The Sun.
London, England, 1858-12-08 00:00:00

Sentence was deferred.
William Preston, 21, was charged with stealing
a post letter containing a 20 franc piece, the pro-
perty of the Postmaster-General.
Mr. Bodkin and Mr. Hurrall conducted the pro-
secution ; the prisoner was defended by Mr. Ribton.
The prisoner was engaged as a letter carrier at
Sheerness, and it seemed that in consequence of
complaints that had been made of letters being lost
Mr. Jeffrey, a gentleman connected with the head
office, was sent down to make inquiries, and on the
7th Sept. a test letter containing some lace and a 20
franc piece, addressed to a Miss Lee, at Miletown,
Sheerness, was handed to Mr. Rigg the postmaster, to
be posted, and he placed it in the letter-box, and
then went into the office and took it out and kept
it in his pocket until the following morning, when
the letter was stamped and ?laced among aquantity
of other letters for the prisoner to deliver. The
prisoner, it, appeared, did not deliver the letter in
due course, and when he handed it to Miss Lee he
said that he had forgotten it, and had brought it
back from Victory-street, which was another por-
tion of his delivery. Upon the letter being opened
the coin was found to have been abstracted, and the
prisoner was taken into custody immediately and
searched, but the missing money was not found.
Mr. Rigg, the postmaster, was very severely
cross-examined by Mr. Ribton, who elicited from
him that there had been previous complaints of
irregularities in reference to the manner in which
the business of the Post-office at Sheerness was
performed, and that upon one occasion the prisoner
had brought back a shilling which he said he had
found in his bag, and which had slipped out of a
letter that had'by some means or other become open.
Mr. Rigg also stated that upon another occasion a
money order had been paid without being signed
by the party who was entitled to receive the money,
and the Post-office authorities disallowed the amount
in his accounts in consequence of the omission.
Mr. Ribton made a very earnest appeal to the
jury on behalf of the prisoner, and lie contended
that after the admission of the postmaster as to the
careless manner in which the business was con-
ducted, it was extremely probable the coin had got
out of the letter by accident, and that at all events
there was an utter absence of evidence that it had
been stolen by the prisoner. He also took an ob-
jection in point of law that under the circumstances
in which this letter came into the possession of the
prisoner, and it having been merely put into the
letter box, and then taken out again, and kept in
the-,postmaster's pocket until the following morn-
ing, that it did not constitute a poSt letter within
the meaning of the statute.
Mr. Justice Wightman said that, if it should be-
come necessary he thought the question of law
raised by Mr. Ribton was worthy of further con-
sideration. He then proceeded to call the atten-
tion of theijury to the facts of the case; and, after
a short deliberation, they returned a verdict of not
guilty.
The prisoner was then charged upon a second in-
dictment with stealing a letter containing a half-
crown.
The same learned counsel were engaged for the
prosecution and the defence.
In this case it appeared that a letter had been
sent by a.Miss Barnes, who resided in London, to
her mother, at Sheerness, which letter contained a
half-crown. The letter was posted in London on
Sept. 7, andin due course should have been de-
livered by. the prisoner at Sheerness on the follow-
ing morning, and it appeared that he did deliver
two other letters that were addressed to Mrs.
Barnes, but the third that contained the half-crown
he kept back, and it was found in his possession
when he was taken into custody upon the former
charge. lie •accounted for having the letter in his
possession by saying that he had forgotten it, and
that he intended to deliver it as he returned.
Mr. Ribton, in his address to the jury for the
prisoner, said he believed there could be no doubt
that but for the former case the Post-office autho-
rities would never have thought of bringing such a
charge as this before a jury, and that there really
was no evidence whatever to support the accusation
that was made against the prisoner. He then ar-
gued that there was nothing to show that the pri-
soner had not really forgotten to deliver this letter,
and that if he had intended to steal it, nothing, he
said, would have been easier than for him to have
torn it up and put the half-crown in his pocket,
and that the fact of his not having done so showed
clearly that he had no dishonest intention.
The jury retired to consider their verdict, and
in about half an hour they returned into court and
gave a verdict of not guilty.

NORTHERN CIRCUIT.-LIVERPOOL, DEC. 7

CROWN SlDE.—(Before Mr. Justice Hill.)
MANSLAUGHTER AT MANCHESTER.

Jonathan Brompton, aged 41, was indicted for
the manslaughter of Henry Mellor, at Manchester,
in September last.
Torr appeared for the prosecution ; Mr.
Wheeler and Mr. Roberts defended the prisoner.
From the evidence of a number of witnesses, it
appeared that ttout one o'clock on the morning of
the 28th of September last, a drunken quarrel took
place in a public-house in Deansgate, Manchester,
in which the prisoner took part. The prisoner, who
had been suffering from rheumatism, carried a large
walking stick in his hand, which, during the
quarrel, he threatened to run through the head of
the deceased, and suiting the action to the word,
darted it at the face of Mellor. The point of the
stick entered the deceased's left eye, and wounded
the brain. Mellor was conveyed on a stretcher to
the Royal Infirmary, but expired before he.arrived
there. _ _ _ _ _ _

Mr. Wheeler, for the defence, admitted that the
deceased had come by his death at the hands of the
prisoner, but urged that he had fallen accidentally
against the point of the stick, which the prisoner
had raised in his own defence. _

The jury returned a verdict of guilty, and the
prisoner was sentenced to imprisonment for six
calendar months, with hard labour.
EXTRAORDINARY CASE OF SHOOTING AT LIVER-

POOL.
A coloured man, named Nathaniel Hitchin, aged
49, was charged with having feloniously shot
Francis Cowes, another coloured man, with intent
to do him grievous bodily harm.
Mr. Tindal Atkinson appeared for the prosecu-
tion ; Mr. Little for the defence.
Mr. Atkinson said the prosecutor was steward of
a vesssel trading to Liverpool, and the prisoner
was also a seafaring man, being the cousin of the
prosecutor's wife. On the 9th of September last,
about half-past 10 o'clock at night, the prisoner
went to the prosecutor's lodgings in Regent-road,
Liverpool, and sat moodily down on the sofa. After
threatening the prosecutor with a sword, he seized
a pistol belonging to Cowes, which was lying on the
table, and although cautioned that it was loaded,
and that it was on cock, he fired it, the two slug
shots with which it was loaded entering the pro-
secutor's thigh, causing two wounds, each four
inches in depth.
Francis Cowes, the prosecutor, stated in his evi-
dence that after the prisoner had fired the pistol,
he said " It was lucky that he did not get his brains
blown out."
The prosecutor, in cross-examination, admitted
that he was willing to compromise the charge if
the prisoner would pay him 25 dollars.
Mr. Little, for the defence, contended that the
prisoner had no intention of shooting
,the prose-
cutor, the pistol having accidentally gone off.
The jury found the prisoner guilty of unlawfully
wounding, and he was sonteneed to three months'
imprisonment with hard labour.
CIVIL SlDE.—(Before Baron ' Bramwell and a
Special Jury.)