The Sun.
London, England, 1847-03-29 00:00:00

ASSIZE INTELLIGENCE.
NORFOLK CIRCUIT.—Bury St. Edmunds,

March 27.

CROW COURT.—(Before Sir F. POLLOdIt.)
Catherine Foster. aged is, was arraigned upon an in-
dictment charging her with the wilful marder of her
husband, John Foster, by administei:ing to him arsenic.
_ _ .

at Acton, on the 18th of Novewber last.
Mr. Gurdon and Mr. Sanders were counsel for the
prosecution ; Mr. Power defended the prisoner.
This case, which has excited much public attention in
this and the adjoining c uuty of Essex, being specially
appointed for this day, the court was greatly crowded

Ceinre the usual hour. From the opening statement of
the Learned Counbei for the pros.,eution, and the evi-

•
dence of the witnesses called in support of it, the fol-
lowing narrative of .this domestic tragedy mi.•4l-it be
gleaned :—The deceased, who was an agrieultiv-al la
bourer, was a native of Acton, a small village near Sud•

bury, where also lived the prisoner, for whom, though
of no prepossessing appearance, he early in life con-
ceived a warm affection. They went to school together
in early youth, and worked together till r‘he went to ser-
vice at the age of 16, when his boyish penchant ripened
into manly love. During her absence he frequently

visited her, and matters progressed between them
In this way till the autumn of last year, when the pri-
soner being about to pay a visit to-her aunt at Paken-
ham, a village on the other side of Bury, and twenty
miles from Acton, the lover became most desirous that

the marriage should take place, possibly because, like all
lovers, he fancied that every man would fall in love with
thelady of his affections, and he might lose his prize. Be
that as it may, according to Mrs. Mu: ley's testimony, he
earnestly urged the propriety of his being at once mar-
ried, and promised that he would allow his bride to pay
her promised visit to her aunt as soon as bhe pleased
after the ceremony—all he wanted was to be married
at once ; and being backed in his suit by the prisonef,
the ceremony took place at Acton Church on the 28th
of October, after which the young couple took up their
abode in the house of Mrs. Morley, with whom was

then living, besides her daughter, arson, Thornm, aged'
three years. John Foster having thus gained the long-
cherished object of his heart, was as happy in the pos-
*session of his youthful wife as man could well be. On
the third morning they parted according to his promise.
He handed her into the carrier's cart, and bidding
adieu to her, asks d if " she thought she would stay all a
month?" To which she replied, " No, John, I'll be back

b. f,,re." After the lapse of ten days she returned to
her home, and her husbend's cup of happiness seemed
filled to overflowing. He was happy as the day was
long; worked with zeal, alacrity, and joyousness, in the
daily discharge of his " lot; in litc." He was then, as he
had ever been, according to one of the witnesses, " as
strong and blooming a young man as ever you seed;"
though he had, about a fortnight before, met with an ac-
cinent while loading a waggon of hay, but that had only
produced a slight headache, a thing which his friend as-
sured him would soon pass off—as he " often had it on
Mondays—after a day's rest." This remark was fully
verified. The deceased soon resumed his wonted cheer-

fulness and strength, and on the 17th of November re-
turned from work to his evening meal with his friend,
singing all the way to that house whence he never de-
parted alive. On his arrival he partook of supper with
his wife and her little brother, their homely meal con-
sisting of dumplings, potatoes, and tea. The mats had
no 'sooner partaken of his dumpling than he was taken
violently sick at the stomach, and obliged to go into the
yard. Soon after this his mother-in-law, who had been
out all day waehing, came home, and found him retching
violently in a basin, the contents of which she threw
into a neighbouring ditch, where some fowls were in
the habit of picking up their scanty subsistence.
During the whole of the night the poor man remained
in great pain; at tour o'clock he trit•O`to get up, but fell
down from weakness, and on the following morning his
wife went to Melford for a doctor, whom she told her
husband had got a " bowel complaint," and asked to
come and seehim that day. Deeming from her account
that his patient was suffering from English cholera, then
very prevalent, the surgeon prescribed eccordinely, and
the prisoner took away the medicine, some of which she
gave to her husbatsd. On her return she found him
worse than when she left him, and he finally died in her
arms at four o'clock, soon atter which
hour his mother
and the surgeon arrived. On the same day the fowls all
died, and a post-mortsm examinatiun of the body of the
deceased was made by Ir. Jones, of Melford. At
that time no suspicion was engendered, and that
gentleman gave it as his opinion that the deceased came
to his death from English cholera; but suspicion being
afterwards excited by the death of the fowls in a sudden
end mysterious way, a further and more searching in-
quiry was deemed necessary by the coroner, and the con-
tents of the stomach of the deceased were taken to Bury,
where they were subjected to analysis by Mr. Image and
Mr. Newham, who unhesitatingly pronounced the pre-
sence of arsenic in great quantities, not only in the sto-
mach and its contents, but also in the crop of the fowls,
and a pudding bag, in which the prisoner had boiled the
dumplieg of which the deceased had eatea the night
before his death. Under these circumstances recourse
was had to the family for further information, and it was
ascertained that the prisoner had spent the day with the
mother of her husband 6- very comfortably," from twelve
to four, when she stated that she " must go home, for it
was dumpling night."• Her brother was also called before
the coroner, when he stated that his sister had made one
dumpling for supper, of which they all partook. After-
wards, however, ,he varied his statement, and then,
as was stated to-day, deposed to having seen his sister
make two dumplings on the night in question, into
one of which she had put soma powder out of a
paper, after which she burnt the paper,•and put that
dumpling into a pudding-cloth. lie is also repre-
sented to have stated that he and his sister supped
off a different dumpling, and did not partake of the
dumpling of which the deceased ate. In addition to
this it was shown that after the unfortunate .occur-
rence the prisoner had stated that " she wished she
had gone to Bury before she had married, for then she
would not have been married at all, and would have got
a good place." This she stated on the day after her
return from Bury, and also on that after her hus-
band's death, when she had gone into a neighbour's
house in tears, and asked ;or leave to stay there
" while the doctor's opened John," which she could not
bear to witness These facts were for the most part
proved to-day, but the boy, when examined, though
he stated that he had seen his sister make the two
dumplings, and boil one for the deceased in a bag, de-
nied that he had seen her put any thing into it from her
pocket, or burn any paper, and insistede in saying, that
both his sister and himself, who had not exhibited any
symptoms of illness,.had partaken of the same dumpling
with the deceased.
On this subject Mr. Image and Mr. Newham both de-
posed, that if the deceased had taken the poison in that
dumpling, it was impossible that any one else could have
tasted it without experiencing great illness and danger to
life from it.
At the close of the case for the prosecution, which oc-
cupied the entire day.
. Mr. POWER addressed the jury on behalf of the pri-
soner, strongly commenting on the extreme improba
bility that a yang and recently married girl would per-
petrate so diabolical a crime as the murder of her 1-.us-
band. He contended that there was an utter absence of
'all motive on her part to commit such an outrage on
human nature ; and without direct proof that she had
bought any arsenic, er been known to be possessed of
any, the more reasonable inferen e was that the husband
must have taken the poison, of which it was impossible
to deny he was the victim, elsewhere that at his own
home, and at some other meal than the supper.
The CHIEF BARON most carefully and minutely went
over the whole evidence to the jury, pointing out to
them the peculiar features of the case, and calling their
attention to the facts which bore in favour of the
prisoner, as well as to those which went to support
the serious charge now under their consideration.
In his opinion it was not essentially necessary to
prove any motive in such a case, but it was for the
jury to say whether, utter all the circumstances which
had been deposed to, they were of opinion that the de
ceased had come by his death frem poison administered
to him in the dumpling at the supper prepared for him
by his wife. If they thought that propositien established,
the serious question was, by what means the poison Carat'
into that dumpling, of which, whatever the boy might
say, no one could believe that any one could have eaten
without feeling the ill effects of poison, as had been de-
posed to most unhesitatingly by two eminent surgeons
who had been examined to-day.
The jury retired for about twenty minutes to delibe-
rate, and after that time returned a verdict of Guilty.—
Sentence deferred.
The prisoner, who bad stood unmoved during the
whole trial, received the verdict of the jury with a slight
quivering of the lips ; but beyond that expression of
feeling, which was momentary, she exhibited not the
least emotion from the first to the last moment of the
inquiry which was fraught with such awful consequences
to her.

MIDLAND ClRCUlT.—Warwick, March 27.
This morning the Learned Judges, Mr. Baron Parke
and Mr. Justice Patteson, attended prayers in St. Mary's
Church; and at half past nine o'clock Mr. Baron Parke
took his seat on the bench at Nisi Prins. Mr. Justice
Patteson did not enter the Crown Court until eleven
o'clock.
There were 25 causes entered, and the calendar
enumerated no fewer than 82 criminal charges, or 114
prisoners for trial.
CROWN COURT.—(Before Mr. Justice PATTESON).
SENTENCE UPON 'WELCH, THE LATE TREASURER TO THE
BIRMINGHAM BOARD OF GUARDIANS.
At the conclusion of the Learned Judge's charge to
the grand jury,
as placed at the bar to
Yeomans Welch was
snit'tize.ceireiccKrrEsoN, addressing the prisoner, said
receive Josephj
sr . Justice
he was tried at the last assizes and convicted of embEz-
ziement; but doubts being entertained upon one or two
points of law, they were reserved for the consideration
of the judges. The judges were unanimously of opinion
that the evidence was properly received, and that the
offence did come within the meaning of the Act of Par-
liament, and that consequently the conviction was good.
Considering all the circumstances, it was his duty to pass
the sentence which Mr. Justice Coleridge said he should
have passed at the last assizes hrbd he tilt reserved the
points submitted by your Learned Counsel—that is, that
you be transported for ten years.
The prisoner, who has apparently suffered much in
body and mind siace the last assizes,. was then removed
from the ha. apparently in a state of stupef=ction.
ATTEMPT TO MURDER A WIFE.— - Bunney was
place d at the bar charged with cutting snd wounding his
wife with to kill, murier, disable, or
,do her some.
grievous bodily hat m.
The offence was stated to have b:en committed as far
back as the 24th 'of January, 1845. Ile was ainirehended
at the time,.but such was and has been the state of his
mind since that period. that it wnq i•ot deeri.ed proper
to put him upon his trial. ' . •
'io day,, whet] placcd at, tlio oar, coo pi.iQuaec pre-'