Records of Bath Borough Courts

Bath Corporation, like other chartered boroughs, had important judicial functions until these were ended by the Municipal Corporations Act of 1835.

The Court of Record, dealt with the recovery of debts; the Assize of Bread set the price of bread according to the price of wheat; and the Coroners' court, at which the mayor was coroner ex officio, inquired into cases of sudden death.

System of Arrangement:
BC/4/1 Records of the Coroner's Court
BC/4/2 Records of the Court of Record
BC/4/3 Records of the Assize of Bread

Only the Coroner's Court records (BC/4/1) have been catalogued in detail. Please contact the Record Office for more information on the Records of the Court of Record and the Records of the Assize of Bread.

Note that the records of the Court of Quarter Sessions have been catalogued separately from the Bath City records. Quarter Sessions was a municipal court, responsible for trying misdemeanours (minor crimes), until the Municipal Corporations Act of 1835 which ended the automatic right of corporations to hold their own courts of Quarter Sessions. Bath Borough Council successfully applied to hold its own Quarter Sessions courts, which could now try more serious cases, but with magistrates appointed by the Crown instead of by the Council. The 1888 Local Government Act completely separated judicial and local government functions, and Bath City Council was no longer responsible for Quarter Sessions. The records we hold are a continuous series from 1672 to 1971 and it was therefore decided to catalogue them as one series, separate from Bath City records, in spite of the fact that the pre-1835 records are very closely linked to the City records. The reference for these records is QS.

Note also that the Court of Requests (a court for the recovery of small debts, in existence 1766-1846) was not a borough court, but a court set up by Act of Parliament and the responsibility of a Commission. The records of the Court of Requests are catalogued at BC/22/1