12th January 1813: Henry Hobhouse sends the result of the York Special Commission to the Home Office

York
Jan. 12. [1813]

Sir,

The Business of the Commission being concluded, I have the Honour to inclose from Lord Sidmouth’s Information a Calendar of the Prisoners, in which their several Sentences or their Modes of Discharge are noted. His Lordship will find the general Result to be that of 64 Prisoners

18 have recd Sentence of Death,
6 of Transportation for 7 Years,
17 capitally indicted, but discharged on Bail to appear & answer when required by the Crown.
2 admitted Evidence for the Crown.
13 discharged without Indictment
7 acquitted (4 of them by Consent)
1 has traversed to the next Assizes.

Of the 15 who have just received Sentence of Death, Mr. Baron Thomson intimated to only one of them any Hope of Mercy, viz. to John Lumb who was recommended by the Jury; & I understand that it is their Lordships’ to execute all the others either on Thursday or Saturday next.

I hope this Result of the Commission will meet the Approbation of his Majesty's Ministers; & as soon as I return to Town I will have the Honour of calling at Whitehall to answer any Enquiries which Lord Sidmouth may wish to make.

I have [etc]
H. Hobhouse

[To] J Beckett Esq

12th January 1813: Baron Thomson passes sentence on the convicted Luddites

Ten days after the Special Commission at York had been opened, all the trials were over, and all that was left was for Baron Thomson to pass sentences on those who had been convicted:

John Eadon, John Baines the elder, Charles Milnes, John Baines the younger, Wm. Blakeborough, and George Duckworth, you, the several prisoners at the bar, have been convicted of an offence, which the wisdom of the legislature has made a felony. You, John Eadon, and John Baines the elder, are convicted of having administered to different persons an unlawful oath, an oath tending to bind the persons taking it (and intended by you that it should so bind them) to join in a society of persons to disturb the public peace, to observe secresy in that association, and never to declare what they should know respecting that confederacy. You, the other four prisoners at the bar, have been convicted of being present, aiding and consenting to the administering of that unlawful oath by the prisoner John Baines the elder; and your offence is of the same degree as that of the man who actually administered that oath.

In the course of the very serious investigations, about which we have been so long employed in this place, it has but too plainly appeared what have been the dreadful effects of such oaths so taken. They certainly have been the means of inducing many unwary persons to enter into these illegal associations, and to continue in them; the effect of which associations and of which engagements in support of them, has been such as we have unfortunately witnessed in the evidence laid before us in the course of these inquiries; they have tended to the disturbance of the public peace in the most populous manufacturing part of this county; they have induced large bodies of men to engage in the most tumultuous proceedings, to attack the houses, plunder the property, begin to demolish, the mills, and to destroy the machinery employed in those mills; nay, they have had the effect of going much further, and have even induced persons to proceed to the horrid crime of murder. Strictly speaking, the administering of these oaths does not make you in law accessaries to those offences; but still they must be heavy upon your consciences, if you have any sense of right or wrong remaining.

You, John Eadon, seem to have been long practised in so administering these oaths. To the person to whom you administered it, you gave instructions to get that oath by heart, that he might qualify himself to be the administrator of it; and to a person who called upon you shortly after you had so administered that oath, you fully explained to what it was intended to bind the parties, not scrupling to admit, that the intention of it was, to overturn the very government of this country.

You, John Baines the elder, have made it your boast that your eyes have been opened for three and twenty years; and you also declared your sentiments with respect to government, and with respect to no government, plainly (according to what we have collected (from the evidence) preferring anarchy and confusion to order and subordination in society.

Such is the offence of which you, the prisoners at the bar, stand convicted; and the punishment which the legislature has provided for that offence is certainly not a severe one, if we consider only what a profanation of religion it is, to make such s daring appeal to the Almighty to witness your desperate engagements, and what are the horrid consequences that follow from it. If the offence committed by one of you, that is, by John Baines the elder, of administering this oath, had been committed only two days later than it was, the administering of that oath would have amounted to a capital felony; for the legislature, seeing that the punishment was hardly sufficient for offences of such magnitude, have enacted, that to administer any such oath, whereby a person is held bound to commit any murder or other capital felony, shall itself amount to a capital offence. That act of parliament, however, did not take place till a day after you had committed this offence.

Under all these circumstances, we feel it our duty to pronounce that judgment upon you which the law has provided, and in the extreme in which it is provided. The judgment of the Court upon you, the prisoners at the bar, is, That you be severally transported beyond the seas for the term of seven years.

The prisoners capitally convicted being next put to the bar, and asked what they had to say, why sentence of death should not be passed upon them, prayed that their lives might be spared.

Mr. Baron Thompson.—John Swallow, John Batley, Joseph Fisher, John Lumb, Job Hey, John Hill, William Hartley, James Hey, Joseph Crowther, Nathan Hoyle, James Haigh, Jonathan Dean, John Ogden, Thomas Brook, John Walker, you, unhappy prisoners at the bar, stand convicted of various offences, for which your lives are justly forfeited to the injured laws of your country You have formed a part of that desperate association of men, who, for a great length of time, have disturbed the peace and tranquillity of the West Riding of this county. You have formed yourselves into bodies; you have proceeded to the most serious extremities against the property of many individuals. The cause of your so associating appears to have been, a strange delusion which you entertained, that the use of machinery in the woollen manufacture was a detriment to the hands that were employed in another way in it; a grosser delusion never could be entertained, proceeding probably from the misrepresentations of artful and designing men, who have turned it the to the very worst purposes which riot and sedition could produce. You have proceeded to great extremities. The first object, perhaps, seems to have been that of your procuring arms, in order to carry on your nefarious designs. With that view, it seems, that some of you went about inquiring for such arms at different houses, and getting them wherever you could find them.

But not stopping there, and not contenting yourselves with getting what arms you could lay your hands upon, you proceeded to plunder the habitations with a great degree of force, and took from them property of every description, which you could find in those houses. An offence of that nature is brought home, and sufficiently established against you the prisoners John Swallow, John Batley, Joseph Fisher, John Lumb, Job Hey, John Hill, William Hartley, James Hey, Joseph Crowther, and Nathan Hoyle.

You the prisoners, Job Hey, John Hill, and William Hartley, did upon the occasion, when you went to the house of your prosecutor, carry away certainly nothing but arms, but you carried them away with great terror, and under circumstances which were sufficient unquestionably to make him deliver what he had. The other prisoners, whose names I have last recited, have been concerned in breaking a dwelling-house in the night time, some of them getting notes, money, and other things; and the last prisoners, James Hey, Joseph Crowther, and Nathan Hoyle, for robbing a person in his dwelling-house.

The evidence, that has been given against you all, was too clear to admit of any doubt; and you have all been convicted of these offences upon the most satisfactory evidence.

You, the other prisoners, James Haigh, Jonathan Dean, John Ogden, Thomas Brook, and John Walker, have been guilty of one of the greatest outrages that ever was committed in a civilized country. You had been long armed and organized, you had assembled upon this night, when the mill of Mr. Cartwright was attacked; you had assembled at the dead hour of night in great numbers; you had formed yourselves into companies under the command of different leaders; you were armed with different instruments of offence, with guns, with pistols, with axes, and with other weapons; you marched in military order and array to the mill, which was afterwards in part pulled down; you began there your attack with fire-arms, discharged into that mill, and kept up a most dreadful fire, and at the same time applied the instruments, which you had brought there, of a description calculated to do the worst of mischief, in beginning to demolish the mill, intending, as it is obvious, to do also mischief to and to demolish the machinery which that mill contained. The cries and exclamations that proceeded from this riotous and tumultuous mob thus assembled, of which you formed a very powerful part, were such as were enough to alarm a man of less firmness than that man possessed, who was the owner of the mill so attacked. Your cry was, "Get in, get in, kill them all!" and there is but little doubt, it is to be feared, that if you had made good your entry into that mill, these threats would have been put into execution, and that the mischief done would hardly have been confined to the machinery which was there. The courage and resolution, however, which that individual displayed, had the effect of making you desist at that time from the attack, and two of your wretched companions paid the forfeit of their lives on that occasion.

It is but too manifest that it was the defeat of you and your other wicked confederates, that afterwards occasioned that fatal attack upon the person of another gentleman, by which he was assassinated and murdered. It was upon that occasion that the plan of that assassination was laid, and too fatally put into execution. The persons immediately concerned in that murder hare suffered the punishment which the law inflicts, and a similar fate is about to await you, prisoners at the bar.

There is one of you, John Lumb, who have received a recommendation from the jury in your favour. A discriminating jury thought that they have seen circumstances in your case, which distinguished it from the case of the rest of your fellows in that indictment; and they have, in their wisdom, recommended you to mercy. It is possible that that mercy may be shewn to you, upon a representation elsewhere, and it is possible that your life may be spared. Whatever becomes of you after that, it is to be hoped and trusted, if that mercy should be extended to you, that you will make a proper use of it.

For the rest of you, prisoners, I wish I could discover any circumstances in your cases, that would at all warrant us in raising an expectation that the sentence which is about to be pronounced can be mitigated. It is of infinite importance, however, that no mercy should be shewn to any of you, the other prisoners. It is of importance also, that the sentence of the law for such evil works should be very speedily executed; and it is but right to tell you, that you have but a very short time to remain in this world. It is to be hoped that the forfeit of your lives, which you are about to pay, may operate as an example to all who have witnessed your trial and your condemnation, and to all without these walls, to whom the tidings of your fate may come, to be cautious how they engage in any such illegal confederacies, as you have unfortunately entered into. For they may rest assured, that it never will be in their power to say (and they will learn that from your sad example) "Hitherto will I go, and no further." They cannot stop in that career, in which they shall have once engaged, till death shall overtake them, in the shape of punishment.

In the awful situation in which you, prisoners, stand, let me seriously exhort you to set about the great work of repentance, and to spend the very short time that you must be allowed to remain in this world, in endeavouring to make your peace with your God, and to reconcile him by deep repentance. A full confession of your crime is the only atonement you can make for that which you have committed. Give yourselves up to the pious admonitions of the reverend clergyman, whose office it will be to prepare you for your awful change; and God grant, that, worthily lamenting your sins, and acknowledging your wretchedness, you may obtain of the God of all mercy perfect remission and forgiveness.

Hear the sentence which the laws of man pronounce upon your crimes. The sentence of the law is, and this court doth adjudge, that you, the several prisoners at the bar, be taken from hence to the place from whence you came, and from thence to the place of execution, where you shall be severally hanged by the neck until you are dead. The lord have mercy upon your souls!

Thirteen other prisoners were discharged by proclamation, there being no indictment against them. This was because the prosecution had decided not to proceed, deciding they had been 'controlled' by others. They were: Joshua Haigh (aged 27), John Shore (32), William Whitehead (26), Cornelius Hobson (19), Benjamin Siswick (25), Thomas Green (31), William Hanson (25), Mark Hill (26), George Rigge (29), Charles Cockcroft (19), John Walker (of Salford, West Yorkshire, 22), James Dyson (21), and Samuel Harling.

The two accomplices, Benjamin Walker and Joseph Carter, who were admitted evidence for the Crown, were also discharged by proclamation.

John Lumb was later pardoned from his death sentence, on condition that he was transported for life.

12th January 1813: The prosecution moves to rapidly conclude the York Special Commission

By 12.30 p.m. on Tuesday 12th January 1812, the prosecution had finally sated it's appetite for Luddite convictions. The 5 trials that remained were rapidly dispensed with.

David Moorhouse (a 26 year-old stonemason) and John Smith (33, a Butcher) were charged with a burglary at the house of William Savage of Kirkburton on 11th June 1812.

James Alan Park for the prosecution addressed the Court saying it was not necessary to read the indictment as the Crown did not intend to give any evidence. He explained this was because that although there was a strong suspicion that the two men were guilty, that conviction was only probable.

Sir Simon Le Blanc directed the Jury to find the men Not Guilty, which they duly did.

Next, James Starkey (a 22 year-old carpet-weaver) was charged with a misdemeanour for inciting 2 men (both undercover agents) to blow up Rawfolds Mill on 5th September 1812. His case was traversed to the next Assizes, and he was discharged on bail in the meantime.

James Alan Park then addressed the Judges about the remaining cases:

My lords; There are still remaining in your calendar 17 prisoners, who stand capitally indicted for different offences. Upon looking through a list of their cases with all the accuracy in my power, assisted by my learned friends, I discover that three of the ringleaders in all those offences have already suffered the penalty of the law; and two others of those who were involved in some of these indictments, have also been capitally convicted; I will not state their names, because I wish to create no prejudice. I further observe, that two others of those persons were acquitted upon a former trial on Saturday night, but I do not think that the circumstance ought to influence my judgment upon the present occasion, so as to render it my duty to put them upon their trial again. But, inasmuch as I consider that those whose cases remain, including the two were acquitted on Saturday, have been, to a considerable degree, the dupes of designing persons, and have been led on by the five persons to whom I have alluded, I am in hopes that I shall not be doing wrong in permitting them to be discharged on giving bail to appear at any time when called upon by the Crown. And I do assure your Lordships, that if they will conduct themselves as honest and industrious subjects, they never shall be called upon. I trust that we shall very materially benefit this country by the course we have taken, and that this lenity and forbearance on the part of the Crown (for so the prisoners must consider it) will have a powerful effect on the minds.

Baron Thomson agreed to the suggestion, providing certain formalities were dealt with. The last 3 cases were rapidly read out, in order to acquit the defendants, as Park had requested.

The third case concerned the breaking of John Hirst's shearing frames at Linley on 23rd February 1812, and also those of James Balderstone at Linthwaite on the same night. Samuel Booth (33 years-old), George Brook (of Dalton, aged 45) George Lodge (48), and Joshua Schofield (22), all croppers, were indicted for the attack on Hirst, along with George Mellor, Thomas Smith, William Thorpe, and Jonathan Dean, and John Walker, who had already been convicted. All of these 9, except Samuel Booth, were also indicted for the attack on Balderstone.

The fourth cases concerned the burglary of the house of William Newton at Foolstone on 18th May 1812, stealing three guns and a bayonet. James Varley (aged 35), Joseph Thornton (19), George Brook (of Lockwood, 18), George Beaumont (42), Abraham Armitage (30), Samuel Haigh (34), Benjamin Hinchliffe (24), John Taylor (26), and Robert Fitton (44) were indicted. Varley & Thornton were croppers, Fitton was a weaver, and the rest were labourers. The already executed George Mellor was also indicted.

The fifth and final case concerned a burglary at the house of Joshua Brook at Wooldale on 1st May 1812, where a gun and pistol were stolen. Charles Thornton (aged 19, a cropper) as well as the aforementioned James Varley and George Brook (of Lockwood), and James Brook & John Brook - who were acquitted at the Rawfolds trial - were indicted.

All 17 remaining prisoners were brought to the bar, and were entered into recognizances, along with 2 sureties each, to appear again if the Special Commission was recalled, and in the meantime keep the peace and be of good behaviour.

All that was left was for Baron Thomson to sentence the already convicted prisoners.

4th January 1813: Baron Thomson's charge to the Grand Jury at the York Special Commission

The Judges at the York Special Commission: Baron Alexander Thomson (left) & Sir Simon le Blanc (right)

The York Special Commission had formally opened on Saturday 2nd January 1813, but the business of the Commission started the following Monday 4th January, with the swearing in of the Grand Jury by one of the Judges, Baron (Sir Alexander) Thomson. The other Judge was Sir Simon Le Blanc. Both Judges had presided over the Lancaster Special Commission 8 months previously, where they had handed down 8 death sentences.

The Grand Jury, which including the West Riding magistrate Joseph Radcliffe, were as follows:

The Hon. Henry Lascelles of Stainsby, Foreman
The Hon. William Gordon of Rudding Park
Sir Bellingham Reginald Graham, of Norton Conyers, Baronet
Sir Henry Carr Ibbetson, of Denton Park, Baronet
Sir Mark Masterman Sykes, of Sledmere, Baronet
James Archibald Stuart-Wortley, of Wortley Hall, Esquire
Robert Frankland, of Thirkleby, Esquire
John Robinson Foulis, of Heslerton, Esquire
Thomas Davison Bland, of Kippax Park, Esquire
John Lister Kaye, of Grange, Esquire
Thomas Norcliffe, of Langton, Esquire
John Bell of Thirsk, Esquire
Ralph Creyke, of Marton, Esquire
Hall Plumer, of Stockton Hall, Esquire
Thomas Dunscombe, of Towlston Lodge, Esquire
John York, of Halton Place, Esquire
Richard Bethell, of Catfoss, Esquire
Richard Stainforth, of Hutton Lodge, Esquire
Joseph Radcliffe, of Milnsbridge, Esquire
Robert Harvey, of Farnham, Esquire
John Wilmer Field, of Heaton, Esquire
Henry Willoughby, of Hutton, Esquire
Richard York of Wighill Park, Esquire

There appear to have been different Juries for different trials.


Counsel for the Crown were: Messrs Park, Topping, Holroyd & Richardson; Attornies, Messrs Hobhouse (London), Allison (Huddersfield), and Lloyd (Stockport)

Counsel for the Prisoners were: Messrs Brougham, Hullock, and Williams; Attorney, Mr Blackburn (Huddersfield)

Thomson's charge to the Grand Jury was as follows:

Gentlemen of the grand Inquest;—We are assembled, by virtue of his majesty's commission, to exercise the criminal judicature in this county, at this unusual season of the year for the occurrence of such solemnities. None of us, however, can be insensible of the necessity which exists for a speedy investigation of the charges against the very numerous class of prisoners in your calendar. You will perceive I allude to those persons, who are accused of having participated (and several of them in repeated instances) in those daring acts of tumultuous outrage, violence, and rapine, by which the public tranquillity has been disturbed throughout the great manufacturing district in the West Riding of this county, for a period comprising, with little intermission, almost the whole of the year which has just elapsed.

Those mischievous associations, dangerous to the public peace, as well as destructive of the property of individual subjects, and in some instances of their lives seem to have originated in a neighbouring county, and at first to have had for their object merely the destruction of machinery invented for the purpose of saving manual labour in manufactures: a notion, probably suggested by evil designing persons, to captivate the working manufacturer, and engage him in tumult and crimes, by persuading him that the use of machinery occasions a decrease of the demand for personal labour, and a consequent decrease of wages, or total want of work. A more fallacious and unfounded argument cannot be made use of. It is to the excellence of our machinery that the existence probably, certainly the excellence and flourishing state of our manufactures are owing. Whatever diminishes expense increases consumption, and the demand for the article both in the home and foreign market; and were the use of machinery entirely to be abolished, the cessation of the manufacture itself would soon follow, inasmuch as other countries, to which the machinery would be banished, would be enabled to undersell us.

The spirit of insubordination and tumult, thus originating, has spread itself into other manufacturing districts; and when large bodies of men are once assembled to act against law, the transition unhappily is too easy from one irregular act to another, even to the highest of crimes against society. And thus we find that the destruction of tools has been succeeded by destroying the houses and the workshops of the manufacturers; it has led to the violent robbery of arms, to protect the tumultuous in their illegal practices, and to enable them to resist or to attack successfully; and from the robbery of arms they have proceeded to the general plunder of property of every description, and even to the murder, the deliberate assassination, of such as were supposed to be hostile to their measures. A temporary impunity (for the law, though sure, is slow) has led on these deluded persons from one atrocious act to another; from the breaking of shears to the stealing of arms, to nightly robberies, to the destruction of property, and of life itself.

The peaceful and industrious inhabitants of the country where these enormous practices have been committed, have had the misfortune to suffer in their persons and property from the acts of men confederated against society, and executing the purposes of their association under circumstances carrying with them the utmost terror and dismay. Armed bodies of these men, in some instances several hundred in number, apparently organised under the command of leaders, and generally with their faces blacked or otherwise disguised, have attacked the mills, shops, and houses of manufacturers and others, by day as well as by night, destroyed tools worked by machinery, and in some instances shot at the persons whose property they have thus attacked. But the worst of these misdeeds is yet behind, a most foul assassination. While such outrages as those mentioned were carrying on in that part of the country, a person in a respectable station of life, returning from Huddersfield to his residence at Marsden, was fired at and shot from behind the wall of an inclosure near the road, receiving several wounds, of which he died shortly after. With this murder some of the prisoners in the calendar stand charged; and it will be your province to inquire into the foundation of that, as well as every other charge to be preferred before you against any of the prisoners, and to treat them as the evidence before you, in your judgment, shall require.

Probably it may be thought requisite, in order to substantiate the charges against the persons accused of being concerned in this murder, or other offences that may come before you, that the testimony of an accomplice should be produced; which is necessary, in many cases, in order to prevent the worst offences from escaping punishment. You will, however, attend to it with caution, taking into consideration all such circumstances as may be laid before you, tending to confirm his evidence, and to satisfy you, that in his narrative of the transaction, in which he would involve others with equal guilt with himself, he is worthy of credit. Such testimony (that is, of an accomplice) is undoubtedly competent, and it is at all times to be received and acted upon, though with a sober degree of jealousy and caution; and with such caution, you, gentlemen, in the first instance, and more especially those who shall be charged with the determination of these important issues in their final resort, will consider them.

With regard to the guilt, which persons may incur by engaging in any riotous assembly, the statute of 1 Geo. I. commonly called the Riot act, has enacted, that if any persons, to the number of twelve or more, who shall be unlawfully, riotously, and tumultuously assembled together to the disturbance of the public peace, shall not disperse, but continue in that state for the space of an hour after such proclamation made as is directed in the act, they shall be guilty of felony without benefit of clergy. And by the same statute, if any persons, so unlawfully, riotously, and tumultuously assembled together, to the disturbance of the public peace, shall unlawfully and with force demolish or pull down any dwellinghouse or other buildings therein mentioned, they shall also be guilty of felony without benefit of clergy.

So also by the statute of  9 George III. it is made a capital felony, for persons, being riotously and tumultuously assembled, to pull down or demolish, or to begin to pull down or demolish any wind saw-mill or other windmill, or any watermill or other mill, or to set fire to the same. In addition to which, the act of 43 Geo. III. cap. 58, has provided against the maliciously setting fire (among other things) to any mill, warehouse or shop, with intent to injure or defraud any of the king's subjects, by subjecting the offenders, their counsellors, aiders and abettors, to a capital punishment.

I do not know whether the offences, of which any of the prisoners are accused, were committed under such circumstances as will bring them within any of the acts I have stated, so that indictments may be framed upon them; but it seemed not unnecessary to state these statutes, in order to call your attention to them, in case any such indictment should be preferred.

But there is one statute, which appears to apply to the charges against the greater number of the prisoners: those who are accused of having destroyed shears employed in the woollen manufacture. By the statute of 22 Geo. III. cap. 40, if any person shall by day or night break into any house or shop, or enter by force into any house or shop, with intent to cut or destroy any serge or other woollen goods in the loom, or any tools employed in making thereof, or shall wilfully and maliciously cut or destroy any such serges or woollen goods in the loom or on the rack, or shall wilfully or maliciously break or destroy any tools used in the making any such serges or other woollen goods; every such offender shall be guilty of felony without benefit of clergy.

Several of the charges, in the calendar, will probably be brought before you in the shape of indictments, either at common law for burglaries, or robberies by violence from the person, and will deserve your serious attention. Other indictments will probably be preferred for maliciously shooting at persons; which, by the statute of Geo. I, is made a capital felony, though death does not ensue.

I do not know, whether any indictments will be brought before you against any persons as accessaries, either before or after the fact, to any felonies which may become the objects of your inquiry; but it may not be unnecessary to state, upon this occasion, that there may be accessaries to all felonies committed before and after the fact, whether felonies at common law, or created such by statute: an accessary before the fact being one, who, being absent at the time of the crime committed does yet procure, counsel, or command, another to commit a felony; and an accessary after the fact being a person, who, knowing a felony to have been committed, receives, succours, comforts, or assists the felon: and generally any assistance given to the felon, to hinder his being apprehended or tried, or suffering punishment, makes the assistant an accessary; and, in some instances, accessaries to felonies are deprived of the benefit of clergy, as well as principals.

There is also an offence, which the law denominates misprision of felony; which is, the concealment of a felony which a man knows; and which is punishable as a high misdemeanor.

There is yet one species of offence contained in your calendar, which deserves to be particularly adverted to, because it is, in all probability, that which has been the means of procuring many of the deluded people who have been guilty of the outrages imputed to them, to embark and to continue in such crimes: I speak of the offence of administering unlawful oaths. By the statute of 37 George 3rd, cap. 123, it is enacted, that any person who shall, in any manner or form whatsoever, administer or cause to be administered, or be aiding or assisting at, or present at and consenting to, the administering or taking of any oath or engagement purporting or intending to bind the person taking it to engage in any mutinous or seditious purpose, or to disturb the public peace, or to be of any association, society, or confederacy, formed for any such purpose, or to obey the orders or commands of any committee or body of men not lawfully constituted, or of any leader or commander, or other person not having authority by law for that purpose; or not to inform or give evidence against any associate, confederate, or other person; or not to reveal or discover any unlawful combination or confederacy; or not to reveal or discover any illegal act done or to be done; or not to reveal or discover any illegal oath or engagement, which may have been administered or tendered to or taken by such person or persons, or to or by any other person or persons, or the import of any such oath or engagement; this offender shall be guilty of felony, and may be transported for any term not exceeding seven years: and every person who has taken any such oath or engagement, not being compelled thereto, shall also be adjudged guilty of felony, and may in like manner be transported: with a proviso, that compulsion shall not excuse any party taking such oath or engagement, unless he shall, within four days after the taking of it (unless prevented by actual force or sickness, and then afterwards within four days), declare the same, together with the whole of what he or she shall know, touching the same, and the person or persons by whom and in whose presence, and when and where such oath or engagement was administered or taken, by information on oath, in such manner as is directed by the act: and all persons aiding and assisting at, or present and consenting to, the administering or taking of any such oath or engagement, as well as all who cause such to be administered or taken, though not present at the administration of them, shall be deemed principal offenders, and be tried as such, though the person who actually administered such oath or engagement shall not have been tried or convicted. It is also enacted, that it shall not be necessary, in any indictment against any person or persons administering or causing to be administered or taken, or taking any such oath or engagement, or aiding or assisting at, or present at and consenting to the administering or taking thereof, to set forth the words of such oath or engagement, and that it shall be sufficient to set forth the purport of them, or some material part thereof: with a proviso, that any engagement or obligation whatsoever, in the nature of an oath, shall be deemed an oath within the meaning of the act, in whatever form or manner it shall be administered or taken.

By a recent statute, the 52nd of the present king, cap. 104, and which took effect from the ninth of July last, it is provided, that every person who shall administer, or be aiding or assisting at the administering of any oath or engagement, purporting or intending to bind the person taking the same to commit any treason or murder, or any felony punishable by law with death, shall suffer death as a felon without benefit of clergy; and every person who shall take any such oath or engagement, not being compelled thereto, shall be guilty of felony, and be transported for life, or for such term of years as the Court before which lie shall be tried shall adjudge: with provision for indemnifying a person taking the oath, on his discovering the same, and complying with the terms prescribed by the act.

No one, who seriously reflects on the infinite mischiefs that may happen to society, from persons associated for any unlawful purpose whatsoever, thus binding themselves to each other under what they are taught to consider as the sanction of an oath, and cementing their union in wickedness by this profane appeal to the Almighty to witness their desperate engagements, can conceive that the punishment which the legislature has provided for such offences, is in any the least degree severe.

You will perceive, that in the course of the address, with which I have now troubled you, I have forborne to advert to any other offences in the calendar than those which appear to be connected with the fatal disturbances in the West Riding, which have produced such dreadful consequences; because I am not aware that any other indictments will be brought before you upon this occasion. And if there should be such, those other offences do not appear to me to be of a nature, that to gentlemen of your description, and accustomed to such inquiries, would call for any observation from me.

I cannot conclude without expressing the utmost confidence that the country may safely rely on the vigilance and attention, with which you will proceed in the examination of the different charges to be brought before you. No indignation at the outrages which have been committed, will excite any prejudice in your minds, when you are weighing the evidence against each individual accused, and deciding how far he is personally implicated in the crime imputed to him. And however those who have been engaged in those, desperate outrages which we deplore, have thereby despised and set at nought the laws and their authority; yet, the persons who are now the objects of your inquiry, will find, that those laws will continue to be administered, not more for the detection and punishment of the guilty, than for the protection and safety of the innocent.

I cannot conclude without also expressing a thorough confidence, that, having discharged the duty which has assembled you at this time, and returned to those parts of the county where you respectively reside, your earnest endeavours will constantly be exerted to restore and preserve the public peace, and to convince those who are liable to be seduced from their duty by the arts and delusions of wicked and designing men, of the fatal consequences attendant on their giving way to such evil solicitations, or engaging in any disturbance of the public peace and tranquillity; and that you will, on all occasions and in every situation in which the country enjoys the benefit of your services, be earnest and zealous to inculcate a firm allegiance to his majesty's throne, and a reverence to the laws, and thus to promote that general regularity and order, upon which depend the peace and the comfort of civil society.

25th May 1812: The Lancaster Special Commission commences

Baron Alexander Thomson (left) & Sir Simon le Blanc (right)

On Monday 25th May 1812, the special Assize to try those committed for trial during the recent disturbances in Lancashire - a Special Commission - commenced at Lancaster Castle, where the prisoners were also held.

The Judges presiding over the trial - Baron (Sir Alexander) Thomson and Sir Simon le Blanc - had arrived at 6.00 p.m. on the previous Saturday, having left London on Thursday 21st May, and were met by the High Sheriff, Edward Greaves, before proceeding to formally open the court on the same day. The Leeds Mercury of 23rd May informed that Mr Justice Chambre and Mr Baron Graham were also present.

Monday began with the swearing-in of the Grand Jury, who were as follows:

Joseph Radcliffe, of Royton, Esq. Foreman,
Isaac Blackburne, of Bank-Hall,
John Birley, of Blackburn,
Thomas Drinkwater, Irwell-House,
William Farrington, of Shawe-Hall,
Henry Fielden, of Witton,
Ralph Fletcher, of Tonge-with-Haulgh,
Thos. Gillibrand, of Chorley,
Nathanial Gould, of Salford,
Wm. Hulton, of Hulton,
Wm. Horton, of Rochdale,
Strethill Harrison, of Lancaster,
Wm. Jones, of Broughton,
John Lever, of Alkrington,
Thomas Leyland, of Walton,
Edmund Rigby, of Ellel Grange,
Benjamin Rawson, of Darley,
Miles Sandys, of Graithwaite,
John Silvester, of Chorley, and
John Simpson, of Hope, Esquire.

The foreman of the Jury was Joseph Radcliffe, the Magistrate from the West Riding who had his hands full dealing with Luddites there. His pre-eminent position these trials is a fact rarely mentioned by historians. Also notably present was Colonel Ralph Fletcher. Even allowing for the wide differences between the modern trial system and that of 200 years ago, it would be difficult to pick a more prejudiced and partial jury than this.

The Lancaster Gazette of 6th June 1812 gave a brief, summarised account of the Judges' charge to the Jury:

An admirable Charge was given to them, by Baron Thomson, in which he stated the law which applied to the different cases which would come before them. Persons breaking into warehouses, mills, or shops, and setting fire to them, or stealing or destroying any goods therein, were guilty of felony, without benefit of clergy. Persons guilty of administering or aiding and consenting to the administering of unlawful oaths, were liable to seven years transportation. He concluded with exhorting them to use their utmost endeavours, in their respective neighbourhoods, to restore and promote the public tranquillity.

The Court was then adjourned to the following morning, when the trials would commence in earnest