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The Condition of the Working Class in England
www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/
1845/condition-working-class/
In 1844, Frederick Engels writes a book that paints an unforgettable picture of daily life in the new industrial towns of England. This classic piece of social history is now available to read online.

The Criminal Law Amendment Act of 1885 and Sexual Assault on Minors
www.geocities.com/Athens/Aegean/7023/
Consent.html
A detailed account of editor W T Stead and his 'Maiden Tribute' articles in the Pall Mall Gazette, generally credited with hastening the passage of the Criminal Justice Amendment Act, raising the age of consent to 16 in 1885.

Health and Hygiene in the 19th century
www.victorianweb.org/science/health/
health10.html
Extract from Bruce Haley's book The Healthy Body and Victorian Culture, which covers the outbreak of cholera in 1831 and the mortality rates of Victorian Britain.

John Snow – a historical giant in epidemiology
www.ph.ucla.edu/epi/snow.html
Includes layers of information that enable users to dig deeply into Snow's background, pursue the facts surrounding his investigation of the 1854 epidemic and locate key sites on a detailed period map of London, with relevant events tied to particular locations. Also includes: links to present-day information on cholera and the London Epidemiological Society, founded by Snow; a photographic tour of Snow's London; and a peek at the John Snow Pub.

Josephine Butler (1828-1906)
www.pinn.net/~sunshine/whm2001/
butler2.html
Biography of the woman who fights organised prostitution and works to improve the conditions of prostitutes themselves.

McGonagall Online: The Tay Bridge Disaster
www.mcgonagall-online.org.uk/poems/
pgdisaster.htm
William McGonagall's inimitable poem plus a brief history of the railway disaster and some good links.

The Railway Accident
www.york.ac.uk/inst/irs/irshome/papers/
rlyacc.htm
Subtitled 'Trains, trauma and technological crisis in 19th-century Britain', this article by Ralph Harrington of the Institute of Railway Studies, York, describes in great detail the accidents that marked Victorian Britain and their consequences.

The Reading Baby Farmer: Amelia Dyer
www.thamesvalley.police.uk/news_info/info
/museum/dyer.htm#dyer1
Extensive article from the Thames Valley Police website, which concentrates on the evidence and investigation of the Dyer case.

State Involvement in Public Education Prior to the 1870 Education Act
www.victorianweb.org/history/education/rosen.html
Short article on what educational opportunities were available to most children before the 1870 act.

Victorian Social History: An overview
www.victorianweb.org/history/sochistov.html
Links to variety of articles about conditions of life and labour, which look at Victorian occupations, child labour, wages and the cost of living and the lack of social security.

Victorians Uncovered
www.channel4.com/history/microsites/V/
victorians/index.html
Lifts the skirts of 19th-century respectability during which time child-prostitution flourished, white slavery was rife and the age of consent was 12.

The Workhouse
www.workhouses.org.uk
Well-illustrated history of the workhouse in Britain.

Books

City of Dreadful Delight: Narratives of sexual danger in late-Victorian London by Judith Walkowitz (Virago Press, 1992)
A study of late-Victorian London life: the music hall; spectator sports; the mingling of high and low life; sexual repression; scandal and the policing of women.
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The Complete History of Jack the Ripper by Philip Sugden (Constable & Robinson, 2002)
A comprehensive account of London's celebrated East End killer. The murders in London between 1888 and 1891 attributed to Jack the Ripper constitute some of the most mysterious unsolved criminal cases. The author reassesses all the evidence and challenges everything we thought we knew about the Victorian serial killer and the vanished East End he terrorised.
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Crime and Society in England 1750-1900 by Clive Emsley (Longman, 1996)
Examines changes in crime and the criminal justice system against the larger changes in an industrialising society, including a chapter on crime and gender.
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The English Vice: Beating, sex and shame in Victorian England and after by Ian Gibson (Duckworth, 1979)
An insight into the murkier side of the Victorians with research taken from the correspondence columns in the periodicals of Victorian England – sub-pornographic letters that appeared in the genteel women's magazines.
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The Hanging Tree: Execution and the English people 1770-1868 by Vic Gatrell (Oxford Paperbacks, 1996)
Using eyewitness accounts, pamphlets and broadsheets of the time, Gatrell vividly depicts what life was like for those witnessing or awaiting execution at Tyburn or Newgate on hanging day.
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Jabez: The rise and fall of a Victorian scoundrel by David McKie (Atlantic Books, 2004)
Jabez Spencer Balfour was a businessman, philanthropist, politician, temperance campaigner and charmer. He was also a charismatic swindler who perpetrated the most destructive fraud of the 19th century – the Robert Maxwell of Victorian England.
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Mutton and Oysters: Food, cooking and eating in Victorian times by Sarah Freeman (Gollancz, 1989)
Social history of Victorian eating habits ranging from those of highest society to the lowliest workhouse, and including shopping, markets and the great scams, home-produced food and imports, drink, cooks and cookery writers, meals and entertaining, nutrition and the first vegetarians, eating out.
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Unsolved Victorian Murders by Jonathan Sutherland (Breedon Books, 2002)
Victorian criminals got away with murder. The police often made mistakes, forensic science was in its infancy and juries sent people to the gallows on the flimsiest of evidence. The author reviews the stories, evidence and trials to shed new light on the verdicts passed by the judges and juries of the 19th century.
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The Victorian Workhouse by Trevor May (Shire Publications, 1997)
Discusses the Poor Laws and the philosophy behind the workhouses and unions in Victorian Britain. Original quotations and pictures bring the horrors of this environment to life.
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