By Henry Taylor (Chester), F.S.A.
That safe guide Stephen’s _Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of
England_, the English law student’s _vade mecum_, in treating of “The
Kingdom of England itself,” says:--
“Three of the English counties, viz. Chester, Durham, and Lancaster,
are called Counties _Palatine_. The two former are such by
prescription or immemorial custom, which dates back at least to the
Norman Conquest. Lancaster was created a County Palatine by Edward the
Third in favour of Henry Plantagenet, Duke of Lancaster, whose heiress
being married to John of Gaunt, the King’s son, the franchise was
greatly enlarged and confirmed in Parliament to honour John of Gaunt
himself.
“Counties Palatine are so called _a palatio_ because the owners
thereof, the Earl of Chester, the Bishop of Durham, and the Duke of
Lancaster, had formerly in those counties _jura regalia_ as fully as
the King in his palace. That is to say, they might pardon treasons,
murders, and felonies; they appointed judges and justices of the
peace; all writs and indictments ran in their names, as in other
counties in the King’s; and all offences were said to be done against
their peace, and not as in other places _contra pacem domini regis_.
These palatine privileges, so similar to the regal independent
jurisdictions usurped by the great barons on the Continent, during
the weak and infant state of the first feudal kingdoms in Europe,
were in all probability originally granted to the counties of Chester
and Durham because these counties bordered upon inimical countries,
Wales and Scotland; in order that the owners, being encouraged by
so large an authority, might be the more watchful in its defence.
In the twenty-seventh year of Henry the Eighth, however, the powers
before mentioned of the owners of these three counties palatine
were abridged, the reason for their continuance having in a manner
ceased, and in modern times alterations have taken place in regard to
the administration of justice in the counties palatine, which have,
for the most part, assimilated them in that respect to the rest of
England. Thus by the Law Terms Act, 1830, the jurisdiction of the
Court of Session of the County Palatine of Chester was abolished,
and that county was subjected in all things to the jurisdiction of
the Superior Courts of Westminster. And by the Judicature Act, 1873,
the jurisdictions of the Court of Common Pleas of Lancaster and of
the Court of Pleas of Durham were respectively transferred to the
High Court of Justice, by that Act established. None of the counties
palatine any longer remain in the hands of subjects. For the Earldom
of Chester was united to the Crown by Henry the Third, and has ever
since been one of the titles of the monarch’s eldest son; the palatine
jurisdiction of Durham was taken from the Bishop of Durham by the
Durham (County Palatine) Act, 1836 (amended by the Durham Palatine
Act, 1858), and was vested as a separate franchise and royalty in the
Crown; and the County Palatine of Lancaster, with the duchy which had
been conferred on John of Gaunt, was at length, in the year 1485,
vested in King Henry the Seventh and his heirs, as a distinct and
separate inheritance from the Crown of England.”
Of these three Palatinates we must, however, here treat only of
Chester, the eldest of the trio. There were Earls of Chester in Saxon
times, but the establishment of the Palatine County of Chester dates
from the Norman Invasion. Before we proceed to describe its foundation
and history, let us see what Camden, in his quaint way, has to say
about Cheshire and its inhabitants. Quoting Lucian the Monk of Chester,
he remarks:--
“Whoever sets about to describe the manners of the inhabitants of this
County in general, or in particular, according to their situation, he
will find them in comparison with those of other parts of England in
some respects better, in others the same. Their manners seem to be in
the main of the best sort, according to the general idea of manners.
They are sociable in their entertainments, cheerful at meals, liberal
in their hospitality, hasty, but soon brought to temper, impatient
of dependance and bondage, kind to the distressed, compassionate
to the poor, fond of their relations, sparing of labour, free from
resentment, not given to excess in eating, undesigning, fond of
borrowing other people’s property, abounding with woods and pastures,
rich in meat and cattle. They border on one side the Britons, and by
long commerce of manners are become very like them. Nor must I forget
to observe that the County of Chester bounded by Lime (Macclesfield)
Forest from the rest of England enjoys distinguished immunities, and
by the indulgences of our Kings and the great merit of its Earls is
more accustomed to attend on the Sword of its own Prince than on the
Crown of the Sovereign in the assembly of the people, and without
restraint or reserve determine the most important causes within its
own territories. Hence Chester itself is much frequented by Irish, a
neighbour to the Welsh, and plentifully supplied with provisions by
the English; beautifully situated, its gates are of an ancient form
of building; approved by hard experience. It has merited the name of
City by its river and its watch-towers, defended by a watchful guard
of holy men and through the mercy of our Saviour it has always been
preserved by divine assistance.”
The late Professor Freeman has said: “Chester was the last English city
to bow to the Norman invader. After the fall of Chester no integral
part of the English kingdom remained unsubdued. William was full King
over all England.”
Recognising, as the Romans before him had done, that Chester was the
key to Wales, and also that it could be made the headquarters for an
invasion of Ireland, the Norman Conqueror placed a great military
camp there, and in A.D. 1070 granted to his kinsman and follower
Hugh, surnamed Lupus of Avranches (which is situate on the borders of
Normandy and Brittany close by Mont St. Michael), the whole of the
present county of Chester, and as much of the neighbouring parts of
Wales as he could secure, to hold as an independent state inferior to
the Crown of England, “ita libere ad gladium, sicut ipse Rex totam
tenebat Angliam ad coronam,” “as the very words of the Charter do run,”
saith Camden. Which words, says Leycester the Chester antiquary, “some
expound to be the tenure of being Sword-bearer of England, whence we
read in Matthew Paris that when Henry III. married Eleanor of Provence,
A.D. 1236, the marriage was pompously solemnised, and all the great men
of the kingdom used those offices and places which had of ancient right
belonged to their ancestors at the coronation of the Kings. The Earl
of Chester (John Scot) then carried the Sword of St. Edward (which is
called Curtein) before the King in token that he was an Earl Palatine
and had power by right to restrain the King if he should do amiss, his
Constable of Cheshire attending on him.
“But although this office might have of ancient right belonged to the
Earls of Chester ever since the time of Hugh Lupus, yet I believe
there is something more magnificent couched in these words of the
first Charter or donation--namely, a dignity inherent in the Sword,
as purchased by it, and to be kept by it also; for as in the Crown of
England there is an inherent right of regality annexed, so here is
given an inherent right of dignity in the Sword. This is to hold as
freely by the Sword as the King holds by the Crown, only inferior to
the King. Hence was it that whatsoever we say concerning the pleas of
the Crown or to be done against the King’s Crown and Dignity, the same
is also said (but in a more limited sense) concerning the pleas of
the Sword of Chester, or against the Sword and Dignity of the Earl of
Chester, as is most evident out of the records and indictments of those
times.”