The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1873-08-16 00:00:00

THE BANK OF ENGLAND FORGERIES.

Monday next has been fixed for the trial of Austin
Boon Bidwell, George Bidwell, George Macdonnell,
and Edwin Noyes, the four Americans who stand
charged with the gigantic forgeries on the Governor
and Company of the Bank of England. The volumi
none and circumstantial depositions taken before the
Lord Mayor at the Justice-room of the Mansion-
house, have been printed for the eonvenience of the
prodding Judge and of the counsel on both sides.
They extend o'er 242 folio pages, including the
oral and documentary evidence, and make of them-
selves a thick volume, together with an elaborate
index for ready reference. Within living memory
there has been no euchre..., for length and importance,
heard before any Lord .Mayor of London in its pre.
linainar7 stage, nor one which excited a greater amount
of public inter. &ikon, first to last (remarks The Timm).
The Overend.Gurney prosecution is the only one in
late years which at all approaches it in those respects,
but in that the printed depositions only extra led over
164 folio pages, or much los than those in the Bank
case, in which as rainy as 108 witneeets gave evidence
before the Lord Mayor, and the preliminary examine-
Sone-23 in number from first to tart—lasted from the
Ist of March until the 2nd of July, exclusive of the
time spent in remands. Those remands, of cecessity,
were unavoidable, having regard to the complex cha-
racter of the forgeries and to the circumstance that two
of the chief conspirators fled the country on the eve nf
discovery, • circumstance which led to much tedious
delay, first in capturing them, and then in applying
Extradition Treaties to their cases and bringing the
prisoners to England. The prisoner Edwin Noyes,
otherwise Edwin Noyes Hills, who was first arrested
In this country, has been in custody continuously since
the let of March last, or upwards of five months, and
the remaining three for periods varying from the 3rd of
April. In the came of the two prisoners Austin Idron
Bidwell and George Macdonnell—apprebended in
Savannah and the United States respectively—the
tedious delay consequent upon the extradition pro-
ceedings WAS further agcravated by ling sea voyages to
this country, where the prisoners were at leng th given up
to justice by their respective Governments. Upon
Noyes, in particular, the protracted confinement pre-
ceding trial appears to have told considerably. Daring
the last examinations before the Lord Mayor he
seemed exceedingly careworn and 1111110119. There,
from firet to last, it may be observed, he always behaved
In a manner entitling him to respect, apart from the
crime with which he is charged, his demeanour being
altogether free from the unseemly levity which at times
marked the conduct of George Macdoianell and Austin
Bu-on Bidwell. As • rule, too, during the preliminary
examinations George Bidwell conducted himself well
before the Conn. Once, during one of the concluding
remands, Noyes, for some moments and for tae first
time, became fairly unmanned. Towards the end of a
long day. while • letter of his, written to his brother,
and in which kindly references were made to his father
and mother, was being read by Mr. Chabot, the expert
In handwriting, he burst into tears, which be tried in
vain to conceal, and sobbed like a child at the recital
of a passage in which he rejoiced at the prospect of
keeping the homestead together for the family. It
may be mentioned, as an incident in the case, that a
witness named James MlCelvie, a private detective in
Edinburgh, who was mainly instrumental in arresting
the prisoner George Bidwell in that city, has died
since he gave Lis evidence before the Lord Mayor.
The circumstance, however, is not likely to affect the
Issue. A most material witness for the prosecution
Is the young woman Ellen Vernon, the mistress of one
of the prisoner', and she has from the first been kept
under the strictest observation of the police.