[29] Pike's "History of Crime in England," 1873.
[30] Morris's "Obsolete Punishments of Shropshire."
Branding.
This mode of punishment was discontinued in the reign of George III., and finally abolished in 1829. Old laws contain many allusions to the subject. In the reign of Edward VI. was passed the famous Statute of Vagabonds, authorising the branding with hot iron the letter V on the breast of a runaway slave. If, on being sold, he afterwards ran away, he might be branded on the cheek or forehead with the letter S, and thus the fact made known to those who saw him that he was a slave. Church brawlers in this reign were liable to be branded on the cheek with the letter F, meaning a fraymaker.
Gipsies were punished with branding. At Haddington, in 1636, some gipsies were severely dealt with, the men being condemned to be hanged, the women drowned, with the exception of those having children, and they were to be scourged through the burgh and burnt on their cheeks.
James Nayler, the Mad Quaker, who claimed to[139] be the Messiah, as part of his punishment for blasphemy, was condemned to have his tongue bored through and his forehead branded with a hot iron with the letter B, signifying that he was a blasphemer.[31]
Persons found guilty of petty offences and claiming benefit of clergy were burnt on the hand. Dr. Cox gives particulars of a case occurring at the Derbyshire Sessions in 1696. A butcher named Palmer, from Wirksworth, had been found guilty of stealing a sheep. He claimed benefit of clergy, which the court granted, and he read. The court gave judgment that he be burnt in his left hand, which was executed. His troubles did not end with the branding, for we find he had to "remaine in Gaole till hee finde Sufficient Suretyes for his Good behaviour to bee approved of and taken by Recoign by Mr. Justice Pole and Mr. Justice Borrowes, and for his appearance att next Sessions, and then to abide further Order of this Court."[32]
