The copper country evening news. [volume] (Calumet, Mich.) 18??-1907, 1898-02-02
TO PUNISH SCOLDS.
THE puckING STOOL IS STILL AVAIL
ABLE IN SOME STATES.

In Jersey City In 1880 rs a Commo,
scold.
Not only Is the common scold still with
In the purview of laws against routs ant
riots and favoring tranquility OF the vici
mage, but IL is held that the ducking stoo
is yet q means of punishment should
some appreciative Pennsylvania Judge
have the nerve to decree a renewal Of it'
use. Fine and imprisonment are the
modern refuge against the shrewish Nc
judge would care 10 return TO the old
ways, for tho gossips might wonder over
his woman hatred and the public might
think he was getting personal.
1t is likely that few people know that
the ducking stool was once employed in
Pittsburg. 1t is held that women had
moro grounds for scolding in pioneer days
than now, and hence the stool should
again be brought into requisition
The English settlers brought to the
United States the ducking stool as an i'm
plement of punishment. as they imported
the common law. At Plymouth, whence
the pilgrims sailed, can be seen today tho
old duckipg stools. Even In 1905 woman
was ducked there. The Puritans brought
over the common scold law, and 1t was
adopted in New Jersey and Delaware. In
1889 the grand jury Of Jersey City indicted
Mrs. Mary Brady as a common scold. Ii
was found to DO there, as here, still an
indictable offense, and that the ducking
stool was yet available as means of pun.
ishment, not having been specifically
abolished by the revised statutes.
The stool was used in Virginia, for
Bishop Meade, In his "Old Churches,
Ministers and Families In Virginia, ~
writes of ducking scolds from vessel in
the James river. From the Old Dominion
the practice OF thus treating scoids reached
Pittsburg. It would be depressing 10 re-
peat the history Of thu establishments OF
courts in this city by Virginia, which be-
gan Feb. 81, 1875. On the second dny Of
that court, the birthday Of George Wash
ington, then but 43, tho sheriff was order
ed to employ workmon to build ducking
stool at tho confluence of the Ohio with
the Monongaheia. ~" caster 70
By patient delving one can dig up much
curious information about the ducking
etool. Allusions to &c recur IN English
chronicles all through the sixteenth, sew
enteenth and eighteenth centuries. Scold-
Ing women In these olden times were
deemed offenders against tho public peace
Blackstone in his Commentaries" treats
Of the common scold in his chapter OH
Public Wrongs" After discussing Of
lenses of graver degree his prelude is, ITO
descend next to offenses whose punish
ment Is short OF death. These offenses
are such, no says. las annoy the whole
community In general, and not merely
some particular portion, and therefore are
indictable, not actionable, as it would be
unreasonable to multiply suits by giving
every man a separate right of action for
what damnifles him in common only with
the rest of his fellow subjects"
Then the great jurist treats of six classes
OF public nuisancos and concludes: Last
ly, a common scold, communis rixatrix
(for our law Latin confines 1t to the fem
inine gender), is public nuisance to her
neighDorhood. She may DO indicted, and
II convicted placed in "a certain engine of
correction, called the trebucket, castiga
tory or cuckiDg stool, which in the Saxon
language is said to signify the scold stool,
though now it is frequently corrupted into
ducking stool because the residue Of the
judgment Is that when she is so placed
therein she shall bo plunged in water for
her punishment.
Blackstone was better jurist than ety.
mologist. There was in even as early as
the fifteenth century the punishment of
sitting in the cucking stool for using short
weights, selling bad ale and scolding, but
1t was n chair of disgrace placed in front
Of tho offenders own home. In the lapse
Of time the cucking and the ducking stool
became synonymous.
In his Travels In England in 100
Mission writes 1.-THE way of furnishing
scolding women Is pleasant enough. They
fasten an armchair to the end of two
beams, IL or 10 feet long and parallel to
zach other, SO that these two pieces of
wood with their two ends embrace the
chair, which hangs between them upon a
sort of axle, by which means 1t plays free
~ and always remains in the natural hor-
zontal position in which the chair should
be, that person may sit conveniently
In 1t, whether you raise it or let il down.
They set up post on the bank of a pond |
Or river, and over this post they lay, al |
most in equilibrium, the two pieces of |
wood, at one end Of which the chair hangs
over tho water"
The English poets have had their thrusts
st the ducking stool, when their eyes in
Inc frenzy rolling seem 20 have caught in
spiration from the temper of the shrew
In 1865, In Homer a Ia Mode" the poet
sings:
She belonged to Rillingsgate
And oftentimes had rid in state
And sat in the bottom Of n pool
EEthroned in q ducking stool.
West wrote q complete poem on the stool
In 1880, the philosophy of which lies In
he extracted couplet;
No brawling wives, no furious wenches
No Ere so hot but water quenchcs.
All through England there were the
stools used for ducking scolds. There was
one at Rugby, and in 1920 man was
tucked for beating his wife Court rec
,rds reveal many instances where the pen.
ilty was inflicted on women.
The chair used at scarborough, Eng.
and, is yet preserved. 1t was last used |
n 1895, when Mrs. Gamble was "ducked |
hrce times over the head and ears" In
he museum at Ipswich is another. It has
ron rods converging over the seat, with a
ing through which to run pole In I72s /
he constable Of Morley charged shillings
or q pole. The stools In some cities were
N wheels, and were called scolding carts
At Kingston upoh-Thames ducking was
Tot infrequent, and the London Post In
745 reuorta the duckinr of ua woman i