The Sun.
London, England, 1860-09-24 00:00:00

TILE STEPNEY MURDER.

Within the last few days the detective officers
from Scotland-yard charged with the endeavour to
discover the murderer of Mrs. Emsley have elicited
some new circumstances having an apparent
bearing upon the matter. These we state
in their naked simplicity, just as they have
been communicated by persons presumed
to be above all others well informed on
the subject. Feeling, however, all the respon-
sibility which attaches to the publication of state-
ments affecting, it may be, however remotely, a man
now charged on suspicion with being concerned in
a capital offence, it is necessary to suggest caution
in deducing inferences, inasmuch as the circum-
stances to which allusion is made may possibly be
hereafter related in different terms, under the obli-
gations of an oath, before a judicial tribunal, and
with all the usual safeguards for testing the truth.
First of all, a man named Mitchell, living at
Hoxton, and employed as a workman in the docks,
has quite recently volunteered the mention of a
circumstance to the police authorities which, he
says, made a strong impression on his mind at the
moment, and a still stronger one after the discovery
of the murder. He is understood to have stated
that about 5 o'clock on Tuesday morning, the 14th
of August—the murder being presumed on all hands
to have been committed on the previous evening—
as he was on his way from Hoxton to the docks he
met a man, a stranger to him, near Stepney-green,
going towards the Bow-road, whose appearance and
manner attracted his attention, This stranger as
he approached seemed to him—but that was only
his first impression—to be slightly tipsy. Mitchell
had his hands in the side pockets of a woollen
jacket he wore. The stranger as he came near him
stopped suddenly right in front of him for a moment,
and stared at him in an extraordinary manner, so
much so that Mitchell instinctively pulled both his
hands out of his pockets for the purpose of self-
defence, if it should be necessary. But they passed
each other without exchanging words, the stranger
giving him the notion by his manner. that he could
have wished to avoid him. A day or two ago
Mitchell was taken to the Clerkenwell House of
Detention, where Mullins is confined, to see if he
could recognise among the prisoners there the
man whom he had met under the circumstances
just stated. Most stringent precautions were
taken that the examination on his part should
be completely free from all external bias. Ser-
geants Tanner and Thomas, who accompanied him,
were charged to remain outside the prison while
he went inside upon his errand. He was at-
tended by a gaoler, an utter stranger to him, who,
without speaking to him, opened the separate cells
of some 20 or 30 prisoners, and thus allowed him to
have a careful look at each—the result being that,
after scrutinising some 18 or 20 prisoners, he iden-
tified Mullins as the man whom he met near Step-
ney-green, although the prisoner was. dressed in
different clothes from those which Mitchell said
the stranger wore on the morning in question.
Another circumstance is that a silver or German
silver pencilcase has recently been delivered up to
the police by a potboy at a publichouse in Chelsea,
near where Mullins lived, which he said was sold
to him by Mrs. Mullins • and this pencil case Mr.
Biggs, the amanuensis Of Mrs. Emsley, is said to
be prepared to prove belonged to her.
For the moment a document is missing to which
some importance is attributed. On the examination
of the house of the deceased on the day on which
the murder was discovered a receipt was found
bearing what purported to be the signature, writ-
ten in pencil, of Mullins to a bill for some work he
had done for her. This document, which is said to
have been dated on the day on the evening of which
the murder was committed, and to have been found
on a table in some part of the house, was sealed up
in an envelope by Mr. Rose, the deceased's solicitor,
who was present at the examination, addressed to
Inspector Thornton, or to Scotland-yard, and
handed for safe custody to Inspector Kerresey, of
the local divisional police. It is wanting for the
present, but it is not supposed to be absolutely lost,
—hopes being entertained that it may be found in
a collection of papers belonging to the deceased, of
which it is said the police, or the authorities at the
Treasury, have the possession.
Again, a man's boot has been found in a dust-
hole connected with a house in which Mullins and
his family lived in Orford-street, Chelsea, at and a
short time after the murder, and this is reported to
correspond with the impression of a footmark found
in blood on the stairs of the deceased on the day on
which the murder was discovered.

TBE CIIILD MURDER AT ROAD.

The inquiry into the circumstances of the myste-
rious child murder at Road, which has been in
course of prosecution during the past fortnight by
Mr. Slack, solicitor, of Bath, was on Saturday
night concluded—so far, at all events, as the evi-
dence which Mr. Slack intends to take at Mr.
Kent's residence. The witnesses who had been
examined at Raad previous to Wednesday last were
the Misses Elizabeth and Mary Kent, the cook,
and housemaid, Master William Kent, and the two
little girls, the one five years, and the other two
and a half years of age. A meeting of magistrates
was held at the Court-hall, Trowbridge, on Wed-
.nesday afternoon; Mr. H. G. G. Ludlow, and
Messrs. W. and J. P. Staucomb were present, and
Mr. Slack attended and read over the whole of the
evidence he had taken on previous days. Consider-
able discussion ensued, for the statements of two or
three of the witnesses occasioned surprise among
gentlemen even so well versed in the case as were
the magistrates present. The evidence of the boy,
Holiday, the knife-cleaner, especially exhibited
some remarkable features, and tended at first sight
to incriminate some members of the household. It
had not been determined previously what course to
adopt in reference to Mr. and Mrs. Kent and Miss
Constance, but after a lengthened deliberation Mr.
Slack was instructed to proceed with his in-
quiry, and to take the evidence of all who it had
been ascertained had slept at Road-hill house on
the night of the murder. On Thursday morning,
therefore, Mr. Slack resumed his sitting at Road,
he being accompanied, as before, by two clerks,
who transcribed the evidence from his notes;
Mr. Dunn, Mr. Kent's legal adviser, and Superin-
tendents Wolfe and Foley being present. The evi-
dence of Mrs. Kent was first taken, and from
eleven o'clock until four that lady endured a most
searching examination, which, however, failed, as far
as we can learn, -to elicit any new feature in the
case. Mr. Kent was also examined for two hours
that evening, and on Friday morning, on the in-
quiry being resumed, ho sustained several hours'
rigid questioning. Miss Constance Emily Kent
was then called in, and, having been examined for
two or three hours, the inquiry was adjourned. The
whole of Saturday was occupied by her renewed
examination, which she bore with great self-posses-
sion and fortitude; and at the conclusion on Satur-
day evening Mr. Slack was understood to say that
he had concluded all the proceedings he deemed it
necessary to take on the premises: It is his inten-
tion, before finally closing his investigation, to call
before him the family medical man—Mr. Parsons, of
Beckington, who was summoned to attend the de-
ceased child immediately the body was found, and
who made the post-mortem examination—and the
nurse, Elizabeth Gough. It has not been hitherto
stated that one of the witnesses examined by Mr.
Slack at Bath was Emma Sparks, who left Mr.
Kent's service a year and a half ago. Her evidence
is said somewhat to contradict the statements which
have been made as to the harmony existing in the
family. The pisition of Mr. Kent's solicitor during
these examinations, at which he has invariably been
present, has been simply that of a passive listener,
ho refusing to incur the responsibility of even-the
appearance of a cross-examination. Ile did, indeed,
we-are informed, interpose to prevent the signature
by those who gave evidence at Road of their depo-
sitions, as had been done by the witnesses examined
at Bath, and he is understood to have formally pro-
tested against the examination of Miss Constance
Kent on the ground that she was still under accu-
sation of the murder, being bound over to appear
when called on. As, however, she expressed her
entire willingness to answer any questions put to
her, the objectiop was unheeded.