• Home
• Membership
• Debtors’ prisons: Dickensian horrors or economic successes?

Debtors’ prisons: Dickensian horrors or economic successes?

How did locking up debtors force them to pay their creditors? Alexander Wakelam reveals how the debtors’ prisons of Georgian society operated

• Alexander Wakelam
• , Dr David Musgrove, FSA

Published: November 30, 2022 at 9:41 AM

Save

• Share on facebook
• Share on twitter
• Share on whatsapp
• Email to a friend

Debtors’ prisons were a major feature of Georgian society in England and Wales. But how did the idea of locking up debtors to make them pay their creditors actually work in reality? Dr Alexander Wakelam explains to David Musgrove why, and how, the system worked.

Ad

Authors

Alexander Wakelam

Alexander Wakelam is a research associate at the University of Cambridge

• Visit us on Twitter

Dr David Musgrove, FSAContent director

David Musgrove is the content director at HistoryExtra

• Visit us on Twitter

Ad

Ad

Loading...

Ad

Loading...