The Wapentake of Wirral - A History of the Royal Franchise of the Hundred and Hundred Court of Wirral in Cheshire; With an Appendix Containing a List of the Officers and Lords of the Hundred From the Fourteenth Century; A Series of Lea... #247460

Little more than fifty years ago, within the memory of some now alive, there existed in Wirral a court of so-called, justice owned by a private individual and upwards of a thousand years old. The power of summoning jurors, of fining offenders, of deciding the law, of ordering payment of debts, of levying distresses, has so long been associated by the present generation with courts administered by officials of the State, that it is difficult to imagine such powers in the hands of a private citizen. Yet for some years in the fifties the inhabitants of Birkenhead, Tranmere, Bebington, Neston, and other parts of Wirral went in daily fear of such a court.<br><br>The only attempt at an account of the Wapentake or Hundred Court of Wirral is contained in the last chapter of Mrs. Gamlin's book "Twixt Mersey and Dee" (Liverpool, 1897) and deals only with the last forty years of the Court's existence.