The Sun.
London, England, 1848-02-08 00:00:00

must be a very bad one, for the complaints made to
me against it by the poor are tt n times as numerous
as those against any of the other unions.
11r. Harvey (the City Police Commissioner) said,
" this case is of greater public importance than the
facts stated upon it are capable of disclosing. I have
received many applications from bankers and mer-
chants for protection against the growing system of
window breaking, and I have been most anxious to
learn the cause of such outrages as have been daily
occurring. Yesterday I visited all our station-
houses, and upon arriving at the station-house in
Bow-lane I heard great noise and confusion, which,
I was told, proceeded from six women who had been
placed in charge by one of the officers connected
with the Cannon-street Union, and who were so
outrageous and furious that the policemen were
obliged to put handcuffs upon one of them, and
to threaten to restrain the rest of them in like
manner. I considered it to be my duty to see the
women, and I spoke to them upon the subject, and
was listened to with quiet and respectful attention.
My conviction is, that if these poor creatures were
kindly treated, your Lordship would not be so much
annoyed by the complaints against the City of Lon-
don Union, and the outrages described would no
longer be perpetrated. The cause of this evil I must
say I can trace to nothing but the conduct of the
officers of the Unions, particularly of the city of
London Union, for when the unfortunate creatures
go to the relieving officers for relief, they do not re-
ceive the order of admission till an advanced hour of the
day, and then they are obliged, exhausted and worn
out, to walk a distance of four miles to Peckman,
before they get a morsel of bread. In fact, the
officers of the city of London Union do all they can
to abate the number of applications, by rendering
them as disagreeable as possible to the persons
making them. I hope and believe that this state-
ment, which I cannot help making thus publicly be-
fore your Lordship, may reach the ears of those to
whom the great responsibility attaches. These outrages
are being incessantly perpetrated, and the unkindness
with which those necessities oblige them to apply for
relief are treated is the positive cause. When an indi •
victual asks for relief, it is the duty of the officers ap-
pointed to give it, to ascertain the wants and claims of
that individual, and to administer it without the ac-
companiment of an insult. The relieving officer,
however, adopts a course calculated to throw the
trouble of dealing with the refractoriness resulting
from their own severity, upon the police, to whom
they hand over the poor person who may dispute their
authority, to do as they please with the distresses of
others. It is time to administer a check to such pro-
ceedings, and to prevent the relieving officers from
looking to the police and to the magistrate, to save
them the trouble of properly and humanely
performing their duty. It is right that they
should know that if they do not perform
their duty with kindness and humanity they
must not expect any assistance from the police.
It is manifestly the duty of the relieving officers to
inquire into the cases of those who ask for relief, and
to grant the relief if the application is found to be
legitimate, with promptness, kindness, and humanity,
instead of postponing for hours the granting of orders,
and then sending the miserable objects four miles off,
before they are to receive a morsel of bread. If the
duties of the relieving officers were performed in the
manner I have stated, you may depend upon it, my
Lord, that you would have nothing of this system of
window breaking, which entirely proceeds from the
exasperated instinct of insulted poverty."
Here there was a murmur of approbation from the
crowd assembled in the police-room.
Mr. Lloyd said he felt exceedingly awkward under
such circumstances as those represented by the City
Police Commissioner. He was under distinct orders,
which those who employed hint would not permit
him to deviate from. He uniformly granted orders
to the female applicants without delay, but it was
considered necessary by the authorities to postpone
the granting of orders to the men until two o'clock,
for reasons connected with the cleanliness and free-
dom from disease of the establishment. He began
his business of passing to Peckham at ten o'clock in
the morning, and continued to the latest hours, as
would be seen by his books, and it was a rule with
him never to refuse an order to a woman.

The defendants said the relieving officer had refused
them repeatedly, and most offensively.
One of the police stated that he had frequently
been present when Mr. Lloyd refused to give orders
before two o'clock, and that there were crowds of ap-
plicants waiting about the house, culd, and in evident
distress, on these occasions.

Mr. Lloyd—l am obliged to obey the directions of
those who employ me, and I treat the poor with all
possible kindness, but women of this description it is
quite impossible to deal with.
The LORD MAYOR—It is, indeed, evident that we
owe these numerous and alarming acts of outrage to
the conduct of the City of London Union. The
least I can say of that union is that it is singularly
unfortunate, for I have fifty complaints against it for
one against all the rest. A vast deal depends upon
the management of the poor, and I believe that
Cannon-street and Peckham operating together in the
manner described is the cause of the mischief. It is
a system of experiments made to ascertain the most
complete way of relieving themselves from the trouble
of relieving the poor.
One of the women accused was then charged with
having kicked one of the police in a most dangerous
manner while he was conveying her to the station.
The LORD MAYOR required that each of the
defendants should find bail to the amount of 51., the
relieving officer having sworn that he apprehended
danger to his life from their violence; and directed
that the City 'solicitor should prosecute Mary Phillips
the woman who kicked the policeman. His Lordship
concluded by emphatically calling upon the authori-
ties of the City of London Union to remedy withott
further delay, an evil which they bad allowed to reach
a fearful magnitude.

When the six females were ordered to be taken back
to prison, they turned upon the police, and a violent
scuffle took place in the narrow bar of the justice-
room, between the constables and their prisoners, and
long after the latter were locked up in the cage, they
continued to scream and bellow through the building,
and to curse the magistrates, and the police, and the
poor-laws, in language the most revolting.
BOW-STREET.

Henry Voller, a footman in the service of Dr.
Fincham, 5, Spring-gardens, was charged with
stealing a silver spoon and 2/. 11s, from a dresser in
the kitchen.

The servant girl in the house finding, on getting
up, that the contents of the dresser had been strewed
about the kitchen, and one of the windows open,
aroused her master, who came down stairs to see
what was the matter. As the footman slept in an
adjoining apartment, he was questioned upon the
subject, when he said he heard some one in the
house, but was afraid to get up. The prosecutor
disbelieving his story, caused his bed to be searched
and the spoon and the money were found therein
upon which he was given into custody.
Mr. lIALL committed him for trial.
MARYLEBONE.

The Rev. Dr. Spry, the rector of St. Marylebone,
attended before Mr. Broughton, the sitting magis-
trate, in order to make a statement with regard to a
shameful system of fraud and imposture which had
recently been brought under his notice.
The Rev. Gentleman briefly set forth the particu-
lars of his complaint, which was, that certain parties
had been in the habit of sending letters to the nobility
and gentry, purporting to be signed by him, and
vouching for the truth of the allegations contaked in
the said documents relative to the distressed condi-
tion of the applicants for assistance.
Some letters and other papers produced by the Rev.
Gentleman were handed over to an officer of the court
by Mr. BROUGHTON, who directed that they should
be shown to the officers of the Mendicit♦ Society,
which course of proceeding might probably have the
effect of tracing out the guilty parties and bringing
them to justice. _