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EXPANDING THE COMPASS OF DOMESTIC VIOLENCE IN THE HANOVERIAN METROPOLIS
| By Greg T. Smith |
University of Manitoba |
| What goes on behind closed doors? This is a question that nosy neighbours and their academic cousins, historians, have been asking for a very long time. Family historians among that lot have uncovered much about family social and economic life, while studies of children and childhood have similarly filled in much of the detail of normative familial relations and behaviours. But in the past, as now, all was not 'happy families'. Greater attention to the situational context of violence has led scholars to consider the various settings for the exercise of interpersonal violence, and indeed historians have been able to shed some light on the darker corners of the domestic sphere. As historians of crime continue to explore the social meanings of the law, we are learning more and more about the dynamics of everyday life in a variety of socio-historical contexts. The result is that a more complex and nuanced picture of life in all of its dramatic, complicated and frequently disturbing multiplicity is beginning to emerge. This is especially true when it comes to understanding the rough edges of daily life. It is clear that in many contexts in the past, not least of which the home, violence or the threat of violence—and by this I mean physical violence to the person—as well as the emotional violence caused by neglect, abandonment or deprivation, were all too common features of daily life. Still, as Peter King noted in a 1996 article, aside from the impressionistic conclusions that may be gained from the work of a few articles there was yet "no detailed study of domestic violence in eighteenth-century England."1 Since that article, a handful of useful studies have emerged.2 Most recently, Joanne Bailey and Elizabeth Foyster have each produced extended studies of the inner dynamics of eighteenth-century families in which wife-beating is explored in some detail, though little is said of abusive wives or of the abuse of children or servants and so King's basic charge still stands.3 |
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Why is this so? There is still no shortage of contemporary interest in domestic violence, battered wife syndrome, and increasing protections for women and children caught in abusive relationships, and much of the recent historical work borrows directly from contemporary sociological and criminological theory. As well, a deeper understanding of the dynamics of life in the microlevel of the family helps to flesh out the character of life at the macro-level in eighteenth-century London more generally. Through a closer examination of cases of domestic discord, we may learn more about the relationships among violence, domination and power in the past. But, of course, historians are driven by their sources so it is reasonable to consider whether the familiar complaint about the paucity of evidence of such behaviour will prevent us from ever writing a complete history of domestic violence in the eighteenth century. In this essay I want to further explore the degree of 'detectability' of domestic interpersonal violence by re-examining some of the familiar and less familiar sources for the study of such behaviour. More particularly, I ask to what extent it is possible to 'detect' cases of domestic violence—including wife beating, but also the abuse of children and the abuse of servants and apprentices, two dimensions of domestic violence which have received comparatively less attention—among the lower orders and the poor in the late eighteenth century. Finally, I call attention to the discursive frameworks that can emerge when particular acts of violence are brought into the public sphere and dissected in the media, and explore some of the consequences of such cases for the shaping of popular attitudes towards violence in society. |
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