ROBERT ABEL - this story is under review
by Membership Team
The story of
Robert Abel provides an interesting insight into the
British court system in so far as he was sentenced to
transportation for seven years but was not convicted of
any crime.
At his Old
Bailey Trial in Sept 1784 ‘Robert
Abel
and
William
Rellions
were indicted for feloniously assaulting William
Rough, on the King's Highway, on the 4th day of July
last, and putting him in fear and danger of his life,
and feloniously taking from his person and against his
will, 5 s. in monies numbered, and two copper halfpence,
value 1 d. his monies .’
Rellions was apprehended the following Wednesday but
Abel was not arrested until about six weeks later.
Nonetheless, Rough testified they were the two men who
had robbed him. While Rellions confessed that ‘I am the
lad that did the robbery’, he exonerated Abel, claiming
that Rough ‘has sworn to this lad wrongfully’
.
In
his defence Abel testified ‘I know no more of the
robbery than the child unborn’, but when asked if he had
any friends to provide a character witness, he said ‘I
have nobody living but a brother, and he is just come
home from sea’.
Although instructed by the Judge, Baron Eyre, to
ignore Rellion's testimony as it could be accorded no
validity in law, the jury convicted both defendants, and
Eyre sentenced both to death.
Both Abel and Rellions were due to be executed on
Wednesday 17 November 1784. Two days before, the
Recorder of London, James Adair, requested a stay
of execution as there appeared to be doubt as to Abel's
guilt, as it ‘depended wholly on the recollection of the
prosecutor, Rough, at some distance of time, under
circumstances not very favourable to recollection, and
confirmed by no circumstances whatever on the trial’.
Midford Young, an undersheriff, reported that
Rellions claimed William Collop, not Abel, had
been concerned with him in the robbery, a fact confirmed
by Collop.
After a strict enquiry, the Undersheriff, together with
Reverend Villette, Ordinary of Newgate, confirmed
that Rellions and Collop both stated that Abel was
innocent, and that ‘the prosecutor [Rough] was a common
labourer, living in Gravel Lane, the known haunt of the
lowest and worst of the people, swearing under the
temptation of sharing a reward of £40 for each prisoner,
whom he should be able to convict. The case as to Abel
rests wholly on his evidence not confirmed by any
circumstances whatsoever, swearing to a person, at the
distance of 6 weeks whom he had never seen but once, in
a sudden in the fields, at 10 o’clock at night [although
it was a moonlit night] and when he admits that he was
much stunned by the first blow he received from Rellions.
He speaks also throughout his evidence, of the persons
who robbed him as two men. Rellions and Collop were
stout lads of about 20, but Abel is I[‘m] informed a boy
of 17, very slight and low of stature.’
However, the Recorder considered Abel to be ‘a bad boy’,
who had ‘connected himself with thieves and pick
pockets’. He therefore did ‘not wish him to be turned
loose upon the public’, and suggested that
transportation for 7 years would be the best course of
action.
On
5 April 1785 Abel was sent to the Ceres hulk and
later transferred to the Censor hulk where he
remained until 6 January 1787 when he was transferred to
the Alexander on which he travelled to Port
Jackson.
At
Port Jackson, in February 1788, he had fifteen and a
half pounds of flour stolen from the hut he shared with
Michael Dennison and William Waterhouse.
On
12 June, 1790 Abel received 200 lashes for stealing
sugar from the transport ship Lady Juliana
On
20 February 1794 Abel received a 30 acre land grant at
Bulanamming, near Cook River, which he later sold to
Thomas Moore.
In
1795 Abel left the Colony on the Endeavour bound
for India. The ship sank off New Zealand. Abel was
among those rescued and was taken to Norfolk Island in
January 1796. He did not remain on the island and there
are no further records of him.
#5129.1
Don Cornford.
References and Sources
Old Bailey Proceedings Online
(www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 7.0, 11 March 2014),
September 1784, trial of ROBERT ABEL WILLIAM RELLIONS
(t17840915-18).
Convict Stockade
http://www.historyaustralia.org.au/twconvic/0002
London Lives
http://www.londonlives.org/browse.jsp?div=t17840915-18&terms=Rellions#highlight
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