King's Bench Prison

King's Bench Prison
King's Bench Prison by Augustus Pugin and Thomas Rowlandson (1808–11).
Map
LocationSouthwark, London, England
StatusClosed
Closed1880[1]
Notable prisoners

The King's Bench Prison was a prison in Southwark, south London, England, from medieval times until it closed in 1880. It took its name from the King's Bench court of law in which cases of defamation, bankruptcy and other misdemeanours were heard; as such, the prison was often used as a debtor's prison until the practice was abolished in the 1860s. In 1842, it was renamed the Queen's Bench Prison,[2] and became the Southwark Convict Prison in 1872.[3]

  1. ^ David Brandon; Alan Brooke (15 August 2011). Bankside: London's Original District of Sin. Amberley Publishing Limited. pp. 82–. ISBN 978-1-4456-0962-1.
  2. ^ Mitchel P. Roth (2006). Prisons and Prison Systems: A Global Encyclopedia. Greenwood Publishing Group. pp. 152–. ISBN 978-0-313-32856-5.
  3. ^ The American Philatelist. American Philatelic Association. January 2006.