Quarter Sessions Print E-mail

                        Carlisle, Friday, January 5, 1844.
                                                                                               _____
 
    The proceedings of the magistrates in Quarter Sessions this week have excited the utmost interest throughout the whole county, from a very general expectation that the Court would take some steps in connection with the late unwarrantable inquest at Beaumont, held upon the body of JAMES CLARKE, calculated to prevent, or at least discourage any similar prostitution of the office of Coroner for the future.  We regret to say, that this has not been done.  From the very loose state of the law, and the great uncertainty that prevailed amongst the magistrates, as to what power they really possessed in the matter, there was an evident reluctance to interfere at all; and the Coroner's charges were at last allowed, not certainly because his conduct was considered immaculate or the inquest proper or necessary, but because there was nothing so "palpably wrong" in what appeared before the Court, as in the opinion of the majority of the magistrates to justify their being refused.
 
    It will be seen that Mr. BRISCO, who brought the matter under the notice of the bench, felt bound to omit the merits of the case altogether, as being irrelevant to the point which he considered the acts and reported cases, entitled the Sessions to consider. viz., whether the inquest in question was not in fact "null," as it was not taken super visum corporis, which the law requires -- the face of the deceased only having been viewed.  Many of the magistrates appeared to consider that the law did not require a view of the entire body, and others that the objection being merely technical, was hardly one on which the court could act -- and therefore, on a division, it was decided that the costs should be allowed, by a majority of fifteen to seven; but it is worthy of remark, that the seven magistrates who voted against the allowance of the costs, were those who, from their position and connection with the district, knew most accurately the whole facts of this monstrous inquest.
 
   But, although the result is so far in his favour, that he suffers no pecuniary loss by his misconduct, the Coroner has very little else whereon to congratulate himself in the issue of this affair.  The court took especial pains to guard against any impression going abroad that the vote for allowing the costs was in any way expressive of an opinion in favour of the mode in which the inquest had been conducted, or the circumstances under which it had been held.  Some magistrates even went farther, and expressed a decided opinion as to the gross impropriety of the proceeding, from beginning to end -- and Mr. CARRICK had further the mortification to hear read in court a renewed charge by the Jury that he had published an addition, to the verdict which they had returned, "which was not pronounced by the Jury, , and was altogether contrary to their opinion"!  How far this was consistent with the impartiality which ought to guide the actions of a judge the public will decide, and be it recollected, that the only answer Mr. CARRICK made to the charge was, that he had not published anything relative to the Inquest, until some weeks after, "when he was induced to write a letter."  That letter contained the "addition" complained of by the Jury; and its purport, which went to exculpate Dr. JACKSON and Mr. ELLIOT in their experimental treatment of the deceased, shows which way the Coroner wished the verdict to go -- in spite of the honest English Jury, whom he could not lead.  Nor is this all.  We have been favoured with a copy of a statement of the Jury, as to the conduct of the Coroner at the time the Jury returned their verdict, which will leave no doubt, that notwithstanding his pretended reluctance to hold an Inquest in the case, he was determined, if possible, to force a verdict to relieve his medical friends from their exigency.  That statement is as follows: --
 
    "After the Coroner had given his charge to the Jury, and ordered the court to be cleared, he said to William ARMSTRONG (one of the Jurors) 'you can write,' and took him aside and whispered to him, we could not hear what he said to ARMSTRONG.  The Coroner then retired from the court.  In about a quarter of an hour he returned and said to the Jury, 'how are you getting on?'  One of the Jurors replied, 'they could do themselves, and they did not want him,' he then went out.  After the lapse of about half an hour he again returned without having been sent for, and enquired how they were getting on?  He said, 'if you want any help I will assist you.  I am going to Mr. GILKERSONS, and you can send for me if you want me.'  After the Jury had agreed on their verdict, one of the Jurors went to the door, and told the door keeper to go for the Coroner.  When he came, he said 'I am pleased you are don,' he took up the paper on which the verdict was written, looked at it -- he immediately exclaimed, 'is this your verdict/ surely it cannot be possible, you cannot have gone by the evidence you' have heard this day.'  He took up the pen several times and put it into the ink, and then laid it down again -- he said, 'I will not take the verdict as you have given it' -- he appeared disappointed.  Gentlemen, he said, 'I would rather it had been the other way, and that you had gone further.
 
 
Mr. BURCH (house-surgeon to the Infirmary) and Mr. PAGE were no evidence.  Mr. BURCH said very little to the purpose, and Mr. PAGE knew nothing of the case.  They had only Dr. BARNES to place against five eminent persons, one of whom, Dr. LONSDALE, was not connected with either party, and his evidence ought to have the greatest weight with the jury, and he must be a very clever man, or he would not hold the situation he did in Edinburgh.'  He said -- 'I think you cannot all be of one mind, and I ought to have been here to lead you.'  He then asked the Jury for their verdict separately, beginning with William LITTLE, who said, ' I will abide by the verdict.'  The next Juror was John NIXON, and he hesitated as to the answer given to the question relating to the treatment at the Infirmary, and he declined giving any opinion.  When he came to John BRYDEN, he tried to 'baffle' him, and John GRAHAM, another juror, spoke up and said we ought to give the verdict as we thought fit, and he had no business to interfere.  He replied, 'I ought to have been here the whole time to lead you.'  He then put the same questions to the rest of the Jury.  We consider he showed great partiality throughout the investigation.
 
(Signed)                    JOHN HODGSON, Foreman
                                JOHN GRAHAM.
                                JOSEPH PEARSON.
                                DAVID GRAHAM.
                                THOMAS TODHUNTER.
                                WILLIAM IRVING.
                                JOHN BRYDEN.
                                WILLIAM LITTLE.
 
    This needs no comment, and we cannot but congratulate the County that owing to the firm independence of the jury, a gross injustice was not perpetrated in this case, in addition to the disgraceful farce to which the solemnity of a Coroner's inquest was reduced.
 
    Upon the propriety of the decision of the bench we have no wish to make any comment.  The magistrates evidently felt the stringency of the law by which they considered themselves bound; and we have little doubt they would gladly have escaped from its obligations, if they could have done so legally.  But the result is well calculated to excite the alarm of the rate-payers -- the immediate consequence, indeed, has been only to subject the county to a cost of £12 10s 2d; but the decision shows also that the county is subject to a constant risk of similar expense, whenever one or two medical men may feel that their professional conduct is liable to severe remark, and can find a Coroner weak enough to yield to their views.  No man can pretend that the ends of justice or the interests of the community required that poor Clark's grave should be disturbed -- and the County, therefore, has been made to pay, in order that professional jealousy and private spleen might have full scope, and that doctors, after unsuccessful practice on the deceased, might, if by any means it could be done, shift the responsibility of their failure from their own shoulders to those of other professional men.
 
 
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