punishment of treason at common law was barbarous in the extreme. The sentence in the case of a man was that the offender be drawn on a hurdle to the place of execution. that there he be hanged by the neck but not till he be dead, and that while yet alive he be disembowelled and that then his body be divided into four quarters, the head and quarters to be at the disposal of the Crown. Until 1790 at common law a woman was drawn to the place of execution and there burned. In that year hanging was substituted for burning in the case of female traitors. In 1814 the part of the sentence relating to hanging and to dis embowelling was altered to hanging until death supervened. Drawing and beheading and quartering after hanging were abol ished in 1870. The Act of 1814 in the case of men enables the Crown by warrant under the sign manual, countersigned by a secretary of State, to change the sentence to beheading. Attainder and forfeiture for treason are abolished by the Forfeitures Act 1870, except where the offender has been outlawed.
Trials for treason in Great Britain and Ireland were at one time frequent and occupy a large part of the numerous volumes of the State Trials. Some of the more interesting may be men tioned. Before the Statute of Treasons were those of Gaveston and the Despensers in the reign of Edward II. on charges of accroaching the royal power. After the statute were those (some before the peers by trial or impeachment, most before the ordi nary criminal courts) of Empson and Dudley, Fisher, More, the earl of Surrey, the duke of Somerset, Anne Boleyn, Lady Jane Grey, Sir Thomas Wyatt, Cranmer, Mary Queen of Scots, Sir Walter Raleigh, Strafford, Laud, Sir Henry Vane and other regicides, William Lord Russell, Algernon Sydney, the duke of Monmouth, and those implicated in the Pilgrimage of Grace, the Gunpowder, Popish, Rye House and other plots. Occasionally the result of a trial was confirmed by statute. In some of these trials, as is well known, the law was considerably strained in order to ensure a conviction. Since the Revolution there have been the cases of those who took part in the risings of 1715 and 1745, Lord George Gordon in 1780, Thomas Hardy and Horne Tooke in the Cato Street conspirators in 1820, Thomas Frost in 1840, Smith O'Brien in 1848.
the Naturalization Act 1870 does not permit naturalization in a foreign State at war with Great Britain, and therefore a British subject who renounces his allegiance and attempts to procure himself to be naturalized in an enemy's country in time of war is guilty of high treason. It was ruled that a person cannot be come naturalized in a State with which his country is at war, for the act of becoming naturalized under such circumstances is itself an act of treason. The accused was sentenced to death, but the sentence was afterwards commuted and he subsequently received a pardon. The most important case dealing with high treason in recent years was that of Rex v. Casement, the trial at bar being reported 25 Cox C.C. 48o, and the decision of the court of criminal appeal in the same volume on p. 503. Sir Roger Casement was charged with high treason during the World War, and it was there held by the court of criminal appeal, affirm ing the decision of the king's bench division at the trial at bar, that if a man is adherent to the king's enemies in his realm by giving to them aid and comfort in the realm, or if he is ad herent to the king's enemies elsewhere, that is, by giving them aid and comfort elsewhere, he is in either case adherent to the king's enemies, and commits the offence declared to be high treason by the Treason Act 1351. It was also held by the king's bench division that if a man—a British subject—does any act which strengthens or tends to strengthen the enemies of the king in the conduct of a war against the king, or if he does any act which weakens or tends to weaken the power of the king and of the country to resist or attack the enemies of the king and the country, he commits the offence of giving aid and comfort to the king's enemies, and is guilty of high treason. Sir Roger Casement was convicted, sentenced to death, and executed.
No amount of residence abroad exempts a British subject from the penalty of treason if he bears arms against the king, unless he has become naturalized as the subject of a foreign State before the outbreak of the war in which he bears arms. To become natural ized as the subject of an enemy during a war is (as decided in Rex v. Lynch) in itself an act of treason. It is well established that an alien resident within British territory owes local allegiance to the Crown and may be indicted for high treason, and there are numerous instances of prosecution of foreigners for treason, the most recent being de Jager v. Attorney-General of Natal (1907, A.C. 326).