OCR GCSE History B Crime and Punishment c.1250 to present: a complete thematic overview
A complete overview of OCR's GCSE History B (SHP) Crime and Punishment thematic study, c.1250 to present. Covers how crime, law enforcement and punishment changed across the medieval, early modern, industrial and modern periods, the factors driving change, and the Paper 1 question types and mark tariffs.
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What this option demands
Crime and Punishment c.1250 to present is the most widely taught OCR History B thematic study. It traces crime, law enforcement and punishment in Britain across about 750 years. Because it is a thematic study, the exam rewards an understanding of change and continuity and the factors that drove or held back change: attitudes and religion, government, individuals, science and technology, and social and economic change. This overview ties the period and case-study pages together.
Medieval crime and punishment, c.1250 to 1500
Order rested on the community, not the state. Every man belonged to a tithing responsible for his neighbours; the hue and cry obliged everyone to chase a criminal; unpaid constables and the sheriff's posse caught fugitives. Guilt was decided by trial by jury or, until 1215, trial by ordeal, in which God was believed to reveal the truth. The Church ran its own courts, offered benefit of the clergy and sanctuary, and shaped the whole system. Punishment aimed to deter and repay: fines, the stocks, mutilation for repeat offenders, and hanging for serious crime.
Early modern crime and punishment, c.1500 to 1700
Religious and economic change created "new" crimes: vagabondage (the feared wandering poor), witchcraft (prosecuted intensely from about 1560 to 1660, peaking in the Civil War under witch-finders such as Matthew Hopkins), smuggling, poaching and heresy. Enforcement still relied on amateurs (constables, watchmen, thief-takers). Punishment grew harsher and more public, with more hangings, public burnings and the start of transportation to America, all driven by fear of disorder and religion.
Industrial crime and punishment, c.1700 to 1900
This is the great turning point. The Bloody Code (over 200 capital crimes by 1800) was abolished in the 1820s to 1830s because juries would not convict and attitudes changed. Robert Peel founded the professional, uniformed Metropolitan Police in 1829, ending amateur policing, and forces became compulsory nationwide by 1856. Punishment moved from the scaffold to the prison: public execution and transportation both ended in 1868, while imprisonment, reshaped by John Howard and Elizabeth Fry and modelled on Pentonville (1842), became central.
Modern crime and punishment, c.1900 to present
New crimes appeared (cybercrime, motoring offences, terrorism, hate crime), though theft remains commonest. Science and technology transformed policing: fingerprinting (from 1901), DNA profiling (from the 1980s), CCTV and computers. The death penalty was abolished in 1965 after notorious miscarriages of justice and changing attitudes. Prison remains the main serious punishment, but its aim has shifted towards rehabilitation, with alternatives to custody such as community service, probation and tagging.
Check your knowledge
A mix of recall questions covering the whole option. Attempt them, then check the solutions.
- What was a tithing, and what was it for? (2 marks)
- In what year did the Church withdraw support for trial by ordeal? (1 mark)
- Name one "new" crime of the early modern period and why it arose. (2 marks)
- What was the Bloody Code, and roughly how many capital crimes did it include? (2 marks)
- Who founded the Metropolitan Police, and in what year? (2 marks)
- In what year did public execution and transportation both end? (1 mark)
- Name the two prison reformers and one thing each did. (4 marks)
- When was the death penalty abolished for murder in Britain? (1 mark)