power Wild sacrificed several hundred of his own people to the hangman. No one since his time, with the exception of Lavrenti Beria of the late Stalin era GPU so nearly succeeded in bringing the underworld under the control of one system of power. At one level, this is a biography of the world's first supercriminal. At another, it is a sociology of criminal behavior and its political consequences. Howson sheds fresh light, not only on a figure who has become famous in literature, but more important, on the entire structure of gang life. The book is written as a terrifying and fascinating study of a historical epoch; it also offers a completely fresh picture of the birth of modern organized-crime families as part of modern organized political systems.

The Thief-Takers

The Thief-Takers PDF Author: Sheldon S. Steinberg
Publisher: Strategic Book Publishing
ISBN: 160911258X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 431

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Book Description
Master Foundryman Peter Garye is seeking revenge upon the villains who brutally murdered his father on their farm in Staffordshire, England. But his journey of vengeance takes an unexpected turn when he foils a highwayman's attempted robbery and ends up learning the lucrative practice of thief-taking - capturing and turning in criminals for reward money. As Peter continues the search for his father's killers, he and his partner, George Ludlow, realize their not-so-legitimate business venture is as dangerous as it is profitable. As they attempt to foil the criminal plans of notorious Thief-Taker General Jonathan Wild, Peter and George suddenly find themselves targets in an elaborate scheme crafted by the very mastermind behind Peter's father's death. Based on actual events in 18th century London, The Thief-Takers is an intriguing latticework of greed, deception and cold-blooded justice. Dr. Sheldon S. Steinberg has written numerous health-related publications and was lead author on Government, Ethics, and Managers, A Guide to Solving Ethical Dilemmas in the Public Sector. He taught personal and community health at Brooklyn and Queens Colleges in New York City and Southern Illinois University. Dr. Steinberg also directed public and professional education programs for various companies and contracts with federal agencies. He and his wife, Stella, have been married for 61 years and have four children and five grandchildren. They live in Silver Spring, Maryland. http: //www.strategicpublishinggroup.com/title/TheThief-Takers.htm

Thief-taker General

Thief-taker General PDF Author: Michael Crouch (Illustrator)
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Comic books, strips, etc
Languages : en
Pages : 28

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Book Description


The Life of Jonathan Wilde

The Life of Jonathan Wilde PDF Author: H. D.
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 40

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Book Description


The Fatal Tree

The Fatal Tree PDF Author: Jake Arnott
Publisher: Sceptre
ISBN: 1473637775
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 352

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Book Description
Newgate Gaol, 1726. An anonymous writer sets down the words of Edgworth Bess as she confides the adventures and misfortunes that led her all too soon to the judgement of London: Cruelly deceived, Bess is cast out onto the streets of the wicked city - and by nightfall her ruin is already certain. What matters now is her survival of it. In that dangerous underworld known in thieves' cant as Romeville, she will learn new tricks and trades. And all begins with her fateful meeting, that very first night, with the corrupt thief-taker general Jonathan Wild. But it is the infamous gaol-breaker, Jack Sheppard, who will lay Romeville at her feet . . . Drawing on the true story that mesmerised eighteenth-century society, the acclaimed author of The Long Firm delivers a tour de force: a riveting, artful tale of crime and rough justice, love and betrayal. Rich in the street slang of the era, it vividly conjures up a murky world of illicit dens and molly-houses; a world where life was lived on the edge, in the shadow of that fatal tree - the gallows. Includes a glossary.

Jonathan Wild the Thief Taker General of England

Jonathan Wild the Thief Taker General of England PDF Author: Graham bell
Publisher: CreateSpace
ISBN: 9781507860212
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 58

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Book Description
THIS IS THE STORY OF THE GREATEST CRIMINAL MASTERMIND THAT ENGLAND HAS EVER PRODUCED JONATHAN WILD A REAL 17OO'S GANGSTER