The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1884-12-13 00:00:00

THE "MIGNONETTE" CASE.

The case of the Queen v. Dudley and others came
on for argument in the Lord Chief Justice's Court,
before the Lord Chief Justice, Mr. Justice Grove, Mr.
Justice Denman, Mr. Justice Hawkins, and Baron
Huddleston, sitting as judges possessing the criminal
jurisdiction of the Queen's Bench Division. It was
originally intended that their lordships should hear
the case as Commissioners under the Commission for
the holding of the last assizes for the county of
Devon; but on the application of the Attorney-
General, in order to avoid legal difficulties that
might possibly arise, the court now sat as judges of
the Queen's Bench Division. Every available seat in
court was occupied by the members of the bar, and
the gallery allotted to thp general public was
crowded.

The Attorney-General, Mr. Charles, Q.C., Mr.
Charles Matthews, and Mr. Danckwertz were counsel
for the Crown; Mr. Collins, Q.C., Mr. Henry Clarke,
and Mr. Pike were for the prisoners, who, it will be
remembered, wore charged with the murder of the lad
Parker, whom they killed and ate at sea. They were
tried at Exeter, and the jury found that the act of
killing was done to save the prisoner's own lives, and
left it to the judges to determine the nature of the
crime, if any, of which the prisoners were guilty.
The Aourt, on the application of the Attorney-
General, ordered that the prisoners should be present.
The Associate then read the indictment.

The Associate read the special verdict of the jury—
namely, that they were ignorant whether upon the
facts of the whole case the prisoners were guilty of
murder or not, and refer the question to the court.
Mr. Collins took some formal objections to the
wording of the record. and a long legal discussion
followed. Their lordships ultimately decided that
the jury had found a special verdict on the facts.
The Attorney-General then proceeded to address
the Court on behalf of the prosecution. He said he
had to submit to their lordships the one question now
before them—namely, whether the crime with which
the two prisoners were charged amounted to murder
or not. He was willing to admit that when these two
men took the life of the boy Parker they thought
that if they could not consume his flesh and drink his
blood they would have perished • that if they had not
taken this boy's life they could not have existed
during the five subsequent days before they
were picked up at sea; and that in no pos-
sible case could the boy Parker have lived even if his
life had not been taken by the prisoners. But ad-
mitting all this, he made this reservation, that no
man acting on his own judgment, and who intention-
ally took away the life of a fellow-creature, was guilt-
less of murder, unless he committed the act in self-
defence, and on no other ground could the act be
justified. The authorities were clear on this point.
hven supposing this boy could not have lived the pri-
soners had not only taken his life, but the chance of
its continuance, and more than that the killing of the
lad did, not save the prisoners. All they did was in
order to obtain food, but by the arrival of a vessel or
the falling of the body overboard this act of killing
would have been no relief to them at all. The law of
England said that if a man was dying of hunger he
must not steal food, and could these men be held
guiltless of murder when they killed this boy in order
to obtain the food of which his body was composed?
If their lordships held that they must also hold that
a man might not only take food from a living person,
but might kill that person in order to obtain the food
of which his body was composed. All the authorities,
he submitted, concurred in this—that the act done by
the prisoners amounted to murder.
Mr. Collins contended that the act done by the pri-
soners was justified as an act of necessity, in support
of which proposition he cited a passage from the work
of Mr. Justice Stephen on Criminal Law, to the effect
that an act otherwise criminal would be excused if the
person charged with it could show that the evil done
was less than that inflicted, and was not dispropor-
tionate to the injury avoided. Applying this doctrine,
the learned counsel said that if this boy had not been
killed there was no chance of saving the lives of the
three others in the boat; and therefore, on the ground
of necessity, the crime—if crime at all—was justifiable
ex necessitate, and as such was excusable homicide.
The question was, did the act with which theprisoners
were charged arise from necessity?
Baron Huddleston : And I so put it to the jury.
Mr. Collins went on to contend that the charge
against the prisoners resolved itself under the circum-
stances into one of justifiable homicide, or in other
words, homicide excusable ex necessitate. The learned
counsel further objected to the indictment on the
ground that, although it was alleged the prisoners were
of the crew of a British yacht, it was not shown that
they were in a British boat when the crime with which
they were charged was committed; and if this were
so, the court, as he submitted, had no jurisdiction.

On the conclusion of the learned counsel's address,
the Lord Chief Justice said that the court would
again hear the Attorney-General after the usual
adjournment.
When the judges returned from lunch, the Lord
Chief Justice said they had taken an opportunity of
conferring together, and they were all agreed that the
conviction for murder should be affirmed. They would
give their written reasons on Saturday.
The Attorney-General then addressed the court
on the question of its jurisdiction as the original
Court of Queen's Bench, and concluded by submitting
that the prisoners being now in the custody of the
marshal of the court it was competent to the court
to pass judgment on them. If, however, their lord-
ships thought it right that no judgment should be
passed within four days, then he, on the part of the
Crown, would acquiesce.
The Lord Chief Justice, after some conversation,
said that the Court would now give a formal judg-
ment against the defendants, but would give their
reasons for it on Tuesday.
Mr. Collins: What, my lord, is to be done with
them in the mean time? They were admitted to bail
on recognizances when the case was heard before Mr.
Baron Iluddleston.

The Lord Chief Justice: But they are in a diffierent
position now. They were not convicted when the
case was before my learned brother (Baron Huddle-
ston), but they are now. They must be removed to
Holloway Goal, which I believe is the most comfort-
able prison that can be provided for them.
The defendants were then removed in the custody
of the tipstaff of the court to Holloway Gaol.

Sentence of death was on the following Tuesday
formally passed on the prisoners by the Lord Chief
Justice, acting for the special tribunal to whose con-
sideration the case had been remitted. A persistent
downpour checked the formation of the crowd that
would under more favourable meteorological condi-
tions have undoubtedly gathered around the Royal
Palace of Justice.

The prisoners were amongst the very earliest
arrivals, having been brought up from Holloway
Prison in charge of a couple of warders. Both took
their seats in front of the solicitors' table, with their
uniformed attendants beside them. The Attorney-
General and Mr. Charles, Q.C., who conducted the
prosecution, were early arrivals, as were Mr. Collins,
Q.C., Mr. H. Clarke, and Mr. L. E. Pyke, the
counsel for the prisoners. Conspicuous in the
jury-box was the Governor of Holloway Gaol,
and the Chief Justice of New Brunswick found a
seat on the bench. At twenty minutes past ten
the public gallery was thrown open and was soon
closely filled, the occupants being without exception
of the sterner sax. At twenty minutes to eleven the
Lord Chief Justice, Mr. Justice Grove, Mr. Justice
Denman, Mr. Baron Pollock, and Mr. Baron Huddle-
ston entered the court and took their seats at the five
desks ranged along the front of the bench. They were
all arrayed in their black robes and wore close wigs.
"The Queen against Dudley and another "proclaimed
bgoneeaonf, the officials,
any
ials,afnurd
further
LporredlimCihniaeryf Justicetoreaadt once
special verdict. The prisoners listened with attention.
The silence was intense. It was rapidly growing
darker, and in the gathering gloom the rows of
white faces peering anxiously down from the
gallery wore an almost ghastly aspect. After
reading the verdict his lordship touched at
some length on the terrible sufferings en-
dured by the prisoners as calculated to break down
the strongest minds, and upon the probabilities of
survival and rescue. He then dealt seriatim and in
extenso with the various technical points raised by
the prisoners counsel as to the jurisdiction of the
Court, and then approached what he defined as "the
real question of the case "—whether a killing under
the circumstance set forth could be anything but
murder. It had now grown so dark that his lordship
was obliged to ask for a couple of candles to enable
him to decipher the judgment lying open before him.
By the aid of their flickering light he continued to
deliver an exposition of the law couched in masterly
fashion. He sternly denounced the view that the
crime of which the prisoners stood aecused could be
aught save murder, as ckingerous, immoral, and
opposed to all legal principles. He quoted extensively
from Bracton, Lord Hale, Sir Michael Foster, Lord
Bacon, Michael Dalton, Mr. Sergeant Hawkins, and
others, touching incidentally on the story of the seven
English sailors alluded to by Puff endorf, and the in-
stance of the two men on the plank considered by
Bacon. Bacon he described as a gread lawyer, but
smaller men could rely on others as great as he who
had pronounced his views as regarded the doctrine
of necessity not to be law. Passing from mere tech-
nical considerations, he proceeded to deal with the
question on higher moral grounds. In clear and
thrilling tones he pointed out that whilst to preserve
life was a duty, it might be a plainer and higher duty
to sacrifice it. He instanced the duty of a captain to
his crew and passengers, and of soldiers to women
and children, as exemplified in the noble case of the
Birkenhead. The duty of dying for others had been
pointed out in glowing and emphatic language by
writers of heathendom, and in a Christian country
we would point to the highest example we follow.
Warming up, he sternly asked on what the
choice was to be founded when it was to be decided
that one should be sacrificed to secure the lives of
others. Was it to be a question of strength or of in-
tellect? Touching on the temptation to slay the
youngest and weakest, he quoted with admirable em-
phasis the line, "So spake the fiend, and by the
tyrant plea necessity excused his devilish deed." It
was, he pointed out in conclusion, the duty of the
judges to teach the law, and to leave it to the Crown
to exercise the prerogative of mercy. They had not

fa-gott terribre had been the prisoners' suffer-
ings, and how hard it was to keep the judgment
straight and the conscience pure under such circum-
stances ; but we had sometimes to lay down rules we
could not follow and set up standards we could not
attain. Terrible as had been the temptation, it was
no excuse, and their duty to the State was to find the
prisoners guilty of murder. The judgment occupied
half an hour in delivery. The Attorney-General
having prayed for judgment, Master Mellor called on
the prisoners to say why sentence of death should not
be passed upon them. Both rose, and Dudley made
a few remarks that were almost inaudible, but which
touched on the terrible straits in which they were
placed, and upon the fact that they threw themselves
on the mercy of the Crown. Stephens spoke still
more briefly to the same effect. The Lord Chief
Justice then passed sentence to the effect that they
should be taken back to their prison, and thence on a
certain day to a place of execution, where they should
be hanged by the neck till their bodies were dead.
Ere omitted the phrase usually employed recommend-
ing their souls to mercy, nor did he assume the black
cap.
The judges then left the bench, and after a brief
interval the prisoners, who had retained their self-
possession, were removed in custody of the warders.

The Home Secretary has advised her Majesty to
respite the capital sentence passed upon Thomas
Dudley d Edwin Stephens until the further signi-
fication of her Majesty's pleasure.