Home Office: Criminal Petitions, Series I

Original petitions made by convicted persons or their friends, relations etc., seeking the revocation or reduction of their sentences. Attached to some petitions are related papers and some returns, made by the governors of convict prisons, of convicts recommended for early release for good behaviour.

The petitions were made between 1819 and 1839; some of the related papers are dated after 1839. Later petitions are in HO 18.

PLEASE NOTE: Electronic images of selected pieces of these records can be searched online through our partner website. Pieces 3-4, 10, 17, 20-24, 27, 29, 31, 34, 37, 39-43, 46-50, 55, 58-59, 61-65, 67, 69-74, 76-77, 79-80, 83, 85-90, 92-96, 99, 101, 103-106, 108-117, 119-124 and 126-131 only have been digitised at this time (February 2013); further releases to follow.

The petitions are arranged in bundles, each with a coded alphabetical reference (apart from (HO 17/1), and papers are numbered within each bundle. For example, the petition from William Ashton is identified as Rk 44 and is in the piece (HO 17/92) containing papers from bundles Rk-R1.

The petitions are indexed by registers in HO 19, which are arranged alphabetically by name of convict and give the coded reference mentioned above. There are some gaps in the petitions referred to in these registers. Bundles with coded alphabetic references ending in a-g, ie Aa, Ba, Ca, etc are missing from this series, except for the Scottish petitions, Aa-Ag (HO 17/6-7) and Ba-Bg (HO 17/20-22) and would appear to have been lost before transfer.

Topics

Crime

Prisons