A Deodnad in the Hundred of Ongar . . . ?

To be sidetracked in the Essex Record Office is so easy. Attention can wander. Mine wandered . . . wandered to an unrelated article, A Deodand in the Hundred of Ongar. What is a deodand . . . and in the Hundred of Ongar? And so one thing led to another . . .

The principle of the deodand concerned chattels. In medieval law, it is necessary to distinguish between ‘movables’ or personal property and ‘immovables’ or ‘real property’. Common law, which relates to personal property, is separate from the law relating to real property. The term that has arisen to represent personal property is ‘chattels’. Chattel comes from the French chattel (plural chateux). Our word, cattle, in use only from the 17C, comes from the same word. The legal chattel included all movable property. ‘Goods’ became the term applied to tangible chattels. However, not all chattels are tangible; there are also chattels real, such as certain rights granted for a term of years.

The principle required the forfeiture to the King of any object, which was involved in a person’s death. The deodand was called the bane, or slayer. The King was then required to ensure that an almoner devote the object¹ to ‘pious uses’. Chattels could be seized in such circumstances. In theory, the deodand was intended to be appropriated to charitable purposes for the benefit of the deceased’s family. In the 13C, the object would be delivered to the men of the town where the death occurred, whereupon they had to answer for it to royal officers. The deodand served several purposes; the owner would have purchased his peace; the dead person’s kin could wreak their vengeance on the deodand, thereby encouraging his soul to lie in peace; a deodand might also provide a primitive form of insurance for the dead person.

There are many references to deodands within coroner’s courts². On 6 July, 1578, Mr Vernon, coroner, viewed the body of Toby Bate of Wivenhoe, a sailor. Toby had been out with others to take the mast out of a boat. In pulling, the mast fell on the head of Toby and ‘put his eyes out’. He died instantly. The mast was worth 13s 4d as a deodand, which “remained in the hands of Rich. Cooke of Wivenhoe sailor, to the Queen’s use”.

At Hatfield Broad Oak on 28 April, 1607, George Bushe, yeoman, committed suicide. The jurors said Bushe, with “a hempen halter worth 1d, which he “did tie about a brac”, parcel of his barn, and the other hand about his neck. The halter then “did ruckdowne” and hanged him. His goods and chattels were worth £334 6s 2d which Lord Riche claimed as deodand.

On 21st October, 1586, the coroner presided over the body of William Godwaerd, a Brightlingsea butcher. A gun lay in the house of Austen Jones, a yeoman. The gun was loaded with “hayleshot”. Austen’s finger touched the ‘vice’ and William Godwaerd, while eating, was struck a mortal wound in the headband. The gun, value 13s 4d, became the deodand.

At Blackmore, on 12 August, 1577, Agnes Tynge, aged 10, sadly, was playing on the green before her father’s house. Agnes tied a halter (cafrist?) to the spokes of the wheel of a cart laden with coal (charcole). The halter dislodged the spokes from the wheel and the cart and its contents fell upon the back of Agnes, killing her instantly. The cart and contents were deemed to be worth 30s and were forfeit to the Queen as deodand.

The responsibility of the deodand was not always accepted. In Witham, following a coroner’s inquest into a suicide a deodand of fifteen shillings was levied against the inhabitants of Witham³. The original records give details of the escalating costs demanded of the inhabitants of Witham as a result of their failure to answer. The full details of the escalating cost are preserved. The proceedings continued for six years, between 1666 and 1672.

By the 19C, records show that the deodand resulting from a road accident would now be just the wheel of the wagon, rather than the wheel, cart and contents. The purpose and charitable uses of the deodand appear to have been lost. The deodand simply passed to the local owner of the rights to the deodand.

So what happened in the Hundred of Ongar? In 1734, John Wright of Waltham Abbey was riding home, when his horse threw him to his death. Following an inquest, the horse was declared a deodand. A Mr Harvey seized it. Mr Smart, the then Lord of the Manor of Theydon Bois challenged the possession of Mr Harvey. Counsel’s opinion was taken and a search to establish the legality of the two claims was initiated. The claim of Mr Harvey originated in the letters patent of Henry VIII, while the claim of Mr Smart went back to the grant of the lordship of the manor by Edward IV. The decision came down in favour of Mr Harvey’s claim though the claim was stated to be obscure. During the course of the dispute, the article¹ concludes “no doubt feeling ran high, and the harmony of country-side life was disturbed”.

The English law of deodands was repealed in 1846. Why? The new possibility that one could be fatally injured in a railway accident had raised the stakes considerably!