Defendants' depositions

[suttontrust]

Trawling A2A for my William Fox, I've come across legal papers, "Papers in William Roberts, gent v. William Hood in Chancery", a file titled "Defendants' depositions taken at the house of Isaac Twopenny called the Chequer in Ticehurst", dated 1743.  Much of it is a list of names, each followed by a figure which seems to be their ages, though a few have a little more explanation like "bought spray from JR" or "lent money to JR who renounced drams in his presence."  (All the descriptions relate to JR, but I've no idea who he was.)  Can someone help me make sense of this.  Presumably a court case was going on but why are all these people listed as defendants?  Who was JR?  Interpretations welcome.

[Lemontree]

Hi

As I read it, it is the list of the Defendants depositions - the defendants witnesses. Depostitions are the witnesses statements, so this is a list of all the statements for the defendant that were taken/writen down at Isaac Twopenny's house.

Lemon

[suttontrust]

Thanks, Lemon, makes sense.  One of those puzzles which sidetrack us so often.

[Lemontree]

Hi

Often the sidetracking problems make us aware of what is contained in the archives.

Deposition records make really rather interesting reading. I have come across deposition records as a side track of my own, when I was supposed to be doing other work!. Found a case of stolen chickens and the witnesses statement were rather engrossing to read, it was also interesting reading the language that ordinery people used (1881 the case was heard)

I think they are usually held in with the quarter session records, so if you have any criminals to investigate have a search through the quarter sessions.

Lemon