CHAPTER XIV. LIFE OF LORD PRESIDENT BRADSHAW. CHAP. XIV. Reason for My collection of biographical sketches of Common Law Judges, of the first rank, would be imperfect were I to pass over him who presided at the most interesting trial which ever took place in England, although he was called LORD noticing PRESIDENT instead of LORD CHIEF JUSTICE, Lord President Bradshaw. A.d. 1635 -1640. His origin and profes sional pro gress. He was born at Marple-hall, in Cheshire, and was the younger son of a respectable family, which had been settled there for many generations. I know nothing of his career till I find him a barrister of Gray's Inn, of considerable but obscure practice, and Judge of the Sheriff's Court in the City of London. Although well versed in his profession, he was a very dull man; and no one imagined that he could rise higher than the dignity which he had then acquired. His name was introduced into the commission of oyer and terminer at the Old Bailey, and, to ease the Judges, he was employed to try assaults and petty larcenies; but no highwayman or burglar would have submitted, without deep murmuring, to his jurisdiction.* He professed himself to be, and was, a A.D. 1640. very violent republican. He failed in an attempt to obtain a seat in the Long Parliament; but he was loud and active in publican. supporting the parliamentary cause in the City of London. For this reason he was appointed junior counsel for the Commonwealth, and assisted in state prosecutions instituted against royalists.† • Prisoners look very much to the rank of those who may pass sentence of death upon them. A Serjeant of great experience going the Oxford Circuit in the room of Lord Chief Justice Abbot, who was suddenly taken ill, a man capitally convicted, being asked if he had any thing to say why sentence of death should not be passed upon him, exclaimed, "Yes; I have been tried before a Journeyman Judge." † Whit. 106. He is a strong re A.D. 1644. CHAP. XIV. The cruel sentence passed by the Star Chamber, in the year 1638, upon John Lilburn, by which he was to be pilA.D. 1645. loried, whipt, and imprisoned for life, being brought before He is employed as counsel for the Commonwealth. A.D. 1646. Oct. 11. 1648. He be comes a Serjeant. Trial of the House of Lords, Bradshaw was assigned him as his coun sel, and succeeded not only in getting a reversal of the sentence, but a compensation of 3000l. for his client, to be raised out of the sequestered estates of delinquents.* When, under the "Self-denying Ordinance," the original set of the Commissioners of the Commonwealth Great Seal were to be removed, a vote passed the House of Commons that Bradshaw should be one of the new commissioners; but this was overruled by the Lords, of whose jurisdiction he had been in the habit of speaking disrespectfully. † Soon after, he was appointed Chief Justice of Chester. He still went on distinguishing himself for his zeal in favour of the new régime, and his loud expression of impatience for the entire abolition of monarchy. At the great move in legal offices shortly before the King's trial, the House of Commons, which was now exercising the functions of all the officers of the Crown, ordered that there should be a new call of Serjeants, and "that Mr. Bradshaw, of Gray's Inn, be of the number." On the day of the solemnity, Lord Commissioner Whitelock, who was a much more moderate politician, advised him to be like his predecessor, celebrated by Chaucer, "A Serjeant-at-law, wary and wise." § When the ordinance to constitute the HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE was first introduced into the House of Commons, Serjeant Bradshaw was named in it as an assistant only, but in a further stage of its progress he was promoted to the rank of Commissioner. It had been hoped that éclat would have been given to the approaching trial by Whitelock, Lord Keeper of the Great Seal,-Rolle, Lord Chief Justice of the King's Bench,-St. John, Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, or Wilde, Lord Chief Baron of the Exchequer, acting as Lord President of this tribunal, which was framed XIV. A.D. 1648. after the fashion of that invented by Queen Elizabeth for the CHAP. condemnation of Mary Queen of Scots; but they all positively refused to take any part in a proceeding so contrary to the established forms of criminal procedure; although, if a bill of indictment had been found against Charles Stuart by a grand jury, and he had been arraigned and made to hold up his hand before a petty jury, in the usual form, some of them, probably, would not have hesitated, in the King's name, to try him and to pass sentence upon him. Bradshaw, either from wishing that he might escape the service altogether, or that in his absence his merits might be more freely discussed, did not attend the first meetings of the Commissioners held for arranging the preliminaries of the trial. "On chosen Pre Court of On the 10th of Jan., 1649, "John Bradshaw, Serjeant-at- He is law, a commissioner of this court, was chosen President; sident of who being absent, Mr. Say, one of the commissioners then the High present, was appointed president pro tempore until the said Justice. Serjeant Bradshaw should attend the said service."* the 12th of Jan., Serjeant Bradshaw, upon special summons, attended this court, and being, according to former order, called to take his place of President of the said court, made an earnest apology for himself to be excused; but therein not prevailing, in obedience to the desires and commands of this court he submitted to their order, and took his place. accordingly. Thereupon the court ordered that he should have the title of LORD PRESIDENT, as well without as within the said court-against which title he pressed much to be heard to offer his exceptions, but was overruled."† Such is the official minute of the appointment of President. Lord Clarendon says, "To that office one BRADSHAW was chosen; a lawyer of Gray's Inn, not much known in Westminster Hall, though of good practice in his chamber, and much employed by the fractious. He was a gentleman of an ancient family in Cheshire, but of a fortune of his own making. He was not without parts, and of great insolence and ambition. When he was first nominated, he seemed much surprised, and very resolute to refuse it; which he did in such a manner, and so much enlarging † Ibid. * Minutes of the Court. CHAP. A.D. 1649. Jan. 1649. the trial. upon It is said that "Mr. Serjeant Bradshaw, the President, was afraid of some tumult upon such new and unprecedented insolence as that of sitting judge upon his King; and therefore, besides other defence, he had a thick big-crowned beaver hat, lined with plated steel, to ward off blows."† We have a very full report of the whole trial; and, after duct during attentively perusing it, I must say that the charge brought against Bradshaw of wanton brutality on this occasion is considerably exaggerated. The act of sitting in trial upon the King is to be regarded as a great atrocity; but this must not be confounded with the manner in which the proceeding was conducted. Assuming a court to be constituted, its authority must be maintained, and the steps must be taken which are necessary for bringing to a conclusion a trial commenced before it. The King's demeanour was most noble; and he *Rebellion, iii. 373. Kennett, iii. 181. n. "This hat, with a Latin inscription upon it, is now to be seen in the Museum at Oxford." - Ibid. In the middle of the seventeenth century, the common law judges adhered to their coifs, or black cloth caps, which they still put on when they pass sentence of death; but the Lord Chancellor, and the Speaker of the House of Commons, wore à round highcrowned beaver hat. The full-bottom wig, and the three-cornered cocked hat, were introduced from France after the Restoration. Barristers' wigs came in at the same time-but very gradually, for the judges at first thought them so coxcombical that they would not suffer young aspirants to plead before them so attired. Who would have supposed that this grotesque ornament, fit only for an African chief, would be considered indispensably necessary for the administration of justice in the middle of the nineteenth century! When I argued the great Privilege Case, having to speak sixteen hours, I obtained leave to speak without a wig; but under the condition that "this was not to be drawn into a precedent." CHAP. XIV. A.D. 1649. displayed such real dignity, such presence of mind, such acuteness, such readiness, such liberality of sentiment, and such touches of eloquence that he makes us forget all his errors, his systematic love of despotic power, and his incorrigible bad faith. Instead of hurrying him to the scaffold, we eagerly desire to see him once more on the throne, in the hope that misfortune might at last induce him sincerely to submit to the restraints of a constitutional monarchy. But these are feelings which could not properly actuate the mind of a judge the very foundation of whose authority was questioned by the accused. Therefore it could be no aggravation of Bradshaw's crime, in accepting the office of President, that he said, "Sir, you have heard the charge read, and we expect that you will answer it;" or that, upon an explanation being required, he observed that "the authority of the Court could not be disputed." He certainly did, more than once, use language unnecessarily disrespectful, as when he talked of Charles being an "elected King," and exclaimed with a sneer, "Sir, how well you have managed your trust is known; your way of answer is to interrogate the Court, which beseems not you in this condition. How great a friend you have been to the laws and liberties of the people, let all England and the world judge. How far you have preserved the privileges of the people, your actions have spoke it; but truly, Sir, men's intentions ought to be known by their actions: you have written your meaning in bloody characters throughout the whole kingdom." However, on each of the three days when Charles was brought to the bar of the Court, he was courteously requested to plead, and he was never interrupted unless when he denied the authority of the judges to sit there. It is likewise remarkable that Bradshaw ab- Jan. 27. stained from pronouncing with his own mouth the sentence "that the said Charles Stuart, as a tyrant, traitor, murderer, and public enemy to the good people of this nation, shall be put to death by the severing of his head from his body' but ordered it to be read by the clerk, and then merely added, the sentence now read and published is the act, sentence, judgment, and resolution of the whole Court; "— whereupon Cromwell, Ireton, Lord Grey de Groby, Ludlow, and the |