Right: Frontpiece form Cotton's Compleat Gamseter

This site is an introduction to the gambling life in the "hells" and social clubs of 18th and 19th century England. Although gambling is probably as old as game play itself, it seems to have reached manic proportions in England by the late 1600's. During Cromwell's rule in England some of the royalist supporters who were in exile on the continent seem to have been infected by the gambling contagion already present on the continent. After the restoration of the king they returned to England, and there seems to have been just as little resistance to this "infection" among the English populace. No doubt the thousands of British mercenaries who served on the continent during the 30 Years War also contributed to the spread of new card and dice games as their surviving numbers returned to Britain. Gambling became rife in all quarters, and in the words of Samuel Pepys, there were "dirty 'prentices and idle people" playing at dice even in the Inns of Court. The popularity of gambling became a favorite subject for satirists and sermons of the period. Poet Sir John Denham waxed so eloquent in a treatise against gaming that his estranged father relented from a decision to disinherit Sir John, and left him a considerable fortune -whereupon Sir John promptly lost it at the card table.

Changes in laws during the 17th century reflected the perception of gambling as a growing social ill. For the first time in England's history a gambling law (the Gaming Act of 1664), focused gambling itself, rather than restricting specific games. It banned "disorderly and excessive" gaming and that all lawful games should not be turned from innocent recreations into "constant trades or callings." It further claimed as one of it's goals of protecting the youth who could be corrupted by gamblers "to the loss of their precious time and the utter ruin of their estates and fortunes, and withdrawing them from noble and laudable employments and exercises."¹ Gambling continued to become an increasing problem in England through the 18th and 19th centuries. For the lower classes illegal gambling "hells" ran in the backrooms of pubs, coffeehouses and other businesses. For the wealthy, gambling and betting was one of the primary amusements in the exclusive social clubs such as Brook's, White's and Crockford's. Nobles lost entire estates betting on horses, cards, and dice. It continued to be a problem until the 1840's when anti-gambling laws were strengthened, and the police were give more power to enter and search suspected gaming halls.

Professional cardsharps are not a new phenomenon. But, during the 17th century cheating among gamblers was not always regarded as so heinous a crime as one might think. In fact, in some circles it has been suggested that cheating (as long as you were not caught) was sometimes considered simply an embellishment to "skilled" play. In the book The Compleat Gamester, it is sometimes difficult to tell whether author Charles Cotton was warning his readers about the methods of cheating, or teaching them. Even some of those at court actually depended on their skill at cards for their income -and they were not over-scrupulous in their methods. In the preface to a 1714 work recounting the lives, losses, and occasional lusts, of some of the more scandalous gamesters, Theophilus Lucas explained that: "Since gaming is become a trade, and the adventurers thereat do not all play upon the square, my design in publishing these memoirs is to detect the several cheats which the sharpers use." He goes on to say that if the purpose of gaming is mere recreation, why are stakes played so high, and why is it pursued "like business, and with all the eagerness of trade?"