LOO193905R Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2017 with funding from Duke University Libraries https://archive.org/details/lettertowilliamjOOdanc A JL J / LETTER WILLIAM JONES, ESQ. MARSHAL OF THE KING’S BENCH PRISON, OCCASIONED BY HIS OBSERVATIONS ON V THE INSOLVENT DEBTORS’ ACT, FROM HENRY DANCE, PROVISIONAL ASSIGNEE OF INSOLVENT DEBTORS IN ENGLAND. LONDON: J. RIDGWAY, PICCADILLY. 1827 . Price. One Shilling. r ' x ' * A LETTER, Sj-c. Sfc. Sir, The observations which you have thought proper to publish on the Insolvent Debtors’ Act, contain among other things matter affecting me. As these observations proceed from a person who, holding an important public situation, professes to write from a sense of public duty, and takes credit to himself for practical knozoledgc and personal observation of the subjects which he treats, I owe it to myself to meet a statement so likely to obtain belief, and to shew that whatever may have been your observation, vour knowledge is none. 4 After representing' that the Commis¬ sioners permit extraordinary fees to be re¬ ceived, to which those contained in the regular list of fees, though very unreasonable , are by comparison nothing (a statement utterly de¬ void of truth, or pretence of truth), you illustrate your position thus : “ There is an “ officer belonging to this court, whose pro- ‘‘ fits are said to be enormous, without “ being subject to any risk whatever, and “ that is the Clerk of the Court; who, if “ eighteen thousand prisoners have been “ discharged, has received no less than ten “ shillings and sixpence for each of them, “ which will amount to nine thousand four “ hundred and fifty pounds in five years * e upon this fee alone, which is paid for “ nothing on earth but witnessing the pe- “ titions, and swearing the insolvents to “ their schedules.” Not one allegation contained in the above sentence is true, excepting the process of multiplication. 5 It is due to the chief clerk, Mr. Massey, who will be supposed to be intended as The Clerk of the Court,’* to state that he receives no share of any fee whatever at ; ny time : his duties are paid altogether by salary. I, who hold the office of Provisional As¬ signee, am the person alluded to in your observations: I am the person who visit the prisons, and whom you state to receive fee of ten shillings and sixpence in each case, “ for nothing on earth but witnessing “ he petitions, and swearing the insolvents to their schedules.” The fee which is paid to me is not ten shillings and sixpence, but five shillings; not for the duties, as stated by you, for I have nothing to do with swearing an insolvent to his schedule— a proceeding which must take place in open court at the hearing, and on account of which there is n fee paid—but I receive it for preparing the Provisional Assignment, which is made to me by every petitioner, and for attend- 6 big at the prison, where I witness his sig¬ nature to his petition and estate papers, and afterwards file them in the court. This is the only fee paid by an insolvent during the process towards his discharge, in which I have any interest, or which comes into my department of the office ; there is one, and only one other fee paid to the office of the court by him during that pro¬ cess, namely, two shillings and sixpence for preparing the warrant of attorney ; but that is paid on a subsequent occasion, when the schedule has been filed, and the order for hearing bespoken ; and if, after petition¬ ing, an insolvent proceeds no farther, but goes out of custody, that fee is never paid at all. All other matters done in the court and the office of the court, in any way concerning a prisoner’s discharge, are done without fee. All affidavits are sworn by me at the prisons, as well as by me and others at the office, gratuitously A 4 * I do not here include the labours of’ the messengers as business done in the court and office. They are paid by a fee There is one other payment made through the office, but not to the benefit of any per¬ son connected with it, namely, three shil¬ lings for the Gazette advertisement of the day appointed for the hearing; the whole of this sum is paid over to the printer of the Gazette, no charge being made by the office for preparing and sending the adver¬ tisement. It is for the benefit of insolvents that all advertisements of cases for the same day are thus consolidated in the office, and an arrangement made with the Gazette printer for charging only three shillings for each, which charge would be very much greater,$ if each insolvent should send for himself to the Gazette his own particular advertisement. This payment is no fee, is not made to the officer who visits for each notice delivered and the return thereof: 9d. within the district of the two-penny post, and Is. beyond that to the distance of 10 miles from London ; and 2d. for preparing and swearing the affidavit. * The 86th section of the Act regulating the payment for advertisements in newspapers, is not considered to apply to the printer of the Gazette, nor so admitted by him. 8 the prison there or elsewhere, goes in full to the Gazette printer, and is made through this office to the clear advantage of the in¬ solvent, and of no other person. These things which I have stated you might have known, considering the inter¬ course which subsists between this court and the King’s Bench Prison : these things you ought to have known before you put forth a pamphlet on the subject, and before you represented (as you do in p. 11), “ theClerk “ of the Court making a parade of going, at- “ tended by his Clerk, with a bag full of “ sixty or seventy schedules and petitions at a “ time to the King's Bench prison alone, for “ every one of which the fee of ten shillings “ and sixpence is claimed and paid” —These things and more might well have been ascertained, before this fee of ten shillings and sixpence, which has no existence, was represented as a part of the enormous profis of an individual officer. Whether you judge well in maintaining 9 that the duties oil which the fee (tive shil¬ lings) is paid, as well as the duty of swear¬ ing an insolvent to his schedule, a proceeding which (as you might have known) necessa¬ rily takes place in open court, would be best performed by one of your turnkeys, I care not to inquire—I object not to your speculations, but to your assertions. I can account for your ignorance as to the officer of the Insolvent Debtor’s Court, who attends the prisons, and for your ignorance in supposing that the schedules are carried in my bag, and sworn to in the prison: I can account for this, because you have never availed yourself of an op¬ portunity to observe what the duties are which are there performed by me. You are the only person at the head of any of the prisons, which I have visited now twice a week for seven years, whom I have never once seen on the occasion of those visits. In every other prison I am in the habit of seeing the superior, and I acknowledge the 10 assistance and accommodation which I have received from them; but though your per¬ petual personal absence from the proceed¬ ings which you criticise, may account for your ignorance, it cannot vindicate your misrepresentation of them: nor does it well justify the claim to public attention which you put forth in the beginning of your pamphlet, on the ground of practical knowledge and personal observation. The next part of your commentary, which (though you have still chosen the expression of “ the Clerk of the Court”), is di¬ rected against myself, is as follows : “ There “ are also many minor expences attending