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'He is a poor, foolish lad'

Before there were staff-informal family and social networks of support in the 18th and early 19th century London, and how the asylum system broke them up

Simon Jarrett

This paper is based on an examination of the transcripts of 42 trials held at the Old Bailey between 1710 and 1907 involving people with learning disabilities – either as the accused, the victim or as someone whose disability impacted on the case.

In the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries we find clear evidence in these transcripts of people with learning disabilities who are well integrated into their communities, many of them working, while those who are too disabled to work are supported by families and friends. Where people fall foul of the law, neighbours, employers, friends, family members and even police frequently testify to their good character. Contrary to the stereotype of a harsh and over-punitive legal system dispensing hanging or transportation as the punishment for the most minor offences, we find for the most part an equal measure of common sense and compassion. Juries sometimes return not guilty or 'lesser offence' verdicts even when it is clear that a person has committed a crime, or find the accused not guilty on the grounds of diminished responsibility. Sometimes a guilty verdict is accompanied by a plea for mercy, which is duly granted by the judge. The difficulties of having a learning disabled child in the family are also taken into account in judgements.

The harshness of the period should not be underestimated – language to describe people with disabilities is direct and, to modern ears, insulting. It is clear that many people suffer bullying, teasing and worse in the workplace and on the streets, and sexual and physical abuse are common. However, it is also clear that people are very much an integral and visible part of the community of eighteenth century London, in both its negative and positive manifestations. They are known and accepted, and form a part of the tumultuous hurly burley of daily life for which the period is well known. Today we would talk of 'community-connectedness'.

As we move through the nineteenth century a pattern emerges of people passing from public view as they disappear into the asylum system and systems of care are formalised, separating people from mainstream society into the supervision of paid staff. The medicalisation of learning disability means that people come to be seen as sick and in need of treatment and separation, becoming more a condition than a person. From 1857 they appear only as passive victims in a world of police, welfare regulators and doctors. The offences now concern violation of regulations when taking in 'idiots' for paid care, neglect and ill treatment of learning disabled children by their families and sexual abuse.

These transcripts of criminal trials where learning disability is a factor offer a fascinating insight into the history of ordinary people with learning disabilities. We observe a gradual transition from informal, voluntary support where the person remains at the heart of their community (for good or for bad), to a system of formalised care, with paid carers, which disempowers the person (however well meaning the transformation) and creates dependency and marginalisation. Study of this period offers important lessons for us today as people with learning disabilities struggle to reconnect with their communities after 150 years of exclusion led by paid professionals.

As well as placing the patterns of change evidenced by the transcripts in their wider historical context, the presentation describes what happened in some of the most significant trials. In 1710 we meet Mary Bradshaw, the first person with a learning disability to appear in the Old Bailey records, who was 'plainly proven' to have stolen clothes worth 36 shillings - an offence for which she could have been hung – but who is acquitted because there is proof of her disability. We also meet Thomas Baggott, a man with a learning disability ('a poor foolish lad'), accused of participation in the anti-catholic Gordon Riots in 1780 – and acquitted by the jury on the testimony of numerous character witnesses from the general public. Or, as we would say today, his (unpaid) advocates.

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About the Group

If you woud like to get in touch with the Social History of Learning Disability (SHLD) Research Group, please contact:

Liz Tilley 
Chair of the Social History of Learning Disability (SHLD) Research Group
School of Health, Wellbeing and Social Care
Faculty of Wellbeing, Education and Language Studies
The Open University
Walton Hall
Milton Keynes
MK7 6AA

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