The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1888-02-11 00:00:00

Xocalaith ,ijistrirt ietn.

S OC KING TRAGEDY AT OLDSW NFOR D

MURDER BY AN OCMCFENARIAN

A t rrible tragedy was enacted at an early
hoer i)e Monlay at Oldswinford and has created, as
rnieht have been anticipated in a comrnuniey ordin-
atidy the most peaceful and quiet character,
great excitement among the inhabitants. At Old -
swieford there is a long thoroughfare known as
eath Lane, occupied almost entirely by small cot
tages, and in one of these there dwelt an aged
couple named Pearaell. The husband, George Pear-
sall, was by trade a nailmaker, but for several y as
past the weight of age and infirmity of body have
prevented him following his employment. He is
nearly eighty years of age, and his wife, Harriet,
whom he murdered on Monday was only three years
his junior. They had been married fifty-eight
years, and had resided in the locality the whole of
their lives, bringing up in respectability a family
of twelve sons and daughters. All their offspring,
wi'h the exception of a son named James, are
married and reside in the same district, and since
-he father was incapacitated from following his
calling have jointly maintained their paren.s in
comfort. James who is by trade a well-s'nker re-
sided with his parents in the house in Heath Lane,
a small cottage with only a single living room on
; the ground floor i,n addition to a lean-to pantry,
and two small bed reoins on the upper floor. This
. little dwelling was very decently furnished, and
' bore every arpearance that the aged c .uple were
speeding their declining years in comfertable
cir-
cumstances. The husband, a short, wizened old man
was exceedingly deaf, and, this infirmity made him
very querulous and apt to be suspicious ef tho
about him, a state of suspicion which in the result
produced actual dementia. Of late he had barb .ured
an idea that his children, who have always treated
with filial kindness, were anxious to get rid of
him, and that they contemplated sending him to a
lunatic asylum. Almost every evening some of the
aged couple's children called at their residence to
see hoer teey were getting on, and on Friday even-
iag lite-, when several members of the family met
and were talking in the kitchen, the old man sud-
denly aeked—" Shall I have time to have a pipe of
tob ice before they come ? " When questioned as to
what he meant he said "The people who are to
talc:: me away. I know you are goina to send me
away." Owing to his deafness he could not hear the
conversation which was going en, but he was as-
sured that nobody contemplated sending him away
anywhere, and eventually he became pacified. On
anoth -r occasion, a week or so previously, he was
observe I fumbling with some pieces of thick string,
and ween asked what he was going to do with the
cord, he answered. "I shall have to be hanged,
and I may as well be hanged first as last," He did
not, however make anything like a distinct threat
to destroy himself, and no one suspected him of ill
intent towards his wife, with whom he had always
lived, making allowance for his peculiarities, very
happily.
The old couple occupied one of the bed rooms,
and the Ben James the other. The family retired to
rest on Sunday night at their accustomed hour and
at that time there wss nothing unusual in the old
man's tawnier. James rose shortly after seven on
Monday morning to go to his work, and as was
his practice before going downstairs he looksd a
the bed occupied my his parents, and saw that they
were sleeping soundly. James returned home, as his
habit was, for breakfast at nine o'clock, tied when
he neared the house was somewhat surprised to see
his father in the road, fully dressed but without his
hat, and apparently hurrying somewhere. Surmis-
ing that he was going to purchase some matches
with which to light a tire, the son took a few lucifers
from his pocket and offered them to the old man,
who rejeoted them with a wave of his haul, at the
same time saying, "I don't want them. I have
done my bit." The son by this time notced that
there were stains of blood on his father's hands and
blood spots on his face, and, coupling these circum-
stances with the lanauae e of the old tuna, immedi-
ately suspected that some terrible thing had hap-
pened. He called to a young man who was passing
to come with him into the house, and they pro-
ceeded immediately to the bedroom where the old
people slept. They there found the old woman lying
on her right side on one edge of the bed, with her
face inwards, the posiien which the son had seen
her in two hours previously. The berl clothes were
not diaturbcd, ant a smelt shawl which she wore
abont her head and shoulders for greeter warmth
while sleeping was still folded about her neck as he
had seen it in the earlier moraine On this shawl
and on the upper part of the bedclothes there was
however, a considerable quantity of blood, and on
the side of the old woman's head which was upper.
most there was a huge gaping wound from which
blood was flowing over her face awl neck. The son
and his companion raised an alarm which promptly
brought in several of the neighbours, one of whom
ran for Dr. .Richards. When the doctor came he
exeinined the body, which was still quite warm and
supple, and pronounced life to be extinct. The
wound on the head, in the centre of the left temple
was a fearful one—rough-edged, several inches
deep, and sufficiently wide to receive three extended
fingers of the doctor's hand.
P. C. Hayes, stationed at Oldswinford, was at
once apprised of the dreadful occurrence. Having
informed himself of the truth of the statement
made to him he went in searoa of the old man, and
found him at a little huckster's shop kept by one of
his daughters, Mrs. Ann Hill, only a few yards away
from the house where the Pearsalls dwelt. He took
him into cnetody and charged him with causing
the death of his wife, when the old man, who was
comparatively calm and offered no resistance to
arrest, replied, " I acknowledge I did it. Tais s
the truth, What I have got to say is, my chili ren
irritated me for a fertnight. My children s lid I
should be gagged, and the gallows is up waitiog for
use. I did it with the shoeiron, but it is no excuse.
My age is seventy-nine on the 14th May." His age
his daughter, who was present, staaed is eighty and
not seventy-nine.
Peareall's statement was the first intimation the
afficer had received as to the instrument with which
the murder had been committed, but after he had
left the house in Heath Lane to look for the hus-
band one of the neighbours, a woman named Bar-
low, found on the floor of the bed room the shoe-
iron whice the old man indicated, covered with
Wood, and a lea grey hairs upon it. It is a heavy
shaped piece of wrought iron, or, more properly
speaking, two pieces of it on. roughly welded together
for the purpose of a shoe iron, a sort of iron last
which the lower claeses in country districts fre-
quently use in doleg, tneir own blot-repairing. The
upr;ght bar is about an inch square, and the tongue
partly formed to the lines. of the sole of it foot is
!Jout four inches long, an inch wide, and a third of
an inch lii thickness. The character of the wound in
the woman's heal showed that it had been inflicted
with tee tongue of t .is instrument, and the depth
.Tas evidence that she had been struck with very
cousider,ibie force. There is only the one woune.
the position of the body and the statement of the
ewe are al nost conclusive evidence that the attack
was made on the old woman whit, she lay peace-
fully slep, itn.l the blow with such a sharp, heavy
,yeapon would be sufficient to cause instart death.
The wo aan Barlow, in her alarm, pushed the shoe-
iron under t me bea, where it was subsequently found
and handed over to time police. Hayes, immediately
after the arrest took his prisoner into Stourbrid,ge,
where he was lodged utiles surveillance in the
police station, and tie n returned with Inspector
Herman and Sergea,ut Hardwinke to Oldswinford
t) continue enquiries. There were no traces of blood
on the prisoecr's clothes, and the inf,Tence from
this fact is !hat he att wked his wife and killed her
as soon ai he rose hem bed, and subsequently
dressed himself and er it out. Ile had not laced his
shoes, not had he on .Itt when seen by his sou in
the road. When tak •ri lute custody he appeared to
have wiped blood iron his hands, which were
smeared, and blood was clotted under the finger
naiis. The position o. the hands of the woman, one
reeting by tier side and the other stretched towards
the centre of the Usti, were corroborative evidence
that nothing in the nature of a struggle had taken
place.
After Pe 'Nall was locked up at Stourbridge one
' of the edifiers went to him for the purpose of asking
the Christi :n name of his ife, and the old man
having answered this query aske "is she dead?"
When told that she was he seemed very much
tressed. Later in the day he was brought befoco
• Mr. Frank Evers at the Magistrate's Clerk's Office
and shareed with the murder of his wile. Superin-
tendent %% heeler, bri fly stated the circumstances
of the murder, and I'. C. Hayes proved in evidence
the arrest and statement of the prisoner, and the
magistrate then, on the application of the Supe,rin-
' tendont, remanded the accused till yesterday. VS hen
prisoner was asked if he had anything to say why
he should not be remanded he simply answ led,
s,se done it, I sui very torry—very sorry "
Mr. Hinds, solicitor, had been instructed by the
membere of the aceused's family to te.present him
aud was preseue

CORO YER'S INQUEST.