Policing and Punishment in London, 1660-1750 - J.M. Beattie

them charged against women who had limited access to clergy and yet whose of-
fences were such that they were not likely to be hanged in large numbers. In-
deed, the inadequacy of the criminal law was most clearly apparent in the
treatment of petty theft, and one can see in the practice of the Old Bailey efforts
to construct more effective responses to such offences than those provided by
the law.
Altogether 272 men and 49 women in our Sample from the City of London
came before the judges at the end of the sessions, having been convicted of or
pleaded guilty to an offence against property to which benefit of clergy (or in
the case of women, ‘benefit of the statute’ of 1623 ) applied. Almost two-thirds of
the men and three-quarters of the women were granted clergy, burned on the
thumb and released (Table 6. 5 ). A significant number of men and a few women
in our Sample were, however, declared to have failed the literacy test or were

found to have been branded earlier and were thus denied clergy and threatened
with the death penalty. As we have seen, this followed a decision taken at the
highest levels of the central government to force the transportation of some of
those who would otherwise be eligible for a clergyable discharge. The intention
in choosing to put some clergyable offenders to a strenuous literacy test—
forcing convicted men to show that they could actually read from the Bible,

302 The Old Bailey in the Late Seventeenth Century

Table 6. 5 .Sentences of defendants convicted of clergyable property offences and petty

larceny: City of London cases at the Old Bailey, 1663 – 1689

Convicteda Clergy Denied Clergy Whipped Unknown/

dischargedb

Transported Hanged

Grand larceny
Men 272 179 74 13 6
% 100. 0 65. 8 27. 2 4. 8 2. 2
Women 49 38 5 6
% 100. 0 77. 6 10. 2 12. 2
Petty larceny
Men 62 62
% 100. 0 100. 0

Women 34 34
% 100. 0 100. 0

Notes:
aConvictions for grand larceny include 54 men who pleaded guilty to clergyable felonies, those
charged with and convicted of clergyable felonies, those charged with non-clergyable felonies but
convicted of a clergyable felony. Petty larceny convictions include those who pleaded guilty or
were convicted of petty larceny, those charged with grand larceny or non-clergyable felonies who were
convicted of petty larceny.
bAbsolute/free pardon; unknown sentence.

Source: Sample