Crime and Punishment in American History - Lawrence M. Friedman [25]
It is hard to say how well this system worked. Hoffer and Scott pronounce it a success; they found very few instances in Richmond, in the eighteenth century, in which bond was forfeited.40 Everyone concerned lived in a tiny world, narrowly bounded and self-enclosed. More than 10 percent of the free men of property in Richmond County, Virginia, during the period 1710-54 or so were named as sureties on recognizances. “The whole community thus had a stake in keeping order,” and thus “in supporting the authority of the courts.” Recognizances created “a warn and watch system” in the county.41 The people who posted bond were unlikely to lose their money, because there were enough watching eyes and listening ears to keep a miscreant in line. In 1696, for example, James Stoddart and Josias Towgood, sureties for Thomas Duley, in Prince Georges County, Maryland, reported a disturbing rumor. Duley, it was said, threatened to “Run away and Leave his Said Suretyes in the Lurch.” The sureties “humbly” asked the court to let them out of their obligation; the court did so and turned Duley over to the Sheriff “untill he Should find other Suretyes” who would guarantee his behavior and his appearance in court.42
Confession and repentance were crucial aims of the criminal process. In Charles County, Maryland, in 1665, Mary Grub accused John Cage of fathering her child; the accusation turned out to be false. The court then forced her “in open Court to Aske him ... upon her bended knees forgivnes Acknowledging that she hath maliciously wronged him.”43 The system assumed that most offenders would indeed repent and recant; that fines, humiliation, perhaps a good whipping, would bring most black sheep back into line. A New Hampshire statute against adultery (1701) neatly illustrates the theory, and suggests the practice. A man and woman convicted of adultery were to be “Sett upon the Gallows” for an hour “with a Rope about their necks and the other [end] ... cast over the Gallows”; afterwards, they were to be “severely whipt.” Moreover, the offenders would “for ever after weare a Capitall Letter :A: of two inches long and proportionable in Bignesse, cutt out in Cloath of a contrary Colour to their Cloaths and Sewed upon their Upper Garments, on the out Side of their Arme or on their Back in open View.”44 (Readers will remember Hawthorne’s famous novel, The Scarlet Letter, in which Hester Prynne wore a scarlet letter A for her adultery.) f
Branding and letter-wearing were ways of marking an offender publicly—like sitting in the stocks, but far more permanently. The message was that this offender was not likely to mend his ways; disgrace would and should last until death. In 1773, in Fairfield County, Connecticut, one Alexander Graham, a “transient person” convicted of breaking into a shop and stealing goods, was ordered branded with a capital B on his forehead.46 Mutilation was another form of bodily punishment. Graham, the Connecticut burglar, also lost an ear. In Richmond, Virginia, in 1729, Tony, “a Negro Man slave,” was brought before the court to give evidence against two other slaves who were suspected of “hogg stealing.” The court was convinced that Tony had “told Lyes and