The Old Order (A Poor Man at the Gate Series Book 7)

by Andrew Wareham

He gave the two death sentences briefly, keeping to the legal formula before informing the prisoner that he would be taken from the court and returned to gaol and then would be hanged at the Crown’s convenience.

  Mark retired to his rooms while waiting for the prisoner to be taken away and the next to be wheeled in. He took up the notes relating to the case, briefly wrote ‘No mercy’ across them, handed them to Smithers. At the end of the week’s sittings there would be a short conference between his clerk and the Sheriff’s representative and the fate of the ten or twenty condemned to death would be determined. Where there was a feeling that there had been too many hangings of late, or if government had called for a softer hand, then most, even all, would be commuted to transportation or possibly a lesser sentence of imprisonment; if there was a degree of popular unrest to be stilled then every one might swing on the gallows. It was almost wholly a question of luck, except where a judge had found a criminal to be particularly undeserving of forgiveness.

  Some judges were very urgent in their desire to offer leniency; others were the exact opposite. Most, it seemed, had a mental list of crimes that were beyond the pale, and those varied according to the individual. Mark Star was rapidly making a name for being particularly down on those who offered casual violence to their betters. It was becoming known that he would give the least of sentences to men found guilty of drunken affray where no outsider had been hurt, but if a respectable passer-by suffered injury then every one of the louts would breathe the air of Botany Bay at absolute minimum. A house-breaker who had snatched up a knife had no chance of survival.

  Mark was travelling on circuit of Oyer and Terminer, sitting as judge at the Assizes held in the larger towns of the Northern Circuit, at the moment in Lancaster, staying each night in the Judge’s Lodgings, reasonably well-fed, comfortably looked after and addressed as ‘m’lud’ by all. Not quite thirty and high in his profession! He was well respected now – the slight divagations from the norm caused by his unfortunate error of some years past almost forgotten by all – and he had every expectation of becoming a Law Lord and sitting in the Upper House well before he was fifty, rich and respected. He knew that the family was proud of him; he could imagine his father referring to ‘my son, the judge’.

  Smithers provided him with the list of cases for each sittings and between them they worked out the order in which they should be taken, most important first if possible. Minor felons could wait, but known villains should be displayed to the public in a pointed message that crime paid only in condign punishment. Add to that, the mob enjoyed hanging days and should be given their little pleasures when possible.

  Five days of long sittings and forty cases dealt with, a dozen of the accused having offered guilty pleas on the unspoken understanding that their necks would be preserved; plea-bargaining as such was wholly forbidden, but a nod and a wink could do just as well. Ten of the cooperative were bound for the Antipodes and two had been released, after fifty lashes at the prison triangle and being bound over to good behaviour, Mark having felt that the years they had spent in gaol on remand had served as sufficient punishment already. Of the twenty-eight who had entered a plea of not guilty five had been successful and had had their freedom returned; the years spent on remand were to be regarded as an unfortunate error – they would receive no compensation for them. That left twenty-three convicted felons, ten of whom Mark regarded as hardened evil-doers: murderers; violent felons; rapists – all of whom should have their careers of infamy brought to a public end. The other thirteen, mostly minor thieves who had previous convictions, he made no comment upon – the sheriff’s officer was to be given a free hand, his decision depending purely upon local factors.

  There had been a small degree of unrest amongst the mill hands of late and the scaffold in Lancaster would take six at a time. Eighteen would therefore be a convenient number and would give a show lasting a good three hours. Five sentences of death were commuted to Botany Bay, the names selected almost at random; the rest would serve as a public object lesson next market day.

  From Lancaster Mark was to travel north to rural Kendal and its horse and sheep thieves and then south and east, back into the industrial areas. His circuit would last for some two months and then he would be located in Manchester for the rest of the half year. Most of his cases in Manchester would be civil, he expected, and interesting - intellectually stimulating arguments about contract and torts, much more satisfying than the low gutter-crawling of the criminal law. A judge could make a name for himself in civil law, his decisions setting precedents for others to argue and distinguish; civil judgements were often published in detail and references in the Law Reports were a golden route to promotion and necessary to a provincial out on the Northern Circuit.

  Mark wondered occasionally whether he should consider a political career. A few judges sat regularly in Parliament and were of use to the government; very often they were given a sinecure as a reward, and a thousand or two a year for doing nothing at all would come in handy. It was a decision that did not have to be made immediately – he would be wiser to wait a few years, establish himself on the Bench first.

  What would poor Christopher have made of it all, he asked himself, suppressing again any speculations about the nature of his death and the questions of entrapment that inevitably arose. Too many conspiracies had been invented for any thinking man to be happy, yet there could be no doubt that Christopher had been a violent young man, although most attractive. Be that as it may, it was his firm intention to avoid any further entanglements – better far to occasionally purchase his pleasures than to take that risk again.

  “Another score of hangings, Papa! Brother Mark does tend to be firm in his approach to the maintenance of order amongst the less fortunate sort of people!”

  Lord Star was not at all sure he approved of such flippancy – capital punishment was not a laughing matter, or so he supposed.

  “He has been sent out on Circuit to deal with the backlog of cases and in the nature of things must have taken the most heinous of offences and felons first. One can hardly be surprised, Thomas, that he has found it necessary to don the black cap so frequently.”

  “You may well be right, sir. On that topic, sir, have you heard of any progress in the pursuit of Lord Andrews’ would-be assassin?”

  “It appears to be at a stand, Thomas. The man probably fled to New York, but whether he stayed there or moved on to another state is unknown. He had money, could well have taken ship north or south along that vast coast and set up in any of the hundreds of little towns that are growing in the new country. He seems to have been moving stolen horses about Southern and Midlands England for two years or more, so he would have the knowledge to set up as a horse coper – he could, if he wished, disappear into the mass of the respectable, hard-working folk of the land.”

  “He is a felon, sir, a criminal by nature – the leopard does not, one understands, change his spots and the villain does not become an honest artisan. He is a thief and a murderer, and such he will remain; that is his nature and he will not fight against it, I believe.”

  Joe Star was somewhat upset at his son’s intransigent denial of the concept of redemption, was inclined to ask whether the same could be said of himself and Lord Andrews. Perhaps not, the fewer the references to his past, the better.

  “Thus, Thomas, you would expect him to be discovered in the underworld of New York?”

  “Or of one of the other great cities, Papa. I believe Washington, Boston and New Orleans to have significant populations of the criminal, sufficient to hide in. You have made investigations into his past it would seem, sir?”

  “I have, Thomas. A thousand gold sovereigns it has cost so far, and money well-spent! Four separate thief-takers: one from Bristol, another out of Birmingham, the third resident in Nottingham and the fourth from the growing town of Leeds. Each has been paid one hundred, cash in hand, and given a hundred as expenses and another fifty for specific payments to informants. They have cau
sed a great stir along Mr Godby Fletcher’s back-track, and between them have effected the arrest of nearly one hundred horse-thieves and felonious copers, taking I have no doubt a reward for each man or woman convicted in addition to my fees. I am given to understand that if Mr Fletcher should ever show his face in England again then he will not survive his identification by his ex-employers for many hours. As well, I am told, and I know not how reliably, that several of his past associates have been forced to flee the country, and none holding any goodwill towards him; they may end up in America, too.”

  Thomas was pleased at his father’s initiative, one that had not occurred to him. Like any number of others he had been shocked and much surprised at the murderous attack – rich peers were normally quite safe from such assaults, the scale of repercussions being far too great. The message was now being reinforced, he realised – Fletcher’s attempt at murder was likely to be the cause of some scores of hangings and sentences of transportation and would severely disrupt the business of any number of rich criminals. The lords of crime would have much to say to their underlings; he would not in fact be surprised to discover that the underworld had organised its own pursuit of Fletcher.

  He turned to his particular business.

  “There is to be a debate in the Lords, Papa, on the subject of Public Health. Was you to be able to raise your voice, it could be to our advantage in our endeavours in Lancashire, sir. We are able to show that as a probable result of our efforts in this area there has been a noticeable reduction in the incidence of some ailments. Were neighbouring towns to be compelled to copy our sewers and waterworks then I have no doubt that even more would be achieved. Government has no inclination to pass any Bills to introduce such compulsion, but a campaign might possibly shame them into at least encouraging local initiatives.”

  Joe Star promised to try, but he doubted it would do any good – this was not a government that responded to shame, being, apparently, alien to the concept.

  Thomas was not surprised at his father’s pessimism, it served merely to reinforce his own observation; but even without aid from Westminster there was much that could be achieved locally, he believed.

  “The Poor Law Union has been agreed, sir, after much argument. All of the parishes in the Act have finally negotiated and accepted their share of the costs and I have set the builders about their business. The Workhouse will open its doors before winter and indoor relief will become a thing of the past for all except deserving widows with young families. There is a general agreement to my proposition that the few young women whose lawful husbands have died should be protected in their own homes and assisted to bring their children up into respectability, and the cost will not be unbearable.”

  Lord Star agreed, there were always a few such families, cast into destitution through no fault of their own – a parent killed in an accident or drowned at sea the most common cause, illness less often, plagues tending to wipe out the whole family not select just one of its members. Where, less commonly, the father had perished on the gallows or, far more likely, in a drunken brawl, then the family was less deserving of consideration and could be consigned to the mercies of the Workhouse.

  “I have not actually looked over the plans for the Workhouse, Thomas.”

  The documents were laid out on the leather top of the working desk.

  “Three wards, sir – male; female; and mothers with infant children. Two dormitories for male and female children from four and up to the age of twelve years. On the ground floor, a refectory and kitchen and working places. It is envisaged that the room on the left shall be used for picking oakum, that on the right, which has larger windows and is airier, for breaking and grinding bones. Oakum is always needed in the shipyards and ground bone can be used as a fertiliser and is also in demand for the fabrication of false teeth and imitation ivory."

  “All to work?”

  “So it is proposed, sir. Brother Luke has suggested, argued strongly indeed, that children between the ages of five and ten years should be given education instead; his chapel has its own day school and charges the least of fees and there is a Lancasterian School as well in the town. I am inclined to agree with him, and may be able to persuade the Board of Guardians that it is a desirable expenditure of the ratepayers’ funds. It is probable, in fact, that the Board would be able to place the older children into employment after they had been schooled, the employer paying a fee for the privilege. It would be to the advantage of, say, shopkeepers or warehousemen at the docks to take boys who could write and count with some facility; seven year indentures would allow them to recoup their initial costs, to their benefit and that of the parishes.”

  It smacked of slavery, but the children would be free of their bonds by the age of eighteen at latest and would possess valuable skills enabling them to find paying employment thereafter.

  “What of the aged?”

  “Those still able will work – oakum picking can be done whilst sitting, after all. The enfeebled will be looked after in their wards by others who can still act as nurses.”

  “Old couples who can no longer keep their cottages up without assistance, will they be taken into the Workhouse?”

  “There can be no exceptions, sir, apart from the deserving widows. If their families will not tend their aged parents then the Workhouse it must be.”

  “Segregated, man and wife to live apart in their own Wards until they perish?”

  “It is not possible to make any other arrangement, sir, without a cost so great as to negate the whole benefit of the Poor Law Union.”

  “It is a harsh regime, my son.”

  Thomas was surprised at the criticism – the care of the elderly was morally and theologically the responsibility of their own children and grandchildren. Where the declining had been such improvident parents as to fail to teach their own children the nature of right and wrong, then they had no grounds for complaint at the nature of the charity so generously offered them.

  “Starvation is harsher, sir!”

  That was indisputable.

  “What says the rector?”

  “Very little, sir. His sole concern seems to be to reduce the church’s contribution to the absolute minimum and to argue against the paupers being admitted to his congregation – their presence in his pews might upset the remainder of his flock, it would seem.”

  “And they might not dig so deep in their pockets when the plate comes round, no doubt! The chapels?”

  “Are supportive, sir. They will identify the deserving as far as they are able and will ensure that divine service shall be held in the wards at least once on the Sabbath for the bed-ridden.”

  It seemed a cold and sterile form of charity that was on offer, but better, as Thomas had said, than starvation. The cost of the existing Poor Law, often doubling farmers' rents, was intolerable as well; if the Workhouse was unwelcoming then the unfortunate would make great efforts to avoid its clutches, taking any work they could find to make a living, and that must in itself be a desirable outcome. If the poor could not be persuaded to work, then they must be driven to it; it was for their own good, after all.

  “What of the Infirmary, Thomas? It has been open for, what, six months now?”

  “Two resident physicians, sir, and a surgeon who operates on two days every week and draws teeth on a third. There is a queue at the doors every morning, the people taking fullest advantage of its services, as they should. It is, and will remain, absolutely free, medicines as well. I am assured that it has been of the greatest benefit already. Ringworm amongst children, for example, is now far less to be seen, infections rigorously cauterised, and vaccination has been most straitly enforced – there will be no small-pox epidemics here, sir!”

  “What of the fevers?”

  “Beyond the doctors’ science, I fear. They rage every summer, only the cold of winter seeming to abate them. If anything, sir, they are growing worse, typhoid to be seen most years and there is a whisper of the cholera. One is inclined to
suspect that the arguments of those who support wholesale sewerage may hold water. Cleanliness may be the sole solution, sir, but the costs of digging sewers through every street are unthinkable! Though one could simultaneously install water reticulation, thus to kill two birds as it were.”

  Closed, brick-lined sewers had been dug through a few of the streets of the town - those holding the biggest shops and richest houses, and cross-links to connect them.

  Lord Star could see that it would be hugely expensive and difficult to achieve. He was puzzled as well – what would one do with the contents of the sewers of a whole town?

  “A question indeed, sir! First thoughts are to extend the sewers to the nearest large river. That of course has the drawback that the next town down the river’s course will draw its drinking water from that source.”

  They shuddered in unison.

  “A preliminary investigation says that the raw contents of the sewers may be run across and through beds of charcoal or coke and that clean water will eventuate. The dross that remains will dry off and may then be removed, to burn or to benefit the fields of local farmers. The cost might not be insignificant. At the moment the night soil contractors mostly spread the harvests of their labours directly onto fields distant from the town, although there is some production of nitre, or saltpetre, for the gunpowder works – I am unsure of the nature of the processes involved, of the costs and profits.”

  “Expensive, whatever is done! Would it not be advantageous to commission a scientist of some sort to investigate the nature of the contagious fevers and to discover how they might best be contained? If we can avoid the costs of sewerage then so much the better.”

  That was an obviously good idea, but scientists were not to be found on every street corner. Where would they find such a man and how would they then employ him?

  “At a university? In a hospital where doctors are trained? Edinburgh, one presumes, if one wishes to find educated men who can do other than spout Latin and Greek to their own amusement.”