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Offences Against the Person Act 1861

1861 United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland Act of Parliament 24 & 25 Vic c. 100

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History and societyInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 18, 2026
Entity authorityQ7079046 ↗
Source-derived summary

The Offences Against the Person Act 1861 (24 & 25 Vict. c. 100) is an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that consolidated provisions related to offences against the person (an expression which, in particular, includes offences of violence) from a number of earlier statutes into a single act. For the most part these provisions were, according to the draftsman of the act, incorporated with little or no variation in their phraseology. It is one of a group of acts sometimes referred to as the Criminal Law Consolidation Acts 1861. It was passed with the object of simplifying the law. It is essentially a revised version of an earlier consolidation act, the Offences Against the Person Act 1828 (9 Geo. 4. c. 31) (and the equivalent Irish Act), incorporating subsequent statutes.

Editorial summary

This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Offences Against the Person Act 1861” as 1861 United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland Act of Parliament 24 & 25 Vic c. 100. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.

Editorial reviewMost valuable as an event-and-institution map that identifies actors, dates and record creators for deeper historical inquiry. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1861, 1828—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1861. The account is most persuasive where Offences, Against and Person can be independently traced.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The subject matters to the history & society register because the source frames it as 1861 United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland Act of Parliament 24 & 25 Vic c. 100. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.

Evidence profile

The record creator and administrative purpose are central evidence, because official documentation reflects both action and institutional priorities. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 18, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7079046. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1861 and 1828.

Critical limits

Institutional narratives can privilege the records that survived while minimizing voices that were never formally collected. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Compare institutional narratives with records created by participants and affected communities. Dates and formal titles are useful anchors, but not substitutes for context.

Best used for
  • Event chronology
  • Institutional context
  • Locating named record creators
Verify next

Contemporary correspondence, government or organizational records, oral histories and cited historical scholarship.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Offences Against the Person Act 1861”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Offences Against the Person Act 1861 primary sources, Offences Against the Person Act 1861 archive and Offences research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Offences Against the Person Act 1861”?
  2. What chronology connects this entry to wider political or social change?
  3. Who created the surviving record, and for what administrative purpose?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Offences Against the Person Act 1861” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.