Changes affecting the correctional system in Manchester during the last part of the 18th century were consistent with those of the nationwide correctional reform movement in England and reflected the national trend toward corrective penology. Officials in Manchester explicitly recognized the need for reform and realized that success would depend on the reformability of those punished. The particular concern with juvenile offenders was a function of other forces rapidly transforming English society, such as the rise of collectivized industries, the migration of child laborers, family disintegration, and the absence of moral guidance in childrearing. Correctional reform in Manchester during the last half of the 18th century lasted less than a generation, and the rash of prison building was over by the mid-1790's. Although the correctional reform effort died young, the fundamental belief in the reformability of young criminals was transplanted in a new movement that took shape a generation later in the early decades of the 19th century. Juvenile reformatories and industrial schools established explicitly for the correction of young offenders in the mid-19th century, not harshly regimented adult penitentiaries built during the same era, were the true heirs of the prison reform movement began in the late 18th century. 446 footnotes and 10 tables