Poultry Compter

Poultry Compter (also sometimes known as Poultry Counter) was a small compter, or prison, run by a Sheriff of the City of London from mediaeval times until 1815.

It took its name from its location on a section of Cheapside called Poultry, from the produce that was once sold in street markets along the thoroughfare.

In 1580 the Catholic printer William Carter was held in Poultry Compter before being transferred to the Tower of London and executed on charges of treason against Queen Elizabeth I.

The compter was used to house prisoners such as vagrants, debtors and religious dissenters, as well as criminals convicted of misdemeanours including homosexuality, prostitution and drunkenness.

On 1 August 1772, for instance, The Craftsman reported that "a well dressed man was detected, near Lombard-street, in an unnatural crime, and immediately committed to the Poultry Compter." On 5 July 1799, a Friday evening, at 7 o'clock, a naked man was arrested at the Mansion House and sent to the compter. He confirmed that he had accepted a wager of 10 guineas (equal to £947 today) to run naked from Cornhill to Cheapside.

The prison became notorious for its poor conditions. A contemporary account describes the prison in the late 17th century:

the mixture of scents that arose from , tobacco, foul feet, dirty shirts, stinking breaths, and uncleanly carcases, poisoned our nostrils far worse than a Southwark ditch, a tanner's yard, or a tallow-chandler's melting-room. The ill-looking vermin, with long, rusty beards, swaddled up in rags, and their heads—some covered with thrum-caps, and others thrust into the tops of old stockings. Some quitted their play they were before engaged in, and came hovering round us, like so many cannibals, with such devouring countenances, as if a man had been but a morsel with 'em, all crying out, "Garnish, garnish," as a rabble in an insurrection crying, "Liberty, liberty!" We were forced to submit to the doctrine of nonresistance, and comply with their demands, which extended to the sum of two shillings each.

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