Cumberland County

Cumberland County may refer to:

Australia

Canada

United Kingdom

United States

See also

Cumberland

Cumberland (/ˈkʌmbələnd/ KUM-bə-lənd; locally /ˈkʊmbələnd/ KUUM-bə-lənd) is a historic county of North West England that had an administrative function from the 12th century until 1974. It was bordered by Northumberland to the east, County Durham to the southeast, Westmorland and Lancashire to the south, and Dumfriesshire in Scotland to the north. It formed an administrative county from 1889 to 1974 (excluding Carlisle from 1914) and now forms part of Cumbria.

Early history

The first record of the term "Cumberland" appears in 945, when the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle recorded that the area was ceded to Malcolm I of Scotland by King Edmund of England. At the time of the Domesday Book in 1086 most of the future county remained part of Scotland although some villages in the ancient district of Millom, which were the possessions of the Earl of Northumbria, were included in the Yorkshire section with the Furness region.

In 1092 King William Rufus of England invaded the Carlisle district, settling it with colonists. He created an Earldom of Carlisle, and granted the territory to Ranulf Meschyn. In 1133 Carlisle was made the see of a new diocese, identical with the area of the earldom. However, on the death of King Henry I in 1135, the area was regained by Scotland's King David I. He was able to consolidate his power and made Carlisle one of his chief seats of government, while England descended into a lengthy civil war. In 1157 Henry II of England resumed possession of the area from Malcolm IV of Scotland, and formed two new counties from the former earldom: Westmorland and "Carliol". The silver-mining area of Alston, previously associated with the Liberty of Durham, was also added to the new county of Carliol for financial reasons. By 1177 the county of Carliol was known as Cumberland. The border between England and Scotland was made permanent by the Treaty of York in 1237.

County

A county, abbreviated Cnty. (US) or Co. (UK and Ireland), is a geographical region of a country used for administrative or other purposes, in certain modern nations. The term is derived from the Old French conté or cunté denoting a jurisdiction under the sovereignty of a count (earl) or a viscount. The modern French is comté, and its equivalents in other languages are contea, contado, comtat, condado, Grafschaft, graafschap, Gau, etc. (cf. conte, comte, conde, Graf).

When the Normans conquered England, they brought the term with them. The Saxons had already established the districts that became the historic counties of England, calling them shires (many county names derive from the name of the county town with the word "shire" added on: for example, Gloucestershire and Worcestershire). The Vikings introduced the term earl (from Old Norse, jarl) to the British Isles. Thus, "earl" and "earldom" were taken as equivalent to the continental use of "count" and "county". So the later-imported term became a synonym for the native English word scir ([ʃiːr]) or, in Modern English, shire. Since a shire was an administrative division of the kingdom, the term "county" evolved to designate an administrative division of national government in most modern uses.

Prison

A prison,correctional facility, penitentiary, gaol (Ireland, UK, Australia), or jail is a facility in which inmates are forcibly confined and denied a variety of freedoms under the authority of the state as a form of punishment. The most common use of prisons is within a criminal justice system. People charged with crimes may be imprisoned until they are brought to trial; those pleading or being found guilty of crimes at trial may be sentenced to a specified period of imprisonment. Besides their use for punishing civil crimes, authoritarian regimes also frequently use prisons and jails as tools of political repression to punish what are deemed political crimes, often without trial or other legal due process; this use is illegal under most forms of international law governing fair administration of justice. In times of war, prisoners of war or detainees may be detained in military prisons or prisoner of war camps, and large groups of civilians might be imprisoned in internment camps.

Cumberland County Jail

The Cumberland County Jail is located in Portland, Maine, and is the largest jail in the state. The jail's governing body is Cumberland County, in which the county Sheriff's office oversees the daily operations. In 2002 it became the first jail in the state of Maine to receive national accreditation from the American Correctional Association, at the time putting it among only 4% of adult correctional facilities in the USA to have been so accredited. It has the capacity to accommodate 600 inmates, and employs over 200 staff (including 130 Corrections Officers). Most inmates are serving short sentences or awaiting trial.

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