Citation

Conley C. New Hibernia Rev. 2001; 5(3): 66-86.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2001, Center for Irish Studies, University of St. Thomas)

DOI

10.1353/nhr.2001.0044

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

One of the peculiarities of Victorian Britain was the marked difference in perceived behavior and attitudes in the two largest Celtic nations. Despite their common roots, by the late nineteenth century the images and experiences of Scotland and Ireland were strikingly different. The Irish were regularly portrayed in the British press, in Scotland as well as England, as violent semibarbarians, incapable of showing gratitude for the blessings of British rule. The Scots, on the other hand, were seen as progressive, well-mannered, and orderly. While these perceptions are certainly open to clarification, the judicial record indicates that Scots were less violent than the Irish; or at least, the Scots were less likely to kill each other.

This study compares the records from homicide trials in Scotland and Ireland between 1867 and 1892 in order to examine the differences in the frequency of, responses to, and perceptions of criminal homicide. Almost any cross-cultural comparison of homicides is problematic, as the number of reported homicides always depends on who is counting and why. Accidents, suicides, and deaths from natural causes might be counted or not, depending on the official involved. Irish crimes were reported both as crimes and as "outrages" with no clear distinction between the two. Further, whether a particular homicide was reported as an outrage was at the discretion of the local police and some, but not all, of the homicides in the city of Dublin were excluded. In Scotland the procurator fiscal--roughly the equivalent of the state prosecutor--had sole discretion as to whether to treat a death as a homicide.