The Express.
London, England, 1853-02-04 00:00:00

INSOLVENT DEBTORS' COURT.-MTERDAT.

Imes Ms. Corinisioxsa Pzuuse.
IN INS *MTN& Or JOHN lIIMILT NAINIT.

The cutunsetanoss of this case were peculiar, and it
cams before the court as an application to mains the re-
port of Edward Ingpen, Esq., the registrar, on a proof of
debts. There had been • good deal of litigation in law and
equity, and it was stated that there would be • large Mir-
plea after paying all the creditors.
Mr. Cooke moved, on the part of the assignees, to con-
firm the report, and Mr. Bagshawe (of the Chancery her)
sad Mr. Dowse represented Mr. Hamby. Mr. Macrae ap-
peared he a Mr. Herschell.
la HMO the insolvent was committed to prison, and some
shsrwards
• vesting order was obtained on • creditor's
In 1846 he woe discharged under the act, as-
stases having been previously appointed. Amour the
=
ha
was entitled to were the tithes of the
LialSeld, in Sumer, of which he was the lay in-
prepsiseer. The Rev. Mr. Sewell had been the curate at
301. a year, sad shamed 1271., and the insolvent denied the
claim on the read that the service had been voluntarily
performed. There were other exceptions to the report, in-
cluding • claim by the areigases for costs in Chancery suits,
and on which they had obtained a judgment, and had
charged him I. execution.
The claim of the Rev. Mr. Sewell was dimmed.
Mr. Commissioner Phillips thought that 301. • year was
• very mall sum. The labourer was worthy of lb hire.
He wish d to know how it arose, as it could hardly be re-

Yr. Cooke said the insolvent was the lay kapropriator.
It was one of Won aboaskratioas that prevailed in the
church.

ii;.Begehairo resisted the deism, ria the ground stated,
that he had set bees anointed by the lay inspropriator.
Mr. Sewell was • geetisman of geed hetes; and had
volgatarily }esteemed the duty. The law is ihe ease meld
met mop' the ley impropriety, ft mrylbsist=res,
Welsh it mem* BBL a year, as Wheat
Mr. Ommissimer Phillips remelted that it wee • very
small atirmil. Is was one aflame that thought the work-
laibeiwbseeem wryness\ moimpaid.
seesened la the remark. He himself wee
a labs of property where a clergyman voluntarily did
duty, and theugh the farmers subscribed, he had no claim
on the lay impropriator, who in the case to which he re-
lated wee • Amigo nobleman.
Kr. Cooke declared that the opposition to the claim of
the Nev. lb. Sewelslo by
s the iensivent, in whose case it was
Umbel there wee • earplug, was • most ungracious
am ?boy knew se them lay impropriations,
and el the robberies mesetitted on the church. Be-
fore the /1161111111111111 metals tithes were taken for service,
perleemed, end atierwagas they were gives to " lay impro-
prieties." se they Win oiled, who were noblemen or gen-
tling* ANA the and, led still they were to see that the
anise mse meteemod.
'Dm affidavit of Mr. Sewell, who described himself of
Osebeihme Ifierrage, sear Garman& Lancaster, was TOW,
111•1111aR did mot say that he was appointed
vol
by N gad ke (Nsfaby) alleged that the services were
perhrmd.
Mr. Oemminioner Philips was of opinion that Mr. Sewell
nest resell,attend before the registrar end make his
deb& It wssld then be seen whether he had voluntarily
performed the duty, or whether the claim was to be ad-
mitted. Kr. been, the officer of the court who had had the
matter behrelhim for some time, bad not admitted the
claim, but had very properly referred the matter to him.
Mr. Macrae sought to be admitted on the part of Mr.
Herschel as • creditor under the schedule.
Mr. Bagshawe objected, as there was an injunction in
Chancery.
Mr. Commissioner Phillips held that the injunction must
be dissolved before the claim could be discussed.
After some farther discussion on • claim by the as-
ees
• Honour confirmed the report in certain matters, and
it stood over on other points, including the claim of the Rev.
Mr. Sewall.

WIIIIIIIN RAILWAY OF F/LANCE.—Acooant of
melon daring the week ending Jan. 30, 1853 : Passengers,
9,5631. ; Goods, OM ; Total, 3,4411. ; corresponding week
last yaw, 2,9001. Wks ors, 09.

CENTRAL CRIMINAL COURT.

OLD COURT.-YEBTER DAT.
llama' Va. Jcnica Caasowszt vas Ms. Omits MAnsw.

Richard 0' Remarry Kelly, 23, pleaded guilty intttiXrpe
of ut.eriog a forged bill of exchange. Saute:ma was doi
tined.

Milky Wilson, a respectable looking tun, surrendered
to take his trial upon an indictment which charged him
with having malicisus'y and feloniously, upon the high
seas, done a certain thing tending to the destruction of a
vessel called the Hue: Lass, she being in distress at the
time, with intent to injure the owner, Hebert Turpin.
In other counts, the intent of the prisoner was laid to be
to defraud certain parties who had under-written the vessel.
Mr. Clarkson said he appeared with his learned friend to
conduct this prosecution, on behalf of a society, established
in the county of Essex, alled the Colchester and Malden
Mutual Marine Insurance Association, and he opened the
case as being one of an extraordinary character, from the
eireumstanees under which the offence was alleged to have
been committed. He went on to say that the owners
of the vesul did not take any part in the prose-
cution, and he also said he should not be in a
condition to prove that the vessel in question was insured
for more than her value, or that any profit was derived from
the insurance, but he apprehended, notwithstanding these
facts, that if he made out to the satisfaction of the jury that
the prisoner had wilfully and maliciously destroyed the
venal, he would be amenable to the charge contained in the
present indictment. He then called the following wit-
nesses : _ _ _

William Cudmore deposed that he was apprenticed on
beard the Essex Lau, and sailed in her from Col-
chester, about two years ago. The vessel went to Am-
sterdam, from thence to Hamburg, and afterwards to
Zante, where she took in a cargo of currants. The crew
consisted of seven persons, and the prisoner was the cap-
tain. They had sailed from Lute five or six days, and
were on their return home, in the Mediterranean,
about fourteen miles from the town of Faro, when
the vessel was lost. Me was at the helm one morning
about half-past eight o'clock, when he saw the prisoner
take an auger from his chest and bore some holes in the
ship's side below the water mark, and through the akin
and lining of the vessel. He did not say anything at the
time, but when the watch cum on deck at twelve o'clock,
he told them what he had seen. Nothing was done until
four o'clock, when the well was sounded, and there was
found to be 5 feet of water in it, and all hands were set to
the pumps, and they kept pumping till twelve o'clock at
night, when the prisoner said that the water gained upon
them, and it was no use pumping any longer. At daylight
the boats were got out, and one of them named a diugey
was brought alongside, and be and the prisoner got
into it. The prisoner had an adze in his hand,
which he had brought from his cabin, and with this in-
strument he chopped out the starboard port, and
then went to the larboard side and knocked
that one out also. The port-holes were not more than ten
inches above the level of the water at this time, and when
the vessel sunk down to them, the water poured in like a
sluice. At the time this occurred, there was a schooner
about 14 miles off them, and the land was about the same
distance, and the vessel might have been towed ashore. The
men all got away from the vessel in the boats, and proceeded
to Faro, and he afterwards came to England, and met the
prisoner in Sunderland about ten mouths ago. Upon this
occasion the prisoner asked him to drink with him, and he
also told him not to say anything about his having cut the
ports out of the Ewe: Lau, or else he should get trans-
ported for life.
The witness was subjected to a very severe cross-exami-
nation by Mr. Ballantine, and the manner in which he
answered the questions put to him was very evasive and
unantisfactotT. lie said that he saw the prisoner do what
he described through the skylight hatchway of the cabin,
which was behind him, but he said he happened to turn his
head quite by accident at the moment he was boring the
holes. The vessel was peppered, but the augur went
through the metal as well as the wood. Ile said he was
perfectly well aware that the consequence of what the
captain was doing was that he and all the rest of the crew
might be " drownded," but yet he said nothing about the
matter to the men who relieved him at the helm at ten
o'clock, nor to any one until twelve, and he said ho mould
give no reason why he did not do so. At the time the
holes were bored the nephew of the owner and two
of the crew ware on deck and standing close
by, but he did not say a word to them of what
was going on. He could give no reason why he
did not tell them. Nobody but he and the captain were in
the diogey when he cut cut the port holes, and he held on
by a rope and ,kept the boat steady while the captain
chopped them out with the adee, and he said that in point
of fact he assisted him in what he was about, but he could
not help it, as he was bound to obey his orders. He re-
membered while the vessel was at Hamburg that something
was said about a gun being stolen from the cabin, and that
upon his saying the prisoner had taken it himself, he
knocked him down, and he might upon that occasion have
threatened to be god, but he said that if he did he
could not recollect it, it was so long ago.
Two or three others of the crew were called to confirm
the evidence of this witness, but they contradicted each
other in many material particulars, and two of them swore
positively that the captain was never in the dingey at all,
but that he cut out the ports while standing on the deck,
and another said that Cudmore was not, in point of fact,
at the helm at all at the time he stated.
Mr. Clarkson was about to close the case with this evi-
denceZbut Mr. Baron Martin said he was of opinion that
there should be some evidence of an intention to defraud
the insurance company, as the cue as it at present stood on
the part of the prosecution clearly did not, in his opinion,
support the first set of counts in the indictment charging
the offeace of destroying a vessel in distress.
A witness was then called who proved that the Essex
Lass had been inured foe 6371., and that 4701. of that
amount had been paid. It was admitted that the vessel
and cargo were insured in two other offices altogether to
the amount of 9001., which was less than their value,
and that those offices took no part in the present pressen-
tiros.

Mr. Ballantine, in addressing the jury for the prisoner,
said that the prosecution against him was a most scandalous
one, and it ought never to have instituted. The evidence
by which it was sought to be supported was absurd and im-
probable, and he could not help expressing his surprise
that the association who appeared as prosecutors should
have placed • man who had all his life borne an honourable
and respectable character, at the felons' bar upon such
evidence as they had heard that day. He would uk
them what earthly motive or object the prisoner
could have bad for the commission of each • dia-
bolical act. He had no interest either in the vessel
or the :cargo, and the only results that could
have happened to him were the loss of his
character, the loss of his position, the loss of his clothes,
and everything that belonged to him, with possibly his life.
The thing was absurd, and he repeated that he was asto-
nished that such a charge should have been preferred upon
such evidence as they had heard that day. He then urged
that the statements made by the different witnesses were
clearly fabricated and false, and he said in conclusion, that
if any wilful mischief had really been done to the vessel,
the probability was that Ctidmore and the others were the
guilty parties, but that at all events it was abundantly made
out that the prisoner was entirely innocent.
Mr. Robert Turpin, the owner of the Essex Lass, was
then examined, and he gave the prisoner an excellent cha-
racter, and said that he had employed him since the trans-
action.

The learned Judge summed up, and the jury immediately
returned a verdict of Not Guilty.
The prisoner was ordered to be immediately discharged.

NEW COURT.-YESTEZDAT.
Dams TIM lizooluus.

Hon Godtchall Johnson aged 42, described in the calen-
dar as a labourer, was placid in the dock to plead to an in-
dictment for stealing certain valuable securities for the pay-
ment and value of 8001., the property of Sarah Stewart.
Mr. Beneath's, on the part of the prisoner, applied to
have the case postponed until nest session, on the ground
that he had only been quite recently instructed, and that In
his opinion more than was upon the depositions was neces-
sary to be obtained for the purposes of the prosecution.
They had been placed in • position of difilculty to obtain
the necessary facts from the proeecutriz being left quite
penniless through the prisoner's artifices.
The prosecutrix, who seemed much elided in her mind,
got up and said that she would have mosey by to-morrow
to pay the expenses.
kir. Parry said that Captain Johnson wished the ease to
be tried now as he bad now been one month in prison.
The Reccoder having conferred with Mr. Parry and Mr.
Ballantine, asked when the prisoner was committed ?
Mr. Jonas, clerk to the gaol, said on Monday last.
The Recorder said the committal being so recent, he
should in a ease of ace importance take upon himself,
irrespective of the wishes of all parties, upon public
grounds, to remand the MINI until next session, elbowing the
prisoner to put in ben. Waal( in 5001. and two sureties in
NM each, with 48 hours' melee of bail.
Williams DtJby, 25, seemsa, was indicted for
perty el
stealing tTh wo feats sail a span, at 11.65., the pro-
eme Ttraititer
It appeared tha the porsecatee is • lieutenant in the
Artillery, and limb barracks at gielielit ; and prisoner,
who is a dieshereed marine, had been heated with the
gratest kindness by the praessenth @levant, Jonathan
Blake, a petty Mime of the Artalevy_ wise aapessismating
prisoner's distressed condition. Ye lama idea has -the
kitchen, and given him kid end iodise vela • pea lane
occasions. It was after one of his vW lad iL astkies,
which were of Malta's manufacture, IMO WIWI. Pri-
soner was not satiated, but a few days afitnewerds offering
the articles for sale at the shop of Mr. gateway, a jew-
eller, at Woolwich, that gentleman very linearly called in
the police to make the prisoner gia an assunt of them.
The Recorder said that Mr. Westaway's conduct reflected
the greatest credit upon him.
The prisoner, in his defence, imputed to Blake certain
infamous and nameless offences, and with the most un-
blushing effrontery said that the things had been given to
buy his silence.
Blake said there wss not one word of truth in it.
The jury found him Guilty.
Lieutenant Fitzgerald said that Blake bore a good caw
racier in the regiment.
The Recorder asked Blake if prisoner had ever held out
any threats of this May nature to him foe purpose of ex-
ternem ?

—ifielu;ssid, never. This wee the first he Dowd of the
etweerlien.

• bag list of prisoner's 'military offeseee, ending in his
dishier, proved him to be a most depraved character.
The Sieseder said that Blake's 'hamster was not the
West Isemsed by the sensation of the prisoner, who was
wflea asst ialissesotassa, sad hod be Salad that

THE EXPRESS, FRIDAY EVENING, FEBRUARY 4, 1P53.