Report of William Henry Ashhurst on 2 collective petitions (5 people, including clergymen...

Report of William Henry Ashhurst on 2 collective petitions (5 people, including clergymen and a gaoler and turnkey of Bedford Gaol; and 9 people) and 1 individual petition (Thomas Tattershall, preacher/clergyman) on behalf of Philip Huckle, tailor, convicted at the Bedfordshire Assizes on 10 March 1792, for killing a mare, property of Samuel Cook, farmer at Pulloxhill, on 23/24 December 1791. There is a covering letter for the petitions from Lord Ludlow and William Wilberforce. There is also a letter from Henry Dundas to Samuel Whitbread junior granting 1 weeks respite but warning that no pardon was likely. There are further letters from Tattershall to Lord Granville and also to Ashhurst and another letter from Ashhurst to Whitbread explaining his reluctance to extend a pardon (following a letter [unsigned] referring to both Huckel and Tobias Smith, both convicted of horse stealing). Reference is also made to another prisoner[?], Ralph Smith, convicted of counterfeiting/treason. Tattershall also writes of the 'iniquitous life' of 4 of the witnesses and alleges the prosecution to be malicious. Evidences supplied by Samuel Cook, Richard Childs, William Horne, servant to Samuel Cook; John Cain, John Thornton, Edward Cook, John King and Anne King. Grounds for clemency: innocent of the crime, has a wife and 3 children, is penitent, bad character of witnesses at the trial, misleading circumstantial evidence was given at the trial, his sister ('conscious of her guilty life with the prosecutor' - she was unmarried but had 2/3 children to him although he was married, and the prosecutor obtained drugs for her for an abortion) was too upset to speak in the courtroom, when the prisoner was taken he was given 'Drink and teased him much [and] he spake many unwarranted and unguarded words', and the prosecution was malicious there being bad feelings between the prisoner's and prosecutor's families. Initial sentence: death, respited. Recommendation: no mercy (there is a note from Dundas that he has been in communication with Ashhurst and the prisoner will be transported for life. Folios 55-86.