Rebel, Traitor, Sailor, Spy: The Social Figure of the Smuggler in Mid-Eighteenth-Century Britain
Smuggling was a common practice in eighteenth-century Britain and British governments tried to prevent it with an increasing arsenal of penal statutes. Beyond the practice of smuggling, however, it was much debated as evidence of deeper problems. Among local populations, it was often regarded as a “...
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| I publikationen: | URI:https://journals.openedition.org/acrh, |
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| Huvudupphovsman: | |
| Materialtyp: | Article ou chapitre numérique |
| Språk: | Anglais |
| Publicerad: |
L’Atelier du Centre de recherches historiques
2024
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| Ämnen: | |
| Länkar: | Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM |
| Sammanfattning: | Smuggling was a common practice in eighteenth-century Britain and British governments tried to prevent it with an increasing arsenal of penal statutes. Beyond the practice of smuggling, however, it was much debated as evidence of deeper problems. Among local populations, it was often regarded as a “socially accepted crime”. In government circles, the wide-spread nature of smuggling led to the belief that it was morally corrupting the people and contributing to the decline of state authority. During times of war, it was linked to the suspicion that smugglers were collaborating with enemies of the kingdom by working as spies. In this line of thinking, smugglers were actively betraying their country. The article focuses on these contradicting views on smuggling during the 1740s. It analyses a number of different discourses on smuggling in order to demonstrate how the social figure of the smuggler changed its appearance in relation to the debates in which it served as an example and argument. It puts particular emphasis on the moments when the social figure of the smugglers turned into a traitor (by betraying his kingdom to the enemy) or rebel (by wilfully corrupting the moral and political order of the kingdom) |
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