The Sun.
London, England, 1838-08-28 00:00:00

CHARGES OF LUNACY

TO THE EDITOR OF THE SUN.
ESTEEMED SlR—The liberty of all persons is properly held
as of incalculable moment, and no one should be deprived of it
without strict and impartial investigation and unquestionable
proof of unfitness to mix wich society. It is equally clear that
an imputation of insanity aggravates all the circumstances of
imprisonsonment, and that if made from interested motives, or
hastily, without good grounds, should be severely dealt with as
the law awards. As no person would venture to argue against
the foregoing positions, it is matter of serious complaint that
upon the certificate of one petty apothecary or pretender to
physic, which may be readily obtained from base persons for
10s., an honourable man may be torn from those dearest to
him, and general society, and sent to a public asylum, sup-
ported by the public purse, wherein, as in too many other
public institutions, it is not to be expected that well paid and
easy livine. persons (who, to use the language of the physician
to one oCthem, " LEAVE THEIR PATIENTS TO NATURE !" and
who do not wish their asylums uupatronized) will trouble
themselves much in scrutinizing_ cases. Then, after reception,
it is not very natural that an admission of negligence or error
will be made by any wrong-doing party, and the injured per-
son is to be left to the melancholy consequences.
Several cases have been submitted to Parliamentary
31
Com-
mittees and Courts of Law, showing something more than the
possibility of sarong-doing, and the care that should lie exer-
cised before confinement be allowed or libels of lunacy justi-
fied. A very able and awakening article will be found in the 8
Edinburgh Review, No. XLVI., August, to
471, which deserves the attention of all humane persons. That
article fully makes out my last painful allegation of wrong_
doing, and the necessity of a new system.
More recently in a case tried before the late most excellent
Judge, Lord Tenterden, for false imprisonment, in only re-
straining a gentleman for three days to his own house under
a charge of lunacy, his Lordship justly and humanely said that
he would not allow the liberty of the person to be trifled with,
nor countenance the very dangerous and presumptuous claim
of any medical men (though they might be what are called
Mad Doctors 1 !) to be the exclusive and dogmatical judges of
insanity, and that youthful or other foolish freaks of persons
should not be deemed (however otherwise to be deprecated)
sufficient to warrant an imputation of insanity—for if this were
allowed, the irregularities of young persons in good circum-
stances might be adduced by their kin to their irreparable injury ;
and the special jury, after along trial and strong evidence from
some mad doctors, under his Lordship's direction gave a ver-
dict for the plaintiff with 300/. damages, which, with the heavy
costs of the cause, put the defendant, a mad-house-keeper, to
the expense of about 1,0001. The doctor who signed the cer-
tificate, escaped by death from the consequences of an action
against him for the libel, and the member of the plaintiff's
family who bad instigated the wrong-doing, admitted his error,
and with considerable difficulty and expense saved himself from
punishment.
More recently still the case of Davis of Philpot-lane, tea
dealer, who was declared by some person a lunatic, shows the
necessity of inquiry—a jury of his fellow-citizens protected
him from the awful consequences.
The withering effects of an imputation of insanity cannot be
too fully felt, but the horrors of imprisonment under it arising
from the abode—the yells, groans, rattling of chains, and other
miseries of the inmates, seem calculated to shake a mind, if
not before affected; and, in respect to the treatment and
means for the recovery of the really insane in those establish-
ments, it is apprehended much remains for the benevolent to
do, unless the awful stigma of insanity (otherwise so slightly
noticed by society) is to exclude all persons so charged from
benevolence altogether. Why so little is felt is quite unac-
countable, when so much is involved, and all persons are ex-
posed to similar treatment I
Should a public inquiry be instituted, of an open nature and
proper character, a considerable number of talented and con-
scientious medical gentlemen would give heart-moving evi-
dence of the wrongs that have come under their notice, and
the imperfections of the present system.
I have many cases of a shocking nature which I may here-
after furnish, but for the present I simply solicit the best con-
sideration of the public to this weighty subject, and suggest
that no legitimate means should be left unused to prevent
future possible wrong-doing to any person, either through
error or base motives.
I am, esteemed Sir,
Yours respectfully,
HUMANITY.

August 25, 1837?.

SHETLAND DESTITUTION•

TO THE REV. DOCTOR CROMBIE, ONE OF THE SECRETARIES OF
THE HIGHLAND AND ISLAND DESTITUTION COMMITTEE OF

LONDON.
SIR-Your letter in the Times, of the 10th inst., and Dr.
Barclay's reply to it, have only reached Lerwick, by this
day's mail. Allow me to say, that unless you had been able
to furnish a better defence than you have made out for the de-
linquent members of the London Committee, it would have
been prudent in you to leave the vindication of their extraor-
dinary proceedings to the "gallant dyspeptic" of the Times,
or some other lay champion of misappropriation. Must people
will be of opinion that a clergyman does not take the likeliest
method of advancing his own respectability, or supporting that
of his order, by standing forward as the advocate of cruelty
and injustice. It is true, that in the concluding paragraph of
your letter you gently hint your disapproval of that monstrous
misappropriation which every honest man in the kingdom has
denounced, informing us that you were no party to the Strath-
puffer job—that had you been present you would have voted
against it—and that your name, which, together with those of
three other Secretaries, is appended to the iniquitous resolu-
tions, wasforged. This disclosure undoubtedly entitles you to
exemption from the censure which has been so unsparingly arid
so deservedly lavished on that particular transaction by an in-
dignant public, although it is not calculated to raise one's
opinion of the scrupulous integrity of some of those members
of the Committee over whom you are desirous to extend the
shield of your protection. But, Sir, while you escape from
the odium of wishing to apply the funds to a water hospital,
you must, I fear, be convicted of a desire to accomplish a job
not one whit less reprehensible.
In the month of May, when the Committee were fully in-
formed of the extent of the destitution in Shetland, notice was
given by Mr. Waugh of a motion for handing over the whole
of the funds to the Edinburgh and Glasgow Committees, or
to one of them—those Committees having solemnly, and, as
they say, irrevocably, devoted to emigration purposes every
farthing of the destitution funds that they could clutch. That
motion was discussed at the meeting of the 20th June, which
I rather think was more fully attended than some of you
liked. How you voted on the question, or whether you voted
at all, I have no means of knowing ; but this I know, that in
two interviews which I had with you between the notice of
motion and the meeting for its discussion, you declared your
determination to support it. A similar determination was ex-
pressed by your principal Secretary Mr. Nisbet ; and the only
difference of opinion between you was as to which of the Emi-
gration Committees should he the favoured recipient of the
cash. Mr. Nisbet was for giving the whole 10,0001. to his
friends in Glasgow, while you, like an impartial steward, were
for dividing the spoil between them. And this, Sir, in the
face of the reiterated resolutions of your Committee and the
official letters of its Secretaries, denouncing emigration as
foreign to the object for which the money was collected and
entrusted to your charge No wonder you touch so lightly
on the delinquency of the Strathpeffer resolutionists, for you
will kne w how they could retort. No wonder you labour so
hard to explain away the destitution of the famishing Shet-
lenders, for unless you can persuade
the public that want of
food and of the means of obtaining it is no evidence of destitu-
tion, and that seven Shetland months are only " ten weeks" in
England, you know the verdict that will he passed on him who
advocated the proposal for handing over to Emigration Com-
mittees the funds " entrusted to his charge" for the express
and sole purpose of supplying the " destitute with the neces-
saries of life." You, therefore, individually, have no right to
take credit, as you " most disingenuously" do, for a desire to
reserve the destitution fund to " meet the claims that are
now pouring in upon you from all quarters ;" for had not
your purpose been overruled, not one fraction of a farthing
would have been reserved by your Committee for the relief
of destitution. Let it not be alleged that although you ad-
vocated the surrender of the funds to these Emigration Com-
mittees, you intended to stipulate for relief out of them to proved
cases of destitution, for such an intention you most explicitly
disclaimed. To my urgent entreaties to you and Mr. Nisbet,
that the grant to these Committees, if made in termsof Mr.
Waugh's motion, should be accompanied with an injunction to
inquire into and relieve the distress in Shetland, the answer
given by both of you was, that your Committee could not and
would not couple the grant with any such injunction. Cloak it,
therefore, as you will, the proposal, of which I found you a
strenuous supporter, was virtually, nay directly, che forlap-
plying the whole of the destitution funds at your diseosa too
emigration purposes ; and this flagrant attempt at. nnscauPnPsris_
priation is rendered more prominently odious by.
and
Y'o,uullar da
tee
your with the previous professions and pledges of
your coadjutors. By what means, and. at what. perm-
of the
your conscientious horror at the emigration schemes
I shall
Edinburgh and Glasgow Committees was overcome,
howv
not at present attempt to trace. You can tell inc
,
ondon on a
in what month in spring Doctor M'Leod visited L
its
tell you
church extension and emigration mission, and I can
wrote
that immediately after his visit, Mr. Secretary Nis
ner-
to the Edinburgh Committee that Doctor NPLeod wa:m' ore
fectly satisfied with the position of your Committee.
d one
ominous annunciation for the destitute Shetlauders, an
more calculate) to awaken suspicions of the sincerity of
uyour
eer,
Committee's former professions, could not well have
ot,
made, for in Scotland Doctor M'Leod has the reputation
being "emigration mad." to break
Now, Sir, having shown how much reason you have
break
the fall of the Strethpeffer jobbers, inasmuch as you and ydudr
clique dare not throw the first stone, I should have procee
.e.
to expose, at considerable length, the futile attem.pts wlnFh
you have made to defend yourself and your coadjutors, by
charging me with disingenuoasness and exaggeration,and y
denying the extent of the destitution which pervades the Shet-
land Islands ; but in that task I have been anticipated by Dr.
Barclay, who in his published reply to your letter, has hunted
you through all your windings, exposed the sophistry of Y°ur
reasonings, and demonstrated the groundlessness of your alle-
gations. To his letter I refer the public for my vinclication;
I desire you to consider every statement and every opinion it
contains as mine, and I leave you the option either to answer
in the hest way you can, or by your silence to admit that you
ear cenvicteu of the most glaring misrepresentations.
I am, Sir, your ohedieet servant,
Lerwick, August 20, 183 S. T. BARCLAY-
P. S. In addition to the numerous distortions of fact whieh
Dr Barclay has pointed out in your aioloectical letter, I beg
to tell you. that in asserting that I demanded'e' for Shetland the
whole residue of your funds, you have allowed yourielf to
make an allegation ; which .5 the reverse of correct. I stated

on one occasion my conviction—which alas I I have not seen
reason to alter—that to afford adequate relief to the destitute
in Shetland would require greater means than your Commit-
tee were possessed of ; but so far was I from demanding, or
exp:cting, or wishing, the whole funds to be given to the suf-
fering Shetlanders, that I distinctly expressed to the members
of the Committee, w hom I saw after the meeting on the 20th
of June, the hope that I should be regarded as pleading the
cause of the destitute in the Highlands and Western Islands,
as well as in Shetland, and that aid would be afforded to the
suff2ring districts in the Isle of Skye, on whose behalf an ap-
plication had been made to you. Again, to enhance the claim
of your Committee to the gratitude of the Shctlanders—which
none of them have ever been backward to admit to the utmost
extent that was due—you state that 15,000/. worth of provi-
sions were received last year by the Shetlandcrs, " and that
chiefly from London." Were you dreaming when you penned
that stiternent ? nearly 15,0001. given last }ear to Shetland
by the London Committee ! say something between three and
four thousand, and you will be nearer the truth.
These, Sir, are merely specimens of the reckless manner in
which you deal not only with figures of speech, but with
figures of arithmetic; and for your own sake I adjure you to
be more careful in future. T. B.

CONSECRATION of the CHIGWELL

MASONIC LODGE.

On Wednesday last, a numerous gathering of the craft took
place at Chigwell, for the purpose of assisting in the conse-
cration of the first Masonic Lodge held in that place, by the
immediate promotion of Brother G. R. Rowe, and several
other influential members of the Dundee Lodge, and under the
ready and zealous auspices of Rowland Alston, Esq., M.P.,
Provincial Grand Master for Essex, and his son Rowland Al-
ston, Esq., the deputy P. G. Master for this county.
Among those present were Brothers Edward Harper, G. S. ;
R. T. Crucefix, (M. D.) past J. G. D. ; John Pattison,
P. G. S., and L. Thompson, P. G. D. C. for Essex, &c.
The Consecration took place at the King's Head, the P. G.
Master presiding. A choice banquet took place on the ceca-
sion, in the course of which,
The DEPUTY PROVINCIAL GRAND MASTER having obtained
the sanction of the Chair to propose a toast, assured the com-
pany that he embraced with much gratification the opportunity
afforded to him, of testifying his opinion of the vast utility of
the Freemasons' Quarterly Review.—(Cheers.) It was of
great service to the craft, and of advantage to all mankind,
that such an organ should exist to publish and extend through-
out the world the principles of Freemasoary.—( Hear, hear.)
In connexion, therefore, with that opinion, lie would give
" The Health of Dr. Crucefix."—(Cheers.)
Brother CRUCEFIX, on returning thanks, observed that such
acknowledgments of the usefulness of his labours fell like
music on the ear, and he trusted that the compliment was not
totally undeserved.—( Hear.) The object of his Masonic
career was the extension of the order under the most favour-
able and enduring circumstances. Having attended their pro-
ceedings as a Mason, he was glad to see that the halcyon days
of Freemasonry were not yet passed away, but that the pre-
sent gave promise of a still brighter future—that the conse-
cration of the Chigwell Lodge, under so many pleasing cir-
cumstances, might be hailed as the harbinger of many such
meetings.—(Cheers.) Sincerely would he pray that every
prosperity might attend the Lodge—that every good might
befall Fremasons—and that the blessed inculcation of " Love
one another" might never be forgotten there or elsewhere.—
(Cheers. )
At half-past ten the party broke up, with mutual demon-
strations of happiness and good-will.