Although imprisonment is the common practice nowadays for most crimes, up until the 1800's, guilty people were rarely in prison for long terms, hanging and transportation (being sent to Australia) were common legal punishments at the time. However, the Victorian era brought prison up as an acceptable punishment for offences. This was mainly due to the growth of towns, which brought on a rise in crime, as well as areas in Australia refusing convicts, and the public's disapproval of public hangings. Before prisons became such a common practice, and when England still used Australia as a convict "dumping ground", it was a common practice to keep prisoners on dirty, disease-ridden ships known as hulks, before shipping them off to Australia, in fact; at one pint more than two thirds of all prisoners were on hulks.