They are very common where there are gardens at the back of the house, such as Kensall Green, Camden Town, Kensington, Battersea, Clapham, Peckham, and Victoria Park.
The clothes are generally disposed of at pawnbrokers or the leaving-shops, commonly called “Dolly Shops.” They leave them there for a small sum of money, and get a ticket. If they return for them in the course of a week, they are charged 3d. a shilling interest. If they do not return for them in seven days, they are disposed of to persons of low character. These wretches at the leaving-shops manage to get them into the hands of parties who would not be likely to give information—the articles, from their superior quality, being generally understood to be stolen.
These felonies are also committed by the female Sneaks who call at gentlemen’s houses, selling small wares, or on some other similar errand. When they find the door open and a convenient opportunity, they often abstract the linen and other clothes from the lines, and dispose of them in the manner referred to.
They are also stolen by ragged juvenile thieves, who get into the yards by climbing over the wall. This is occasionally done in the Lambeth district, in the dusk of the evening, or early in the morning, and is effected in this way:—Some time previously they commence some boyish game, about half a dozen of them together. They then pretend to quarrel, when one boy will take the other’s cap off his head and place it on the garden wall. Another boy lifts him up to fetch it—the object being to reconnoitre the adjacent grounds, and see if there are any clothes laid out to dry, as well as to find out the best mode of stealing them.
When they discover clothes in a yard, they come back at dusk, or at midnight, and carry them off the lines.
They take the stolen property to the receiver’s, after having divided the clothes among the party. Some will go off in one direction, and others in another to get them disposed of, which is done to prevent suspicion on the part of the police.
The receiving-houses are opened to them at night, as these low people are very greedy of gain. Sometimes they convey the stolen property to their lodgings, at other times they lodge it in concealment till the next day. These clothes are occasionally of trifling value, at other times worth several pounds, which on being sold bring the thief a very poor return—scarcely the price of his breakfast—the lion’s share of the spoil being given to the unprincipled receiver.
They are often encouraged to commit these thefts by wretches in the low lodging-houses, who are aware of their midnight excursions.
| Number of felonies of linen, &c., exposed to dry in the Metropolitan districts for 1860 | 236 |
| Ditto ditto for the City | 0 |
| 236 |
| Value of property thereby abstracted in the Metropolis | £150 |