The Victorians

Health and Hygiene
In the Victorian era life expectancy was quite low, being 45 for a middle class male and lower for working class individuals. Many children did not live until the age of 5 hence one of the reasons Victorian families were so large in numbers.
A reason many people were dying at such young ages was because of air pollution in poorer areas and also the lack of sewage systems which caused the Great Stink in 1858 where the River Thames contained undiluted sewage. However in terms of health and hygiene there was a slight breakthrough during this period with Florence Nightingale who helped to improve the standards of nursing and hospitals. 
During the Victorian era many diseases which are no longer common were easily contracted such as cholera and tuberculosis.

Crimes and Punishment
In 1829 the Metropolitan Police force was formed and the Metropolitan Police Act was formed several years later in 1839. This gave the police force more power to be able to arrest children for playing and musicians for performing. This allowed London to be a much safer area to live within.
The criminal justice system during this time was quite strict with many court cases lasting no longer than 2 days. After an arrest it was most likely that many people would end up in prison. Every prisoner was given their own cell which had adequate washing facilities. Unlike prisons nowadays, prisoners were not allowed much human contact and were only allowed out of their cell for exercise periods.
Executions were still a public affair that people could watch. Charles Dickens witnessed one execution and then campaigned to have all executions to occur within prison walls. This was passed 20 years after Dickens first campaigned.

The Great Exhibition
The Great Exhibition was carried out by Victoria and Albert to display the greatest inventions of the times. It was held in the Crystal Palace. There was more than 100,000 objects on display by over 15,000 contributors.

Travel, Transport and Communications
In the Victorian era the railway networks began to develop greatly by 1852 over 7,000 miles of railway had been laid in England and Scotland. Major cities, such as Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester and Bristol were were now interconnected. The development of the London Underground also began in this time period. This also led to the rise in summer holidays as many more people were able to use trains to go to beach areas such as Blackpool.