60 Before the Bobbieswere attacked and ransacked. Hackney called out its watch only after the
rioters attacked Newgate Prison, fearful of the 'Depredations' freed thieves
might make.^14 Fires broke out in several areas and many were killed and
injured when breweries and distilleries in the East End were broken into and
the alcohol caught fire. When the military finally succeeded in clearing the
streets, 285 rioters were dead and 173 wounded. The crowds inflicted one
hundred thousand pounds' worth of property damage. One hundred and
sixty rioters were tried for various offences; 25 were hanged and 12 others
sentenced to various terms of imprisonment.^15
Most contemporaries, though, saw a distinction between everyday crime
and disorder that they struggled with and the kind of disorder represented by
the Gordon Riots.^16 While very frightening and definitely cause for concern,
the Gordon Riots were not viewed as a lack of efficiency on the part of
parochial law enforcement. In a debate about 'police' almost a year after the
riots, a government supporter, Mr Pelham, illustrates the continuing support
for locally controlled policing. He stated: 'a single instance of malpractice in
the executive administration of a city police was by no means sufficient
foundation for destroying the established system of interior government,
and introducing a new one'P
Riot control was, after all, the duty of magistrates, assisted if necessary by the
army.^18 Thus, the real target of criticism, some of it very harsh, was not the
parochial watch system but the magistrates of greater London.^19 In a parlia-
mentary debate, Edmund Burke described the Middlesex magistrates as 'gen-
erally the scum of the earth'.^20 What had failed in June 1780 was not the
structure of law enforcement but the people who were responsible for over-
seeing it. What emerged from the Gordon riots was an increasing interest on
the part of the central government in reforming the metropolitan magistracy.
So while the Gordon Riots may not have focused public attention on
parish policing in particular, they contributed to a general sense of crisis
regarding crime and punishment in the last decades of the eighteenth
century. The most important responses to this crisis were two broad move-
ments for reform: the movement for 'economical reform', of administration
and that for reform of the criminal justice system, including a re-emergent
movement for the reformation of manners. National in scope, these move-
ments had significant influence on metropolitan policing.
The movement for economical reform emerged after the American Revo-
lution and its supporters worked to improve administrative efficiency in
government and cut down on corruption and waste.^21 A more radical branch
emerged as the movement for Parliamentary reform. The moderates focused
on administrative reform and had the earlier successes, including the finan-
cial and administrative reforms of William Pitt the Younger after 1784.^22 The
establishment of the Home Office in 1782 gave a focal point for those
interested in criminal justice and its reform.^23