**!! TICKETS FOR THIS EVENT ARE NOW SOLD OUT !!** **Join us at the London Archives for a talk about 'Crime in Victorian London - The Realities of Charles Dickens'. We'll also have time to explore the 'Londoners On Trial: Crime, Courts and the Public 1244-1924' exhibition before the talk starts.** **Talk: 'Crime in Victorian London - The Realities of Charles Dickens' by Patrick Voss, Blue Badge Guide. 50-60 minutes plus Q&A.** Discover what author Charles Dickens got right about Victorian crime, poverty and the workhouse, and how dangerous London really was. Dickens portrayed a world of pickpockets, thieves, and child exploitation - with fictional characters such as Oliver Twist, Fagin, Bill Sikes and the Artful Dodger. Crime features heavily in his novel Oliver Twist with offences ranging from pickpocketing, burglary, and handling stolen goods, to violent assault and murder. But how accurate was this picture of Victorian crime? Patrick Voss explores the real conditions behind the fiction, including the workhouse system, urban poverty, and the pressures of life in the largest city in the world. This talk will reveal how dangerous it was in Victorian London and why Dickens wrote so urgently about it. **Read more here:** **[https://www.thelondonarchives.org/whats-on/crime-in-victorian-london-the-realities-of-charles-dickens](https://www.thelondonarchives.org/whats-on/crime-in-victorian-london-the-realities-of-charles-dickens)** **Exhibition:** **'Londoners On Trial: Crime, Courts and the Public 1244-1924** This exhibition explores the history of law and order in London, uncovering the stories of London’s criminals, victims and law enforcers from the medieval period to modern times. Drawing on extensive archives, it examines how the growing city was governed and Londoners’ enduring fascination with true crime. Through cases involving figures such as Moll Cutpurse, Dick Turpin, Jack Sheppard, Oscar Wilde, and Sylvia Pankhurst, the exhibition reveals how historical record

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