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Using Court Records

For the family historian, crime really does pay. Criminal ancestors left an extensive paper trail, allowing you to uncover a tremendous amount of information about them.

Your ancestors would, of course, never have been involved in anything really nasty - or would they? Perhaps so but I expect it's much more likely they were the victims.

There is an extremely good chance that one of your ancestors has appeared in the criminal courts either as defendant, plaintiff, victim, witness or even as a member of the jury, so legal records are well worth looking into.

Punishments included the use of the pillory, stocks, ducking stool, carting, whipping, fines and, for debtors particularly, prison. The greatest change in punishment, however, was the introduction of transportation to the American colonies in the 1660s.

The death penalty was extensively used as a punishment and by 1688 fifty crimes were punishable by death, rising by 1815 to over 225. Capital offences included murder, treason, counterfeiting, arson, stealing horses or sheep, destroying turnpike roads, cutting down growing trees, pick-pocketing goods worth more than 1 shilling, being out at night with a blackened face, deliberately breaking tools used in the manufacture of wool or stealing from a rabbit warren. The idea was that punishment should be as harsh a deterrent as possible. By 1841 only murder and treason remained as capital crimes, the others having been abolished.

Prior to 1800, imprisonment was rarely used as a punishment, prisons being mainly places where individuals were held for trial or until their sentences were implemented. The group of people who were the exception were debtors, who could be imprisoned until their debt was paid.

From the fourteenth century, Justices of the Peace (JPs) held their own courts four times a year. These were known as Quarter Sessions and they were a vital part of the legal system, taking over much of the work of the Royal Judges. JPs dealt with all kinds of cases, from murder, poaching, vagrancy and assault to whether local landowners were paying their workers the going rate. These records also cover such matters as: by-law offences, licensing offences, non-payment of tithes and taxes, non-payment under bastardy orders, apprenticeship offences, Poor Law offences and many of the same crimes as the Assize Courts. JPs were usually wealthy landowners and until recent times had no legal training. Nevertheless they were able to impose sentences of death or transportation.

Records of the Quarter Sessions and the Petty Sessions can survive from the sixteenth century. They are usually found in the local County Record Office. However, a detailed listing of the whereabouts of the surviving records has been published. The details are on the Access to Archives website - www.a2a.org.uk.

Criminal records are to be found divided between The National Archives (TNA) and local record offices. The National Archives holds the records for the higher or more important criminal courts, which includes the Assize Courts, the Central Criminal Court (the Old Bailey) plus the Exchequer and Chancery courts, which tried important civil cases. Records relating to bankruptcy and debt can also be found at TNA. The records of the original Old Bailey sessions (1673-1834) are available online and fully searchable. They make extremely interesting reading.

Family historians who take the time to research these types of legal documents will often be pleasantly surprised by the rewards that are in store. The amount of information contained within a court file can vary greatly from one case to another and from one region of the country to another. In general, you should hope to find dates and places of births, marriages, and deaths; the names and ages of children; information about your relatives' residences; and financial and employment information.

The records are not always easy to read, but sometimes the material they contain is pure gold, with the trial details providing a fascinating insight into our ancestors' lives and the world they lived in. In addition, they'll allow you to discover if you are descended from a sinner or a saint.


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