The Sun.
London, England, 1860-10-20 00:00:00

THE ROAD CHILD MURDER.

The Wiltshire magistrates appear to participate
in the opinion of the public that so terrible a mys-
tery as the murder at Road must never be given up
as inscrutable. It concerns us all that a crime like
this should be brought to light; but we are bound
to say that, though the case was mismanaged at
first, there has been no negligence in any quarter
since that time. The original inquiry has been fol-
lowed up by other investigations of unusual cha-
racter, and the action of Government in the matter,
if not so direct as was desired, has been extraordi-
nary enough to provoke some remonstrance. Un-
fortunately, all attempts at elucidation have hitherto
been fruitless, and, though we have undoubtedly
had the advantage of a great body of evidence, it may
be questioned whether we are much nearer the
truth at this moment than we were three months
ago. We are reluctant, however, to quit the
case at this stage without recapitulating some
of the points apparently established. In a
matter so mysterious and alarming the public itself
should be taken into confidence. The more heads
that can be set thinking the better. Justice is at
fault for lack of a clue, but nobody can say when
or where the clue may not be picked up.
To begin, then, we think we are justified by the
evidence before us in discarding the hypothesis
which would ascribe the deed to a stranger secreted
in the house for the purpose. It does, indeed, appear
that the possibility of a man's being so hidden was
greater than had been imagined, for there were un-
occupied rooms in the house in which any person
might have lain concealed. Still, after conceding
this much, we must needs say that the improba-
bility of the supposition is greater even than any of
the improbabilities attaching to the various theories
of the case which have been successively devised.
It is hard to conceive that any man should desire
to wreak his spite upon another by kidnapping or
killing his child, but that he should secrete himself
in the house with this object, upon the speculation
of being able to enter a nursery where a nurse and
another child were sleeping, and from this room, so
protected, to carry off a boy four years old without
giving alarm, is really an idea too absurd to be en-
tertained. Moreover, even if we could get over
these antecedent improbabilities, there are three
facts in the case utterly inconsistent with the hypo-
thesis in question. If it was a stranger who stole
the child from his bed, what could possibly be his
motive for troubling himself to replace the bed-
clothes so smoothly ? Why did he not envelope
the child as quickly as possible in the first garment
that came to hand aad decamp ? Again, the win-
dow of the drawingroom was found open in the
morning, but not open enough to allow of the egress
of any person. It must, therefore, have been
partially closed either by some person who had
re-entered the house after the disposal of the
body, or by somebody who returned simply for
that purpose. The latter supposition admits, cer-
tainly, of its being the work of a stranger; but why
should he do it To presume that he took such
unnecessary trouble and incurred such gratuitous
risk for the mere chance of throwing suspicion
upon somebody in the house is perfectly unreason-
able. After the deed was done and the body dis-
posed, of his natural impulse would have been to get
clear of the premises without a moment's delay.
Lastly, there is the missing nightdress—one of the
few pregnant facts in the case, and we need hardly
say that such a fact cannot be connected with the
hypothesis before us. A stranger decamping from
the house in the middle of the night could not have
made away with the dress, which was worn all night
and found on the wearer's bed in the morning.
We conclude therefore that we are warranted by
the results of the investigation in falling back upon
the conviction originally prevailing—that the crime
was committed either by the hands or with the
complicity of one or more of the inmates of the
house ; but here the mystery seems as hopeless as
ever. The inmates of the house on the night of the
murder were 12 in number—nine being adults, and
of these nine six were able in a manner to exone-
rate each other. Three slept in one apartment,
three in a second, two in a third, and two more in
a fourth ; so that, apart from the occupants of the
nursery itself, there were but two persons in the
house who could not call a certain kind of evidence
to their behaviour throughout that fatal night.
The cook and the housemaid slept together, the two
eldest sisters slept together, and Mr. and Mrs. Kent
had a young child sleeping in their bedroom. Mr.
William Kent and Miss Constance Kent had each
a room to themselves, while the two youngest
children—the little boy who was murdered and an
infant of two years old—were, as will be readily
remembered, in the nursery with the nurse. All
the survivors have now been examined with the
exception of the two youngest children—the infant
who shared the nurse's bed and the little girl five
years old, who slept in the apartment with her father
and mother, and who, it is said, was excepted from
the examination at the instance of the solicitor
acting for the family. All testify to their having
passed the night without disturbance, except that
wakeful,ca
Mrs. Kent, who was in weak health and
did early in the morning hear the drawingroom
shutter moved, though the sound gave her
Her testimony, we presume, implies
asser-
tion that everything, so far as she the
quiet in her own room and in the roomsaelrt scoe
ve
dadjacentw aa ts
that moment. It will be remembereddoor of which, if
sleeping close to the nursery,he that she was
opened as a stranger would opent
it, made a creak-
ing kind of noise.
We find, therefore, thati theeai s
and ecopfre the house, and, though
Mr. Wm. Kenttestimonypee ies o
f ecmovcuer a
iPs a-
tion provided by this
r
majority of the inmates Miss Constance Kent are not
thus protected, the former of these is exempt from
suspicion,rwehxi laemtihnea
tliaotnt,e rbhuat s
hnaost
beenon l y
been discharged a
particular e
acquitted by the voluntary evidence of those Who
con ducted the subsequent inquiries. The nurse, too,
the greatest weight of suspicion in the
also been dis..
upon whom
with
first instance inevitably falls, has
something
charged by the magistrates, and
like a compliment to her general character. As a
final result, therefore, we are left with the circle of
suspicion as narrow as ever, and with the addi-
tional embarrassment ensuing on the successive
failures of justice. That the evidence at certain
points is very suggestive may, no doubt, be true.
The magistrates themselves appeared to think so at
the conclusion of the recent inquiry ; but it must be
remembered that what we remarked on behalf of
the nurse may be alleged with more or less force for
the other inmates of the house. In such a position,
and with such a charge weighing upon them col-
lectively, they might say and do many things with
no ill meaning which under ordinary circumstances
might well be suspiciously regarded.
All, then, that has been done at present can be
briefly stated. It has been pretty clearly established
that the murder could not have been committed
without at least the complicity of some inmate of
the house. It- has been reasonably concluded that
more than one person was engaged in the deed, and
that the hand of a man is traceable in the proceed-
ings. The deed has not been brought home to any
one, though two persons—one of them twice over
_e
—have been put upon their defence, and thus the
mystery of blood still rests as inexplicable a_
It really seems almost a case for the art
clair-
voyance or the old machinery of the d'
at fault,
rod. Ordinary agencies are completevyews
t?f.vsnin
but we trust that in one respect
otheugidy of the
carried
Wiltshire magistrates will be, th
out. There should be no remission, even for a single