Genealogy and Family History in Scotland
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Crown Office Cases (AD8)

This is an index to Crown Office cases. It is based on the National Records of Scotland AD8 series. The basic records include the following columns:
  • Name of accused
  • Date when first committed to prison
  • Place where Accused committed, and by what Magistrate
  • Crime
  • Date of forwarding precognition to Crown Agent
  • Crown Counsel to whom transmitted
  • Indicted or how disposed of
  • Date of trial
  • Plea
  • Verdict
  • Sentence
This digital index includes Name, Place where committed, Crime and Date of forwarding precognition. When you order a record, we will provide a digital image of the full record including all the information listed above (where applicable).
Name of accused
This includes maiden surnames for married or widowed women, and often includes aliases. It can also include tee-names, mostly for people from fishing villages in the north of Scotland.
Date when first committed to prison
This is useful for linking the accused to entries in prison registers, which the NRS is gradually publishing on the Scotland's People website.
Place where Accused committed, and by what Magistrate
This is not necessarily the residence of the Accused, but is instead usually the head town of a Sheriffdom or the county town.
Crime
This is often self-explanatory, but not always. Some entries merely cite the statute in the form of e.g. 17 & 18 Vict. c 80 s 60. In most cases, we have expanded such entries to clarify which law is being applied. In this instance, 17 & 18 Vict. c 80 s 60 is Section 60 of the Registration Act 1854 - in other words, the person was accused of providing false information to a registrar. You can view a comprehensive list of 19th century statutes with links to the full texts here.
Date of forwarding precognition to Crown Agent
A precognition is a written statement from a witness or accused setting out the alleged facts of the case.
Crown Counsel to whom transmitted
This is not usually relevant to genealogical searches.
Indicted or how disposed of
  • "Indicted" means that the accused was sent to the High Court or Circuit Court for trial.
  • "Section 31" means that the accused pleaded guilty and was sentenced using an abbreviated procedure. This means that there was no trial, and any additional records will likely be limited in terms of information.
  • "No proceedings" means that no charges were brought against the Accused, so there will not be any trial records.
  • "Sh & Jury" means there was a solemn trial in the relevant Sheriff Court before a sheriff and jury. Not all Sheriff Court criminal records survive, but they can be of great interest and may include precognitions, minutes, witness statements and other productions.
Date of trial
This is very useful for identifying the relevant archival source for any further records, as well as locating the case in bound volumes of minutes or precognitions.
Plea
A guilty plea often means that the court records are limited in terms of information, although they may include precognitions and indictments, which set out the alleged facts of the case.
Verdict
Scotland of course has three verdicts: Guilty, Not Guilty and Not Proven, although the last two are essentially functionally identical.
Sentence
Usually self-explanatory, although you may see the Scots word assoilzied, meaning freed or absolved of guilt.

The index currently includes NRS references AD8/1-15 and contains 33,108 entries, covering the years 1890-1899. We will be adding later years shortly. The series is closed for 100 years, so our index will eventually run up to 1922, with subsequent years added annually after the new year. It complements our existing Crown Counsel Procedure Books indexes, which run from 1822 to 1879. The AD8 series is a little more detailed than AD9.

What next?
Armed with the AD8 entry, it should be possible to locate the archival records relating to the trial or indictment, if they survive. The Sheriff Court criminal records are mostly unindexed (but we're working on an index to them, watch this space), but when you order an AD8 record, we will offer the option of a search for any surviving detailed records of the case.

Updates: 11,726 records covering AD8/11-15, 1900-1904 inclusive, added 7 September 2023.
Indexes 1890-1899

Abbot - Burns
Burns - Curren
Currie - Forrest
Forrest - Herd
Herd - Londragan
Loney - McEwan
McEwan - McRonald
McRonald - Paxton
Peacock - Sloan
Sloan - Tweedlie
Tweedlie - Zugg
1900-1904

Aberdeen - Coyle
Coyle - Hamilton
Hamilton - McCallum
McCallum - Mulholland
Mullan - Smith
Smith - Zeusiez

1905 onwards
​Coming soon


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  • Home
  • Records
    • Board of Supervision
    • Fathers Found
    • Asylum Patients
    • Sheriff Court Paternity Decrees
    • Sheriff Court Extract Decrees
    • School Leaving Certificates
    • Crown Office Cases AD8 >
      • AD8 index 1890 01
      • AD8 index 1890 02
      • AD8 index 1890 03
      • AD8 index 1890 04
      • AD8 index 1890 05
      • AD8 index 1890 06
      • AD8 index 1890 07
      • AD8 index 1890 08
      • AD8 index 1890 09
      • AD8 index 1890 10
      • AD8 index 1890 11
      • AD8 index 1900 1
      • AD8 index 1900 2
      • AD8 index 1900 3
      • AD8 index 1900 4
      • AD8 index 1900 5
      • AD8 index 1900 6
    • Crown Counsel Procedure Books
    • Registers of Deeds
    • General Register of the Poor
    • Registers of Sudden Deaths
    • Anatomy Registers
  • Resources
    • Scottish Genealogy Sources
    • KINCLAVEN One Place Study >
      • Kinclaven 1911 census
      • Kinclaven Parish Church Books
      • Kinclaven Communion Roll 1880-1894
    • Archives in Scotland map
    • Scottish surnames >
      • Surnames-A
      • Surnames-B
      • Surnames-C
      • Surnames-D
      • Surnames-E
      • Surnames-F
      • Surnames-G
      • Surnames-H
      • Surnames-I
      • Surnames-J
      • Surnames-K
      • Surnames-L
      • Surnames-M
      • Surnames-N
      • Surnames-O
      • Surnames-P
      • Surnames-Q
      • Surnames-R
      • Surnames-S
      • Surnames-T
      • Surnames-U
      • Surnames-V
      • Surnames-W
      • Surnames-Y
      • Surnames-Z
    • Statutes
    • Auchterarder in WWI
  • Blog
  • Contact
    • Managed Service Customer Login
    • Tourism Partners Login
  • Shop