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from the King, under which the trial was to be held in such county as the commission should direct, and,
according to the common course of the laws of the realm, used for such offences when done upon the land within the realm',
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"it is, I think, beyond dispute, that all that was effected by this statute or by those that have succeeded it, as "regards jurisdiction, was transfer of the criminal jurisdiction of the admiral, such as it was, to Courts proceeding according to the ordinary procedure of the 10 common law --not an extension of it. The statute created no new offence, effected Do extension of jurisdiction. It simply transferred the jurisdiction of the admiral, talem qualem, to the Common Law Courts, to be exercised according to the procedure of the common law. As to this the received authorities are, as I shall have occasion more fully to show hereafter, entirely agreed. The Central Criminal Court Act, 4 & 5 Wm. 4, c. 36, which gives power to try,
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offences committed on the high seas and other places "' within the jurisdiction of the Admiralty of England', 20 has, obviously, carried the matter no further. If the admiral had not jurisdiction as to the offences committed on foreign ships, the commissioners, to whom the jurisdiction was trans- ferred by the statute, must be equally without it."
9. It is submitted that the statutes 11 & 12 Will. 3 c. 7 Offences at Sea Act 1806 (46 Geo. 3 c. 54) Admiralty Offences (Colonial) Act 1849 (12 & 13 Vict. c. 96) which provide for the trial of piracy in the Dominions and Colonies have also created no new offence nor effected any extension of the jurisdiction of the Admiral,
10. The earliest recorded case in the English Courts in which 30 the crime of piracy jure gentium was defined appears to be that of R. v. Dawson (1696) 13 State Trials p. 451 where Sir Charles Hedges (p. 454) charged the Grand Jury in the following terms :-
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Now piracy is only a sea term for robbery, piracy being a "robbery committed within the jurisdiction of the admiralty. If any man be assaulted within that jurisdiction, and his ship
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or goods violently taken away without legal authority, this is robbery and piracy. If the mariners of any ship shall violently dispossess the master, and afterwards carry away the ship itself, or any of the goods, or tackle, apparel or furniture, with a 40
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felonious intention, in any place where the Lord Admiral hath, or pretends to have jurisdiction, this is also robbery and piracy."
This definition was accepted as correct by the Privy Council in A-G for Hong Kong v. Kwok-a-Sing (1873) L.R. 5 Privy Council, 179, where Lord Justice Mellish delivering the Judgment of the Board quotes the above passage from Sir Charles Hedges and states :—
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Their Lordships see no reason to doubt that the charge of Sir Charles Hedges to the Grand Jury as reported in the case of "The King v. Dawson, which was made in the presence, and with
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the approval of Chief Justice Holt and several other common law Judges, contains a correct exposition of the law as to what "constitutes piracy jure gentium.”
11. In Regina v. McGregor, 1 Car. & K. 429, a case in which the proceedings were brought under the Suppression of Piracy Act, 1698, against British Seamen, Lord Abinger at p. 431, in summing up to the Jury states:-
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The prisoners are charged with an act of piracy, either by exciting a revolt, or endeavouring to do so.. This particular offence was not piracy at common law. Piracy at common law "involved a charge of robbery, but this Act of Parliament
makes it piracy to create a revolt ".
12. In support of the view that piracy at common law involved a charge of robbery, it is interesting to see the forms of indictment set out in the trial of Captain Kidd, 14 State Trials p. 123, and the trial of Bonnett & others, 15 State Trials p. 2341.
13. In the case of Republic of Bolivia v. Indemnity Mutual Marine Insurance 1909 1 K.B. 785 Pickford J., expressly approved and quoted the definition of piracy jure gentium given in Hall's 30 International Law to the effect that:-
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Primarily the pirate is a man who satisfies his personal greed
or his personal vengeance by robbery or murder in places beyond the jurisdiction of a state ".
This statement was approved by the Court of Appeal in the same case (see per Vaughan-Williams, L.J., at p. 796). Kennedy, L.J., whilst approving the above definition also approved the definition given in Section 94 of Carver's Carriage of Goods by Sea, which runs as follows:--
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Piracy is forcible robbery at sea, whether committed by marauders from outside the ship or by mariners or passengers
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RECORD.
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