Which debtors’ prison, in Southwark, was depicted in Charles Dickens’ book Little Dorrit?
"1729 he sent a petition to his old school friend, the Duke of Dorset, in which he raged against the injustices of the system. Some debtor prisoners were even less fortunate, being sent to prisons with a mixture of vicious criminals and petty criminals, and many more were confined to a single cell. The father of the English author Charles Dickens was sent to one of these prisons (the Marshalsea), which were often described in Dickens's novels. He became an advocate for debt prison reform, and his novel ""Little Dorrit"" dealt directly with this issue. The Debtors' Act of 1869"
"Southwark Act 1722 removed these rights. The area remained a slum until the 19th century. The only reminder of The Mint is Mint Street off Marshalsea Road, where there used to be a workhouse. The Marshalsea prison, associated with the Marshalsea Court, was located a little to the north of the southeast end of Lant Street, just north of St George's Church. The prison was mentioned in the works of Charles Dickens. In 1902, a small public open space, known as Little Dorrit's Playground, after the Charles Dickens character, was opened north of Lant Street. Much of the area became"
"public open space, known as Little Dorrit's Playground, after the Charles Dickens character, was opened north of Marshalsea Road. Much of the area became derelict as a result of air raid damage during World War II. North of Marshalsea Road is Little Dorrit's Court, also named after the Dickens character. Marshalsea Road Marshalsea Road (classified A3201) is a major street in Southwark, south London, England. At the northwest end is the Southwark Bridge Road. At the southeast end is Borough tube station on Borough High Street. Continuing across the street are Long Lane and Great Dover Street. At the northeast"
"public spectacles. Dickens later based the character of Hortense in ""Bleak House"" on Maria Manning, while Mrs Chivery's tobacco shop in ""Little Dorrit"" is located on Horsemonger Lane. Executions at Horsemonger Lane are also mentioned in Sarah Waters' novel ""Fingersmith"". Horsemonger Lane Gaol Horsemonger Lane Gaol (also known as the Surrey County Gaol or the New Gaol) was a prison close to present-day Newington Causeway in Southwark, south London. Built at the end of the 18th century, it was in use until 1878. Constructed between 1791 and 1799 to a design by George Gwilt the Elder, architect surveyor to the"
"in a house that belonged to the Vestry Clerk of St George's. This was during the darkest period of his life when, as a teenager, with his father in prison, he had to work in the 'blacking factory', and his literary career must have seemed an impossible dream. Later, he was to set several scenes of the novel ""Little Dorrit"" in and around St George's Church. There is a small representation of Little Dorrit in the east window of the church. It is also a recognised church of the City of London Company of Parish Clerks and the guild church"
"Marshalsea The Marshalsea (1373–1842) was a notorious prison in Southwark (now London), just south of the River Thames. Although it housed a variety of prisoners, including men accused of crimes at sea and political figures charged with sedition, it became known, in particular, for its incarceration of the poorest of London's debtors. Over half the population of England's prisons in the 18th century were in jail because of debt. Run privately for profit, as were all English prisons until the 19th century, the Marshalsea looked like an Oxbridge college and functioned as an extortion racket. Debtors in the 18th century"
"that eight to ten were dying every 24 hours in the warmer weather. The prison became known around the world in the 19th century through the writing of the English novelist Charles Dickens, whose father was sent there in 1824, when Dickens was 12, for a debt to a baker. Forced as a result to leave school to work in a factory, Dickens based several of his characters on his experience, most notably Amy Dorrit, whose father is in the Marshalsea for debts so complex no one can fathom how to get him out. Much of the prison was demolished"
"Cheyney, Patrick. The Cambridge Companion to Christopher Marlowe. Cambridge University Press. pp. 24–40 Location Articles, documents Marshalsea The Marshalsea (1373–1842) was a notorious prison in Southwark (now London), just south of the River Thames. Although it housed a variety of prisoners, including men accused of crimes at sea and political figures charged with sedition, it became known, in particular, for its incarceration of the poorest of London's debtors. Over half the population of England's prisons in the 18th century were in jail because of debt. Run privately for profit, as were all English prisons until the 19th century, the Marshalsea"
"had not been opened for four weeks. Before the Bankruptcy Act of 1869, debtors in England were routinely imprisoned at the pleasure of their creditors. Around 10,000 people in England and Wales were in prison for debt in 1641, often for small amounts. In the 18th century debtors comprised over half the prison population: 945 of London's 1,500 prisoners in 1779 were debtors. According to John Wade, writing in 1829, in London in 1826–1827, 753 people were imprisoned for debts under £5, for between 20 and 100 days. In Southwark that year the debts of 1,893 prisoners amounted collectively to"
"prisons using the same models used in Great Britain. James Wilson, a signatory to the Declaration of Independence, spent some time in a debtors' prison while still serving as an Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. Fellow signatory Robert Morris spent three years, from 1798 to 1801, in the Prune Street Debtors' Prison, Philadelphia Henry Lee III, better known as Henry ""Light-Horse"" Lee, a Revolutionary War general and father of Robert E. Lee, was imprisoned for debt between 1808 and 1809 where he made use of his time by writing ""Memoirs of the War"". Debtors' prisons were prevalent throughout"
"was finally outlawed in England in 1869, except in cases of fraud or refusal to pay, and in the 1870s the Home Office demolished most of the prison buildings, though in 1955 parts of it were still in use by George Harding & Sons, hardware merchants. Dickens visited what was left of the Marshalsea in May 1857, just before he finished ""Little Dorrit"". He wrote in the preface: Some of my readers may have an interest in being informed whether or no any portions of the Marshalsea Prison are yet standing. I did not know, myself, until the sixth of"
"raft. The granite gate piers at the entrance of Purbeck House, High Street, Swanage in Dorset, and a granite bollard next to the gate, are thought by English Heritage to be possibly from Millbank Prison. Charles Dickens describes the prison in chapter 52 (""Obstinacy"") of his novel, ""Bleak House"" (1852–3). One of the characters is put into custody there, and other characters go to visit him. Esther Summerson, one of the book's narrators, gives a brief description of its layout. In Henry James's realist novel ""The Princess Casamassima"" (1886) the prison is the ""primal scene"" of Hyacinth Robinson's life: the"
"is imprisoned for debt in the King's Bench Prison. Madeline Bray and her father lived within the Rules of the King's Bench in ""Nicholas Nickleby"", while the prison is also discussed by Mr. Rugg and Arthur Clennam in ""Little Dorrit"". In Herman Melville's ""Billy Budd, Sailor"", King's Bench is referred to when Melville describes John Claggart as being possibly arraigned at King's Bench. In his ""The Diary of a Prison Governor"", James William Newham (1825–1890) makes reference to the period that his step-father, Henry Benthall, spent in the Queens Bench Prison (c.1839) for bankruptcy, after running up debts to the"
"City Marshalsea, Dublin The City Marshalsea was a debtor's prison in Dublin, Ireland. Debtors were imprisoned there by order of the Court of Conscience and Lord Mayor's Court of the county of the city of Dublin. The maximum debt was £10 in the Lord Mayor's Court, and 40""s."" (£2) in the Court of Conscience. Other debtor's prisons in Dublin which shared the name were the Four Courts Marshalsea, and the Marshalseas of Saint Sepulchre (abolished 1856) and of Thomas Court and Donore (abolished 1826). The original Marshalsea prison from which these were named was built in Southwark south of the"
"Prison each Christmas, a payment that could apparently be traced back to the long time mistress of King Charles II. Whitecross Street Prison Whitecross Street Prison was a debtors' prison in London, England. It was built between 1813-15 to ease overcrowding at Newgate Prison and closed in 1870, when all of the prisoners were transferred to the newly built Holloway Prison. Situated on Whitecross Street in Islington the prison was capable of holding up to 500 prisoners, although in normal circumstances less than half that number would be held there. The prisoners were held in six separate 'wards,' and included"
"Charles Dickens novels are littered with stock-market speculations, villains, swindlers and fictional speculators. Little Dorrit (1857) The financial house of Mr Merdle; Martin Chuzzlewit (1844) 'Anglo-Bengalee Disinterested Loan and Life Company, modeled loosely on the South Sea Bubble,- is in essence a classic Ponzi scheme; Nicholas Nickleby (1839) Ralph Nickleby's great Joint Stock Company, United Metropolitan Improved Hot Muffin and Crumpet Baking and Punctual Delivery Company; David Copperfield (1850) the false accounting by the sycophant Uriah Heep, clerk to lawyer Mr Wickfield; South Sea Company The South Sea Company (officially The Governor and Company of the merchants of Great Britain,"
"and from there north to old London Bridge. The area became known for its travellers and inns, including Geoffrey Chaucer's Tabard Inn. The itinerant population brought with it poverty, prostitutes, bear baiting, theatres (including Shakespeare's Globe) and prisons. In 1796 there were five prisons in Southwark—the Clink, King's Bench, Borough Compter, White Lion and the Marshalsea—compared to 18 in London as a whole. Until the 19th century imprisonment in England was not viewed as a punishment, except for minor offences such as vagrancy. Prisons held people until their creditors had been paid or their fate decided by judges. Options included"
"King's Bench Prison The King's Bench Prison was a prison in Southwark, south London, England, from medieval times until it closed in 1880. It took its name from the King's Bench court of law in which cases of defamation, bankruptcy and other misdemeanours were heard; as such, the prison was often used as a debtor's prison until the practice was abolished in the 1860s. In 1842, it was renamed the Queen's Prison, and later became the Southwark Convict Prison. The first prison was originally constructed from two houses and was situated in Angel Place, off Borough High Street, Southwark -"
"Whitecross Street Prison Whitecross Street Prison was a debtors' prison in London, England. It was built between 1813-15 to ease overcrowding at Newgate Prison and closed in 1870, when all of the prisoners were transferred to the newly built Holloway Prison. Situated on Whitecross Street in Islington the prison was capable of holding up to 500 prisoners, although in normal circumstances less than half that number would be held there. The prisoners were held in six separate 'wards,' and included a 'Female ward.' Known both as 'Burdon's Hotel' (after one of Governors) and the 'Cripplegate Coffeehouse,' the prison seems to"
"suffered from his increasing lack of interest, until eventually he became a bankrupt and as such ended up in the Debtors' prison. He had managed to send his wife and family to London together with a small wooden printing press, some type etc. and other small items which they had managed to secret away. The family moved into lodgings in a court off Drury Lane, where they were joined by John in 1812 on his release, but the accommodation was to prove temporary. Very shortly after, they were evicted and moved firstly to a small shop in Wardour Street, Soho"
"aid by searching for Blandois/Rigaud when Arthur wants him found. This action brings about the revelation of the secrets kept by Mrs Clennam. The other major subplot is the satire of British bureaucracy, named as the Circumlocution Office, where the expertise is how not to do it. The character Little Dorrit (Amy) was inspired by Mary Ann Cooper (née Mitton), whom Dickens sometimes visited along with her family, and called by that name. They lived in The Cedars, a house on Hatton Road west of London; its site is now under the east end of London Heathrow Airport. This model"
"The only reminder of The Mint is Mint Street off Marshalsea Road, where there used to be a workhouse. The Marshalsea prison, associated with the Marshalsea Court, was located close to the southeast end of what is now Marshalsea Road, just north of St George's Church. The area has Dickensian connections and the prison was mentioned in the works of Charles Dickens. The Marshalsea was very significant to Dickens since his father was imprisoned at the prison for debt from 2 February 1824 to 28 May 1824. At the time, Dickens lived nearby in Lant Street, just south of Marshalsea"
"body was found here on 27 January 1646, """"torn limb from limb, but with her heart still pumping blood."""" Bleeding Heart Yard features in the Charles Dickens novel ""Little Dorrit"" as the home of the Plornish family. Dickens wrote of it: [It was] a place much changed in feature and in fortune, yet with some relish of ancient greatness about it. Two or three mighty stacks of chimneys, and a few large dark rooms which had escaped being walled and subdivided out of the recognition of their old proportions, gave the Yard a character. It was inhabited by poor people,"
"the days of Charles Dickens. Dickens in fact visited the George and referred to it in ""Little Dorrit"". The building is partly timber framed. The ground floor is divided into a number of connected bars. The Parliament Bar used to be a waiting room for passengers on coaches. The Middle Bar was the Coffee Room, which was frequented by Charles Dickens. The bedrooms, now a restaurant, were upstairs in the galleried part of the building. It is one of only two coaching inns to survive in Greater London, and is the only galleried example. The White Hart is immediately to"
"they allowed the debtor. With a little money, a debtor could pay for some freedoms; some prisons allowed inmates to conduct business and to receive visitors; others (including the Fleet and King's Bench Prisons) even allowed inmates to live a short distance outside the prison—a practice known as the 'Liberty of the Rules'—and the Fleet even tolerated clandestine 'Fleet Marriages'. Life in these prisons, however, was far from pleasant, and the inmates were forced to pay for their keep. Samuel Byrom, son of the writer and poet John Byrom, was imprisoned for debt in the Fleet in 1725, and in"
"to enclose the pent-up inner prison where nobody was put, except for ceremony. But, whosoever goes into Marshalsea Place, turning out of Angel Court, leading to Bermondsey, will find his feet on the very paving-stones of the extinct Marshalsea jail; will see its narrow yard to the right and to the left, very little altered if at all, except that the walls were lowered when the place got free; will look upon the rooms in which the debtors lived; and will stand among the crowding ghosts of many miserable years. The building on the site of the prison houses Southwark"
"frequently died of malnutrition or were murdered before raising enough money to escape. The Mint's geography was a factor in its poor living standard, as it was below the river's level and was a breeding ground for sewage- and water-borne maladies. Daniel Defoe describes life there for his heroine Moll Flanders in the novel of the same name. In 1723, the Mint lost its protected status as a result of The Mint in Southwark Act 1722 and at the same time, imprisonment for debts of less than £50 was abolished, and many residents left without fear of arrest. The area"
"as will be remembered, having been committed in a room occupied by Colt at the corner of Broadway and Chambers street, now Delmonico's. He convicted Colt, thought the latter cheated the gallows by suicide. He also conducted the prosecution of Monroe Edwards, the noted forger, securing his conviction and ridding the community of one of the most daring and successful forgers of the period. He was never so happy as when he convicted a prisoner, and it was to the fact of his conducting his prosecutions with such bitterness of spirit that he obtained the sobriquet of ""Little Bitters,"" referred"
"the 1,000 debtors annually, and the 1,000 criminals and vagrants; the men and the women; the old men and black boys; the idiots, the lunatics and the drunkards; all confined in two buildings at night, and on the Sabbath, in which there can be no separation, and no effectual supervision or restraint, to prevent gambling and falsehood, profane swearing and lascivious conversation, wrath, strife, backbiting and revenge. In 1833 the city built a new House of Correction in South Boston, designed on the Auburn system (an improvement at the time). After 1833 ""as the city and county lock-up the Leverett"
"total debt of ₤16,442. The debtors' section consisted of a brick barracks, a yard measuring , a kitchen, a public room, and a tap room or snuggery, where debtors could drink as much beer as they wanted, at fivepence a pot in 1815. Philpotts reports that, by the early 19th century, most debtors spent only months in the prison; on 19 April 1826 it held 105 debtors, 99 of whom had been there for less than six months and the other six for less than a year. The barracks was less than 10 yards wide and 33 yards long (9"
"for rape and murder committed suicide. His spirit haunted the jail and caused several gruesome deaths in the vicinity in the guise of a demon or wild beast. The Black Dog, Dublin The Black Dog was a prison in Newhall Market, now Cornmarket, in Dublin, Ireland. The Black Dog was located in Browne's Castle, which became a tavern from which the prison got its name. From the early 18th century the Black Dog functioned as the main debtors' prison in Dublin. The length of a prisoner's stay was determined largely by the whim of his creditors. It was run privately"
"of the prison was found during archaeological investigations of the site of a new office block at One Wood Street. Wood Street Compter The Wood Street Compter (or Wood Street Counter) was a small prison within the City of London in England. It was primarily a debtors' prison, and also held people accused of such misdemeanours as public drunkenness, although some wealthier prisoners were able to obtain alcohol through bribery. The prison was built and opened in 1555, replacing the earlier Bread Street Compter, from which many prisoners were transferred. The Compter was originally one of two prisons, the other,"
"Bankside, Southwark. The Clink Prison Museum tries to recreate the conditions of the original prison. The Clink The Clink was a prison in Southwark, England, which operated from the 12th century until 1780. The prison served the Liberty of the Clink, a local manor area owned by the Bishop of Winchester rather than by the reigning monarch. As the Liberty owner, the Bishop kept all revenues from the Clink Liberty, and could put people in prison for failing to make their payments. As the Bishop, he could also imprison heretics. The Clink prison was situated next to the Bishop's London-area"