misdemeanours common to county and borough quarter sessions elsewhere:
assault, disturbances of the peace, fraud, and various forms of cheating.^28 They
differed from those courts in one important respect, however: the London ses-
sions of the peace did not deal with many charges of theft. Even petty larceny,
the theft of goods under a shilling in value, and a misdemeanour rather than a
felony—and thus a non-capital offence unlike most other offences against prop-
erty—was only rarely prosecuted at the City sessions, or at those held for the
county of Middlesex or Westminster. In the rest of the country, the magistrates
were likely to deal with at least some of the straightforward and minor cases of
theft, while leaving the more serious offences to the assize courts, the sessions of
which were held twice a year (once on the Northern Circuit) and presided over
by two judges from the high courts in London. The Middlesex and London
magistrates left virtually all charges involving the taking of property (as well as
violent offences that could result in a sentence of death, and occasional matters
involving particular interest or difficulties) to the courts presided over by the
judges of the high courts, which in the metropolis meant the sessions of the
peace, oyer and terminer, and gaol delivery held in the sessions house in the Old
Bailey.^29 This rule had considerable implications for the administration of the
criminal law in London.
The county ofMiddlesex and the City ofLondon were separate jurisdictions.
Each had its own clerical staff.^30 But in dealing with serious offences their juris-
dictions overlapped because they shared the gaol in which their accused of-
fenders were held for trial. The main work of the judges at the Old Bailey was to
deliver that gaol—that is, to hold the trials of men and women who were being
held in Newgate when the court sat. It was this that brought cases from both
Middlesex and the City of London before the same bench at the Old Bailey, for
Newgate gaol, though located in the City, had historically served both jurisdic-
tions. Accused felons were transferred there from the Middlesex prisons on the
eve of the sessions; City prisoners were also sent to Newgate if they had been
held in the sheriffs’ prisons, the compters. All were brought to trial in the
‘sessions house’ attached to the prison and known as the Old Bailey from the
street in which it was situated. For the most part, the court tried offences that
had been committed in either Middlesex or the City, though they could also
12 Introduction: The Crime Problem
(^28) For the business at the sessions of the peace, see Norma Landau, The Justices of the Peace, 1679 – 1760
(Berkeley, Calif., 1984 ), ch. 8 ; idem, ‘Appearance at the Quarter Sessions of Eighteenth-Century Middle-
sex’; idem, ‘Indictment for Fun and Profit: A Prosecutor’s Reward at Eighteenth-Century Quarter Ses-
sions’, Law and History Review, 17 / 3 ( 1999 ), 507 – 36 ; Shoemaker, Prosecution and Punishment, chs 5 – 6.
(^29) The Old Bailey judges were not issued a commission of assize, unlike the judges who went on cir-
cuit. Such a power was unnecessary in the metropolis because the court of King’s Bench sat in West-
minster Hall and at the Guildhall and took civil pleas along with criminal business. See Cockburn, History
of English Assizes, 59 – 62 , 134 – 50 ; and J. H. Baker, ‘Criminal Courts and Procedure at Common Law,
1550 – 1800 ’, in Cockburn (ed.), Crime in England, 30 – 1.
(^30) In the City, the post of clerk of the peace was held by the town clerk, but the business of the office
was performed by one of his clerks, acting as his deputy; see Betty R. Masters, ‘City Officers, III: The
Town Clerk’, Guildhall Miscellany, 3 ( 1969 – 71 ), 55 – 74.