The Sun.
London, England, 1864-12-03 00:00:00

WHAT SHE HAS DONE.

By the arrival of the City of Baltimore at Liver-
pool we learn that the celebrated cruiser Florida,
lately seized at Bahia by the Federal war-ship
Wachusset, arrived at Fortress Monroe on the 11th
ult, in charge of a prize crew. Now that the career
of the Florida as a Confederate cruiser may be
said to be at an end, we append a list of her cap-
tures as showing " what she has done" since Jan.
16, 1863 :
January 16—Captured and burned the brigantine Estelle,
Captain Brown, from Santa Cruz, bound for Boston, with
cargo of molasses, dyewood, ; estimated value 100,000
dole.

January 22—Captured and burned brigantine Wind-
ward, Captain Roberts, from Matanzas, bOudd for Portland
with cargo of sugar and molasses, estimated value 60,000
dols. Same day, captured and burned brigantine Corissa
Anne, from Philadelphia, bound for Cardenas, with cargo
of shooks—estimated value, 40,000 dols. Same day, cap-
tured ship Jacob Bell, from Foo Chow for New York, with
cargo of tea, cassia, &o. ; estimated at 1.000,000 dole.
March 6—Captured and burned the ship Star of Peace,
Captain Hinckley, from Shanghai, bound for Boston ;
estimated value, 750,000 dols.

March 13—Captured and burned schooner Aldeseran,
Captain Hand, from New York for Maranham, with as-
sorted cargo ; value 25,000 dole.
March 28—Captured the barque Lapwidg, Capt. Boiger
from Boston to Batavia, with cargo of coal; estimated at
100,000 dole. Retained the vessel as a consort until her
coal was exhausted, and than burned her.
March 30.—Captured and burned the barque M. J. Col-
cord, from New York to Cape Town, with assorted cargo ;
valued at 70,000 dollars. _ _ .

. ,
April IT—Captured and burned the ship Commonwealth,
Captain Bl‘Clellan, from New York to San Francieoo, with
general cargo ; valued at 150,000 dollars.
April 23—Captured and burned barque Henrietta, from
Baltimore to Rio Janeiro, with general cargo; estimated at
50,000 dollars.
April 24—Captured and burned ship Oneida, from Shang-
hai to New York, with cargo of silks and teas; estirc.ated at
350,000 dollars,

May 6—Captured the brig Clarence, Captain Finney,
from Rie to Baltimore, with coffee; estimated at 40,000
dols. Lieut. Reed in this brig captured the Tacony, and
burned the Clarence and Caleb Cashing.
May 13—Captured and burned the ship Crown Point,
from New York for San Francisco, with a general cargo;
valued at 150,000 dols.

June 6.—Captured and burned the ship Southern Cross;
from Belle Yista to New York, with cargo of dyestuffs;
valued at 75,000 dollars.

June 11—Captured and burned the ship Red Gauntlet,
from New York for Shanghai, with coal, ice, &c.; valued
at 150,000 dollars.
June 16—Captured and burned the ship B. F. Hosie,
from Belle Vista to Falmouth, with a cargo of silver ore
and logwood ; valued at 275.000 dollars.
June 27.—Captured schooner Y. V. Hill, while fishing
Bonded this vessel for 10,000 dollars, and sent prisoners
home in her.

July 7—Captured ship Sunrise, from Now York to Liver.
pool. Bonded her for 60,000 dole.
July B—Captured and burned the brigs W. B. Nash and
Rienzi, bound from New York to Pfiaranhatu ; valued at
38,000 dole.

August 6—Captured the ship F. B. Cutting, from Liver-
pool to New York, with 250 passengers; bonded the ves-
sel for 40,000 dole.
August 20—Captured and burned the ship Anglo-Saxon,
from Liverpool to New York, with coal ; valued a
100,000 dole.

August 23-IVcnt into Brest for repairs. From this data
no latitu les or longitudes were taken.

The Florida loft Brest on February 10, 186
and made no captures until the following

March 29—Ship Avon of Boston, burned.
May 18—.chooner G. Latimer, of Baltimore, burned.
June 17—Brig William Clark, of Boston, burned.
July I—Brig H. Stevens of New York, burned.
July B—Whaler Conoordia, 1,880 barrels of oil, burned.
July 9—Schooner Margaret Davis and barque Greenland;
burned.

July 10—Barques General Berry, Belinda, and Howard,
burned.

July 10—Steamer F.:lv:trio Spark, sunk at sea.
August 22—Ship Southern ilightP, bonded for 35,000
dole. ; and barque Mordarnin, burned.
From the latter date the Florida made no cap-
tures, and, after cruising about for some time,
went into Bahia Bay for coals and repairs, and was
there captured as already stated.

Sir Edward and Lady Head and Mrs Lane Fox
are among the visitors to Mr Baring, Mir,, at Norman
Court, near Stockbridge.

The Wa.

:ystery,

Seven years have elapsed since a startling announcement
was made that a horrible murder had been committed in
London, and that an attempt had been made to conceal it
under circumstances of an unusual character. It was said
that some boys who were out in a boat on the Thames had
found on one of the abutments on the western side of Water-
loo-bridge a bag which contained the bones of a human
body. with a suit of clothes, which, when examined, led to
the conclusion that a man, moving in a respectable sphere
of life, had been barbarously murdered, his body roughly
hewn to pieces by unprofessional' hands, and the bag con-
taining the bones let down over the parapet of the bridge
with the intention that they should sink in the river and be
no more heard of, The bag, instead of going into the
water, rested upon the abutment, and was so found by the
boys, who handed it over to the police. Various rumours
were in circulation at the time in reference to the persons
who had been seen on the bridge, and who were suspected
of having dropped the bag, but nothing conclusive was
ascertained, and the matter at length subsided, although
I the most diligent inquiries had been made by the
police. Last August the subject was revived by a letter
which was published in some of the papers from Mr.
Irwin, of Dublin, who gave the initial letters of the names
of four persons who, as he imagined, were im-
plicated in this matter, three of them being suspected of
making away with the fourth, who had mysteriously disap-
peared under circumstances which he very fully and some-
what plausibly detailed, Application was made to the
authorities at Scotland-yard that the bag in which the bones
had been deposited and the clothing might be sent to Vic•
toria (Aussralia), in order that the wife of the missing man
might see them, with a view if possible to their identifica-
tion as the property of her husband. That request, how-
ever, could not be complied with in the face of stringent
police regulations. It was also considered that the descrip-
tion would be sufficient to serve first purposes, and that, if
the articles were identiled, the detective officers might be
instructed to bring over any persons whose evidence they
might suppose would tend to further more detailed inquiries.
To make the matter perfectly clear, it may be mentioned
that Mr Irwin, in his letter, expressed his conviction that
the supposed victim was a man named R--, who had
gone out from England to Australia some time prior to the
occurrence, and had amassed a large sum of money. lle
left his wife and child in Australia, and carne back to Eng-
land, bringing with him securities of the value of
£1,400, for which he received the money. At that time
he was living in the house of one W--, in a street
leading out of the Strand, not far from Waterloo-
bridge. R-- remained there a short time, and all at once
he disappeared, and this was about the date of the finding
of the bag of bones and clothes, Mr Irwin's letter also re-
ferred to parties with the initials S. and N. as having had
something to do with the monetary transactions of It-.
The circumstantial character of Mr Irwin's allegations ne •
cessitated in the minds of the authorities at Scotland-yard
further and minute inquiries in the direction pointed out,
and the matter was entrusted for investigation to one of the
most experienced officers of the detective force. The officer
ascertained in the first place that just antecedent to the time
of the discovery a man named Woolfe lived at 15, Arundel-
street, Strand, which was then a private hotel, and about
that time a person of the name of Ratcliffe came there to
see him. Ratcliffe remained at the hotel as a resident for a

few days, and while there Woolfe took the house No. 10 in
the same street. During this period of their acquaintance-
ship Ratcliffe told Woolf 'e that he had some Tasmanian de-
benture bonds, upon which he was to receive the interest
in the City, and that he wished to turn the bonds into
money. It appears that Woolfe himself did not want to
buy them, but ho introduced Ratcliffe to a man of the name
of Sinnett, who was understood to be a dealer in securities
and bills, but he did not require them ; and he in his
turn introduced Ratcliffe to one Nathan, who purchased
the bonds, paying the amount in Dank of England notes to
to Ratcliffe, who almost immediately afterwards departed,

no one knowing what had become of him. Three months
later, however, as the detective officer has since ascertained,
Ratcliffe opened an account with the Commercial Banking
Company, at Livsrp'ol, and deposited a considerable sum
of money, doubtless the produce of the sale of the bonds,

and after a short interval he withdrew his balance, for the
purpose, as he stated, of going to America. From that day
to the present nothing further is known of hire. The iden-
tity of the man Ratcliffe, who lived with Iv oolfe in Arundel-
street, and who was imagined by Mr Irwin to be the victim
of the Waterloo-bridge tragedy, with the man Ratcliffe,
who, three months afterwards, was at Liverpool, was proved
by a comparison of the signature of the Tasmanian bonds
with that on the books of the Commercial Banking Com•

pany. It is has also been ascertained that Woolfe, having
left England for Australia, died in that colony about three
years since. The result of this investigation entirely puts
an end to the grave suspicions which Mr Irwin's letter not
unnaturally raised, and leaves still undiscovered the perpe-
trator of a crime which at the time created a profound
sensation on the public mind.