AWARD OF THE FISHERY COMMISSION. 1905 



had committed a crime, was within the connty of Glamorgan, the indictment havinr 

 whether necessarily or not, charged the offense aa having been committal in thai 

 connty. 



The Bristol Channel, it is to be remembered, is an arm of the *>a dividing EngUad 

 from Wales. Into the upper end of this arm of the sea the rivr Sevnru How*. Thro 

 the arm of the sea lies between Somersetshire and Glamorganshire, and afterward be. 

 tween Devonshire and the counties of Glamorgan, Carmarthen, nd 1'nmbroke. It 

 widens as it descends, and between Port Eyuon Head, the lowt point of Glamorgan- 

 shire, and the opposite shore of Devon, it is wider then Conception Hay; between Mart- 

 land Point, in Devonshire, and Pembrokeshire it is much wider. The cane r*werve| waa 

 carefully prepared. It describes the spot where the (Time was committal a* being in 

 the Bristol Channel, between the Glamorganshire and Somersetshire COM!*, and about 

 ten miles or more from that of Somerset. It negatived the spot being in ih river 

 Severn, the mouth of which, it is stated, was proved to IMS at King's Koad, higher op 

 the channel, and that was to be taken as the finding of the jury. It also showed that 

 the spot iu question was outside Penarth Head, and could not, therefore, be treated a* 

 within the smaller bay formed by Penarth Head and Lavernock Point. And it net ont 

 what evidence was given to prove that the spot had been treated a.s part of th* county 

 of Glamorgan, and the question was stated to be whether the prisoner* wore properlj 

 convicted of an offense within the county of Glamorgan. 



The case was much considered, being twice argued, and Chief Justice Cockbnrn 

 delivered judgment, saying: "The only question with which it become* neceiwary for 

 us to deal is whether the part of the sea on which the vessel was at the time when tin- 

 offense was committed forms part of the body of the connty of Glamorgan, and we 

 are of opinion that it does. The sea in question is part of the Bristol Channel, both 

 shores of which form part of England and Wales, of the county of Somerset on ihe 

 one side and the county of Glamorgan on the other. We are of opinion that, looking 

 at the local situation of this sea, it must be taken to belong to the countim respect- 

 ively by the shores of which it is bounded; and the fact of the Holms, between which 

 and the shore of the county of Glamorgan the place in question is situated, having 

 always been treated as parr of the parish of Cardiff, and as part of the connty of Gla- 

 morgan, is a strong illustration of the principle on which we proceed, namely, that 

 the whole of this inland sea between the counties of Somerset and Glamorgan IB to be 

 considered as within the counties by the shores of which its several parts are renpert- 

 ively bounded. We are therefore of opinion that the place in question is within flu- 

 body of the coo'ity of Glamorgan." The case reserved in Cunningham's raw inci- 

 dentally states that it was about ninety miles from Penarth Roads (where the rrime 

 'was committed) to the mouth of the channel, which points to the headlands in Prm- 

 broke and Hartland Point, iu Devonshire, as being the fauces of that arm of tbr r. 

 It was not, however, necessary for the decision of Cunningham's case to determine 

 what was the entrance of the Bristol Channel, further than that it was below the place 

 where the crime was committed; and though the language used in the judgment U 

 such as to show that the impression of the court was that at least the whole of thai 

 part of the channel between the counties of Somerset and Glamorgan wan within 

 those counties, perhaps that was not determined. But this much was determined, that 

 a place in the sea, out of any river, and where the sea was more than ten miles wide, 

 was within the county of Glamorgan, and consequently, in every sense of the word*, 

 within the territory of Great Britain. It also shows that usnge and the manner in 

 which that portion of the sea bad been tieated as being part of the county wan ma 

 rial, and this was clearly Lord Kale's opinion, as he says, not that a bay is part of t (, 

 county, but only that it may be. 



Passing from the common law of England to the general law of nation*, M n 

 by the text-writers on international jurisprudence, we find an universal agtr^niei 

 that harbors, estuaries, and bays landlocked belong to the territory of the r 

 which possesses the shores round them, but no agreement as to what i the rule t. 

 termine what is " bay " for this purpose. 



It seems generally agreed that where the configuration and dimension* 

 are snch as to show that the nation occupying the adjoining coat also ,* ,..); 

 bay it is part of the territory ; aud with this idea most of the writers on 

 to defensibility from the shore as the test of occupation ; some Rnggeming. I 

 width of one 'cannon shot from shore to shore, or three mile; some a car 

 from each shore, or six miles; some an arbitrary distance of ten mill 

 are rules which, if adopted, would exclude Conception Bay from the t 

 foundland, but also would have excluded from the territory of Great I 

 of the Bristol Channel which in Regina r. Cunningham was dec 

 county of Glamorgan. On the other hand, the diplomatists of the t 

 1793 claimed a territorial jurisdiction over much more extensive bays, ai 

 Kent in bis Commentaries, though by no means giving the weight 

 this claim, gives some reasons for not considering it altogether i 



It does not appear to their lordships that jurist* and text-t 



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