The Sun.
London, England, 1847-10-09 00:00:00

THE SWINTON MURDER.

SHEFFIELD, THIIRSDAY.—The third adjourned in-
quest respecting the murder of Caleb Barker, late a
warehouseman in the employ of Mr. Samuel Barker,
of the Swinton Pottery, was held last night before
Mr. Badger, one of the coroners for Yorkshire, at the
Canal Tavern, Swinton-bridge.
The last adjournment took place in order to give
time to the coroner to apply to Sir G. Grey, Secre-
tary for the Home Department, for an order to have
Sellars, the man to whom suspicion attaches as the
person who committed the murder, brought before
the Swinton jury for examination, and also to see
whether he could be identified as the person who was
seen in the neighbourhood on the night of the 4th of
September, where the assassination was perpetrated.
Sellars was last week committed to York Castle to
take his trial on two separate charges unconnected
with the murder, but the magistrates of Sheffield, on
being applied to, refused to allow him to be brought
before the coroner and the jury. Upon the assem-
bling of the jury, some formal evidence was gone
into, but no new facts connected with the affair
transpired.
The CORONER, in addressing the jury, said—ln
pursuance of a request which the jury had made to
him at the last inquiry, he had written to the Secre-
tary of State, Sir G. Grey, giving a statement of the
whole of the details connected with the present pro-
ceedings, and enclosing copies of the depositions
which had been taken at the previous investigations,
and requesting that he (Sir G. Grey) would order
the prisoner Sellars to be brought before him. The
following was the reply which he had received.
" Whitehall, Sept. 25.
" Sir,—l am directed by Secretary Sir George
Grey to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the
24th instant, and its inclosure, and to inform you
that the Secretary of State has no authority to order
the person referred to in your letter to be brought
before the jury, at the inquest which you are holding
on the body of Caleb Barker.—l am, &c.

" DENIS LE MARCHANT.
" T. Badger, Esq., Coroner for Yorkshire."
He (the Coroner) very much regretted that the ma-
gistrates should have acted as they had done on the
present occasion, in not allowing the prisoner to be
brought before them, because it was a course which
he considered was calculated to impede the ends of
justice.

The jury then retired to consider their verdict, and
after about half an hour's absence the foreman handed
in the following written verdict :
" The jury find, that on the evening of the 4th of
September last, Caleb Barker was brutally beaten with
some heavy weapon, and his skull severely fractured by
some person or persons to the jurors unknown, in
consequence of which the said Caleb Barker died on
the following morning. The jury have to express their
strong conviction, that if the Sheffield magistrates
had not, as they conceive, improperly interfered and
prevented a party strongly suspected of the murder
being brought before them, they would have now been
in a position to return a different verdict. They are
of opinion that the ends of justice are defeated by col-
lisions between the Coroner and the magistrates as to
the question of jurisdiction, the county put to addi-
tional expenses, and also that inquiries of this nature
should not be conducted in the compulsory absence of
the implicated or suspected parties.
" JOHN WOOD, Foreman.

" Swinton, Oct. 6."

The CORONER asked if the jury were unanimous,
and they replied in the affirmative.
Mr. Wood said, before the parties left the room he
was desired by the jury, to make the following state-
ment, which they had intended to have appended to
their verdict :

"The jury cannot but express their surprise at
finding an impediment thrown in the way of eliciting
information respecting a.crime of no less magnitude
than midnight assassination, should have come from
that quarter to which they conceive they have a right
to look for the maintenance of every facility for the
protection of both life and property."
The inquiry then terminated.