Edmund Burton

338

Penny-Lyn Beale on 16th May 2021

1826 - New South Wales and Tasmania, Australia Convict Musters, Tasmania. 1826 No; 815 Name; Edward Burton Ship arrived by; Lady East To whom assigned/Occupation; HOSPITAL

71

Robin Sharkey on 19th January 2018

Edmund Burton was only 15 years old when he was found guilty at the Old Bailey of stealing a bank note and was sentenced to death. He must have been able to read and write since he was clerking at a barrister’s office. His death sentence was commuted to transportation for only 7 years, he having been recommended to mercy by the Jury as well as Mr Young, the prosecutor, on account of his age. He also presented a petition– see below. HIS CRIME Edmund’s brother was clerk to a barrister named Gilbert Ainslie Young, Esq whose chambers were at Gray’s Inn, London. The brother was ill on the 5th January 1824. Edmund went to his brother’s clerk room that day to assist. Mr Young had four bank notes in his drawer of his library table, each L20. The day after Edmund was working there, he noticed one was missing. Edmund did not come to work the next day because the brother was recovered. Edmund was apprehended that next day, at the chambers by a constable. There he was searched, found with money on him, and arrested. Mr Young said “I believe him to be a good boy previously.” Mrs Martha Taylor was a laundress at the chambers and she spoke to him when he was brought back to chambers by the constable. After he was searched, she went into the back room with him and his brother, and said to him, "So you took the note on Sunday night, how did you get to the drawer?" He told her "I took the key of the cupboard in the same room, and that opened it." Mrs Taylor gave evidence that she had since tried that key, and it opens the drawer. When he was arrested he had some money on him and he told the constable as regards the rest of it “he gave Cooper a sovereign, some he had spent, and some he believed he had lost.” Thomas Cooper was his mate. He gave evidence that “on Monday, the 5th of January - he gave me a sovereign; he said nothing about it. I went over the water with him.” i.e. they took a boat ride. The mother of this boy, Mary Anne Cooper said that on Monday night, the 5th of January, about half-past seven o'clock, her son Thomas came home quite drunk. She put him to bed without undressing him, and next morning found a sovereign in his bed. PRISONER’S PETTION. HO 17/30/52 (summary of petition) Date: 29 January 1824 Prisoner name(s): Edmund Burton. Prisoner age: 15. Court and date of trial: Old Bailey January Sessions 1824. Crime: Stealing in a dwelling house - £20, from G A Young his employer. Initial sentence: Death. Annotated (Outcome): Considered at the Report in Council 19 March 1824. Petitioner(s): Prisoner and eight others. Grounds for clemency (Petition Details): Convict is very sorry for his crime; his youth; he asks to go at the earliest opportunity to Sydney New South Wales as he feels he will not get on this country. Additional Information: In Newgate Gaol. However, he sailed on the “Lady East” on 4th November 1824. Arrived 9th April, 1825 at Van Diemen's Land  Conduct Record in Tasmania Edmund had two good placements with Hobart barriseters but threw them both away with disorderly conduct: 25 Aug 1826 he was charged with Neglect of duty and other improper conduct in his master’s service. To be placed in the Prisoner’s Barracks. His Master was Alfred Stephen Esq, a young barrister who had arrived from England with his new wife in January 1825. Therefore Edmund Burton may have been assigned to Alfred Stephen soon on Burton’s arrival. It would have been a good posting for him. Alfred Stephen was only aged 23 and his barrister uncle, in commending Stephen to Lt Gov Arthur, had written that “He is a pleasant, lively, talkative youth, who has neither thought nor read deeply upon any subject … generally well informed, though not profound in his own profession as a lawyer”. 13 Dec 1827 He had been assigned to Mr Hone Esq. Joseph Hone was a barrister from Gray’s Inn who was appointed Master of the Tasmanian Supreme Court arriving in Hobart in July 1824 with wife and three daughters. He may have recalled the prosecution of Burton by his fellow Gray’s Inn barrister at the start of 1824. Mr Hone was also acting as Attorney General in Hobart in 1826 after the removal of Joseph Gellibrand, and had heavy workload. What did Edmund do in the service of Mr Hone? Disorderly conduct. He was sent to the Prisoner’s Barracks with a note that he was not to be assigned in Buckingamhshire (ie. The area of Hobart) In February 1828 he’d been in the Prisoner’s Barracks two months from Mr Hone’s when he went absent from the barracks without leave for the whole of a Saturday night. His punishment was to labor on the treadwheel for 7 days. By 1 June 1829, he was back assigned to Mr Hone again but put before the magistrate for disobeying orders and neglect of duty yesterday. He was to go on the treadwheel for 6 days and then be returned to his Master Mr Hone. FREEDOM In January 1831 a Certificate of Freedom was issued to him the period for which he was transported having expired. Hobart Town Courier, 22 Jan 1831 page 2. There is no Tasmanian record of his marriage or death so it is likely he left Tasmania on gaining his freedom in 1831. He would have been aged only 22 years.