The trial of William Lord Russell, 1683. Mezzotint after G. Hayter.

Lord Russell stands in the dock on the right. In front of him, his wife Rachel Russell looks up at him as she takes notes

"On 26 June 1683 Russell was arrested and sent to the Tower charged with conspiring with others in a scheme, known as the Rye House plot, to raise rebellion by seizing the king's guards and thereby, in law, to kill the king . He was not charged with plotting to murder the king physically. William remained in the Tower for two weeks, seeing family and many friends, and consulting lawyers about his defence. On Friday 13 July William was tried in the court of king's bench at the Old Bailey. Presiding was the lord chief justice of the court of common pleas, Francis Pemberton, who was sympathetic to Russell, even-handed in addressing the jury, and insistent that the law be strictly observed. Sir George Jeffreys and others assisted by Sir Francis North, managed the prosecution. Russell, as planned, tried to delay the proceedings, brought forward Lady Russell to take notes for him, using her as a symbol of his good character and of her father's services to Charles II and his father, and questioned the jurors' status as freeholders, a point inapplicable in treason cases. Russell's formal defence was weak: he appealed to the sympathy of the court, claimed that his acts, if proven, did not fall within the law of treason (they did), maintained that two witnesses to the same act of treason were required (not true at the time), tried to discredit the testimony of plea bargainers, and brought in witnesses to testify to his good character but not to answer his accusers. The jury deliberated for over an hour and brought in a verdict of guilty of high treason. The next day Russell was sentenced to die. ... a magnificent commissioned painting of the trial by Sir George Hayter sustained the interpretation [of Russell as a martyr]"--Oxford dictionary of national biography

[London?] : [publisher not identified], [between 1820 and 1829?]

1 print : mezzotint, with etching and aquatint (?) ; image 34.9 x 53.3 cm

Wellcome Collection 2969771i