The Sun.
London, England, 1861-09-12 00:00:00

SHOCKING SUICIDE FROMWATE.RLOO-

BRIDGE.

Mr. Sergeant Payne yesterday held an inquest
at the Talbot, Fair-street, Horselydown, on the
body of William James Brunsdon, aged 22, who
committed suicide by drowning through disappointed
love, having previously tied his legs together!
Joseph William Bavington, a waterman, proved
finding the body floating in the river at a quarter
before six on Tuesday morning off St. Olave's
Stairs. The legs were tightly tied together just
below the knees.
John Eatwell, of Bolt-court, Fleet•street, identi-
fied the body as that of William James Brunsdon,
of the Great Western Hotel, where he was em-
ployed as a waiter.
Eliza Blunden, a showily-dressed young woman,
stated that she knew the deceased William James
Brunsdon. She last saw him at her house, No. 1,
Langham-street, Regent-street, on Tuesday evening
about nine o'clock. He had been there since about
half-past six o'clock. No unpleasant words passed
between them, and they parted good friends. He
said that he was going to his sister's in Brydges-
street, Covent-garden. He had been paying his
addresses to witness. He did not tell witness
when he should see her again, nor did he say any-
thing to lead her to suppose that he contemplated
committing suicide.
Coroner—Does anything occur to your mind to
account for his being found in the water?
Witness—No.
Coroner—Cannot you think of anything that is
likely to account for this ?
Witness (hesitating)—l told him I could not think
any more of him as a friend.
Coroner—Then you required from him some fur-
ther declaration ?

Witness—Yes; he left me in a very agitated
state.

Coroner—He wished to continue on terms of
friendship, but you did not think that enough ?
Witness (who now appeared to take a different
view of the matter)—l told him I could not think
any more of him at present than as a friend. When
I said this, he left me in a very agitated state.
George Carless, toll collector at Waterloo-bridge,
said, about five minutes before 12 o'clock on Thurs-
day night, a man without hat or coat passed on to
the bridge from the Middlesex side. He stood for a
few minutes near the second lamp as if waiting for
some one, and then he saw no more of him.
Mr. Lawson, brother-in-law of the deceased, and
keeper of the Sir John Falstaff Tavern, Brydges-
street, Covent-garden, said he was at his house on
Thursday evening last, and for a time assisted him
in his business. He was very low-spirited, and said
he had been disappointed in his expectations. About
11 o'clock he went out, leaving his coat and hat
behind him. He had no idea that he contemplated
destroying himself.
The Jury returned a verdict of " Temporary In-
sanity."

POLICE IN2ELLIGENCE, crept. 11.

MANSION-HOUSE —Richard Fostel, a stoker
on board the Seine, a vessel plying between Lon-
don-bridge and Boulogne, was brought before the
Lord Mayor, charged upon an information laid
under the directions of her Majesty's Customs, by
Alfred Parsons, one of the officers of her Majesty's
Customs, with having secreted on board the ship
Seine a quantity of spirits, contrary to the 28th
section of the Supplementary Customs Consolidated
Act of 1855, and thereby rendering himself liable
to a penalty of £lOO.
The charge having been read over to the prisoner
Mr. Goodman, the chief clerk, asked him if he was
guilty or not guilty ?
The prisoner replied, guilty.
The prisoner was brought before the Lord Mayor
on Saturday last and fined 40s. for a similar offence.

The Lord Mayor said he was sorry to think the
prisoner should be so foolish, after what he had said
to him on Saturday, as to render himself liable to a
penalty of £lOO, which it was entirely out of his
power to mitigate. The prisoner, he said, must pay
the fine of £lOO or go to prison for six months in
default of payment.
James Hoole, also a stoker on board the Seine, was
also charged with secreting two bottles of spirits.
This being the first offence, the prisoner was only
fined 205., or in default be imprisoned for ten days.
John Spicer and Maria Spicer, husband and wife,
were brought up on a charge of stealing a purse
containing 4s. 6d. from the person of Mrs. Frances
Wool teg, on Fishmongers-hall Pier, London-bridge.
It appeared that the prisoners were standing on
the pier waithig with a number of other people for
the Woolwich boat, when the captain of a boat
which runs from London-bridge to Chelsea saw some
movements which excited his suspicions, and he
spoke to the pier master, and they both watched
the pri4oners, and saw the man put his hand into
Mrs. Woolfeg's pocket and walk away. He went
after them and found the purse on the male prisoner
and it was identified by the lady.
The prisoner said he picked up the purse.
The Lord Mayor said it was evident they were
both there for the purpose of picking pockets, and
it was equally evident that the male prisoner stole
the purse in question. He sentenced them each to
three months hard labour.

John Aberdeen, who has been twice previously
remanded, was brought up for final examination
on a charge of stealing a quantity of shawls and
some skirt lengths the property of his employer,
Mr. Knox, of 42, Cheapsidc, warehouseman.
The prisoner was committed for trial.

LAMBETH.—EmiIy Cornett, a female advanced
in pregnancy, was charged with stealing 51b. of
meat from the snop of Mr. Swift, a butcher, on
1 Gipsey-hill, Norwood.
. CLERKENWELL.—Mr. Frederick J....!- s, et . . Mr. Swift said that the prisoner came into his
12, Granville-strect, Brunswick-square, waF ' _Lee. lop and purchased and paid for half a pound of
moned before Mr. D'Eyncourt, by Mr. 'IV, hart ~tret, but before going away he saw her take the
Richardson, the assistant surveyor of the dis ..., u. iece of meat produced and put it into her basket.
St. Pancras, " for that he, on the 3d day ..:-.1 Sept., Having been a considerable loser by such a system
in doing certain work at 8, Gaildford-street, Rus- of plunder, he sent for a constable and gave her into
sell-square, did erect an enclosed portico on the custody.
side next Guildford-street, the permission of the The constable who took the charge said that at
Metropolitan Board of Works having been refused." the station-house the prisoner said that it was her
The defendant said the work had been done. little boy who who had put the meat into the
This was a very hard case. The portico had been basket; but the child stoutly denied it.
erected to allow of more room being given for The solicitor who attended for the prisoner spoke
opening the street door. The street is 60 feet wide, of the high respectability of his client, who, he said,
and the portico could be no inconvenience, for it was in the employment of Mr. Strange, in the
was erected on his own property, and did not come Crystal Palace, and had borne an irreproachable
out so far as the pavement. Application had been character, and she could not account for the meat
made to the Metropolitan Board of Works, and being in her basket in any other way than by mere
oatghies t
prisonerr
t aes aid,
s t hgeuriel could
and notth a
tb
thiset he slightest
species of
although they made no order for allowing its erec- accident.
Lion, at the same time they verbally said they
would not pull it down. doTubhtemf
robbery was carried onto
Mr. Richardson said the portico was out of the . a very greet extent. He
regular line of the houses, and the neighbours should therefore commit her to prison for 21 days.
complained. The board had said that if he (the sur- A person from Mr. Strange's establishment
veyor) failed to pull it down or to get an order for sequently attended, and gave the prisoner a sub-
it, they would come and pull it down themselves. character; but the magistrate, considering the fact
good
Mr. D'Eyecourt—l have no power to reverse the of her endeavouring to shift the offence
order of the Board of Work 3. You set the law at child, did not see the slightest
defiance. I have no option in the matter but to his judgment. for altering
make the order, as the Metropolitan Board refused Eivine Hassen, a middle-aged foreigner, whose
yon leave. appearance and manner betokened m
gner,
.s('
The defendant-Ithe
/ot exactly set the law at de- tellect, was charged before a disordered
Hon. G. C. Norton,
fiance, but I think it a very arbitrary and hardact. , Niith destroying a cross
, and other articles of an

ecclesiastical character, placed in the Roman Ca-
tholic Cathedral, St. George's, Southwark,
Mr, Thomas Briesnahan, the sexton of the church,
said that between the hours of 11 and 12 o'clock
'that day, while in the cathedral, he heard a great
noise there, and on going to the spot from whence
it proceeded, he found the prisoner in a state of per-
fect frenzy, pulling down and destroying all the
articles of decoration within reach. One, a crucifix,
he had dashed to the ground, but the instant wit-
ness made his appearance he became perfectly calm,
and asked what was the matter. From his manner
for some time in the church, thefe could be no doubt
that his mind was affected, and for his own sake it
was considered desirable to send him before a ma-
gistrate.

James Harris, the day beadle at the cathedral,
said that for the last fortnight or three weeks the
prisoner had been a regular morning attendant at
the church, and appeared to pray with great devo-
tion. It was evident from his manner that he was
labouring under insanity, but till that morning he
had not committed any act of violence.
The prisoner, who said he had been in the army,
was remanded for a week, the magistrate giving
directions that he should be attended to by the
medical officer of the prison.

MR. SPURGEON AND THE LATE _RAIL-
WAY ACCIDENTS.

On Sunday morning, at the Metropolitan Tabernacle, the
Rev. C. H. Spurgeon addressed his congregation at great
length upon the subject of the late railway accidents. He
observed that the columns of the newspapers during the
past fortnight had been filled, not merely with accounts of
these accidents, but also with those of an unusually large
number of minor occurrences of a fatal nature which had
taken place in various parts of the country. The year 1861
would be reckoned as about the most calamitous which had
occurred within the memory of the present generation, and
it was particularly at that season of it when the sickle
had done its work, and our barns were filled with
plenty, that death had been reaping his harvest. It
was worthy, he thought, of remark, that in every age of
the world accidents of one kind or another had taken place,
quite as numerous and as calamitous as those which were
now being deplored ; and his own opinion was that those
which were recorded in the newspapers as happening
in the days of the old stage coaches were just as many
and as fatal as those which had followed since the inven-
tion of the steam-engine. He repudiated the notion that
the collision in .the Clayton tunnel was a judgment
from Heaven because of Sunday travelling, and said
it was as likely to have occurred upon any other day of the
week as upon the Sabbath. In fact the catastrophe on the
Hampstead Junction had occurred upon a Monday, and
when the excursionists were going upon an errand of mercy.
He contended that it was both foolish and unscriptural to
attempt to unravel the mysteries of Providence. As well
might a man who entered the theatre in the middle of the
third act, and only stopped a few minutes to look at
one of the performers, pretend that he could under
stand the whole plot of the drama from beginning to
end, as for any one who, for a period of 30 or 40 years looked.
at the great drama which for 6,000 years had been in course
of representation in this world, and which would continue
to go on until the consummation of all sublunary things—
to fancy that he could comprehend the inscrutable work-
ings of God's Providence throughout the whole of that
lengthened period. It had been stated in some quarters
that the people killed in Clayton tunnel, and on the Hamp-
stead Junction, must have been greater sinners than those
who escaped. He denied this assumption in very strong
terms, asking whether the unconscious babe who was
crushed to death in the tunnel could be supposed for a mo-
ment to be a greater sinner than some of those who were
occupying the dens of London, and who were yet alive. He
did not believe there was one among the whole congregation
who would have the brutality to go and tell the female who
had been rendered a weeping widow by these calamities that
her husband had been killed because he was a greater sin-
ner than other people. The rev, gentleman having enlarged
upon the dreadful scene in the tunnel at the moment of the
collision—of the crushing weight of the engine, of the one
train upon the hinder carriages of the other—of the break-
ing timbers, the shrieks of the women, and the groans of
the wounded, proceeded to remark upon the variety of modes
—in the street, in the domestic circle, and in the pulpit—in
which death might overtake us in a moment, referring par-
ticularly to the death of the celebrated Dr. Beaumont, who
died whilst in the act of delivering a sermon; and also to
that of an American divine, who finished his earthly course
after he had given out from the pulpit the first verse of a
hymn. The latter part of Mr. Spurgeon's discourse was of
a practical character, arising out of the melancholy catas-
trophes of the last fortnight. Hs was listened to through-
out with marked attention.