James Neild (1744–16 Feb 1814) was a British prison reformer.

James Neild was born in Knutsford, Cheshire. He made a fortune as a jeweller and retired to Chelsea to become a philanthropist and campaigner, especially in the field of prison reform. In 1812, after inspecting a number of prisons, he published his State of Prisons in England, Scotland and Wales. Along with Jeremy Bentham's Theorie des Peines et des Recompenses (1811), Neild's book helped to trigger parliamentary pressure for reform.^[1]

He was High Sheriff for Buckinghamshire in 1804.

He had married, in 1778, the eldest daughter of John Camden of Battersea. They had two sons and a daughter. On his death he was succeeded by his younger son John Camden Neild, his elder son being disinherited and having gone abroad. John Camden Neild lived the life of a recluse and on his death in 1852 left the whole of his fortune to the Queen

• John Camden Neild

• Cheyne Walk, Chelsea

v t e Marshalsea
Prisoners	Sir Francis Barrington Bishop Edward Bonner Henry Chettle Richard Cox Robert Culliford Robert Daborne John Dickens Thomas Drury John Eliot John Gerard Hannah Glasse John Baptist Grano Nicholas Grimald Charlotte Hayes William Herle Denzil Holles Ben Jonson Thomas Malory Philip Massinger George Morland Nicholas Owen Sally Salisbury John Selden Richard Shelley Ralph Sherwin Nicholas Udall Robert Wingfield George Wither
Issues	Debt bondage Debtors' prison Marshalsea Court Poor Law Sponging-house Workhouse
Reformers	James Oglethorpe John Howard James Neild
Books and films	Little Dorrit Little Dorrit (film) Little Dorrit (TV series)
Categories	Marshalsea Defunct prisons in London