Death on the Victorian Beat: The Shocking Story of Police Deaths

Martin Baggoley

May 2018 · Pen and Sword

About this ebook

Death on the Victorian Beat is the first book dedicated solely to the murders of police officers in the Victorian era, recalling numerous cases from across the United Kingdom. Martin Baggoley highlights the resistance faced everyday by officers of all ranks, in both the great cities and in the supposedly peaceful countryside, during this important and sometimes turbulent period in our history.Many cases are unveiled by the author, including those of: Sergeant Charles Brett, murdered on the streets of Manchester by Fenians attempting to release two of their leaders from a police van; Detective Inspector Charles Thain, fatally wounded at sea by a prisoner he was escorting back from Germany; Constable William Jump lost his life during a bitter industrial dispute involving brickmakers in Ashton-under-Lyne; and Inspector Joseph Drewitt and Constable Thomas Shorter murdered in a confrontation with poachers in Hungerford, to name but a few.This book is bursting with accounts of danger and great courage urging to be read, as the author allows the lives of these gallant officers to run through the pages.

About the author

Martin Baggoley is a retired probation officer, having worked in Greater Manchester for more than thirty five years. He has a masters degree in criminology and has written many articles on the history of crime and punishment for magazines in the United Kingdom and United States. He is also the author of several true crime books and this will be his fourth for Wharncliffe; his others are Foul Deeds and Suspicious Deaths in Manchester; Strangeways, a Century of Hangings in Manchester; Hanged in Lancashire. He lives in Ramsbottom with his wife Claire and they have two adult children.