Next up, in our trawl through the court archives of the Old Bailey: young Maria Gurdham, aged 18, who was punished on this day in 1799.
She’d been taken on 1 March in as a servant by John Allingham, landlord of the “Greendragon”, a pub in Hart Street (known these days as Bloomsbury Way). She came with character references “from Princes-street, Westminster.” Yet on the 18th, her new employer noticed that various items were missing from his bedroom.
“We accused her of it”, the landlord explained, but she denied it. Yet her guilt was in little doubt: the items had subsequently been recovered from the local pawnbroker, Samuel Morritt of nearby Long Acre, who swore that he had received them from young Maria.
Up to that point, of course, she must have hoped to get away with her crime. But I’m imagining the conversation playing out:
Allingham: So you still proclaim your innocence?
Maria: Of course, sir.
Allingham: Then how do my possessions come to be at Mr Morritt’s pawn shop?
Maria: I have no idea, sir. You’d have to ask him that.
Allignham: But I did. And he assures me that it was you who sold him the items in question.
Maria: Please sir. I can explain. Have mercy on me. Please don’t send me before the court.
But before the court she was taken, where she was:
indicted for feloniously stealing, two shirts, value 8s. a linen sheet, value 3s. a pair of nankeen breeches, value 3s. a dimity waistcoat, value 2s. a pair of cotton stockings, value 12d.
She was tried before the second Middlesex jury, whose names are recorded for posterity: Thomas Hill, James Ward, Joseph Welch, Matthew Long, Henry Young, Thomas Brown, William Nash, John Morgan, Joseph Leach, James Watts, Hezekiah Denby and Robert Thompson.
They found her guilty, of course, and Lord Kenyon passed sentence:
The prosecutor having consented to take her into his service again, the Court ordered her to be privately whipped , and discharged.
“Having consented to take her into his service again?”!! Do I sense that, despite her criminal ways, Mr. Allingham might have had something of a soft spot for young Maria? If so, might he have stood outside, waiting while she was whipped, before taking the sobbing, remorseful girl back to the Green Dragon to comfort her?
He may have had a soft spot or….knowing that Maria would never have got another position and would have ended up in the workhouse had he not taken her back into his service, the poor girl has been left forever in his debt, a debt he could upon in whatever way he chose at any time he wanted and she would never complain no matter how severe the punishments, no matter how perverse the services he wanted from her…
Rather like a scene my man and I have been playing recently, when the poor maid was taken back after running away and was severely thrashed and abused in the most wonderful…erm… I mean terrible manner, with promises of more of the same after the Master had been so good as to forgive her transgressions and take her back into his home! 😉
Sarah: you mean he wouldn’t consider that after she’d taken the punishment of the court, justice had been done – time to forgive the girl out of hand, tomorrow’s-another-day, fresh-new-start sort of thing? Gosh, what a mean man.
Very hot… 😉
Ooooo, Sarah, what a delicious little twist on the tale!
Catherine – I guess he might be of the opinion that she had taken her punishment from the State, but still owed him a personal apology for her wrong-doing…
So now I wonder what the method of whipping would have been, as well as the duration/number of strokes or lashes?
Well, I wonder if members of the jury are allowed to oversee the execution of the sentence. Me, I know I couldn’t resist the fascinating Hezekiah Denby. I’m guessing he was slim, dangerous, very sexy…
LOL but can you imagine using ‘Hezekiah’ as a name within a scene now? The girl wouldn’t be able to stop laughing!
Larry – I’d like to think tied down over a birching blog. I suspect probably tied upright, with a whip to the back.
Law Courts should sentence more women to be flogged, when found guilty. Martha Stewart should have so sentenced. 25 lashes with the cane on her bare derriere would have been perfect.
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