The Express.
London, England, 1857-11-09 00:00:00

(Stamped Id. Additional.) [TWOPENCE.

THE MURDER OP A POLICE CONET..IBLE 111

HERTFORDSHIRE.

The Hertford Mercury gives the following addi-
tional partici:dare respecting the murder of the polioe.man at
Ste Herta, a short account of which appeared in
Friday's ess. It will
.be remembered that the murder
took place on the evening of Friday week, and that a
labourer of the neighbourhood had been spprehended. An
inquest was held the next day and adjourned till Monday
this day).
The man apprehended is Jeremiah Carpenter, • labourer,
in the service of Mr. Horn, of Norton-green Farm, which is
situate about a mile front Stevenage. Carpenter is about
95 years of age, of a powerful phyeique, and determined
ohmmeter. He has long_ been outvoted of thefts, but has
never been in custody. He has been beard to ray—in allu-
sion to the circumstance that the baskets or wallets of
Mowers are sometimes searched by the police after leaving
their work—that no one policeman enould over search him.
The chnentetanote width led to the tippreb!nrdon. of Car-

minter may bete briefly stated. The priitiner lives in one of
four cottages, at the mouth end of Stevenage, about 300
yeas out of the town. Norton End Farm is about a mile
from the prisomea cottage, and Is reached by • lane which
ruts from the mouth end of the cotter to the farm. On
Friday, the da of the murder, the prisoner was net, Low
em -
rers the Aim bat to field at some &Mance
o:rtk of t • and hi nearest way home would be, not by the
farm and the kas, but across the secluded field in which the
murder took *on through.:Fin the hedge of that held,
V
then ong the railway, into • which leads by the aide
of the Let sod meet myth deka.* In the row in which
he lived. Thew Is seldom! to show *Mho must hareems*

7J:1116 that, instead of creaming the railway Into the
i to, he came along the line, and over the fence
his own back garden.
it ammo that the prisoner lift work about half-past eve,
and reached home about ten minutes past six, thus t
forty minutes in going a distance which a labourer, at histd2
nary leisurely pace, would walk in twenty minutes. Two
men, named Shird and Spion, who worked on the same
fine, were on Friday detained a quarter of an hour beyond
their usual time in looking after the horses. Shepherd, who
lived nest door to the primmer, however, reached home Soot,
and had been at home fully ten minute., when be sew the
prisoner come from the direction of the railway over the fence
into his own garden, indenter hie cottage by the back door.
The prisoner being thus shown to have come in the direo-
tion from the field in which the murder took plaice, and to
hare been delayed oa his return home, it le necessary for the
elucidation of the cake to refer to the time at which the con-
stable was last seen, and in what direction he wee then pro-

04014.
At 4 o'clock on Friday. afternoon, Starting was directed to
look after the men returning from their work on the Hertford
side of Stemmage, and particularly to direct his attention to
theLelsoner Carpenter, who was suspected of stealing his
em yer's oorn. Starkins was to return and report himgelf
at . At half•yeat sbe was seen in a lane, leading from the
road to the farm in the direction of and about 150 yards from
the field in which his body was found. Nothing more was
seen or heard of him till the discovery of hie body on the
following Monday. From the /mot where be was seen at
half-past. 5 walking lamely and looking about him, we may
assume that he reeled the field in question in about ten
minuted, and we thus trace him to the 'pot where the
murder was committed at about twenty minute. to six. The
prieoner, assuming that he came scree the field, se
he must have done, arrived at the same spot—nearly
equi-distant between the field where he was at work
I sad his collage—about the game time. The prisoner
says he returned home by another and more circuitous route,
past . some cottages near the rued leading to the farm ; but
this te disproved by witnesses who were out in front of their
dwellings from half•past five until long after the prisoner
readied home. Other witnesses also prove that at the
Stevenage end no one passed along the paths leading to the
high read. Moans were heard, but no one retreated in that
direction; and no one can be traced near the spot except the
prisoner Carpenter. He and the constable are thus brought
together at the same spot, at the same time, when the murder
was committed.
Having thus traced the prisoner to the field in which the
conflict and the murder took place, at about twenty minutes
to six, we have to account for his not reaching Lis home—to
which he might have walked in ten minuter or lens—till
thirty minutes after that time. He was evidently delayed
on the toad; but he had met no one, if not the police
constable. The struggle would account for the delay.
It was a desperate one, and the marks of It ere
observable in the tall grass,' kicked up by the powerful men
striking their heels deep into the ground. It was a struggle
between two men only ; the constable had taken out his
handruns (for they were found in the field) to put on a pet-
goner whom he expected to capture ; and he would hardly
have done this if he had had two men to encounter. Thew
had been two &tenet stivales—the tint Woggle near the
spot where the tield was entered through a gap in a high
hedge, and 90 yards nearer the prisoner's house than the
spot where the second struggle took place. Further off, in
a corner of the field, was a plot of turnips; five turnips had
been fresh pulled and were thrown down. The inference is
that they were thrown down on the policeman entering the
field, and the person who threw them down then walked on
in the directice of the gap in the hedge, and of the priamer's
house, till he met the eomtable at the 'pot where the IRA
struggle took place. Here he was stopped, and probably
Raked to show the contents of his basket, fora quantity of
wheat was found upon the ground, and a basket, or some-
thing containing wheat, must have been dropped. Then
there was a flight, and a pursuit by the constable; then
another struggle—this time a deadly one.
But there are other &tandems-I which throw strong
suspicion upon the prisoner. When he returned home
Shepherd observed that his smock waa twisted round hb
shoulders; but he shortly re appeared with hie Sunday
smock frock and his Sunday willy-hat on, and called in
Shepherd in consequence of a hurt he seed hn had received by
a trunk of timber which be, at that hour of the night, with
his beat clothes on, been attempting to split with4.hzdhcl
felling upon his lig. His boot wee taken off, and
found that the leg had very much swelled, though the hurt
wee laid to have been received only the instant before. He
advised that a doctor should be sent for.
When the body of the constable was found on Monday
suspicion at once. fell upon Carpenter. On Tuesday morning
Captain Robertson proceeded to Stevenage, and having made
inquiries, at once apprehended him. He at that time had on
the clothes he wore on the day of the murder. Upon hie
smock-hock, his boots, his pocket knife, and his basket were
marks of blood.
- - -• •

It remains to be added that on the day before the murder
the prisoner was employed in sowing wheat in a field at some
distance from the farm and was sent to the farm to procure
more wheat, there not being enough. Mr. Horn haa identi-
fied the wheat found in the field where the murder took place
as part of that wheat; it could only have been procured by
one of hie men; the prisoner had the opportunity of
Procuring
It, and it is certain that no other man in Mr. Horns employ
went home that way on the night of the murder, the prisoner
being employed dune . the other men were employed
at the farm, and went home down the road. In the
1 skirt of a wood lying in the prisoner's road from the
field where he was at work to the field where the murder
took place, a small quantity of the same wheat baa been
found : it had evidently been concealed, and a larger quan-
tity had been removed. On the Thursday, when the wheat
le supposed to have been taken by the prisoner, be was at
work with the other men, and returned home with them ; he
bad, therefore, no opportunity of carrying it home then. It
Is, therefore, inferred that be hid it In the wood and recovered
it an his way home on Friday night.
This is the sum of the evidence which the police have at
present obtained ageing Carpenter. Captain Robertson has
been at Stevenage every day since the dreadful occurrence,
investigating the affair, sodded by Superintendent Bunco
and Coxedge, Inspectors English, Hawke" Capron, Beck-
with and Evans, and five constables. The prisoner stoutly
denies his guilt, but other important evidence is expected to
be adducedat the adjourned examination next week.
We have omitted to state in the proper place that before
the constable's throat was cut, several stabs bad been made
at him, sad that a cut on his coat roller is precbely of the
size of the blade of the prisoner's pocket knife. The reedi-
est evidence will go to show that the constable was strangled,
probably by his murderer grasping him by his neckerchief,
end that his throat was cut while he was in a state of un-
conaciommeas, and lying helpleee on Ws back on the
ground.

INQUEST ON Mn. FRANCIS JOHN FIELD.-011
Saturday evening an inquest arm held in the drawing-room
of No. 13, Cornwall-times, Rageors-park, the late resi-
dence of Mr. Francis John Field, aged 66 (a Coormimioner of
Woods and Forests, and formerly Accountant. General in
India), on the body of that gentleman. William Itahley,
decrees valet, mid between seven and eight o'clock on
Friday morning he hoard hie master suddenly call out se if
in great pain, and immediately after the sound of a heavy fall.
On rnnnoog up to his room he found him ateetelted on the
neer, and Dins. Field supportiss him. He appeared Wakes.
and wittier ran for Mr. Newton. a surgeon, who arrived is
about 20 minutia, sad pronounced him to be dead. Decemed
bad retired to bed on the previous night in his most pod
health. Mr. Newton, eurgeon, of 31, Fitzroy-Kum% stated
he had seen deceased • few days before death, and he ap-
mared is perfect health. On hie arrival he found him deed.
On aped merino examination be discovered that the aorta
MA )eret, Wing* pericardium with blood, which mused
sunlit death. Verdict, "Natural death."
CENTRAL. CRIMINAL COURT.—The twelfth session,
which has just terniineted, has been remarkably heavy.
The two principal omits sat for nine days each, a third
court eat for five days, and a fourth court for twowtem
making a total of twisty-five dap...mining', although
eases have been postponed to the November session. In
addition to this, owing to the late hour to which the courts
have frequently eat, it may be laid that the evening sittings
have been partially easurned. The last aerainn, therefore, of
Mr. alderman Finale's mayoralty has been remarkable ea
being the heaviest that hue occurred for many yeere past

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