Welsh Journals

REBECCA, CRIME AND POLICING: A TURNING-POINT IN NINETEENTH-CENTURY ATTITUDES by D. J. V. JONES, B.A., Ph.D.* I should like, first of all, to express my thanks to the Cymmrodorion Society for inviting me to give this talk. It is a lecture which has its origins in a book published last year, entitled Rebecca's Children (Oxford, 1989). The book was written with financial help from the University College of Swansea and from the British Academy, in whose building we meet this evening. Let me begin with the correspondence between the royal family, the prime minister and the home secretary in the summer and autumn of 1843. In this Queen Victoria and Prince Albert expressed their displeasure with the state of south-west Wales. Trouble in Ireland was expected, and indeed was reaching a dangerous climax at this time, but this was different from extensive disturbances on the mainland. Queen Victoria suspected that her government had underestimated the Rebecca affair. It was too close for comfort, and a bad example to the rest of her empire.' The royal pair wished to know what their prime minister was going to do about the situation. Robert Peel consulted James Graham, his home secretary, and the latter wrote once again to the county leaders of Cardiganshire, Pembrokeshire and Carmarthenshire. The tone of the correspondence was polite but anxious, for the men at Whitehall put much of the blame for the Rebecca crisis on the lords lieutenant and magistrates of the three *A lecture given to the Society at the British Academy, 7 June 1990. Chairman: Dr. David W. Howell. See, for instance, Cambridge University Library. Graham Papers, on microfilm. Letters from the Queen, James Graham and Prince Albert, 23 and 30 June 1843. I am grateful to the Librarian for allowing me to use this microfilm.