MEMORIES OF FAMOUS TRIALS

Manawatu Times, Volume XLIX, Issue 3462, 25 September 1926, Page 10

MEMORIES OF FAMOUS TRIALS

£IOI,OOO COSTS. A man who once handled a cheque for £104,000, the bill of costs in the famous Tichborne trial, is rearing irom tlio Raw Courts after a service of nearly 01 years. Mr. W. E. Stewart, who is now 77, joined tire service of the courts at the age of 1(1. He remembers the days long before the present Raw Courts were built .when the site on which they now stand was a network of courts and alleys, law stationers’ ofliees, dirty old public houses and coffee shops. "After the Tichborne trial,” said Mr Stewart to a newspaper representative, "one of the solicitors engaged in Ihe ciuVj came to our room, and flourishing a cheque for £104,000 —the (nil of costs in the trial —invited us to hold and examine the historic document. This we did in turn with great solemnity, and we experienced a thrill as we fingered it.” There have been few famous judges, counsel, and litigants in the past half century with whom MY. Stewart in his offffcial capacity has not come in contact.

V hile the original Old Bailey was being transformed into the present building many sensational trials were held in the Raw Courts, including those of Whitaker Wright and Jabea Balfour.

“They had to bring Jabez Balfour into the courts through a different, door each day to save him from being lynched,” said Mr. Stewart. “There was usually a crowd of angry people who had been ruined by him waiting outside for a chance to get at him.” “Before the present Law Courts vere opened by Queen Victoria in ISBI the separate courts were situated in various parts of London. The King's Bench Division cases were heard in an old building at Westminster; the Divorce and Admiralty Division somewhere near Charing Cross, and the Master of the Rolls’ Court was in Stone Buildings in Chancery Lane.

In those days Chancery Lane was just a quagmire, and a favourite trick of the old hansom cabmen was to drive close into the gutter of the narrow pavement and splash pedestrians from head to foot with thick black nmd and then driVe away laughing.” Mr. • Stewart can recall the days Mnen it was possible, to have a substantial midday meal for 6fd. ' He has also a fund of stories about London in the old days when it was unsafe to walk the streets after dark.