The Sun.
London, England, 1858-12-09 00:00:00

ASSIZE INTELLIGENCE.

HOME CIRCUIT.—MAIDSTONE, DEC. 8.
(Before Mr. Justice Wightman.)
Henry Alfred Cocksedge, 39, a very respectable-
looking man, was indicted for felouiously forging a
receipt for £2 10s., with intent to defraud the in-
habitants of the county of Kent.

Mr. Russell conducted the prosecution. The
prisoner was defended by the Hon. Mr. Denman.
This was a prosecution instituted by the direc-
tion of the visting justices of the county gaol at
Maidstone, the prisoner at the time of the commis-
sion of the alleged offence having held the position
of storekeeper at that prison. It appeared that
there had been a custom in the county gaol, that a
sum of money should be placed in the hands of the
governor, for the purpose of providing for petty
disbursements, and that he at certain periods ac-
counted to the treasurer of the county for the
money so advanced, and produced the vouchers.
Latterly, however, it seemed that the governor
had delegated this duty to the prisoner, who held
the office of storekeeper in the prison, and the
offence appeared to have been committed under the
following circumstances. In the month of October
last a pair of new wheels were required for the
prison water-cart, and the prisoner purchased a pair
of a Mr. Loder, a carriage-builder in Maidstone, for
which he agreed to pay the sum of £2. The wheels
were sent in, accompanied by a receipt for that
amount, and the prisoner paid the money, and on
the same day he handed this receipt, with the figure
" 1" placed before the " 0" of the shillings, thus mak-
ing the amount £2los. instead of £2, and two other
receipts for 9s. and Cs. 6d., sums he had paid to other
tradesmen, to the deputy-governor of the gaol,
and receiving from him £3 ss. 6d., thus receiving
10s. more than he was entitled to of the county
funds. The fraud was not discovered until several
weeks afterwards, and the prisoner was then taken
into custody upon the present charge, and when he
was asked for an explanation he said that he did
not deny that he had only paid £2 to Mr. Loder
for the wheels, and that he had charged the county
£2 10s. for them, and he accounted for doing so by
saying that he paid the £2 in the first instance out
of his own pocket, and that the wheels were very
cheap at £2 10s., and he considered himself entitled
to charge the additional amount as "commission,"
and that he had not the least idea that he was
committing any offence in so doing. The officers
of the gaol, however, stated that the prisoner had
no right whatever to make such a charge, and he
was committed to take his trial for forgery in hay-
ing fraudulently altered the amount of the receipt
that had been given him by Mr. Loder.
Mr. Denman, in the course of a very able address
to the jury on behalf of the prisoner, said that he
had never laboured under feelings of greater anxiety
than on the present occasion, on account of the
high character the prisoner appeared to have borne
all his life, and he said that he should be able, by
the testimony of gentlemen of the highest respect-
ability and position, to show in the most conclusive
manner that the prisoner, during the whole period