Report of John Hullock, Recorder of Berwick, Northumberland, on 2 collective petitions...

Report of John Hullock, Recorder of Berwick, Northumberland, on 2 collective petitions (12 people of Hart, Seaton, Greatham, Norton, Stockton, Wolviston and Billingham [Durham]; and 14 people of Berwick, relatives of the prisoner; this petition to Alexander Allan MP) on behalf of John Bird, Hessleton [Hesleton], mail coach guard, convicted at Berwick on Tweed on 13 January 1809, for stealing an Indian shawl, property of James Spittal and other goods, property of John Cooper, William Parton, Charles Cooper, William Drysdale, Stoddart Drysdale, William Lang, James Lawinian, David Hume, William Hume, George Dixon, Elizabeth McDonald, George Wilson, Mary Sunderland and [Peter Ger------], on 13 December 1808. Evidences supplied by James Spittal, merchant of Edinburgh; James Brown, gaoler at Berwick; William Wemyss, apprentice to Spittal; Stoddart Drysdale, mail coach assistant; Mary Twiner, mail coach clerk; Henry Batchelor, employee of Cooper & Co, London; John Henderson, Post Office Clerk; Andrew Harriott, manufacturer of cottons and shawls; Thomas Laybourn, linen draper; Elizabeth Bird alias Elizabeth Simpson, the prisoner's daughter and Alexander Adams, Post Office employee. Grounds for clemency: previous good character, worked 10 years as a guard, is a widower with 8 children who are now reliant on the parish for support, is well connected in Durham (friends and brother are farmers), the hulk he is on is crowded, is educated and willing to serve in HM Navy on a man-of-war. Initial sentence: 7 years transportation. Recommendation: no mercy. Folios 329-339.