Old Bailey

Old Bailey, the court or sessions house in which the sittings of the Central Criminal Court are held monthly for the trial of offences within its jurisdiction. The judges of this court are the Lord Mayor, the Lord Chancellor, the judges, aldermen, recorder, and common serjeant of London. But of these the recorder, the serjeant, and the judge of the sheriff's court are in most cases the actually presiding judges. The judicial sittings here are of such antiquity that all record of their commencement has been lost. Crimes of all kinds, from treason to petty larceny, are tried, and the numbers in past times were enormous, but are now greatly reduced by the extended jurisdiction given to the quarter sessions, and the summary powers granted to magistrates. Here were tried in 1660, after the Restoration, the surviving judges of Charles I.; and Milton's Eikonoklastes and Defensio Prima were in the same year burned at the Old Bailey by the common hangman. The patriot Lord William Russell was tried here in 1683, Jack Sheppard in 1724, Jonathan Wild in 1725, the poet Savage in 1727, Dr Dodd in 1777, Bellingham, the assassin of the statesman Perceval, in 1812, the Cato Street conspirators in 1820. The Old Bailey dinners given by the sheriffs to the judges were long famous. However else varied, they always included beefsteaks and narrow puddings, and were served twice a day. The Old Bailey adjoins Newgate (q.v.) Prison, between Holborn Viaduct and Ludgate Hill. Prisoners awaiting trial at this court are transferred to Newgate for the sake of convenience whilst the sessions here are sitting.