The Sun.
London, England, 1853-08-25 00:00:00

MURDER AND ATTEMPTED SUICIDE.

Yesterday afternoon, between two and three o'clock,
the inhabitants of Goodman's-fields, St. Botolph, Ald-
gate, City, were suddenly thrown into a state of great
excitement in consequence of a most dreadful and deli-
berate murder of a married female named Catherine
Mobbs, aged 46 years, by her husband, Nathaniel Mobbs,
aged 43, a wine cooper and porter, residing at No. 7,
Enoch- court, Goodman's-fields, Minories, who afterwards
cut his own throat with a table-knife.
The man Mobbs had been in the service of Messrs.
Walter Howell and Hale, the wholesale wine-merchants
of Water-lane, Great Tower-street, City, but for some
time past he has been leading a life of dissipation, and
while intoxicated he would return home in a state of
excitement, and cruelly ill-treat his wife. They had a
family of four children, two boys and two girls, the
eldest being about ten years of age. Mobbs went out
in the morning, and returned about half-past one in the
afternoon apparently quite sober, and told the children
to go out and play in the street, and nothing was
heard of the man or his wife until about a
quarter to three o'clock, when one of the landlord's
daughters who was sitting in the front parlour, heard a
cry of " murder," which was accompanied by a despe-
rate struggling noise in the first floor room. The girl
went on to the stairs to listen, when she met Mrs.
Mobbs rushing down with a frightful wound in the front
of her neck. Her hands were covered with blood, and
her dress was also saturated with gore. Mrs. Mobbs
reached the front of the house, and fell on to the stone
pavement, where several neighbours, who had been at-
tracted to the spot, raised her up and placed her in a
chair, while several persons ran for medical assistance.
By this time a young man named John Reader came to
the house, and was asked by one of the family to go up
stairs and see where the man Mobbs was, when a most
dreadful scene presented itself to his view. The man
was lying in a corner of the room with a severe wound
in the throat, and the flooring boards of the apartment
were literally covered with blood, which in some parts
had gushed on to the walls and boxes round the room.
There were two knives besmeared with blood lying on
the table, and a piece of grindstone, on which the hus-
band had sharpened the weapons before he cut his wife's
throat, and used the second knife on his own person.
The room was in a state of great confusion, as if the de-
ceased and the wretched man had struggled together for
several minutes.

Mr. Rawle, of the Minories, and another medical
gentleman, were soon in attendance, and no time was
lost by them in temporarily dressing the wounds ; but
such was their condition that it was deemed expedient
to place them in separate cabs, which was accordingly
done by city police constables 526 and 577, who conveyed
them to the London Hospital, where Mr. H. K. Deben-
ham, the house surgeon, rendered every possible atten-
tirn, but the female expired as she was being placed on
the surgery table. The man was sensible, but his wounds
were not so extensive, although the windpipe is partially
cut through. No hopes were given of his recovery when
he was first examined.
As the man was being carried to the cab he exclaimed,
•' I did it, I did it." The wound in the neck of the
female is very long and deep, extending from ear to
ear. The house surgeon ordered the body of the female
to be conveyed to the deadhouse, and the man, after
his injuries were dressed, was taken into the ward,
where he was placed under the care of two nurses and
a policeman of the city force.
Mobbs was a most desperate character, and was called
in the neighbourhood, among the lower class of persons,
" General Haynau."
Mobbs is a man about 40 years of age and a jobbing
wine-cooper by trade. His wife was of about the same
age. The children of the murderer were removed by
the city police to the unionhouse, where they will be
much better taken care of than they ever were during
the lifetime of their unfortunate mother. They appear
to have been most grievously neglected, and were the
objects of much sympathy. Their cries on hearing of the
horrible fate of their mother were most heartrending.

CREMORNE GARDENS.—The Scottish fetes, wb ich, for
some seasons past, have been successful in the metropo-
lis, when Lord Holland's Park was thrown open for
them, and royal patronage smiled upon them, are to be
repeated this year, and Cremorne has been the spot
selected for the representation of these favourite na-
tional sports and pastimes. The first of these fetes takes
place to-day, and doubtless large numbers of the Sens
and daughters of Caledonia will flock to these favourite
grounds to enjoy what to them will indeed be national
festivities. The advance of the season causes no diminu-
tion in the number of the patrons of this popular place
of entertainment, and yesterday an immense concourse
assembled to witness the aerial ascent by the Italian
brothers upon the double trapeze. The balloon ascended
very steadily at about seven o'clock, and the brothers
were seen hanging beneath the car, the one suspended
by one leg, and holding the other in one hand. A safe
descent, thongh of a somewhat novel character, took
place about nine o'clock in Kensington, where, guided
intrepid
freight the light of the gas, the balloon and its
freight reached terra firma quite securely.
ENFIELD.—The twelth estate purchased for allotment
amongst the shareholders of the Conservative Land So-
ciety has just been made, at the ancient market town of
Enfield, Middlesex, on the Eastern Counties Railroad,
close to the old edifice occupied by the Earl of Essex,
now used as the station. Enfield is remarkable for its
salubrity, the soil being gravel, and is celebrated as the
residence of Edward the Sixth, and afterwards of Queen
Elizabeth, who held their Courts at this place.
EAST INDIA HOUSE.—Yesterday a Court of Directors
was held at the East India House, when Major-General
William Staveley, C. 8., was appointed Commander in
Chief of the Company's forces on the Madras establish-
ment.
CAUTION TO TRADESMEN.—FORGED 5/. NOTES.—III•
formation has been received by the police of an exten•
sive issue of forged 5/. notes. The engraving of the
note is very good, and would deceive the most expe-
rienced judges, especially the Britannia in the corner ;
but the water-mark is badly executed, and appears to
have been impressed after the paper was made, and the
note has not that crispness of feel and whiteness of
colour so peculiar to Bank of England notes. The three
edges of the notes are cut, the other appears to have
been torn, and different to the usual fray-edges of the
genuine Bank of England 5L notes.
THE FOG.- During Tuesday night a dense fog, appro-
priate to November but unusual in August, settled down
in the valley of the Thames, and was the occasion of
much confusion and inconvenience, but fortunately not
attended with any accident. The above-bridge river
boats did not commence plying so early next morning as
usual, from the danger to navigation arising from the
i:penetrable mantle which hung like a shroud over the
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river. As the morning advanced the fog began gra-
dually to vanish, and before 10 o'clock it had disappeared
altogether, and e
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unhealthy state f
the atmosphere for some days, the fog was expected,
and created no surprise.
DOCKYARD AND SOMERSET-HOUSE CLERKS.—It is re-
ported that Sir .tames Graham is about to introduce a
new plan of appointing clerks to the Admiralty Depart-
ments of Somerset-house in future, which he considers
will prove highly beneficial to the service,—namely, by
promoting the hard-working dockyard clerks to that
establishment. It has long been our opinion that such
a system would prove of great advantage to the service,
and ought long since to have been adopted. A dockyard
is the place in which a newly-appointed Admiralty clerk
should certainly commence his official career.—Plymouth,
Mail.