Catalogue description Palatinate of Chester: Chester County Court and Court of Great Sessions of Chester, and Flint Justice's Sessions: Files

This series comprises files of the Chester County Court and Court of Great Sessions of Chester, and Flint Justice's Sessions. There are four sub-series, arranged in separate sequences within it, as well as some related inquisitions and various loose writs and returns. The first sub-series is an undifferentiated series of sessional files covering both civil and criminal cases in the Chester county court, which runs, with many gaps, from 1342 to 1542.

From 1543 there are two separate sub series of sessional files of the court, which by then was becoming better known as the Court of Great Sessions of Chester: one, running until the date of the court's abolition in 1830 and covering criminal proceedings; and one for civil causes, which ceases in 1659. Finally there is a separate sub-series of undifferentiated civil and criminal sessions files for the justice of Chester's Flintshire sessions, from 1329 to 1542. The files include writs, indictments, jury panels, mainprises, etc.

Also included are some inquisitions resulting from judgments of the Chester Great Session, from the reign of Charles II onwards, and various writs and returns which illustrate the relationships between the Great Sessions and both its subordinate courts in Cheshire and the central courts of common law at Westminster, including posteas giving the verdicts of Cheshire juries to whom cases from Westminster were remitted.