BOROUGH PETTY SESSIONS

BRIEF NOTES ON BOROUGH GENERAL AND PETTY SESSIONS

General Sessions

Letters Patent of James I, 17 Nov. 1603, made the Bailiffs, the Steward of the Saturday Court [or Court of Record] and the Recorder, ex officio justices of the Peace for the Town and Liberty of Kingston, with the village and hamlets of Surbiton, Ham and Hatch, to have as full powers in this area as the justices of Surrey in the County, including charge of the Town Gaol and power to commit felons to the County Gaol [KA1/26].

The main series of General Sessions files survive in broken series from 1668 to 1748, and the files of presentments and recognizances, from 1676 (again in broken series) to 1772. [KE2/2/1-66 and KE2/3/1-10].

The Sessions are referred to as 'General Sessions for the Town of Kingston and the Hundred of Kingston (except Richmond and Kew)'. They are most usually called General Sessions of the Peace, but also Open Sessions, General and Open Sessions, Sessions, rarely Public Sessions, and only once Quarter Sessions.

According to the report on Municipal Corporations, 1834, the Sessions were held at Michaelmas and Easter. Offenders were also tried at the Epiphany and Midsummer Sessions for the County to avoid keeping them too long in prison. [There would appear to have been some deviation from this practice in the seventeenth century when some sessions were held at Epiphany and Midsummer].

The General Sessions files usually contain a copy of the royal writs summoning those concerned to the Sessions, lists of the juries, lists of indictments by the juries and lists of fines. Other documents include lists of persons bound over to the next Sessions, orders by the justices, certificates of the removal of nuisances etc., and special jury lists for particular cases.

Following the Municipal Corporations Act 1835, the Corporation on 12 January 1836 petitioned under section c III of the Act for a Commission of Quarter Sessions which was however refused in June of the same year.

Bailiffs' Minute Books (KE2/5/1-5)

The two Bailiffs were Justices of the Peace for Kingston as were the Bailiffs of the preceding year. The volumes, which cover the period 1705 - 1779, contain a mixture of judicial and administrative material and consist mainly of records of examinations and complaints made before one or two justices.

Information contained in them can be summarised as follows:

(a) Examinations for settlement or bastardy and orders thereupon, orders to produce settlement certificates and orders to leave the town. Also enquiries into the provenance of good quality possessions held by vagabonds

(b) Informations, e.g. assaults, tippling on Sundays, thefts, swearing

(c) Records of Summary justice, often resulting from an information in (b) above

(d) Orders concerning civil matters e.g. fences encroaching on the highways, false weight

(e) Notes of bonds to appear at next sessions or assizes, (e.g. 18-13 Dec 1705 - problems over enlistment)

(f) List of names of persons that watch in Kingston under the heading of the Headborough in whose 'Dozen' they lived

(g) Charity administration; lists of poor persons to be relieved and the money to given to them each month

(h) Assize of Bread, setting out the weight and ingredients to be contained in each size of loaf

(i) List of alehouses licensed in the Town and Hundred of Kingston

(j) List of persons taking oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy and Abjuration, 1715

(k) Notes of delivery of custody of gaol, maces and keys of the chamber to the new bailiffs

(l) Swearing in of market officers

(m) Special Sessions for Surveyors of the Highways begin in KE2/5/4, 1750 - 65.

<span class="wrapper"><p>Kinston and Elmbridge Petty Sessional Division (later Kingston Division).</p> <p>See Surrey Record Office, Petty Sessions list</p></span>

Borough Petty Sessions

According to the 1834 Report on Municipal Corporations, Petty Sessions (for the same district as the general sessions) were held every Saturday, or oftener if need be, before the bailiffs. As far as it has been possible to ascertain no Justices' minutes survive earlier than 1893 and no registers before 1913.

The records described in the following list (KT1) were transferred to the archivist between 1967 and 1968. Gaps in the sequence of minutes and the absence of registers prior to 1913 are apparently due to unauthorised destruction in the 1960s. The dates of the destroyed registers are not know but it is likely that they were no earlier than the Summary Jurisdiction Act of 1879 which made special provision for the keeping of records.

Since 1965 the Borough Bench has ceased to exist, and is now part of the Kingston Petty Sessional Division in the County of South West London.