To the GOVERNORS of the Hospital for the Maintenance and Education of Exposed and Deserted Young Children. The MEMORIAL of ELIZABETH SAYERS of Great Ormond Street, SHEWETH, THAT your Memorialist has rented a seat in one of the pews of the East gallery of the Chapel upwards of sixteen years. That in the month of Jan. 1803, your Memorialist was informed, that her seat in the said pew was taken from her and given to Dr. Willain, who had two other seats in the said pew, upon some suggestion stated by him, which suggestion was in itself trivial, and wholly untrue; and that your Memorialist was to have another seat provided for her in some other part of the Chapel. That your Memorialist at the next meeting of the Chapel-Committee stated her objection to being thus turned out of her seat, and was assured by the Chairman, and other members of the Committee, that nothing should be done that might be offensive or uncivil to her. That at a subsequent meeting of the Chapel Committee, it was proposed by some of Dr. Willain's friends, that a railing should be put up to separate your Memorialist in her sitting from the other part of the pew; that your Memorialist considering this railing or bar as carrying on the face of it an imputation that your Memorialist had so conducted herself that it was necessary to confine, or impound, her within a certain portion or seat in the pew, and as it was a separation or division unprecedented in any other * That the Memorialist had more than once introduced another person into the pew. a part C. Roworth, Printer, Bell Yard, Fleet Street. part of the Chapel, and was ordered by the friends of Dr. Willain, without their having given your Memorialist an opportunity of making her objections to it, your Memorialist addressed a letter to Mr. Livesley, your secretary, stating her ground of objection to the order, which letter was laid before a Committee, and at a subsequent Committee, at which your Memorialist's brother attended on her behalf, he was given to understand that the railing should not be put up if it was disagreeable to your Memorialist. That your Memorialist continued to rent her seat in the said pew, without any alteration, till the month of March last, when she found that a rail had been put up at the instance of Dr. Willain, upon some other suggestion, which was equally untrue as the former, and which your Memorialist's brother, who was implicated in the suggestion, solemnly declared to the Committee, and was ready to attest by his oath, was wholly unfounded. That your Memorialist refused to take the seat within the railing, conceiving that she had a right to refuse this impounding, at least during the term for which she rented a seat in the said pew, and stated her reason for the same in a letter addressed to Tho. Everett, Esq. the Chairman of the Committees, to which letter she begs leave to refer. That on the next Sunday, being Easter-day, Mrs. Willain came to the pew where your Memorialist was then sitting, and would have had her taken the seat within the rail, which your Memorialist declined. That at the Evening Service Doctor Willain came with Mrs. Willain to the pew, and upon your Memorialist's refusing to change her seat, he said, 'Then I'll make you,' and in the most. insulting and violent manner took her by the shoulder and endeavoured to force her out of her seat, and beyond the rail, and after threatening and insulting her a considerable time he left the pew with Mrs. Willain. That That at a Committee held the Wednesday next, after this, your Memorialist's brother stated these circumstances, which he offered to prove, if necessary, and again requested and claimed as a right that the rail should be removed, inasmuch as it might be productive of future insult to your Memorialist, or otherwise oblige her to leave the Chapel. That in consequence of a Committee, held the next week, at which Dr. Willain attended, your Memorialist was served with an order, to which she begs leave to refer (a copy whereof is annexed to this Memorial), and which she submits to your consideration was evidently framed to give a sanction or approbation to the conduct of Dr. Willain, and to gloss over the outrage he has committed, and under the pretence of offering an accommodation to your Memorialist, proposing a regulation, by which it is impossible that she can consider herself accommodated. That your Memorialist has been advised, that this Chapel not being within the jurisdiction of the Ecclesiastical Court, the offence committed therein by Dr. Willain is only punishable by indictment at the Common Law. That under these circumstances, which your Memorialist is ready to verify upon her own oath, and by the evidence of several witnesses, and for the truth of a great part whereof she begs leave to appeal to the Chairman of your Committees, Your Memorialist conceives---that inasmuch as this Chapel is not within the ecclesiastical jurisdiction, and the renters of seats, and others of the congregation, are not protected by the Statutor Canon Law, in the same manner as they are in parochial churches and chapels, there is a particular care and delicacy required of those to whom this, a sacred part of your trust is delegated, which, in this instance, they have evidently disregarded: and that under the last order the conduct of the majority of the Committee has been arbitrary and partial; arbitrary---for that it tends to remove from her seat, and in effect effect from the Chapel, your Memorialist, who has had a sitting there without interruption or offence for more than sixteen years; and partial---for that they have gone out of their way to give a sitting in a pew appropriated only to the Governors, and at the end of the year an exclusive right to another pew, to a person, who, in profanation of the Sabbath, in the face of the whole congregation, and during the time of divine service, has been guilty of a gross and lawless outrage. And your Memorialist therefore trusts, trusts, that you will direct the said order to be annulled, and that such order may be made herein as to you shall seem meet. This Memorial was laid before the Governors at their last general meeting, The Memorialist is informed, that by the constitution of the Charity, the Governors at large have not a power to interfere with the acts of the Committee, who made the order which she complains of, and that she can seek redress only by presenting a Memorial to a like Committee. It is unnecessary to add, that she is not inclined to make the experiment, she has had quite enough of Committees already. C. Roworth, Printer, Bell Yard, Fleet Street. |