In common law, a hue and cry is a process by which bystanders are summoned to assist in the apprehension of a criminal who has been witnessed in the act of committing a crime.
By the Statute of Winchester of 1285, 13 Edw. I cc. 1 and 4, it was provided that anyone, either a constable or a private citizen, who witnessed a crime shall make hue and cry, and that the hue and cry must be kept up against the fleeing criminal from town to town and from county to county, until the felon is apprehended and delivered to the sheriff. All able-bodied men, upon hearing the shouts, were obliged to assist in the pursuit of the criminal, which makes it comparable to the posse comitatus. It was moreover provided that a hundred that failed to give pursuit on the hue and cry would become liable in case of any theft or robbery. Those who raised a hue and cry falsely were themselves guilty of a crime.[1]
In Oliver Twist, Fagin reads a magazine called the Hue and Cry which was a weekly Police Gazette-type magazine detailing crimes and wanted people.
It is possible that it is an Anglicization via Anglo-French of the Latin, hutesium et clamor, meaning "a horn and shouting".[2] But other sources indicate that it has always been a somewhat redundant phrase meaning an outcry and cry. "Hue" appears to come from the Old French huer which means to shout, and Old French crier which means to cry.[3][4][5]