Court of King's Bench: Plea Side: General Affidavits and Affidavits of Attorneys...

KB 101

1734-1874

A selection, mainly of affidavits concerning individual cases relating to questions of title (actions of ejectment) or deemed to be of particular interest.

There is a major gap from 1848 to 1873. There are also affidavits sworn by attorneys wishing to return to practice after having ceased to renew their annual certificates; they run from 1806 to 1848.

There are two sequences of affidavits relating to cases, those to 1848 and those from 1873 to 1874. KB 101/1/1-26/26 are listed case by case; in the later pieces the affidavits are filed in case number order. In the index the abbreviation 'dem', used in actions of ejectment, stands for 'at the demise of'. The real plaintiff is the second named person, by whom the property has been demised, in the terminology of the writ; it will be noted that the first-named plaintiff is often a legal fiction, such as 'Goodtitle' or 'Doe'. KB 101/26/27-26/29 contain extracts from baptismal registers, marriage registers and burial registers. They were probably originally associated with affidavits, since in KB 101/26/27, nos 2, 6, 26/28, no 12, 26/29, nos 4, 8, 9, 14 affidavits are still filed with notes of baptisms, burials and marriages.

The series of affidavits continues after 1875, as records of the King's Bench Division of the High Court of Justice, in J 5

Public Record(s)

English

42 bundle(s)

Topics

Litigation

These affidavits begin only in 1734; the earlier Plea Side affidavits have not survived. Those that have survived are only a selection of items relating to questions of title, mainly in actions of ejectment, or considered to be of material interest. They were 'collected and methodically arranged' in 1795 on the order of Charles Abbot, clerk of the rules (KB 139/74, p 15). Various types of affidavit connected with the grant of bail to defendants, to enable persons imprisoned for debt to be discharged upon surrendering their estates for the benefit of their creditors, recording the due service of process, or connected with the taxing of costs, were destroyed under schedules of 1882 and 1883 because they were considered useless or that the information they contained was recorded elsewhere (Statutes, Rules and Schedules governing the disposal of Public Records, 1877-1913, pp 41-44, 62-65, 86-88, 102-103).