Volume 1
The trial of Elizabeth Duchess Dowager of Kingston for bigamy, before the Right Honourable the House of Peers, in Westminster-Hall, in full Parliament, on Monday the 15th, Tuesday the 16th, Friday the 19th, Saturday the 20th, and Monday the 22d of April, 1776. On the last of which days the said Elizabeth duchess dowager of Kingston was found guilty / Published by order of the House of Peers.
- Elizabeth Pierrepont, Duchess of Kingston-upon-Hull
- Date:
- 1776
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: The trial of Elizabeth Duchess Dowager of Kingston for bigamy, before the Right Honourable the House of Peers, in Westminster-Hall, in full Parliament, on Monday the 15th, Tuesday the 16th, Friday the 19th, Saturday the 20th, and Monday the 22d of April, 1776. On the last of which days the said Elizabeth duchess dowager of Kingston was found guilty / Published by order of the House of Peers. Source: Wellcome Collection.
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![t Ii« ] moner) was not fubftituted in the Place of legal Trial, but fuperadded to it, for his Advan- tage. This was the only Way, which had then been thought of, in any Cafe, to avoid Judgment of Death. The Reafon of the Thing, and the exprefs Letter of the Statute unite to prove, that, till the Eighteenth of Elizabeth, a Lord of Parliament, convicted of a Clergyable Crime, and being capable of Purgation, muft have been deemed and treated as a Clerk Convict, who might make Purgation, and delivered over to the Ordinary for that Purpofe. The learned and laborious Staunford, our ableft Writer, at lead on this Branch of the Law, treats it as a Thing without Queftion, Fol. 130, A Lord /hall have Privilege of Clergy4 where a common Per Jon Jhall not have it. He ought to make Purgation ; and, if fo, he mufl be delivered to the Ordinary, to be kept, till he has made his Purgation. If he confejfes, abjures, or is outlawed, he cannot have the Benefit of this Statute ; becaufe he cannot make Purgation. Staunford flourifhed when this Statute was made ; wrote a few Years after; and died before the Eighteenth of Elizabeth. His therefore is a contemporary Expofition of it, unentan¬ gled with the cafual Phrafe of any fubfequent A£t. Hale, in his Second Volume, Fol. 376, where he feems to differ from Staunford, as to the Extent of the Statute, agrees with him as to the Nature of the Privilege ; which he calls The Clergy of Noblemen. At one Time, Judges would not deliver Clerks to the Ordinary, who had become incapable of Purgation, by Confeflion, or otherwife. The Church al- Jedged, that nothing done before an unlawful Judge was fufficient to fuftain their Procefs, or Sentence. Whereupon the Articuli Cleri provided, that all Clerks fhall be delivered to their Ordinaries. But they were delivered, in the Inftances mentioned by Staunford, abfque Purgatione faciendd. Now the Cafe put in the Statute is, where any Man may have the Privilege of Clergy, as a Clerk ConviCt, that may make Purgation. And a Lord of Parliament, being in the fame Predicament, was put in the Cafe of a Clerk Convift that may make Purgation, without Reading or undergoing the Pains, which attended a Commoner under thofe Circumftances. Staunford therefore thought, that thefe Exemptions did not reach to the Cafe, where, before the Statute, there could be no Purgation for any Man. And the Opinion was fo probable, at leaft, that a very eminent Lawyer, of unexceptiona¬ ble Character, in the Time of the great Rebellion, actually burnt a Peer, who confeffed. Hale doubts ; efpecially at this Day, when Delivery to the Ordinary and Purgation are both taken away by the Eighteenth of Elizabeth. It is not obvious what Difference that makes. 1 think, fays he, it was never meant, that a Peer of the Realm fhould he put to read, or be burnt; where a common Perfon fhould be put to his Clergy. Both agree, that the Peer fhould have had his Clergy, and have been delivered to the Ordinary, and have made Purgation, —exempt from the concomitant Penalties; in fome Cafes, fays Staundford in all, fays Hale. But even Hale makes no Doubt cf Peers being liable to Imprifonment. In the Trial of Lord Warwick, the Chief Juftice lays it down, That the Statute of Ed¬ ward VI. exempted Peers from the Penalty of Burning, and repealed the Statute of Henry VII. as to fo much. Then a Peer was liable to Burning before ; and by the A<5t of Henry VII. which, in Terms, puts it upon Perfons admitted to their Clergy. But how could it be feri- oufly agued, that a Thing fo anxioufly repealed never exifted ?—I have confulted on this - Occafion as many Books, as I could think of referring to •, and I don’t recoiled One, which fuppofes a Time, when a Peer had not the Benefit of his Clergy. Nothing, it muft be confeffed, could be more unprincipled, and incongruous, than to fuffer the Truth or Juftice of aConviClion at Common Law to be queftioned in the Eccle- fiaftical Court. But the Church had not then loft its Hold upon Metis Minds; nor would, probably, for fome Ages, but for its own glaring Mifcondud. The Trial, called Purgation, as it was had in the Bifhops Couit, was a ridiculous Mockery of Juftice ; or became ferious, only by the Perjury, which it produced. It was therefore abolifhed. But fimply to abolifh it would alfo have cut off that Imprifonment, which fol¬ lowed a Conviction in the Bifhops Court, and which (it fhould have been prefumed) would always follow adtual Guilt. To remedy which, it was thought fit to give the Court Au¬ thority to punifh by Imprifonment for any Time lefs than a Year. This was proper in all Cafes *, but particularly fo in the Cafes of Peers, and Perfons in holy Orders, who were not liable to Burning in the Hand. It was therefore enadted by the Eighteenth of Eliz. c 7, f. 2, and 3, “ That every Perfon and Perfons, which at any Time, after this pre- “ fent Sefiion of Parliament, fhall be admitted and allowed to have the Benefit or Privi- “ ledge of his or their Clergy, fhall not thereupon be delivered to the Ordinary, as hath “ been accuftomed ; but, after fuch Clergy allowed, and Burning in the Hand according “ to the Statute in that Behalf provided, fhall forthwith be enlarged, and delivered out “ of](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b30458961_0001_0168.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
