The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1881-11-12 00:00:00

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used to receive the proceeds of the business some years
ago ?—Mrs. Gold: My husband's brother, my Lord.
Lorfl Coleridge: What is his name ?—Thomas.
Where does he live 2—At Hackney-wick. I have not teen
him for some five years. I had no occasion to Leo him; net
having been in London.
Mr. Williams asked if there Was atly reason why he ceased
to collect the proceeds of the business.
Mrs. Gold Only this, that as my husband had Olen Up
two shops he had time to attend to this.
WitnesSes .-ore then called as to the soft; gra.,t'; coin hat
spokeh tt by the police-officers (produced),
Mr. Hannom, the hatter at Lewes, stated that:he had mea-
sured it carefully, auk,: its size was 6i full—that is, an " easy"
ta llavln /coxed at the round felt hat found on the line,
h 9 FRIA it was 6-1 bare; that being hard, the gray one soft.
Looking at the tall black hat pnduced, he said the size was
7, which was too larpfo,
Lord Coleridg.e It comes to this, that the hats will fit thZ
prirontr and hundreds of others.
the Attorney-General: True; it P.,. a sioall fact, no doubt,
yet we thought it better to :^,roVe it.
The death of Mr,,, Griffiths, the maker of Mr. Gold's watch,
was then pttVed, to account for his not being called to
identlfy the watch. His son proved the death of hit rather
Utid also that Mr. Gold was a customer of his.
The coroner who held the firttle'A was called to produce a
photograph of the prisoler which had been produced at the
inquest, and,whith, it appeared, was taken from a drawing,
and waz hot in the least like the prisoner.

The Attorney-General then stated that some knives
had been found on the line' which he produced, hot as
having anything to do with the case in the View of the
counsel for the prosecution, but at the desire of the
prisoner's counsel, to afford him the opportunity of seeing
them.
An inspector was caljed and stated that-since the murth r
search had been made on the line. He knew the line, he
said, and there were upon it ponds at Three Brlog.s
(which), he said, it was impossible to empty, and a great
deal of sedge, grass, and undervvood. He produced two or
three knives, which Mr. Bend said bore no stains of blood,
and which it wao net suggested had any connexion with
the murder.

The Attorney-General then stated that the case for
the prosecution was now oloncd,

Mr. Oliver Weston, of Brighton, who gave evidence on
Friday thc.t he was at Brighton Station when Lefroy arrived
and said his wounds looked like the "prod "of an urui*.rella,
complained to the Judge that his presence there at the time
was doubted, and that three witnesses who saw him there
had not been calla _

The Lord Chief Justice cannot hear them now.
Mr. Weston: But I beseech your lordship; it may be ruin
nine.

""ifielord Chief Justice: I repeat that I cannot hear them
flow

Mr. Weston: There are certain matters to be cleared up,
and I have my witnesses ready, my lord.
The Lord Chief Justice: That may be, but I cannot hear
them now.

Mr. Weston then withdrew, and at five minutes to twelve
the court adjourned for a quarter of an hour.

ou tiio Ko-ttsselubling of the Cvurb Mr. Montnitat
proceeded to address the fury on behalf of the prisoner at
the bar. This, he said, was no ordinary case of murder,
and there was no question of sanity or insanity; it was not
a casein which it was likely that any mercy would be extended
to the prisoner if found guilty, and it was therefore erapha-
tically a question of life and death. It was a question whether
the prisoner should leave the court free or suffer an
Ignominious and violent death. It had been said it was a
" chain " of evidence, but the jury must see that the.
chain was unbroken and of such a metal as to stand
every test; otherwise the prisoner was entitled to go
free. He had a fault to find—the only fault—with an
expression used by the Attorney-General that the pri-
soner "was entitled to the benefit of a doubt," If the
jury were not as certain as they could be of the
prisoner's guilt, he was entitled to be acquitted. They
were asked by the prosecution to embark on a sea of
speculation, and he warned them against being lost and
cast away upon it. The very first link in the " chain "of
proof was wanting, inasmuch as, while the crime must
from its nature hare been premeditated, the prosecu-
tion had not shown that Lefroy possessed the slightest
knowledge of Mr. Gold or of his affairs. The learned
counsel then proceeded to comment upon the many contra-
Uictory points in the evidence adduced with regard to the
hats worn and those found on the line, the speed of the
train, the possession of a revolver, and other important
matters; and argued that under all the circumstances the
theory that the crime had been committed by a third man.
who had succeeded in escaping was tenable. In con-
clusion ,Mr. Williams urged that it had been said that cir-
cumstantial evidence was convincing. He denied
it, for it meant that human intellect was infallible.
Yet how weak we were, and how open to error and mistake!
Circumstantial evidence was fallible and had often misled
jurors, and caused life to be sacrificed erroneously—the life
of the innocent. For Heaven's sake he would say let not the
jury add another instance to the melancholy catalogue of
persons so sacrificed. Let them stand and scrutinise the
evidence most strictly, and bring to hear upon it all the
sense and judgment that God had given them. They
could but do their best, but they must remember that if
they erred in convicting him his blood would be upon
their heads, and he prayed that at this awful hour He to
whom all secrets were known would guide them to a right
conclusion.

The Attorney-General then proceeded to address the jury,
in reply on the part of the Crown, observing that the
prisoner had had a most able defence. His learned
ft-tend had spoken in defence of a fellow-creature's life.
His own duty was a public duty—to assist in taking
care that the guilty did not escape • and the jury were
bound to see that if the guilt of die crime were traced
to anyone he should not escape from jlistice. _Nor,
was this duty less sacred than that of leaning to mercy,
which his learned friend had invoked. It was said that cir-
cumstantial evidence might mislead, and so might direct
evidence ; but here there was not wily circumstantial evi-
dence, there was also a great nice of direct evidence in the
cate pointing, as he submitted, elear4 to tie emici union
of guilt The Attorney-General then proceeded u. review
the main points of the evidence, and argued that it 811
iii-
ciently established the guilt of the plisoner. He must
have gone down with no other object than that of
'robbery, and there was nothing whatever shown to justify
the theory of a third person. The Attorney-General referred
to the fact that no object had been shown for the pri-
soner's visit to Brighton, and remarked upon his in-
tense anxiety to return to London when he knew
what had taken place and that he stood in danger of
being charged at any moment with murder. The Attorney-
ueneral concluded by saying that it would be cowardice in
all of them to forget that they had all an interest in the ad-
ministration of justice, and while they should be anxious
not to convict the innocent, they should also be desirous
that the guilty should not escape and that the public should
be protected by the punishment of crime.
[Our limited sipt—te precludes us from giving at length the
tidal-c.a.. of Nir. Nlontattu Williams, and the Attorney-
General, which occupy nearly four columns of The Times.)
Dr. Pond was recalled, and, in answer to a question of the
Chief Justice, whether he had observed hair on the hands
of the deceased, replied that he had not, adding however,
that he did not know whether the body had been washed
or not before he examined it.

At twenty minutes to six o'clock the Court ad-
journed until Tuesday.

FOURTH DAY.
TIIE JUDGES SUMMING UP.

The Court did not sit until a few minutes before
eleven o'clock on Tuesday, in consequence of Lord
Coleridge requiring time to arrange his notes ot the
evidence previous to his commencing his charge to the
jury. At ten o'clock, however, the Crown Court was
filled by persons of both sexes, and every available seat
even in the galleries set apart for the representatives
of the Press was occupied by ladies and gentle-
men. The prisoner was placed in the dock im-
mediately Lord Coleridge took his seat. He was
more dejected and pale than he had yet appeared,
and, as on the previous day, entered the dock, carrying
a white pocket handkerchief in his right hand. He
cast his eyes neither to the right nor the left, and
having bowed to the court, stood erect close against
the spiked railings of the dock until at a signal from
the chief warder he sat down in his cushioned seat,
folding his arms as on previous days. The rrisoner,
who all along had a strong impression that he would
be acquitted, listened with more than his usual interest
and anxiety to the well-toned periods of the Lord
Chief Justice as he led up to what promised to be a
masterly recapitulation of the evidence adduced before
him.

Lord Coleridge, in his summing up to the jury, said they
had now arrived at that stage of the trial with which he and
the jury especially had to deal. Long as the inquiry had
been, and long as it might he necessary for him to address
them, he hoped that they would feel with him that an in-
quiry of this kind could not be too exhaustive, considering
the momentous issues that were submitted to them. They
had been told—and correctly told—that the prisoner was a
young man on the threshold of life, and if he should be found
guilty he would be cut off in the flower of his youth. It was
therefore but right that a step of that kind should only be
taken after the grestest care and deliberation. It was true
that, like all other verdicts, great interest attached to it, but
unlike most other verdicts, a mistake in it could not be atoned
for in the way that other mistakes were atoned for. In
most cases mistakes could to a certain extent be set right,
but in this case the result could have but one effect, and,
therefore, it was only right that their judgment should be
arrived at after full and close consideration. One rule was
that where murder was proved, it should be punished by
death, and with so momentous an issue before them they
were bound to give their gravest consideration to the facts,
and to deal with them only after the clearest deliberation.
Now as to the character of the two persons. Mr. Gold was an
old man of some 61 years. He was retired from business, and
was in the habit regularly • of bringing sums of money—as much
as £3) at a time—from London to Preston, where he resided.
The other was a young man who had shown that he was
capable of acts which were of a reprehensible character.
Indeed, on the very day of the murder they were acquainted
with one such act committed at Wallington before his de-
parture. There could be no doubt whatever that the pri-
soner and Mr. Gelid were passengers iu the same compart-
ment on the day of the murder. Mr. Geld had been to
London, and received a sum cf money at Walworth, and had
banked it at his bankers at Whitechapel. They therefore
had this fact—that in the compartment were a well-to do
man, in very comfortable circumstances, and a man who
was in an impecunious state. They had also evidence
that the prisoner had upon him several pawn tickets,
and that these pawn tickets were in the name of Lee. It
might be said that the tickets had come into the prisoner's
possession by some means which did not necessarily fix him
as the pawner. That might have been the case ; but, if so,
the prisoner, in order to bring witnesses to show that this
was the case, had only to ask for assistance, acid it
would be granted to him out of the police funds. He
therefore did not think that there could be any doubt
that the prisoner was the man who pawned the clothes
on the 20th June. With reference to the pawning of
the pistol on the 21st Juue, which came next chrono-
logically, he could net here refer to it, he would discuss '
that with them hereafter, lie would not go on to the
22nd June, when the pi isoner pledged a bag and smite
spoons, the bag being identified by Mr. Clayton as his pro.
perty, and he having admitted that he had lost it and that
the prisoner had no autherity to dispose of it. This again
was in the name of Lee, and everything pointed to the fact
that it was the prisoner who had pawned the goods. Now
he came to the question—Did the prisoner pawn on the 21st
June a pistol at NI essrs. Adams', and redeem it on the 27th
June, the day of the murder? They had the evidence of the
pawnbroker's assistant upon the subject, who firmly be-
lieved that the prisoner was the man, but who could not
swear to him. The pawnbroker's assistant further said that
the prisoner when he came to pledge the pistol brought some
cartridges with him, and that he declined to take the pistol
in because it was loaded. 'this could, no doubt, fix his
memory to some extent; and further than this, Creek identi-
fied the prisoner amongst others in Lewes Gaol as the man
who pledged the pistol. In this case, again, he took the
name and the street which had been identified with the
actual and undoubted transaction, and Allwright, the
assistant, who was standing by when the pistol was pledged,
identified the prisoner positively, he having had a trans-
action with him only a short time previously. The cross-
examination of the witnesses did not suegeet at all what
was going to be suggested by Mr. and Mrs. Clayton, and
what they gave in evidence at this trial. The manly and
simple course to take was to open the case for the defence
in cross examination, or, at any rate, to indicate it. Upon
that point lie should have something further to say.
It was an important thing to see whether the pri-
soner redeemed the pledge on the 27th June. It was an
Important thing to ascertain who pledged the article, but it
was more important to find out who redeemed it, because
there could be no doubt the same man was party to both
transactions. Now, what about the 27th? Allwright re-
membered being called into the shop on that day to bring
back the pistol, and believed that the prisoner was the man
who took it out of pawn; and Creek expressed a similar view.
pat being so, it was reasonable to suppose that the prisoner
slot only pledged, but redeemed the weapon. But what was
there to be put against this? They had the evidence of Mr.
4snd Mrs. Clayton with regard to the day. of .thepawniug
They were connected with the prisoner by relationship, but
that was no reason why their evidence should not be

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