Rural Rides Page 52

  From WEYHILL I was shown, yesterday, THE WOOD, in which took place the battle, in which was concerned poor TURNER, one of the young men, who was HANGED at Winchester, in the year 1822. There was another young man, named SMITH, who was, on account of another game-battle, HANGED ON THE SAME GALLOWS! And this for the preservation of the game, you will observe! This for the preservation of the sports of that aristocracy for whose sake, and solely for whose sake, ‘SIR JAMES GRAHAM, of Netherby, descendant of the Earls of Monteith and of the seventh Earl of Galloway, K. T.’ (being sure not to omit the K. T.); this HANGING of us is for the preservation of the SPORTS of that aristocracy, for the sake of whom this GRAHAM, this barefaced plagiarist, this bungling and yet impudent pamphleteer, would sacrifice, would reduce to beggary, according to his pamphlet, three hundred thousand families (making, doubtless, two millions of persons), in the middle rank of life! It is for the preservation, for upholding what he insolently calls the ‘dignity’ of this sporting aristocracy, that he proposes to rob all mortgagees, all who have claims upon land! The feudal lords in France had, as Mr YOUNG tells us, a right, when they came in, fatigued, from hunting or shooting, to cause the belly of one of their vassals to be ripped up, in order for the lord to soak his feet in the bowels! Sir JAMES GRAHAM of the bright sword does not propose to carry us back so far as this; he is willing to stop at taking away the money and the victuals of a very large part of the community; and, monstrous as it may seem, I will venture to say, that there are scores of the Lord-Charles tribe who think him moderate to a fault!

  But, to return to the above-mentioned HANGING at Winchester (a thing never to be forgotten by me), JAMES TURNER, aged 28 years, was accused of assisting to kill ROBERT BAKER, game-keeper to THOMAS ASHETON SMITH, Esq., in the parish of South Tidworth; and CHARLES SMITH, aged 27 years, was accused of shooting at (not killing) ROBERT SNELGROVE, assistant game-keeper to LORD PALMERSTON (Secretary at War), at Broad-lands, in the parish of Romsey. POOR CHARLES SMITH had better have been hunting after shares than after hares! Mines, however deep, he would have found less perilous than the pleasure grounds of Lord Palmerston! I deem this HANGING2 at Winchester worthy of general attention, and particularly at this time, when the aristocracy near Andover, and one, at least, of the members for that town, of whom THIS VERY THOMAS ASHETON SMITH was, until lately, ONE, was, if the report in the Morning Chronicle (copied into the Register of the 7th instant) be correct, endeavouring, at the late Meeting at Andover, to persuade people, that they (these aristocrats) wished to keep up the price of corn FOR THE SAKE OF THE LABOURERS, whom Sir JOHN POLLEN {Thomas Asheton Smiths son’s present colleague as member for Andover) called ‘POOR DEVILS’, and who, he said, had ‘hardly a rag to cover them’! Oh! wished to keep up the price of corn for the good of the ‘poor devils of labourers who have hardly a rag to cover them’! Amiable feeling, tender-hearted souls! Cared not a straw about rents! Did not; oh, no! did not care even about the farmers! It was only for the sake of the poor, naked devils of labourers, that the colleague of young Thomas Asheton Smith cared; it was only for those who were in the same rank of life as JAMES TURNER and CHARLES SMITH were, that these kind Andover aristocrats cared! This was the only reason in the world for their wanting corn to sell at a high price! We often say, ‘that beats every thing’; but really, I think, that these professions of the Andover aristocrats do ‘beat every thing’. Ah! but, Sir JOHN POLLEN, these professions come too late in the day: the people are no longer to be deceived by such stupid attempts at disguising hypocrisy. However, the attempt shall do this: it shall make me repeat here that which I published on the Winchester HANGING, in the Register of the 6th of April, 1822. It made part of a ‘Letter to Landlords’. Many boys have, since this article was published, grown up to the age of thought. Let them now read it; and I hope, that they will REMEMBER IT WELL.

  I, last fall, addressed ten letters to you on the subject of the3 Agricultural Report? My object was to convince you, that you would be ruined; and, when I think of your general conduct towards the rest of the nation, and especially towards the labourers, I must say that I have great pleasure in seeing that my opinions are in a fair way of being verified to the full extent. I dislike the Jews; but, the Jews are not so inimical to the industrious classes of the country as you are. We should do a great deal better with the ‘Squires from’ Change Alley, who, at any rate, have nothing of the ferocious and bloody in their characters. Engrafted upon your native want of feeling is the sort of military spirit of command that you have acquired during the late war. You appeared, at the close of that war, to think that you had made a conquest of the rest of the nation for ever; and, if it had not been for the burdens which the war left behind it, there would have been no such thing as air, in England, for any one but a slave to breathe. The Bey of Tunis never talked to his subjects in language more insolent than you talked to the people of England. The DEBT, the blessed Debt, stood our friend, made you soften your tone, and will finally place you where you ought to be placed.

  This is the last Letter that I shall ever take the trouble to address to you. In a short time, you will become much too insignificant to merit any particular notice; but, just in the way of farewell, and that there may be something on record to show what care has been taken of the partridges, pheasants, and hares, while the estates themselves have been suffered to slide away, I have resolved to address this one more Letter to you, which resolution has been occasioned by the recent putting to death, at Winchester, of two men denominated Poachers. This is a thing, which, whatever you may think of it, has not been passed over, and is not to be passed over, without full notice and ample record. The account of the matter, as it appeared in the public prints, was very short; but, the fact is such as never ought to be forgotten. And, while you are complaining of your ‘distress’, I will endeavour to lay before the public that which will show, that the law has not been unmindful of even your sports. The time is approaching, when the people will have an opportunity of exercising their judgment as to what are called ‘game-laws’; when they will look back a little at what has been done for the sake of insuring sport to landlords. In short, landlords as well as labourers will pass under review. But, I must proceed to my subject, reserving reflections for a subsequent part of my letter.

  The account, to which I have alluded, is this: ‘HAMPSHIRE. The Lent Assizes for this county concluded on Saturday morning. The Criminal Calendar contained 58 prisoners for trial, 16 of whom have been sentenced to suffer death, but two only of that number (poachers) were left by the judges for execution, viz. James Turner, aged 28, for aiding and assisting in killing Robert Baker, gamekeeper to Thomas Asheton Smith, Esq., in the parish of South Tidworth, and Charles Smith, aged 27, for having wilfully and maliciously shot at Robert Snellgrove, assistant gamekeeper to Lord Palmerston, at Broadlands, in the parish of Romsey, with intent to do him grievous bodily harm. The Judge (Burrough) observed, it became necessary to these cases, that the extreme sentence of the law should be inflicted, to deter others, as resistance to game-keepers was now arrived at an alarming height, and many lives had been lost.’

  The first thing to observe here is, that there were sixteen persons sentenced to suffer death; and that, the only persons actually put to death, were those who had been endeavouring to get at the hares, pheasants or partridges of Thomas Asheton Smith, and of our Secretary at War, Lord Palmerston. Whether the Judge Burrough (who was long Chairman of the Quarter Sessions in Hampshire), uttered the words ascribed to him, or not, I cannot say; but, the words have gone forth in print, and the impression they are calculated to make is this: that it was necessary to put these two men to death, in order to deter others from resisting gamekeepers. The putting of these men to death has excited a very deep feeling throughout the County of Hants; a feeling, very honourable to the people of that County, and very natural to the breast of every human being.

  In this case there appears to have been a killing, in which Turner assisted; and Turner might, by possibility, have given
the fatal blow; but in the case of Smith, there was no killing at all. There was a mere shooting at, with intention to do him bodily harm. This latter offence was not a crime for which men were put to death, even when there was no assault, or attempt at assault, on the part of the person shot at; this was not a crime punished with death, until that terrible act, brought in by the late Lord Ellenborough, was passed, and formed a part of our matchless Code, that Code which there is such a talk about softening; but which softening does not appear to have in view this Act, or any portion of the Game-Laws.

  In order to form a just opinion with regard to the offence of these two men that have been hanged at Winchester, we must first consider the motives by which they were actuated, in committing the acts of violence laid to their charge. For, it is the intention, and not the mere act, that constitutes the crime. To make an act murder, there must be malice afore thought. The question, therefore, is, did these men attack, or were they the attacked? It seems to be clear that they were the attacked parties; for they are executed, according to this publication, to deter others from resisting game-keepers!

  I know very well that there is Law for this; but what I shall endeavour to show is, that the Law ought to be altered; that the people of Hampshire ought to petition for such alteration; and that if you, the Landlords, were wise, you would petition also, for an alteration, if not a total annihilation of that terrible Code, called the Game-Laws, which has been growing harder and harder all the time that it ought to have been wearing away. It should never be forgotten, that, in order to make punishments efficient in the way of example, they must be thought just by the Community at large; and they will never be thought just if they aim at the protection of things belonging to one particular class of the Community, and, especially, if those very things be grudged to this class by the Community in general. When punishments of this sort take place, they are looked upon as unnecessary, the sufferers are objects of pity, the common feeling of the Community is in their favour, instead of being against them; and it is those who cause the punishment, and not those who suffer it, who become objects of abhorrence.

  Upon seeing two of our countrymen hanging upon a gallows, we naturally, and instantly, run back to the cause. First we find the fighting with game-keepers; next we find that the men would have been transported if caught in or near a covert with guns, after dark; next we find that these trespassers are exposed to transportation because they are in pursuit, or supposed to be in pursuit, of partridges, pheasants or hares; and then, we ask, where is the foundation of a law to punish a man with transportation for being in pursuit of these animals? And where, indeed, is the foundation of the Law, to take from any man, be he who he may, the right of catching and using these animals? We know very well; we are instructed by mere feeling, that we have a right to live, to see and to move. Common sense tells us that there are some things which no man can reasonably call his property; and though poachers (as they are called) do not read Blackstone’s Commentaries, they know that such animals as are of a wild and untameable disposition, any man may seize upon and keep for his own use and pleasure. ‘All these dungs, so long as they remain in possession, every man has a right to enjoy without disturbance; but if once they escape from his custody, or he voluntarily abandons the use of them, they return to the common stock, and any man else has an equal right to seize and enjoy them afterwards.’

  In the Second Book and Twenty-sixth Chapter of Blackstone, the poacher might read as follows: ‘With regard likewise to wild animals, all mankind had by the original grant of the Creator a right to pursue and take away any fowl or insect of the air, any fish or inhabitant of the waters, and any beast or reptile of the field: and this natural right still continues in every individual, unless where it is restrained by the civil laws of the country. And when a man has once so seized them, they become, while living, his qualified property, or, if dead, are absolutely his own: so that to steal them, or otherwise invade this property, is, according to the respective values, sometimes a criminal offence, sometimes only a civil injury.’

  Poachers do not read this; but that reason which is common to all mankind tells them that this is true, and tells them, also, what to think of any positive law that is made to restrain them from this right granted by the Creator. Before I proceed further in commenting upon the case immediately before me, let me once more quote this English Judge, who wrote fifty years ago, when the Game Code was mild indeed, compared, to the one of the present day. ‘Another violent alteration,’ says he, ‘of the English Constitution consisted in the depopulation of whole countries, for the purposes of the King’s royal diversion; and subjecting both them, and all the ancient forests of the kingdom, to the unreasonable severities of forest laws imported from the continent, whereby the slaughter of a beast was made almost as penal as the death of a man. In the Saxon times, though no man was allowed to kill or chase the King’s deer, yet he might start any game, pursue, and kill it upon his own estate. But the rigour of these new constitutions vested the sole property of all the game in England in the King alone; and no man was entitled to disturb any fowl of the air, or any beast of the field, of such kinds as were specially reserved for the royal amusement of the Sovereign, without express license from the King, by a grant of a chase or free warren: and those franchises were granted as much with a view to preserve the breed of animals, as to indulge the subject. From a similar principle to which, though the forest laws are now mitigated, and by degrees grown entirely obsolete, yet from this root has sprung up a bastard slip, known by the name of the game-law, now arrived to and wantoning in its highest vigour: both founded upon the same unreasonable notions of permanent property in wild creatures; and both productive of the same tyranny to the commons: but with this difference; that though the forest laws established only one mighty hunter throughout the land, the game-laws have raised a little Nimrod in every manor.’ When this was written nothing was known of the present severity of the law. Judge Blackstone says that the Game Law was then wantoning in its highest vigour; what, then, would he have said, if any one had proposed to make it felony to resist a Game-keeper? He calls it tyranny to the commons, as it existed in his time; what would he have said of the present Code; which, so far from being thought a thing to be softened, is never so much as mentioned by those humane and gentle creatures, who are absolutely supporting a sort of reputation, and aiming at distinction in Society, in consequence of their incessant talk about softening the Criminal Code?

  The Law may say what it will, but the feelings of mankind will never be in favour of this Code; and whenever it produces putting to death, it will, necessarily, excite horror. It is impossible to make men believe that any particular set of individuals should have a permanent property in wild creatures. That the owner of land should have a quiet possession of it is reasonable and right and necessary; it is also necessary that he should have the power of inflicting pecuniary punishment, in a moderate degree, upon such as trespass on his lands; but, his right can go no further according to reason. If the law give him ample compensation for every damage that he sustains, in consequence of a trespass on his lands, what right has he to complain?

  The law authorizes the King, in case of invasion, or apprehended invasion, to call upon all his people to take up arms in defence of the country. The Militia Law compels every man, in his turn, to become a soldier. And upon what ground is this? There must be some reason for it, or else the law would be tyranny. The reason is, that every man has rights in the country to which he belongs; and that, therefore, it is his duty to defend the country. Some rights, too, beyond that of merely living, merely that of breathing the air. And then, I should be glad to know, what rights an Englishman has, if the pursuit of even wild animals is to be the ground of transporting him from his country? There is a sufficient punishment provided by the law of trespass; quite sufficient means to keep men off your land altogether; how can it be necessary, then, to have a law to transport them for coming upon your land? No, it is not for coming upon
the land, it is for coming after the wild animals, which nature and reason tells them, are as much theirs as they are yours.

  It is impossible for the people not to contrast the treatment of these two men at Winchester with the treatment of some game-keepers that have killed or maimed the persons they call Poachers; and it is equally impossible for the people, when they see these two men hanging on a gallows, after being recommended to mercy, not to remember the almost instant pardon, given to the Exciseman, who was not recommended to mercy, and who was found guilty of wilful murder in the County of Sussex!

  It is said, and, I believe truly, that there are more persons imprisoned in England for offences against the game-laws, than there are persons imprisoned in France (with more than twice the population) for all sorts of offences put together. When there was a loud outcry against the cruelties committed on the priests and the seigneurs, by the people of France, ARTHUR YOUNG bade them remember the cruelties committed on the people by the game-laws, and to bear in mind how many had been made galley-slaves for having killed, or tried to kill, partridges, pheasants and hares!