86 



THE PREDECESSORS OF THE 



sentenced to be hanged, under the Statutes relating to 

 that crime which were in force in England in 1726 ; 42 and 

 this precedent was followed on the celebrated trial of Nunco- 

 mar before the Supreme Court of Calcutta in 1776, which 

 was afterwards made a matter of impeachment against both 

 the Grovernor-Greneral, Mr. Warren Hastings, and the Chief 

 Justice, Sir Elijah Impey. 



Eichard Higginson, Esquire, the first and modern Mayor 

 of Madras appointed by the new Charter, and Messrs. Dun- 

 combe Monroe, Robert Woolley, and Thomas Way, three of 

 the first and modern Aldermen thereby appointed, having 

 died before the Charter reached Madras, the President and 

 Council on Monday the 14th August 1727 nominated Mr. 

 John Powney, one of the Aldermen named in the Charter 

 to be the modern Mayor, and Messrs. Thomas Weston 

 William Monsen, John Buekelay and Edward Braistone to be 

 Aldermen, and ordered that Thursday next be appointed for 

 swearing the Mayor and Aldermen and putting the Charter 

 in execution so far as it related to the Mayor's Court. 



On Thursday the 17th, being the day appointed, and the 

 Town having received notice accordingly, the new Mayor and 

 Aldermen were sworn in with much ceremony, after having 

 come from the Fort in a grand procession of soldiers with 

 kettle-drums and trumpets, dancing girls with the country 

 music, the Court Attornies on horseback, the Eegistrar, the 

 Sheriff, and others, followed by the chief gentry of the Town 

 on horseback, through Black Town and Pedda Naick's 

 Petta, to the Company's Grarden, where the President and 

 Council were met to receive them. The Governor and the 

 five Senior Councillors, who were to constitute the Court of 

 Oyer and Terminer and Graol Delivery, were sworn in a few 

 days afterwards. 43 



42 Memoirs of Sir Elijah Impey, Appendix No. 1. 



43 Wheeler's Madras, vol. iii, p. 2'6 ; and see page 27 for a list of fees made 

 and approved of by the Mayor's Court on the 29th August 1727. 



