8
To this statement the attention of the Lord Mayor, as chief of the Forest
Conservators, has been formally called by the Defence Association, in the
following letter from the Secretary :—
" I am requested by my Association to call your Lordship's attention to
the statement made by Sir H. Selwin-Ibbetson at an interview with the
Commoners' Defence Association, at which the Rev. J. Whitaker Maitland,
Rector and Lord of Loughton Manor, Mr. Barclay Heward, C.C, Colonel
Lockwood, and others were present. The statement made by Sir Henry
Ibbetson was as follows:—
"' It was his good fortune to draw the Bill which gave Epping
Forest to the people. Although he was not a lawyer, he could tell
them what his feeling was in drawing that Act and in passing it.
He had before him Sir George Jessel's decision in the court of law
as to the right of the Commoners. He had before him the Com-
mission which had then sat for two years to consider how the
question ought to be met, but without coming to any real decision.
Upon the decision of the law as it then stood he drew the Bill, and he
knew it was the intention of the 5th clause that every owner and occupier
should have the right of common from the very fact of his occupation. It
might be said that the Corporation of London, which had paid large
sums, was entitled to make bye-laws for the regulation of the Forest.
Yes, but those bye-laws were laid down in the Act; they referred
to specific objects, and nobody could by a bye-law abrogate a clause
of the Act. Therefore, although no lawyer, he hoped, as the man
who drew the Act, that its intention would be carried out.'
"This statement fully justifies the agitation of the poor Commoners, who
from the first have protested against the interpretation of the Act by the
Conservators, as depriving them of their legal rights.
"It is obvious from Sir Henry Ibbetson's frank admission, that ' the
owners and occupiers of lands and tenements lying within Epping Forest'
are entitled to be placed upon the register of Commoners in accordance
with section 5 of the Act, which preserves to the Commoners " All rights
of common of pasture, of mast or pannage for swine, as they exist at the
passing of this Act, &c.'
"I am requested by my Association once more to protest most strongly
against the action the Corporation has taken with respect to the poor Com-
moners, and to respectfully ask your Lordship to use your best influence
with your fellow Conservators to see that justice is done."
How then after Lord Rookwood's admission does the law actually stand ?
The question is answered in the following pages.