The contract between master and manservant: a legal dispute

Report and verdict of a legal case involving a discharged servant and his master’s dislike of tobacco, 1807
This legal case involves a dispute over an unpaid year’s salary when the servant, William Robson, was discharged by his employer Mr ET Nicholls Esq. after six-months’ work. Robson was proved to have been “habitually drunk, riotous and disobedient”, and had been caught smoking tobacco on the premises for a second time after he had promised not to do so again. He swore at Mr Nicholls and was discharged on the spot.

The judge considers the relationship of Master and Servant as being the greatest next after that of Parent and Child, and that the contract requires decency, sobriety and honesty in return for payment, food, board and clothing. Robson’s behaviour was in breach of this contract, and he lost his case.

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