The Sun.
London, England, 1860-12-15 00:00:00

ASSIZE INTELLIGENCE.

WESTERN CIRCUIT.—WINCHESTER, DEC. 14.
CROWN COURT.
(Before Mr. Justice Byles.)
The execution of James Johnson, condemned at
these assizes, for the double murder at Aldershott,
has been fixed to take place in front of the county
gaol at Winchester, on Tuesday morning, the Ist
of January.
Edward Wilton 5, pleaded guilty to
bigamy, at Portsmouth. Barnes,lt was alleged that the
second wife knew that the prisoner was a married
man at the time of their marriage, but she denied it.
Prisoner was sentenced to nine months' impri-
sonment and hard labour.
Thomas Mullens, convicted yesterday of the man-
slaughter of John Wickham, at Portsmouth, was
sentenced to six months' hard labour.
Wm. Pullen, 21, James Gilroy, 22, and Wm.
Bradshaw, 21, were indicted for wounding George
Smith, with intent to do him some grievous bodily
harm, at Gosport, in the parish of Alverstoke.
Mr. Poulden and Mr. Beetham prosecuted ; Mr.
W. M. Cooke defended Pullen and Gilroy.
The prisoners belonged to the Durham Militia
Artillery, and on August 4, while stationed at Gos-
port, made an attack upon Wheeler and Littlefield,
two policemen, who requested them to desist from
creating a disturbance in South-street. Smith also
expostulated with them, and was called on by the
police to assist, when he was set upon by the sol-
diers, who beat him with their belts, each having a
heavy buckle upon it ; his nose was cut through, his
face and head were wounded, and he bled very
considerably.
The jury convicted the prisoners of unlawfully
wounding.
A second indictment, for the assaults on the
police, was abandoned by the learned counsel for
the prosecution. The prisoners had been four
months in gaol.
His lordship strongly deprecated the use of sol-
diers' belts. Pullen and Gilroy were sentenced to
six months' hard labour ; Bradshaw, who had not
used his belt, to one month's hard labour.
Eliza Steel, 22, a servant, was indicting for con-
cealing the birth of her child, at Basingstoke.
Mr. Beetham prosecuted.
In the month of September the prisoner was in
the service of Mr. Wigg, a highly respectable
farmer residing at Basingstoke. On the'l7th, in con-
sequence of something having occurred, Drew, the
superintendent of police, instituted a search, and in
a closet found the body of a male child, undressed,
partially covered with soil. He tcok the body to
the police station. It presented no marks of vio-
lence.
Prisoner, in reply to the policeman's charge of
murder or concealment, said that she had neither
murdered nor concealed her child. She had had a
miscarriage in the closet.
Mr. Charles Webb, the surgeon, said that it was
a full-grown child. It had a healthy appearance,
and there were no marks of violence, but he was
unable to prove that the child had been born alive.
It had only partially, and very imperfectly,
breathed.
His Lordship said the statute required, in order
to make this young person guilty of concealment,
that she must have been guilty of conceclment
by burying or otherwise secretly disposing of the
body. There was no evidence of this fact in
this case, and there was no reason to suppose
that any violence was used to this child.
The jury acquitted the prisoner.
This case terminated the assizes. Mr. Justice
Byles will open his commission at Exeter on Satur-
day afternoon.