The Sun.
London, England, 1851-11-21 00:00:00

WORSHIP-STREET.

James Chalmers, a haggard, emaciated-looking
man, stated to be very respectably connected, was
brought up before Mr. Hammill, charged with the
following determined attempt at self destruction.
Baker, a - constable of the H division, stated that
while on duty in the Hackney-road, between ten and
eleven o'clock in the evening of Wednesday se'nnight,
the prisoner advanced towards him with a staggering
gait, and, thrusting a piece of paper into his hand,
instantly dropped senseless to the pavement. On
perusing the paper •ho found it to contain the
words, " I have poisoned myself. Take me,
if you can, when I am dead, to Norwood-
Place Hackney-road." The prisoner, who had
several letters . clutched tightly in his hand
at the time he fell, was, with the assistance of several
by-passers, raised from the ground and carried into
the shop of an adjoining chemist, who succeed-d, by
the administration of several powerful emetics, in
restoring him to a state of partial consciousness, and
directed his immediate removal to the London Hos-
pital, in which he had been retained as an inmate
until pronounced to have sufficiently recovered to be
able to attend the court to answer the charge. On
making subsequent inquiries at the address given on
the paper, he had ascertained that about a twelve-
month since the prisoner had contracted a clandestine
marriage with a young lady, then only fifteen years
of age, with whom he bad since lived ; but, from the
tenor of the letters found it his possession, two of
which were addressed to his wife, and one to his
mother-in-law, whom he bitterly reproached for
her contumelious treatment of him, it appeared
that a great deal of domestic discord and misery
had resulted from the match, which had eventually
worked upon his mind to such a degree as to induce
him to makb the attempt upon his life. It was also
manifest that the prisoner entertained a morbid feel-
ing of jealousy. towards his wife, one of his letters to
whom, written immediately after taking the poison,
was couched in terms of the most devoted affection for
her, but despair of her affection for him, and concluded
with the words, "It will soon be over—three days'
employment for the papers, and you will then be
without a tie, unless your conscience should revive
such recollections as will embitter all your future life."
Some obscure allusion was then made to some occur-
rence that had taken place at Gravesend, and the
memory of which, he said, could only die with him ;
to which he added, " The agony I am now in is not so
great as that you have occasioned me, and may God
forgive you, as I now do." The officer added that
the prisoner had purchased small quantities of lauda-
num at different chemists', amounting altogether to
nearly two ounces, the whole of which he had taken,
and, upon searching his pockets, he had found an
empty bottle containing traces of the poison.
Mr. Joseph Burch, surgeon, of the London Hospi-
tal, deposed that the prisoner, on being brought to
that institution, was still so labouring under the
effects of a copious dose of opium that he was in a
state of complete stupor, but that by the administra-
tion of antidotes and other means the action of the
drug was counteracted, and the prisoner, after several
days' detention, was at length restored.
When asked if he wished to say anything, the pri-
soner, in a low and dejected tone, merely said that he
was in such a state of despondency and excitement
that he could not control himself, but he was inow
very sorry for his conduct and did not intend to re-
peat it.
The prisoner's wife, a young creature in an ad-

vanced stage of pregnancy, was in court, and as it cdi
not appear, from the statement of her relatives, than
the prisoner had himself behaved very well towards
her,
__

Mr. HAMMILL, who remarked upon the determina-
tion the prisoner had displayed in carrying out his
purpose, ordered him to be committed until that day
week, to afford time for consideration as to his ulti-
mate disposal.