The Sun.
London, England, 1851-09-12 00:00:00

MILITARY DESERTERS.

(Circular Memorandum.)
Horse Guards, Aug. 19.
In consequence of the diversity of practice and in-
efficiency of the existing methods of marking the deser-
ter with the letter D, and it being found in many in-
stances that the mark has become obliterated in a short
time, and even been removed by artificial means, it has
been decided that from the Ist of October next this part
of the sentence of the court-martial shall be inflicted, in
all cases where practicable, in the military prisons, by
the medical officer attached to each of those establish-
ments, and under special instructions from the Secre-
tary-at-War.
Under this improved system it is expected that this
important part of the sentences of courts-martial will be
duly and effectually carried out.
Offenders sentenced to imprisonment and who are also
to be masked with the letter D, will, therefore, in all
cases be committed to a military prison, in order to this
part of their sentence being inflicted.
This rule applies Equally to all deserters so sentenced,
whether the individual is ultimately to be discharged the
service or nor, although such prisoners may not be liable
to be retained in the military prison for a longer period
than may be deemed sufficient to render the mask

Soldiers, however, who are to be marked with the
letter D and sentenced to transportation without previous
imprisonment, or belonging to corps stationed in districts
where there may not be a military prison, are to be so
marked at their regiments as heretofore.
In order to ascertain how far a permanent impression '
has been obtained, a record is to be kept at the prison,
showing the date on which the offender is marked, and
the state of the mark when he quits the prison, and re-
ports thereon are to be made periodically to the War-
office from the several military prisons. An animal re-
turn is also to be transmitted on the Ist of January in
each year to the War-office by regiments, and depots
showing the names of all soldiers who have been so
marked in the military prisons, and the state of the mark
at the date of the return being rendered.
As the u,,w arrangemvnt will comineece on the Ist of
October next, a return for the quarter to the 31st of De-
cember, 1851, is to be rendered to the War-office.
(By command)
G, Dlows, Icijatant•Gteneral. J

NG-, SEPTEMBE

POLICE INTELLIGENCE;

LAMBET g.

Yesterday Robert Turner appeared before Mr.
Elliott to answer to a summons charging him with
assaulting Thomas Huntley.
The complainant stated that on Saturday last the
defendant, after keeping his wife from her home for
two whole nights and days, came to his house and
acknowledged, even in the presence of her children,
that he had carried on an adulterous correspondence
with her for six years past. This disclosure of course
exasperated him, and at the moment he was so excited
that he struck at his wife, upon which the defendant
gave him a violent blow on the left eye and walked
away with his wife.
The complainant called as a witness his own child,
a girl of ten years of age, who said she heard the whole
of the disgusting abuse between the parties, and saw
the defendant strike her father in the eye.
The defendant, in reply to the charge, said that the
complainant had agreed, in the presence of witnesses
whom he could produce, to sell him his wife for a pot
of beer ; and, taking him at his word, he cried,
"done," and they had the pot of beer together, after
which Mrs. Huntley, of course (as he expressed it),
left her husband and went with him. _ _

Mrs. Huntley, who stood behind the defendant,
and whom, up to this time it was found difficult to
restrain from interrupting the proceedings, here burst
forth and declared the statement of the defendant was
perfectly true. Her htfsband, she said, had regularly
disposed of her, and therefore she was not going to
have anything more to say to him.
Mr. ELLIOTT remarked that a more disgusting or
profligate case, or one more disgraceful to the whole
of the parties concerned in it, had never come before
him. The defendant had struck the complainant
without any just provocation, and for that assault he
must pay 103. and expenses, or be imprisoned for ten
days.
It subsequently appeared that while the parties
were in attendance at the court the wife of Turner,
the defendant, called in a broker, to whom she sold
the whole of the goods and started off with the
amount.