CRIME IN PAST TIMES

Teenage girl spared the gallows
but transported instead

Domestic servants in past times were treated like slaves and had little chance of improving their situation. Girls particularly were ill-used but to complain could mean dismissal and a diminished chance of finding alternative employment.

The case of Priscilla Woodford is particularly poignant for although she had the courage to protest about her treatment, she unleashed a chain of events which had terrifying consequences.

On 1st December 1831, at the age of 15, she obtained employment as a servant to Isaac Teesdale, a farmer, at his house in Haconby, near Bourne. The conditions of service were that she lived in and carried out domestic duties as directed and for a day or two she had no complaints.

But by the end of the week, Priscilla was given other tasks in the farmyard including milking the cows which she particularly disliked and suggested to the farmer’s wife that this was a job that should be done by someone else but Mrs Teesdale told the girl that she must complain to her husband.

Priscilla said she would and added: “I will give him a d-----d good blowing up when he comes home” and that afternoon, haystacks in the farmyard were found ablaze. She was subsequently charged with setting them on fire and after appearing before the magistrates at Bourne, was sent for trial at Lincoln Assizes on Monday 5th March 1832. By this time, she was 16 years old.

She pleaded not guilty to the offence but the prospects were not good. The court convened with a grand jury consisting of a foreman and 22 members, all from the landed gentry and in addition, the judge, Sir James Parke, opened the proceedings by lamenting that there were no less than six persons charged with arson during the current sitting, five of them for the destruction of hay, corn and other agricultural produce.

“I am afraid that these offenders form but a small portion of the total number of persons who have been guilty of the incendiary crime in this part of the country in a short period”, he said. “After carefully looking over the whole of the depositions in the cases of arson, I have come to the conclusion, which I am sure must be admitted by all, that a serious picture is presented of the extreme moral depravity of the lower orders and of their contempt for the laws. To such a pitch has this arrived in many districts that farmers are compelled to keep a nightly watch upon their premises, at much trouble and serious expense and yet in several instances, the protection that they thus dearly purchased has been found insufficient.

“What remedy might be devised or adopted to stop this fearful state of things is not my province to inquire on this occasion but there is one thing to which I would aver, upon which you will all agree: that is a firm, unbending and impartial administration of the law.”

When her case came up, Priscilla said in her defence that she had seen the blaze while fetching kindling wood for the house and had helped to put it out with a bucket of water but an investigation next day revealed two pieces of coal and some sticks in the ashes, identical to that which had been used in a fire for the brewhouse the day before. A milkmaid, Mary Glen, also gave evidence of Priscilla’s threat and a servant who had been working in an adjoining field told the court that he had seen her in the vicinity of the fire. But Priscilla continued to plead her innocence saying that she knew nothing of the fire and that all she wanted was to leave the farm because she was being ill-treated.

When it came, the verdict of guilty seemed inevitable and the judge directed that she be detained in Lincoln jail in order that he could consider her sentence, the usual punishment for arson being the death penalty.

There was great public sympathy for the girl and soon a petition was underway to save her from the gallows. “It is hoped that this humane effort will not be unsuccessful on behalf of the wretched girl who is left to suffer the extreme penalty of the law”, reported the Stamford Mercury on Friday 16th March. “It seems too much to assume as a matter of course, that a creature so young and so ignorant should be aware of the dreadful penalties attached to the offence. She is the only prisoner left for execution.”

Priscilla’s appeal for clemency came before the court when the Lincoln Assizes resumed on Saturday 17th March. The judge heard a recommendation for mercy on the grounds of her age and that "besides her almost childish years, the miserable girl appeared to be in a state of stupid ignorance, being unable to read or write." But there was to be no leniency. “I am painfully bound to suffer the awful judgment of the law to take its course”, said the judge and sentenced her to death.

However, the case was later reviewed by the Crown and Priscilla was subsequently reprieved, the death penalty being commuted to transportation for life.

During her time in Lincoln gaol, Priscilla was thought to be pregnant but the prison surgeon who examined her thought this "very doubtful". The gaoler described "the behaviour of Priscilla Woodford under sentence of death" as "orderly and becoming, she acknowledges her guilt".

From Lincoln jail, she was sent to one of the hulks or floating prisons off the east coast to await a passage and on 29th July 1832, she sailed aboard the 275-ton female convict ship Fanny II, one of 98 women prisoners bound for a penal settlement in Australia. The ship arrived at New South Wales after 188 days at sea on 2nd February 1833. Priscilla Woodford would then have been 17 years old but we have no knowledge of what happened to her after that.

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