Alison Eatwell has
an easy narrative style which she uses to good effect in this study of early
nineteenth-century petitions for clemency, which were laid before the Home Secretary in the hope
that a convict might gain a revocation or reduction of his or her sentence. The
book offers a snap-shot in time of the many years during which certain convicts
were likely to receive the death penalty, be sentenced to transportation to one
of the oversees colonies, or serve a term of imprisonment with an additional
order of hard labour. In other circumstances transportation was sought as a reduced sentence
for a convict who might otherwise have been executed. The records of those
appeals provides evidence of the experiences of individual prisoners.
Eatwell
makes effective use of the original petitions held by The National Archives in series
HO 17 and HO 18 to extract evidence of the daily business
and conditions in the London prisons of Millbank and Newgate; on the hulk ships
used to alleviate pressure on an overcrowded prison system or hold prisoners
awaiting transportation; and in the penal colonies in New South Wales and Van
Diemen’s Land. The author similarly uses case studies to examine
some of the offences typically represented in the records,
namely: bigamy, forgery, assault with a deadly weapon, murder and offences of a
sexual nature.
Petitions
were submitted to the Home Officer by convicts, their friends,
relatives and other associates with the intention of establishing a convict’s
good character and proving him or her worthy of mercy. As such, the documents often
include details of a prisoner’s personal circumstances and family background. Eastwell
does not ignore the
self-serving nature of a convict’s appeal for mercy, or the fact that the records
are at best a highly edited version of events and circumstances.
With that in mind, she examines the subjective nature of the appeal process,
when the social standing of a petitioner or the extent of local support for a
particular convict might influence the response received.
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