Little Ilford gaol’s staff and supervision

Little Ilford gaol, like its contemporaries, operated under a strict regime of regulation and supervision. Every key postholder was held to a high standard of accountability for their actions. The Essex Quarter Sessions, for instance, appointed two or three “Visiting Magistrates” from their ranks, who oversaw the gaol on behalf of the county. They came very much from the privileged end of society, as the brief biographies of two of the more significant of their number – at the end of this article – show.

Visting Magistrates

They were expected to provide quarterly reports on conditions at the establishment and to furnish detailed breakdowns of costs, responsibilities, and staff appointments.

Upon receipt of the Visiting Magistrates' quarterly reports, the Quarter Sessions were obligated to compile annual statements on the gaol's conditions for the Home Secretary. These reports, many of which are archived in the Essex County Records Office, were not kept secret. The Essex Quarter Sessions were open to the press, and summaries of the reports were regularly published in local newspapers, ensuring the gaol's operations were subject to public accountability.

As the ultimate authority, the Quarter Sessions exercised significant control over the gaol's operations. They directly appointed key personnel such as the governor, chaplain, and surgeon and required regular reports from the governor. Their influence extended to the conditions within the gaol, dictating everything from the prisoners' diets to the clothing and bedding they were provided.

The tone was set for Little Ilford gaol just before it opened at the Quarter Sessions in July 1831.

During a discussion on conditions in local prisons. William Pole Wellesley, the wastrel whose profligacy led to the destruction of Wanstead House and local MP, expressed a reasonably liberal view for the time, arguing against the imposition of the harshest conditions. 

Essex magistrate, William Pole Wellesley, the wastrel whose property adjoined Little Ilford gaol, had surprisngly liberal views about prison conditions. Etching from c 1827, a little before gaol contruction was underway. Etching couresy of Greg Roberts.

Pole Wellesley was quickly refuted by RW Hall-Dare, who was to be one of the initial visiting magistrates. The Essex and Herts Mercury of 5 July 1831 could not have been clearer in reporting Hall’s vindictive stance:

I am about in the short term to report on the state of Ilford gaol, which in a week or two will be ready for prisoners … It is the duty of magistrates to keep the prisoners in safe custody. I believe a gaol ought to be a place of suffering, so much so, indeed, as to operate on the mind and body of one in confinement in such a way as to induce him to say: “If ever I get out of this place, they shall never catch me here again” … many who are out of gaol are in a much worse condition than those confined within its wall (Hear). A gaol is intended, as it ought, to be a place of suffering; we should not only be acted upon by a sort of pseudo philanthropy, which may be pleasing to our feelings but would nevertheless operate against the best interest of society.

From the 1840s, the House of Commons published annual statistical surveys on data relating to prisons nationwide (staff numbers and pay, details of prisoners, etc.), and the Essex Quarter Sessions produced fairly detailed summaries on the conditions of the gaols and detention centres under their purview. Visiting magistrates at Little Ilford, certainly in the early days of its existence, often used these reports to provide evidence for them to embark on a race to the bottom for conditions in local gaols.

However, from the 1860s, two more liberal magistrates took on the roles—John Gurney Fry and William Swainson Suart. They were men of financial substance with significant other public service records before becoming visiting magistrates (see brief biographies at the end).

Their contributions to discussions about the gaol and proposals for changes were usually aimed at improving conditions for staff and prisoners rather than being simply cost-cutting and punitive.

Staff

Staff numbers varied a little throughout the history of the gaol, but a typical complement was eight, comprising: a governor (in 1844 paid £150 p.a.), a chaplain – always CofE (£100), a surgeon (medical officer would be a more appropriate term today) (£40), the principal turnkey (£67), assistant turnkey and schoolmaster – this post would report to the chaplain – see later (£52), assistant turnkey and baker (£52), cook and labourer (15s per week, i.e £39 p.a.) and matron (£20p.a.) (source ERO QAGp 15). [Turnkeys were what today we would call wardens].

Initially, only the governor and his family lived on the premises, but additional staff accommodation was built above the brew and bakehouses for wardens in the 1840s. During the 1871 census, staff living within the gaol included the governor, the senior warden, his wife - the assistant matron - and two other prison wardens who were lodgers in the senior warden’s dwelling.

Occasionally, there was no turnkey who could double up as schoolmaster, in which case “the most orderly and competent of the adult prisoners being from time to time employed as a teacher under my (the chaplain’s) supervision” (ERO 1832).

Staff wages varied over the gaol's history, but comparative statistics with other prisons showed that they tended to be on the low side in Little Ilford. William Stringer was the longest-serving governor, occupying the role for almost the last twenty years of the gaol’s existence, but barely saw a doubling of his pay over the period.

Interestingly, on average, there was a ratio of about 7 inmates to one staff member in the gaol, compared to about 30 children to one staff member in the children’s workhouse on Forest Lane later in the century. 

As indicated earlier, the Quarter Sessions and the visiting magistrates tightly defined the staff's working conditions and job descriptions.

The governor

The Governor was required to keep up to 30 different journals and log books about prison life, which were open to regular inspection by visiting magistrates. They included: the governor’s journal, a separate journal/day book for each member of staff, the provision dietary book, a bedding and clothing book, a quarterly account book, a ledger, a cash book and day book, prisoners received and prisoners discharged books, a prisoners’ punishment book, an inventory of books furnished by the chaplain and volumes dedicated to reports written to visiting magistrates, and the Quarter Sessions, as well as correspondence ledgers and a prisoners’ misconduct book.

In the early 1840s, the governor, John Anderson, gave a detailed statement of his daily routine to the Quarter Sessions as part of a bid for a pay rise (ERO QAGp 15). If it was accurate, he was a busy man.

He said his day started by ensuring the turnkeys were in the correct uniform, and the prisoners were unlocked and set to work by them (6 a.m. in the summer, 7 a.m. in winter). He supervised breakfast at 8 a.m. and met with the schoolmaster to review his work at 9 a.m. An hour later, he attended the chapel, supervised the service, and inspected the infirmary, yards, and cells.

During this period, he interviewed prisoners, reported any misconduct or injustices, and saw that any instructions he had previously given relating to this were being executed. He would then attend to anything requiring entry into his various journals and write any of the reports he was responsible for submitting. At about noon, he would discharge any prisoners due for release.

He occasionally attended some of the magistrates courts his gaol served, including visiting the Ilford court once a fortnight when he met up with the local magistrates. He would write “letters to the friends of all prisoners under 21, appraising them of the time they will be discharged from jail, and if any prisoners are taken ill, their friends are written to.”

He was charged with running an economically tight institution, so he proudly stated that “the cost per prisoner, per head, per day on my appointment, including staff and all other expenses was: 1841: 1/7d, 1842 1/4d and 1843 1/3d.”

Other staff

Legislation from 1814 required all gaols to have a chaplain. The relatively well-renumerated postholder usually doubled up as a local vicar with an additional stipend from the parish. He provided a detailed account of his activities in 1845, in which he described performing morning and evening services of the Church of England and preaching every Sunday.

He also performed church services on Christmas Day and Good Friday and was “always prepared to administer the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper to those who wish and be fit to receive the same.”. He claimed to frequently read scriptures to prisoners who came to him at the chapel and to instruct school classes. He provided “a sufficient number of bibles and prayer and other books of a religious and moral character” (ERO Q/SBb 550)

The Assistant Turnkey/schoolmaster reported to the chaplain and would have had a professional relationship with all prisoners – not just those of school age. He would teach religious studies and assist with reading and writing for the illiterate, based on books approved and supplied by the chaplain. Quaker influence, stressing the importance of religious teaching in prisons, is well illustrated by the etching below, showing Elizabeth Fry reading the bible to female prisoners in Newgate.

Elizabeth Fry, reading to prisoners at Newgate, showing imporatnce of religious teaching and education to many prison reformers

Like the chaplain, the surgeon or medical officer doubled up his role in the gaol with a practice outside the prison. He visited the gaol three or four times per week and “oftener, if required.” He was expected to give fairly detailed sickness reports to the Quarter Sessions.

Fewer details survive of the job descriptions of the more junior staff, although the matron—the postholders of which were usually married to another staff member—was in charge of all female prisoners and their cells and yards in gaol, as well as both male and female infirmaries, in the absence of the surgeon.

The tight regime and supervision the gaol experienced and its accountability to so many bodies, including the press, made it appear to be a scandal-free institution throughout its existence.

The life experiences of its two most significant visiting magistrates suggested an open-minded and public-spirited approach to its governance in its latter days, which was very much at variance with some of the corruption associated with many of the guardians who supervised workhouses, locally and beyond.

John Gurney Fry - biography

John Gurney Fry - 1804 - 1871

John Gurney Fry was born on 29 July 1804 in St Mildred’s Court in the City of London, the eldest son of later prisoner reformer Elizabeth Fry and her husband, banker and tea merchant Joseph Fry. When John was four, his father inherited the Plashet estate in East Ham, and John would have spent most of his childhood between there (about two miles from the site of Little Ilford gaol) and the City.

From a young age, he was immersed in the world of penal reform. His mother, Elizabeth, was not the most attentive of parents, and by the time he was nine, she began to dedicate herself to prison reform, particularly with women in mind. This early exposure to penal reform would shape John’s childhood and serve as a catalyst for his later involvement as an Essex magistrate and visitor to Little Ilford gaol.

Aged just nine, he witnessed his mother's remarkable involvement with the plight of women prisoners at London’s Newgate gaol. She established education classes and collected clothing for them. Two years later, she founded the Association for the Reformation of Female Prisoners at Newgate, and the following year—when John was just 14—Elizabeth made history as the first woman to give evidence to a parliamentary committee on prisons. These achievements were a testament to Elizabeth's dedication and a significant influence on John's future path.

When John was 17 (1821), Elizabeth established the London Society for Promoting the Reformation of Female Prisoners, where she campaigned against women being manacled in chains, the public execution of female prisoners, prison ships (hulks), solitary confinement and above all, capital punishment.

At the age of 21, John married his second cousin, Rachel. Their union was not just personal but also a consolidation of their family's social standing. Both were well-connected Quakers, and the witnesses to their marriage included prominent names such as Frys, Barclays, Buxtons, Gurneys, and Pellys. However, John's health was a constant struggle, and his illness marred the ceremony. A witness to the event noted, “It was too much for John. He was not feeling well and kept having to lie down.”

After the wedding, the couple lived in St Mildred’s Court, which was simultaneously the headquarters of the family banking and tea businesses, a family home, and a hostel for unmarried clerks working for the business.

They lived there for over fifteen years, although it was not very conducive to family life. By the time of the 1841 census, they had moved to Little Warley Lodge in Billericay, which they shared with their three children, his brother-in-law and his four children, a governess, and 13 servants. This was a farm, which John sold in 1847. He moved to Hale End in Walthamstow in 1851 with his wife, two unmarried daughters, and just seven servants!

By then, John was already an Essex magistrate and merchant with the East India Company. Having sold the farm, he could devote himself more to charitable and public service duties. Among the roles he undertook over the following twenty years were: Trustee of the City  Orthopedic Hospital (1851), Deputy Lieutenant of Essex (1852),  Chairman of the Metropolitan Free Hospital – Devonshire Square, The City, where “The friendless have immediate attention paid to their ailments” (1852) Vice President of the Agricultural Benevolent Society (1860) – with a brief to alleviate the needs of “decayed farmers, their widows and orphans” and was “a generous subscriber to the Benevolent Asylum for the Insane of the Middle Classes” (Evening Standard 10 Feb 1862).

It is difficult to fully assess John’s impact on Little Ilford gaol, as there is no definitive statement of it, but weaving through reports of his contributions, on the bench, at Quarter Session proceedings and through press reports, he seemed to be a mildly reforming character, who without his mother’s zeal, would appear to have been a force for good for the institution and its inmates.

In the late 1860s, he and Rachel moved from Hale End to Prittlewell near Southend for health reasons. Rachel died at the end of 1871, and John six months later, on 11 June 1872, of Typhoid. The Essex Herald explained the circumstances. Having presided over a meeting of Ilford magistrates on 1 June, he went home to Prittlewell and died ten days later:

His doctors agree in their opinion that his death indirectly resulted from the poisoned air of Ilford Court, and this eldest son of the great philanthropist may be said to have followed his mother’s example and to have been, perhaps indirectly, a martyr for the public benefit, for had he not been so constant an attendant to his magisterial duties, he would in all probability, have lived for many years.

William Swainson Suart - biography

William Swainson Suart was born 30 July 1814 in Liverpool and educated at Royal Military College, Addiscombe. He then received a commission in the East India Company, which effectively ran India on behalf of the British government. He became a cadet in the Royal Bombay Corps of Engineers in 1833 and married Elizabeth Murray in 1849 in that city. 

He was a civil engineer who worked on land reclamation and drainage work. He was promoted to lieutenant in 1842 and transferred to Aden as an engineer in 1847. His wife had their first child there, and he was promoted to captain the following year. He finally retired from the East India Company’s service with the honorary rank of major in November 1857 during the Indian Rebellion (Mutiny).

After his return to England, he was appointed to the Commission of the Peace for Essex on 16 October 1860 and “long acted as chairman of the Committee of Visiting Justices at Ilford Gaol”. By the time of the 1861 census, six months later, he was living in Chigwell with his wife, three children and six servants. A decade later, the family was down to three servants and just two in 1881. He played an active part in the Essex Court of Sessions, particularly in matters relating to the Beconsfield Division (of which Little Ilford Gaol was a part)”.

He was outspoken about the 1877 Prisons Act, which he described as “An Act for Abolishing the Ancient Office of Justice of the Peace”. He was interested in juvenile crime and wrote and published a pamphlet on the subject, which was apparently full of suggestions, which we have been unable to access.

Like Fry, Suart seems to have been a fair and publicly minded individual who served the court without fear or favour.

He was a governor of Chigwell Grammar School, and active in that community. He died after a long illness on 23 May 1882 (aged 69) in Bowls, Chigwell, and left an estate valued at £4,290 (twenty times a clerk’s salary of the day). (Sources: obituaries in The Essex Herald, Chelmsford Chronicle, Naval and Military Gazette and Ancestry).

Little Ilford Gaol’s final twenty years

This is the third article on Little Ilford gaol. It delves into its history, tracing its journey from its pinnacle of importance to its intriguing sale in 1880 as: “An eligible site for the erection of villa residences.” Its three acres were swiftly transformed into houses, utilising bricks and other construction materials from the prison buildings, now forming Worcester and Gloucester Roads, off the Romford Road in Manor Park/Little Ilford.

Auction document, for sale of gaol site

By 1860, the gaol's role and scope of responsibilities were under scrutiny. The Essex Standard (4 July) reported the Quarter Sessions to be pondering over whether to retain Ilford gaol solely for remand cases or construct another facility for that purpose:

 

In consequence of Ilford Gaol being within the Metropolitan Police District … it is recommended to the justices in the Ilford Division to commit all further remand cases, as well as short sentences and prisoners on trial at the Central Criminal Court (Old Bailey), to Ilford gaol and all other convicted prisoners, together with prisoners on trial at the Assizes and Sessions (in Chelmsford) to the County gaol in Springfield.

 

It is not clear which of the proposals to combat overcrowding were adopted, but by 1866, the 31st Report of the Inspector of Prisons of Great Britain noted that there had been a reduction in prisoners in Little Ilford. And, simultaneously, apparently, for the first time, indicated that several debtors were imprisoned there. Fourteen in total that year, with the average number at any time being seven – one of whom was female.

 

Changing roles

 

The Inspector’s report of that year also revealed a significant shift in the gaol's inmate population. It noted a higher percentage of all female criminal prisoners (22%) than the typical 10% in previous years. A future article in this series will delve into the nature and types of prisoners held through the gaol's lifetime and the conditions they endured.

 

By this time, there were 35 cells for males and five for females, together with a day room, a punishment cell (for solitary confinement), five reception cells, two male exercise yards, and one for females. For debtors, who were treated differently, there were four sleeping cells, one day room, and one exercise yard. The report did not mention infirmaries.

 

Although there was no “national prison system” at the time, prisons were highly regulated and closely supervised by external bodies, and parliament was very prescriptive about the conditions that prevailed within them.

 

The terms of the 1865 Prison Act had a very significant impact on Little Ilford gaol. Just as an earlier Act had deemed Barking gaol unfit for purpose (see previous article), the 1865 Act offered a real challenge to Little Ilford and its controlling bodies.

 

In January 1868, the Essex Quarter Sessions received a letter from the Home Office saying that Little Ilford did not conform to the standards laid down in the legislation and wanted proposals for addressing the shortcomings. Over the following 18 months, a considerable volume of correspondence related to the matter circulated.

 

Bid for growth

 

The visiting magistrates (supervisors of the gaol) took the challenge as an opportunity to bid for a significant upgrading of its size and status: “in the belief that the great increase in the population in the parishes near London renders such an enlargement necessary and advisable”. (Essex Standard 2 July 1869).

 

The 1865 legislation required cell sizes to be larger than they were in Little Ilford, and the visiting magistrates concluded that this could be done most cost-effectively by knocking down some partition walls and thereby halving the number of cells. This would require the construction of additional cells if the gaol’s  capacity were to be maintained, never mind increased, to cope with “the great increase in the population in the parishes near London.”

 

John Gurney Fry (Elizabeth’s son and a principal visiting magistrate to Little Ilford - for full details, see a forthcoming article) seized the opportunity to increase the significance of Little Ilford. 

The only known surviving photo of John Gurney Fry - son of prison reformer, Elizabeth

 

He proposed that 48 new men’s cells would be required, at a cost of £4,180, six additional women’s cells, at a cost of £725, and £500 would be required to convert the existing 32 cells into 16 larger ones. He proposed that a total of £5,675 would be required for adequate transformation.

 

Huge as this sum was at the time, he argued that it would be dwarfed by the estimated £30k - £40k that would be needed to build a new institution from scratch. For the much smaller sum, he insisted, Little Ilford could not only be made fit for purpose but also relieve some of the pressure on Springfield gaol by accommodating longer-term prisoners. Consequently, he stated that Little Ilford’s significance would be considerably enhanced.

 

It was probably John Gurney Fry’s greatest moment as a visiting magistrate: within two years, he had died of typhoid (the cause of which some put down to the conditions he endured in visiting the gaol – see subsequent article), his vision unfulfilled.

 

Unfulfilled vision

 

His proposals were debated in various forms around the Essex Quarter Sessions for a couple of years (see Essex Herald 17 March 1871 and Chelmsford Chronicle 6 June 1873) but never agreed upon or implemented.

 

Meanwhile, significant developments were happening elsewhere. Edmund Frederick du Cane was a prison administrator who, following the 1865 Prison Act, was instrumental in abolishing penal transportation to Australia in 1867. Two years later, partially in recognition of his achievement, he was appointed to a new role of national Director of Prisons. This was a signal for the effective “nationalisation” of the prison service, taking responsibility for them away from independent county assizes and Quarter Sessions.

 

As part of his proposals, he announced a halving of the number of prisons in Great Britain, boosting the size and importance of some and making the rest redundant. Little Ilford, undeveloped by the Fry proposals, fell victim. It is probably a coincidence, but the leading visiting magistrate at Chelmsford’s Springfield prison, which survived the cull, was Edmund du Cane’s cousin, Sir Charles du Cane.

 

The Essex Quarter Sessions received compensation from the government, to the tune of £120 per cell, for decommissioning the gaol, and was left to dispose of the facility as it saw fit.

 

The end of the institution

 

In a debate at the Quarter Sessions, John Gurney Fry’s long-term fellow visiting magistrate William Swainson Suart outlined some of the options for disposal (Chelmsford Chronicle18 October 1878):

 

The motion of Major Suart to consider and report to the next court (Quarter Session) as to the future disposal of the gaol, for the utilisation of which there are already a charming variety of objects suggested, some thinking that it would make a nice little lunatic asylum (!) or workhouse, some that it should be a hospital for infectious diseases and others that it was too ugly for anything.

 

In the event, it was sold at auction on 14 October 1880 for housing development to George Blizard, 91 Ladbroke Grove, for £3,800. Around 100 houses were built, to form Worcester and Gloucester Roads, which was still surrounded by farmland and open spaces.

 

Purchase contract signed by George Blizzard of Ladbroke Grove

The auction documentation (ERO B280 - see below) makes interesting reading. 

 

 

The auction lot was described as follows:

 

A substantial pile of buildings, a large area of garden ground … an important frontage to the main Essex Road. The total extent being nearly 3 acres. An eligible site for the erection of villa residences. The present buildings affording a large quantity of sound material … (it was) Auctioned by Messrs Beadel of Gresham Street in the City. All fixtures and fittings are included in the sale. “Ilford Prison”.

 

The existing erections have until lately been occupied for the purpose of a prison and comprise a Governor’s House, Eight Blocks of Cells opening into Twelve Yards, one of which has a Well of excellent water, a Stable and other Outbuildings, a Chapel and Court-house, with extensive offices attached. The Buildings are most substantial, the Yards and Cells paved with Bath Stone and the latter enclosed by high and massive Iron Railings, thereby affording a quantity of Building and other Material on the spot, and offering an excellent opportunity to Builders, Speculators and others, for acquiring a profitable Investment. … There is a large extent of garden ground. The whole is surrounded by a High Brick Wall, around which there is a strip of Vacant land, included in the above area.

 

Gloucester Road today, half of the 100 "villas" built on the site of the gaol, partially with materials from the gaol's buildings

 

The next article in this series will examine how the gaol was supervised and managed, and the final chapter will explore the lives and conditions of those incarcerated there.

 

Little Ilford Gaol – introduction and background

This is the first of a five-part series examining the history and role of Little Ilford gaol, which was the second most important prison facility in Essex for almost forty years. It was located in the area now occupied by Worcester and Gloucester Roads, opposite Seventh Avenue and bordering Romford Road in Manor Park, and over its lifetime will have held around 30,000 prisoners.

Site of Little Ilford gaol today - Romford Road, Manor Park

Gaol was the common spelling for what we would now call jail until the mid-twentieth century, and so will be the spelling we will adopt for the Little Ilford establishment through its mid-nineteenth century existence.

Subsequent chapters, assembled from extensive research at the Essex County Records Office and examining newspaper archives, will delve into the institution's history, its management and supervision, and the lives and conditions of the prisoners it housed.

Little Ilford in the early nineteenth century

Little Ilford owes its mid-nineteenth-century growth to establishing a gaol in 1830. According to the Victoria County History of Essex, it comprised 768 acres, with Wanstead and the River Roding forming its northern and eastern boundaries. It was called Little Ilford to distinguish the area from Great Ilford, which lay east of the Roding and was located on the main London—Colchester road.

It underwent significant changes in the nineteenth century (see here). It transitioned from being the smallest parish in the Becontree Hundred, one of the 23 civil administrative units that had provided civil government for Essex-including law-and-order functions since the Middle Ages, to becoming part of the West Ham Poor Law Union in 1836. It was embraced by the Metropolitan Police District in 1840 and was incorporated into the East Ham Urban District, upon its creation in 1886. This transformation placed it on the cusp of rural Essex and the rapidly growing London conurbation, adding a layer of interest to its historical narrative.

We are getting ahead of ourselves. Little Ilford was entirely rural at the start of that century. There were just 15 houses in the district in 1801, and the only substantial building was the Three Rabbits pub (a coaching and trading inn, dating back to the 1630s). The population during the first three decades of the century hovered around 100. It was almost totally agricultural, with its main crop appearing to be the cultivation of osier (part of the willow family, used for basket making) on the banks of the Roding.

The population rose from 100 in 1831 to 189 a decade later, almost entirely because of the establishment of the gaol.

The local prison situation before Little Ilford was constructed

Before the construction of the Little Ilford gaol, there were only two significant prisons in Essex: Springfield in the county town of Chelmsford – which survives today in a much modified form, and the  Becontree House of Correction, which was located in Barking. They both came under the control of Essex’s Justices of the Peace, who were technically royal appointments but were, in practice, appointed by the Lord Lieutenant of the County, who, himself had been appointed by the Lord Chancellor – head of the judiciary.

To be recognised for the position, they had to be of considerable financial and social standing and socially minded enough to accept the unpaid post. The function required travelling around the county, sitting in judgment at police (magistrates) courts, visiting prisons, and reporting to the Essex Quarter Sessions every three months, which supervised both justice and administration in the county.

Each gaol had courts attached, and in Chelmsford’s case, its Assize and Quarter Session courts dealt with more serious cases, that could have resulted in Transportation or execution. Becontree court and gaol were primarily concerned with minor offences, or holding prisoners awaiting trial in Chelmsford.

The Becontree House of Correction had been located in East Street, Barking and served the whole of the Becontree Hundred between 1609 and 1791, incarcerating both “criminals and lunatics”.  It was replaced by a new “House of Correction/Bridewell” in nearby North Street in 1792, but this facility didn’t last long, as it failed to meet standards set for prisons from the 1820s.

Map of Becontree Hundred, soon after Little Ilford Gaol constructed

Early nineteenth-century prison reform

Prompted by prison reformers, including East Ham/Forest Gate’s Elizabeth Fry (see here), Robert Peel’s 1820s tenure as Home Secretary began to rationalise the justice system. The 1823 Gaol Act sought to establish a measure of uniformity throughout prisons in England and Wales. It established health regulations, required room for religious observance, the separation of different categories of prisoners and facilities for imposing hard labour on certain categories of prisoners. 

Early prison reformer, Elizabeth Fry, who lived about 2 miles from Little Ilford gaol and was the mother of the gaol's most prominent "Visiting Magistrate"

The Act directed county magistrates to inspect gaols at least quarterly and demanded that annual reports for each gaol be sent to the Home Secretary.

The Barking House of Correction could not meet the requirements of the 1823 legislation, so the Essex magistrates sought a replacement. It was closed in 1831, and its functions transferred to the newly created Little Ilford gaol. Thus, a community barely larger than a hamlet came to host the only significant prison in Essex outside the main Springfield establishment in the county town of Chelmsford.

Springfield gaol, Chelmsford c1900

Law and order in Britain before 1829 (and the establishment of the Metropolitan Police) were very much hit and miss. The functions were generally in the hands of “constables,” who were often part-time county appointments. Their main function was the collection of county rates.

 They had no detection or preventative responsibilities but did have the powers of arrest and an obligation to pursue felonies reported to them. The initial pursuit of offenders was often assumed to be the injured party's responsibility, who would call upon constables to make the arrests, serve warrants, and move prisoners from place to place (court, prison, transportation, etc.).

Constables also had a responsibility to clamp down on perceived anti-social behaviour and activity and move vagrants from the parish (because they were a drain on local finances). In the absence of locally convenient gaols, they would often be required to accommodate suspects in their own homes, which was something of a disincentive always to arrest perceived offenders.

Unsurprisingly, the convenience of having a local court and goal encouraged prosecution in the neighbourhood, and small towns with their own courts had greater levels of crime recorded than those whose individuals had a long trek to quarter sessions in county towns. (PJR King: Crime, Law and Society in Essex 1740-1820—unpublished Cambridge PhD, 1984).

Impact of Little Ilford gaol on local law and order

Therefore, establishing a gaol and court in Little Ilford meant that the area surrounding the court was more likely to see convictions for various offences than before the goal was constructed.

The 1829 Act establishing the Metropolitan Police brought a more structured approach to law, order, and detection in London—and a subsequent increase in the number of gaols in London. The Act impacted the court and gaol of Little Ilford when, a decade later, the jurisdiction of the Met was extended to incorporate the area covered by the Little Ilford facilities.

Two distinct actions – the establishment of the goal and court and the incorporation into the territory of a detection police force - within a decade, meant that the West Ham area started to record a greater incidence of crime and conviction than it had previously, although the actual level of criminal or anti-social activity may not have changed at all.

Subsequent chapters in this series on the gaol will examine its fifty-year history and how it was managed and overseen on a day-to-day basis, particularly by the “visiting justices” appointed by the Essex Quarter Sessions. The most prominent of them was John Gurney Fry, son of the aforementioned Elizabeth.

The series will conclude with a detailed look at the gaol’s estimated thirty thousand prisoners, their offences, and the conditions in which they were held during their confinements.