Carlisle Patriot, 23 Jul 1825 - Cumberland County Sessions (10)

[petra.mi...@doctors.org.uk]

Saturday 23 Jul 1825   (p. 4, col. 1-3)

 

CUMBERLAND MIDSUMMER SESSIONS.

  

THE KING v. INHABITANTS OF DALSTON.

 

This cause excited considerable local interest. Mr. COURTENAY appeared in support of the indictment; Mr. AGLIONBY for the defendants.

 

Mr. COURTENAY addressed the Jury:—He said the indictment had been preferred against the inhabitants of the parish of Dalston for the non-repair of a foot-bridge over the river Caldew near Dalston village. At first hearing, it would perhaps strike the jury as rather singular that the parish should be indicted, because the County is in general liable for such repairs. But there were exceptions to this rule as well as to most others. The same in the case of high-ways. Prima facie, the whole parish was always liable, but there were instances in which districts and individuals, for some particular reason, were compellable to repair; so in respect to counties, it sometimes happened, as in the present instance, that parishes lay under the liability. To make out his case, it would be necessary for him to prove, first, that the foot-bridge in question was out of repair; secondly, that the parish of Dalston had always repaired it. In a case of immemorial usage, it was not requisite to prove the reason, but the existence of the usage. He was in a condition to show beyond all doubt, that for more than a century past the parish of Dalston had been exempted from county rates, on account of building and repairing their own bridges; and he could also show that, on their own prayer, they had received help from the county in the performance of this duty. So that it was particularly ungracious, not to say unjust, that they came here to-day and said, "Oh, we will take all the advantages we can gain from the county, and in return we will not leave the public any thing." As soon as he had established the facts adverted to, the cause would in reality be an undefended one, for nothing could be given in answer to them. He would first prove an order of Sessions above an hundred years ago, which showed that £60 had been granted on the petition of the parish, they acknowledging their own liability, but pleading poverty, to assist them in building a stone-bridge at Hawksdale. In 1724, on another application from the parish, complaining that certain individuals having refused to contribute towards the said bridge, the Court of Quarter Sessions ordered a levy upon their property if they thereafter refused to pay. Thus he should take the jury back fully a century, and there show them the parish admitting their liability, obtaining county assistance through a plea of great poverty, yet distinctly exhonerating the county. But further than this, he would produce the parish books, and show them by entries in 1765-6-7, that this very bridge had been repaired out of the poor-rates of the whole parish. In the years 1816 and 1819, he would likewise show that more money, to a considerable amount, was expressly paid for the same purpose. With all this before him, he really felt it difficult to conjecture what defence the other side intended to set up. He was told, however, that the parish was divided into two parts, and that they meant to say that each, by an award regularly agreed upon at an early period, was liable only to build and repair the bridges within the limits of the respective divisions. He did not know that such a document as this award existed; but if it did, and were now produced, it could not be put in, for an agreement among themselves, for their own purpose, could not, in point of law nor in reason, bind the public. Yet if it were put in, he should show that it had not been acted upon, for the general parish repaired Hawksdale Bridge at the periods to which he had alluded. Again, then, he would say that he knew not what defence there was to this indictment; and he must consider the conduct of the parish in coming into court in the teeth of these overwhelming facts, both inconsistent and dishonourable. The prosecutors had no other course than to indict the whole parish. If they had indicted the Dalston division, they would have come into Court and then attempted to show that the whole parish repaired Hawksdale Bridge. Now that the whole parish was indicted, he had reason for concluding that they would make an attempt to throw the burthen upon a single division. This, then, was an dishonest endeavour to shift the burthen, and to keep the public out of its just rights: but the verdict of the jury would teach them that they could not make it with impunity.

 

The Clerk of the Peace produced from the records of the Court of Quarter Sessions an order made on the 24th April, 1723.

 

Mr. AGLIONBY objected. He submitted that this document could not be binding upon any of the parties to the present suit. It was not a legal document—there was nothing to show that the parties who appeared as petitioners had anything whatever to do with the parish. Moreover he did not know on what law the Court of Quarter Sessions could make such an order as was now attempted to be put in.

 

Mr. COURTENAY scarcely thought it worth while to answer such an objection as this. He did not adduce the record as one of judgment. They could not assume that a fraud had been put upon the records of the Court, because the negative of such a position was now incapable of proof: there it was, in the regular way, and it must be held as a bona fide instrument. He did not say the Sessions had a legal right to grant the money: but that had nothing to do with this case.

 

Mr. AGLIONBY still thought his objection good. There was nothing to identify these persons, so as to bind their successors as parishioners. It ought to be shown that the petitioners had a right to present such a petition. It might have been by a neighbouring parish, and the other side not appear; and thus, and not because correct, became a record of the Court.

 

Mr. COURTENAY.—This all goes for nothing. You need not identify a deed after a lapse of thirty years.

 

The Chairman directed the document to be read.

 

It in substance ran thus: Whereas the inhabitants of the parish of Dalston, having set forth that the bridges within the parish have been repaired and maintained time out of mind by the whole of the inhabitants of the said parish, and that therefore they have been exempted from contributing towards the county rates; and Hawksdale Bridge being now out of repair, and considering the great quantities of wood carried away by the water, and the said Hawksdale Bridge being in the common carriers' road from Whitehaven to Newcastle, &c.; considering also the dearness of wood, and other burthens, the said parish is unable to repair the said bridge as it ought to be, and the Court being satisfied that this is correct, doth order Mr. R. MONKHOUSE (the treasurer) to pay sixty pounds to the inhabitants of Dalston, on condition of their making a good and sufficient stone bridge, the said inhabitants taking upon themselves the liability of all future repairs, &c.

 

 

[to be continued]