The Sun.
London, England, 1852-02-02 00:00:00

CRIMINAL COURT.-(THIS DAYY•)

OLD COURT
The February sessions of the Central Criminal Court
were opened this morning, before the Right Hon. the
Lord Mayor, the Recorder, and the other civic func-
tionaries who usually attend the court on these occasions.
The grand jury having been sworn and empannelled,
The Learned RECORDER proceeded to deliver his
charge to them. He said he was happy to be enabled to
inform them that, notwithstanding a considerable in-
terval had elapsed since tho last session, the bushaess
this session was not of a very heavy character; but at the
same time he was sorry to say there were some very
serious offences which they would have to inquire into;
there were, however, hardly any cases iu the calendar
which he thought it necessary to detain them upc n,
because it was not his practice to make
any observations upon a case unless there was sorao
legal difficulty involved in it which made it desirable that
some explanation should he offered about it. The facts
were for them to deal with, and if any unforeseen diffi-
culty should hereafter arise, the Court would be at baud
ready to give them every assistance. He found, ulac
looking over the calendar, that there were two charge.s
of murder, one of them the result of a dispute in a
brothel, and the other a charge against a mother of
having caused the death of her child by wilful strvation
and neglect. In the latter case, the woman charged sop-
peered to have been the mother of two children, one
of them seven years of age, and the other an
infant. In a case like this, where the woman was
married, the first obligation of supporting the offspring
of the marriage rested upon the husband of supplying
necessary food and shelter, and unless it could be shown
that the woman had the means within her reach of sup-
plying the wants of life, her husband would be responsible
to the law for the consequences of his neglect. In eh is
ease, however, no question of that sort was likely to
arise, because it appeared from the depositions that there
was ample food and clothing within her command if she
had chosen to use it. In the first place, then, all that
they would have to do would be to be satisfied that the
child died from want and exposure; and, secondly,
whether that want and exposure resulted from
the wilful neglect of the mother. The re
was a very serious case of stabbing or wounding, wi th
intent to murder, upon the high seas. In this case %Ivo
men were charged, but before they could return a tr uo
bill against the two they must be satisfied that the one
who did not actually strike the blow was conscious of
what the other was going to do, and assented to it.
There were some serious cases of forgery likely to corne
before them, but it was not necessary that he should, go
into the details of them. The great majority of the
other cases was, as usual, made up of common larcenies,
and they were of a very simple character. Now, it :had
occurred to some gentlemen who had sat upon the
graud jury that it was a great hardship, ti ,nd
incurred unnecessary expense, that gentlemen should be
assembled together every session to investigate th ese
petty charges, more especially as the vast proportion of
these cases had already undergone a preliminary inquiry
before
help police magistrate. In these cases ho could not
concurring with them that the intervention. of a
gentlemen whovd
grauditjuiin'yyowlaa scarcely necessary. It was not merely
only objection
that
great loss of time on the
was afraid, indeed he considerable t served on grand juries that was the
part of the
expoenthe system,
With that the intervention but it also involved
onto the prosecutors ; arid he
could say from experience,
some cases facilitated the
e
while, i
desireatfho t ht
gdefeatnn
witnesses,thteirl
done to partieshdthejureavds in
ustamaensd,
great keeping
justice, by tampering
bybills! enemies going
iagainst them upon
after attended
ituhsetmiceouNtvaosf thdso,
behind their backs and preferring
ex parte statements, which were some t
with succsss, without having previousryhgone before a
police magistrate. It was, however, for another
place to
decide whether it was desirable to call so
in"Y gentle-
men from their homes to attend on these grand ' urJy in-
quisitions, but he could not help believing that many of
the gentlemen who were compelled to lose their time in
this way might render more service to the public, and be
more usefully employed by being occasionally called
upon to serve on the common jury.
The grand jury were then dismissed to their duties,
and in a short while, several true bills having been re-
turned into Court, a jury was at once sworn, and the
trials proceeded with.

MARLBRO'-STREET( THIS DAY.)
ROBBERY BY A tiIIOPMAN.—.IO/112, Barret was broughtbefore Mr. Bingham charged with robbing his employer,
Mr. Peter Squire, chemist, 277, Oxford-street.
•
The prosecutor stated that in consequence of a cm-
_
n
municatiou made to him, that the prisoner was robbing
robbing
him, he on Saturday evening marked two ball
which he placed in the till iu the presence of a wltne3e.
About eleven o'clock the same night he lcoked in the
till and missed two of the marked half-crowns there-
from. Witness then went into the parlour, where the
prisoner was sitting with the other young men, and told
him he had missed some silver from the till, and
directed him to turn out his silver. Defendant then

pulled some silver from his waistcoat pocket, and
amongst it one of the marked pieces. He subsequently
took from his trowsers' pocket some more loose silver in
which was the other marked half-crown. Witness then
sent for a constable and gave him in charge.
Inspector Park, C division, said alter he bad entered
the charge on the sheet he read it over to the defendant,
who stated that he bad sold goods to the value of live-
pence, in payment for which he received a sovereign.
Not having sufficient change in the till be made up the
did'erence from his own pocket, and repaid himself from
the money in the till, and that was the only way he
could account for the two half-crowns being in his pos-
session.

The defendant said he wished to adhere to the same
statement now.

Mr. BINGHAM remanded the prisoner till Thursday
next.

SUSPECTED MURDER OF THE REV. J.
EVAIVS, OF THE WESLEYAN CONN.EC-
TION.

The neighbourhood of Banwell, Somerset, and the adjoin-
ing district, was on Saturdaythrown into great consterna-
tion, by the intelligence that Rev. J.Evans, a well-known
and much respected conference minister of the Wesleyan
connection, had been found dead in the road leading
from Blackford to Banwell, and that, from the peculiar
circumstances under which the body was found, there
were strong suspicions that his death had been caused by
unfair means. About two o'clock in the morning, as a
man named Chilcott, who is in the habit of bringing
butter, eggs, and other dairy produce to the Bristol
market, was coming along the road with his cart, his
attention was attracted by a horse and gig without a
driver, which had, been apparently drawn into a little
opening in the side of the road. He was rather surprised
at the circumstance, and looked carefully round to see
if the occupant had fallen out. He was not, however,
to be seen; but on searching the other side of the road,
the body of a man respectably dressed was found in a
dry ditch. His clothes were covered with mud, and in the
road were found various footmarks, as if a struggle had
taken place. A few minutes after the body was disco-
vered by Chilcott, another person named Charles Paddy
came up, and a more thorough inspection of the road was
made, when the Rev. Gentleman's mackintosh was dis-
covered some yards off, and apparently much trampled
on. An alarm was immediately given, and some la-
bourers were called up, when the body was identified as
that of a gentleman who had lately visited the house of
Mr. flardwich, in the neighbourhood, a local preacher.
Mr. Hardwich was accordingly called, and recognised
the body as that of the Rev. Mr. Evans. From the cur-
sory examination of the two men, Chilcott and Puddy,
no 4,wounds were discovered, but both the men were
quite positive that the appearance of the road indicated
that a severe and prolonged scuffle had taken place.
They found his whip in the middle of the road, also
trampled on, and his hat a considerable distance off.
The whole affair is at present enveloped in much mystery,
but a searching investigation into the case will be made
at the inquest. The Rev. Mr. Evans was well known
among the large and highly respectable body of Wes-
leyans of this city. He was a tall and stout man, and
about fifty years of age. In the neighbourhood where he
laboured ho had gained the affection and almost the
veneration of all around him, for his general kindness
of heart, urbanity, and true piety.—Bristol Mirror.

HORRIBLE AFFAIR AT GUILDFORD.
A most tragical event bas just come so light at Al-
bury, near this town. From the facts collected it ap-
pears that some time ago a man named Keene, who had
been in the on3ploy of the South-Eastern Railway Com-
pany, at Shelford station, married Jane Broomer, a na-
tive of Albury, who had, previous to her marriage, given
birth to an illegitimate child, the father of which, it i 3
stated, was a policeman. About ten months ago Keene
and his wife were walking together on the Downs, when
Keene took the child away, and, after an absence of
three-quarters of an hour, returned without the child,
saying to his wife she should never see it again. She
frequently asked her husband what he had done with the
child, which she at last appears to have elicited from
him, for she told her mother, a very aged woman, that
her husband had thrown the child alive down a well,
situate in the Warren, in the parish of Albury. The
old lady was horrorstruck, and communicated the matter
to one of her sons, who immediately proceeded to Guild-
ford and obtained the assistance of the police. They
proceeded to the well and a man descended, and on
reaching the bottom was horrified at finding the complete
skeleton of a child lying on its back, with one foot across
a small beam. He lifted up the body, but it fell to
pieces. He gathered up the bones and brought them to
the top of the well, whore they were taken possession of
by the police, who immediately made search and ap-
prehended Keene and his wife, and they now remain in
custody, awaiting the coroner's inquest, which will be
held in a day or two. The depth of the well was 180
feet. The child was about two years and half old when
thrown down the well