by Alex Wakelam (University of Cambridge) While it is often assumed that debtors’ prisons were illogical and ineffective, my research demonstrates that they were extremely economically effective for creditors though they could ruin the lives of debtors. The debtors’ prison is a frequent historical bogeyman, a Dickensian symptom of the illogical cruelty of the past … Continue reading Squeezing blood from a stone: eighteenth century debtors’ prisons worked
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