Bloody Assizes
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The Bloody Assizes were a series of trials started at Winchester on 25th August 1685 in the aftermath of the Battle of Sedgemoor, which ended the Monmouth Rebellion in England.
There were five judges - Baron Montagu, Baron Wright, Justice Wythens, Justice Levinz and Sir Henry Polexfen, led by Lord Chief Justice George Jeffreys.[1]
The trials started in Winchester where the first notable trial was that of an elderly gentlewoman called Dame Alice Lyle.[2] The jury reluctantly found her guilty, and, the law recognizing no distinction between principals and accessories in treason, she was sentenced to be burned. This was commuted to beheading, with the sentence being carried out in Winchester market-place on 2 September 1685.
From Winchester the court proceeded to Dorchester and on to Taunton before finishing up at Wells on 23 September. More than 1400 prisoners were dealt with and although most were sentenced to death about 300 only were hanged or hanged, drawn and quartered.[3]
Some 800-850 were transported to the West Indies[2] where they were worth more alive than dead as a source of cheap labour.[4] Others were imprisoned to await further trial although many did not live long enough, succumbing to 'Gaol Fever' (Typhus) which was rife in the insanitary conditions common to most English gaols at that time. A woman called Elisabeth Gaunt had the grisly distinction of being the last woman to be burnt in England for political crimes.[5]
The Taunton Assize took place in the Great Hall of Taunton Castle (now the home of the Somerset County Museum). Of more than 500 prisoners brought before the court on the 18th/19th September, 144 were hanged and their remains displayed around the county for all to see and know what happened to those who rebelled against the king.[6]
The 284 who were transported were treated worse than slaves as, unlike slaves who had to be bought and paid for, they cost nothing and were therefore expendable. Jeffreys returned to London after the Assizes to report to King James who rewarded him by making him Lord Chancellor (at age of only 40), 'For the many eminent and faithful services to the Crown'.[4]
After the Glorious Revolution Jeffreys was incarcerated in the Tower of London where he eventually died in 1689,[4] the cause of death probably due to his chronic medical history of kidney and bladder stones leading to an acute infection, kidney failure and possibly toxaemia.
[edit] References
- ^ Sick Man or Sinner?. Somerset Gateway. Retrieved on 2008-02-20.
- ^ a b The Bloody Assize. Somerset County Council. Retrieved on 2008-02-20.
- ^ The battle of Sedgemoor. Britain Express. Retrieved on 2007-11-21.
- ^ a b c George Jeffreys (1645-1689). Early Modern Notes. Retrieved on 2008-02-20.
- ^ The Bloody Assizes. From Watford Gap to Camelot. Retrieved on 2008-02-20.
- ^ Taunton Castle. Everything Exmoor. Retrieved on 2007-11-21.
[edit] Further reading
- The Bloody Assize, web site of Somerset County Council
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