The Sun.
London, England, 1806-04-19 00:00:00

OLD BAILEY.

-THIRD-DAY---FRIDAY, APRIL 18.
Met Mack, a Serjeant• belongint.; to the 38th
• Regiment, of -Foot, was capitally indiaed for the
murder of Timothy Kirby, on the 24th March last.
- The Prisoner, along with an Officer, Corporal,
and-2a men of the same Regiment, took charge of
I'6 deserters at fichester to escort them to- London,
ainons whom was the deceased. From the evidencey
of Thomas Lee and John Cdoke, two of the desert-
ers, it appeared that they had been- brought from
_ -Ireland; by Chester; and having marched from Il-
cheter to iNlOrthampton, they there halted, and
While the Officer sought the gaoler, the 'men grum-
bled at .not, getting-their alloWances; the Prisoner
damned them for a pack of Irish rebels, saying
they should be all put to death, and swore he would,
have the deceased's life, calling him a deserter ;
the latter retorted the charge against him. , The
next day they reached...ll.vport Pavel.; on Satur-
day they marched to , St. Alban's-; and on Sun-
day arrived 'at Barnet:. In going thi-ough the
Chalk Hills, near Dunstable, the Prisoner and
the deceased had some . more . high and abusiYe
words, mutually accusing each other "of desertion,
The 'Prisoner'drew back, held up his halbert, and
swore he would' run the deceased through; the Cor-
poral laid hold of him to prevent him, and he was
then ordered by the Officer, 'into the front. The
sixteen deSerters were handcuffed two and two, and
were 11r:welted the whole-way in that order, with a
rope tied to -the two in front, Which, passed along
the line to the rear,:so that they were-all, it may be
,said, tied to:each other, the soldiers with fixed bay-
onets marching at each side. -They had had no- re-
freshment from the- mid-day of • Saturday- till the
same hour on Sunday. :When they came to Bar.
net, all halted opposite the Red Lion public-house,
end the Officer asked Who halted them,? when they,
answered, • that he had-promised to halt them there
for that day; he, however, commanded them to
go on, and he should stop at the next public-house
on the road; but finding he did not do so, They
halted again, without orders ; the Officer again de-
sired they should go on till they game to. Highgate,
but the deceased and three others declared they wee
unable to proceed without some refreshment, At
that-thOment the Prisoner came up, and the witnesses
heard high' words pass between him and- the de-
ceased, and the lie. and liar were received and re-
torted ; when the Prisoner, who had before carried
his halbert on his'right shohlder, raised it in both.,
his hands, and struck the deceased a violent blow on
the head with ,the guard of it; he made several at-
tempts-to take it out of the skull before he could
force it away, carrying with' it the hat, which he
had cut through. The deceased called out, that he
was killed; begged his hand-cuffs might be taken off,
and his wife and child, who were behind, sent for.
After a surgeon had seen him, and dressed his
. ivatmd, he was conveyed to town in a cart, and
left at the Savoy prison, where he languished till
the following ThOrsday morning, and then died.
The testimony of theSe witnesses, so far as it re-
lated to,the transactions at Barnet, were corroborated
by the evidence of Thomas .Webb, an „inhabitant,
and Walter Smith, the headborough of that place ;
the former in describing the manner in which the
blow was given, said it was done in the same w„ay
initaler would fell'an Ox.
- Robert gaundert, a post boy, who drove jhe cart
with the deeeged into London, said, that he lay
quite insensible, with his head in. his wife's lap, the
whole way, -Ivhile' she endeavoured' to manage the
ch-dci at the same time.;
Mr. Walter -.Morrison, 4 Stirgeon, of garnet,
proved the:nature 'of t he- -Wound ; the blow had pe-
netrated therskull about an inch, and entered, the
,brain, mart of Which. wasexuding from the wound,
Which. he thdught Nety .dangerOus;-and told the Of-
ficer

Mr. Henry Worthless, Surgeon, of the Savoy,
'stated, that the deceased appeared very, well on the
fc)lowing Tuesday- and Wednesday morning, but
grew'W-.Ol"Se toWards night, and died on Thursday
niPrning; he.operre.d the head and examined it, and
had, no doubt but the deceased had died in conse-
quence of the .wound.

Peggy Kirby; alias-Moor, the utthippy widow of
the,deCeased, proved his death.
'The PriSono being Called upon for hii defence;
slated; othav-sphen he - took charge of the deCeased
and-the other deserters, he was informed .that they
'were a dangerous =set of men; and had.endeavoured
to break out of Staftbrd Gaol, and this made him the

more .cautiou4. The deceased, and one Cooke,
were eery refraaory the whole march, and when
they,got to Barnet, the deceased pulled the rope,
made the rest stop, and used very abusive language
to the Prisoner, and ran hear four yardS out of his
ranks to strike. him ; upon, which he rose his hal-
bert, merely intending to give him a blow with the
woodenpart of it, but the deceased drew hack, by-
which the-steel part fell on his head, and made the
wound.

Thomas Wilson and Charies Gilbert, -t‘vo of the
soldiers, who escorted- the deserters along with the
Prisoner into town, in part corroborated this-defence,.
is to the refradory conduct: of the deceased, and the
manner_in which .the bloW Was.o-°iven: They were
on their march back to Litchfield when the Prisoner
was arrested by a Bow-street Officer.
. Lieut.Hain' Wiltshire, who commanded the
escort, deposed much to the same effei,i, but did not
say that he saw the deceased attempt a blow at the
Wisoner; before the latter 'truck him With the hal-
bert. • He; had received the Prisoner as a volunteer
from- the Lancaster -Militia, an 4, from the good
chaFaCter giVen of him,- he was soon.after appointed
serje...mit. He had been at the Isle of Wight, and
.got leave 91abSente, but was taken up,..a Suspicion.
9'llaVing iriseit'that his pass Was a forgery. This gave
rise-to the 'report of his being a deserter.
- Lord -EatNttonouoir, in surruning up the evi-
dence obserVed, that the question was, whether the
aet was innocent or justifiable, and if it was capable
of explanation as to reduce the Malignity ? It
was natural to use all necessary means, to pre-
gerve due -.subordination on the march. If any dis-
turbance Ercke but 6' any leutinous cOndud ap-
peared;,oe Offi .
Officer would be warranted in taking
every means of'-quelling and if the force .ex.-
ceeded the *proVocation giVen; or unnecessary

, .
severity was resorted to, in either case the party
was'guilty of manslaughter only'; but if the Jury,
believed-be--had clothr the aa, harbouring in his
mind a malignant and a pre-coneived purpose of
malice, in order to Wreak his'engeranee upon the
Obj•ea of his" hatred, then it' would be the duty of
the Jury to find iiini gUilty of the capital crime of
Murder.

The Jury retired for about twenty minutes, and
then returned a Verdid of Guilty (if Manslaughter,

CLERK.ENIVELL SESSIOI\S.

Yesterday'two men of the names of Sullivan and
Atkins were indiCtecl forfora miSdemeanour, in break-
ing open_ the,coach4louse, of Lord. Donally, with an
intent to steal. It appeared ,from the evidence of
his' Lordship's coachman,' that in the latter end of
last month' he 'was informed that his Lordship'S
,coach-house, situated in Quebec-street, was-broken
open. He went there immediately, and found the
two Prisoners in it : One of them, Atkins,, he seized;
and the other haying% escaped, was apprehended a
few days .after by a B-ow-strecit. Officer, who' knew
both_ the Prisoners to be reputed thieves. One of,
them. had been transported, and the other was some
time back convieted as a rogue and vagabond.
The Jury instantly found them Guilty, and they
were sentenced by the Court to be imprisoned for
two years each in the House of Correaion:

A striking instance of the fertility of a drained
bog :--- '

• ' About. nine years ago Lord CREWE granted an
improvuig lease of an estate in Madeley, in the
County of Statibrd, to Messrs. ELKINGTONS, the ce-
lebratect drainers. It. consisted of about '5OO-acres
of land, 300 of which was 'a bog so thoroughly un-
sound, that neither man or beast could go upon it.
About half of it has been already-drained and brought
,into a state of cultivation: The craps of turnips
that have been raised upon it, both of the common
and the Swedish sort, have.been remarkably good.
These have" been fed off by cattle' and sheep. In
t 4 succeeding crops. Mr; ELKINGTON has had to
contend with an unusual sort of difficulty, arising
from the too great luxuriance of the soil. Not-
' withstanding every precaution, by sowing.less than
half the. usual quantity of seed 4 the barley crops
have been sa luxuriant, and the. bulk :of straw so
great, that it has been uniformly laid. - -Of .course
the quality of the grain has been thereby greatly in-
jured,
,and the clover and grass seeds, sown with the
_barley, -completely smothered and destroyed. Air.
ELKINGTON, therefore, has been reduced to the ne-
cessity of attempting ' to render his land more pro-
fitable by means of exhausting crops. ..
Last year he raised ten acres of hemp, and sowed
' grass seeds with the hemp, which has fully answered,
all his expectations. The, hemp crop was a good
one, and his root of grasses is now, from its uncom-
monly flourishing state, the admiration of.the neigh-
bourhood. With the same object in view, Mr. EL-'
KINGTON has been induced to reduce hi - soil by
sowing successive crops of oats upon land that bad
borne two 'previous crops of oats without any ma-
pure :. be got last year. the astonishing produce of one,
hundred and seventy-four' bisheis of good oats from
five bushels: and eleven quaits of seed, sown broad I
Cast. This extraordinary return has been made from-1
lapd that, seven years ago, was not worth one shil- 1
ling per acre! ! ,

Tom PAINE.—We stated some time ago that an
attempt had been made to assassinate foal PAINE,
at his house near New ROchelle,•iti the State of New
• York. In one of.the last American Papers wel-find
the following account of the transgtion, Which, as
iCStrongly- resembles some of the circumstances of
the s'hocking.murderof Mr. BLIGHT,. we think will
not be uninteresting to our-Readers : -
" On Christmas Eve, while a Mulatto Woman
(tile only servant in PAINE'S employ) was alone in
the house, a gin) was discharged into the window of
the apartment on the ground floor in which PAINE
usually sat. PAINE was absent.' The wadding, or
paper (without ball or shot) entered, in-an oblique
direetion, into the board or siding of the house, but
did not injure the.plaistering. The servant related
the transadion to PAINE, who received it without
emotion, and even neglected to make any farther in-
quiries. On the third night-after the first shot had
been "fired, while PAINE was sitting with a young
man of the neighbourhood, a gun was dis-
charged under or near the window, two balls from.
.which paSsed between PAINE and the-young man,,
and lodged in the partition of the apartment On the-
opposite side. Two months after, a man- who had
lived with PAlNli4ltillg the summer was appre-
hended on tlw Oath OiTAINE, as the person suspe&-
ed of the attempt, and is held to bail to answer the
charge." .

It having been inserted in . a Morning Paper, of
Friday, that a considerable, quantity of Coculas In-
dicus, Cardamon Seeds, Guinea Pepper, Honey, and
other _ingredients, to .be employed in the adultera,
tion of. Malt Liquor, 'had been seized in a .Brew-
house in the' Borough, we are authorized to state,
for the satisfadion of the Public, that the seizure
did not take place in any of the old *established
Breweries, but in' one of those which have been
lately formed, and make such strong professions of
Brewing ,Genuine Beer from Malt and Hops only.
It seldom happens, from the variety of opinions
that govern public ,Sentiment, that a matter gains
universal . approbation. One of these rare occur-
rences, however, is the censtmaion of the present
Lottery Scheme, since .among its numerous very
striking featlires, that of not confining the immense
number (no less than abOVe six thousand) of its
lesser prizes to any fixed days of drawing, but mak-
ing them pervade the entire 4rmiring, has justly me-
rited the assent and approbation of adventurers in
creneral.

A Nabob in. India, who was bald-pated, issued
a' Mandate, requiring
„all Officers and Soldiers of
his 'Army to have the crown of their heads con-
stantly shaved, in the exa& form of his own bald-
ness; .and, in order that the most perfe& uniformity
might be produced, he appointed, by Patent, the
most celebrated Artists in that professional line to
dire& and -superintend the due execution of that
important operation.