Indeed so. We do have an unhappy history and 'folk memory' of such things. This anarchist period also gives the story to Conrad's 'The Secret Agent', a set literature text here for our 16-18 year olds. Just to add to the fun, the Fenians, Irish terrorists and precursors of the IRA, got in on the act in 1884, bombing the House of Commons, London Bridge, Clerkenwell jail and other significant buildings. There were still anarchists around as late as 1911, when some Latvian ones, led by the mysterious 'Peter the Painter', were in a shoot-out with police at a house in London's East End ( 'The siege of Sidney Street' ) where they were hiding after a robbery where they'd killed three policemen.
