Catalogue description Records of the High Court of Appeals for Prizes

When the medieval Admiral's Court became the English Prize Court its decisions were not necessarily final and a suitor had a right of appeal from the admiral to the King and his Council. This was gradually delegated to a special body of learned and eminent persons acting as a Court of Appeal. Out of the establishment of a High Court of Delegates under the Submission of the Clergy Act 1533 and the reference to that body of appeals in ecclesiastical and maritime causes there was constituted a separate tribunal to deal with appeals in prize causes known as the Commission of Appeals in Prizes or the High Court of Appeals for Prizes. Their work extended not only to a review of the prize decisions of the High Court of Admiralty but also to Vice-Admiralty courts in the colonies.

Under the Judicial Committee Act 1833 this appellate jurisdiction in prize passed to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, where it remains.