The Sun.
London, England, 1868-03-02 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, .110NDAY EVENING, MARCH 2, 1868.

SHARE LlST.—This Day.

1 POLICE INTELLIGENCE.—This Day.

BOW STREET.

CHALLENGING PASSENGERS TO FIGHT.--Joseph
Smart, a sailor, belonging to her Majesty's ship
Vivid, was charged with being drunk and disorderly
at the Charing-cross terminus of the South Eastern
Railway, assaulting Sergeant Monckton, the detcc-
tive officer attached to the station, and William
Ellis, henry Ilubbard, and Joseph London, were
charged with being drunk and attempting to rescue
Smart. They were each fined 10s.

LUNACY PROSECUTION.

A most important prosecution by the Commissioners in
Lunacy has just concluded by a conviction at the Hertford
Assizes. Mr. Edward Charles James Shaw, surgeon, sur-
rendered before the Lord Chief Justice to take his trial
for misdemeanour, in having wilfully taken the charge of
a lunatic patient named Frances Danvers Weston, for
profit, without the certificate of two medical men as to her
being insane, and without an order by a relative for her
being placed in his charge, and without having a house
licensed for the purpose.—Serjeant Parry and Mr. Poland
conducted the prosecution on behalf of the Commissioners
of Lunacy, instructed by Mr. Law, their solicitor; Serjeant
Ballantine and Mr. Willis appeared for the defendant.
The learned counsel for the prosecution, in opening the
case to the jury, stated that Mrs. Weston was a married
lady, of good education and highly accomplished, but
there was not the least doubt that she had been of un-
sound mind for a great many years, and for some consi-
derable time prior to her being placed in a private lunatic
asylum at Egham, and there was no doubt she was labour-
ing under the most extraordinary delusions. One
of these delusions was that she understood the lan-
guage of. cats, and that they understood her ; she
would walk about with a cat in her arms and pretend to
hold a conversation with the roimal. She also used to say
she was Queen of England, and that she set the fashions.
She was removed from the house at Egham four or five
years ago, a certificate being at that time given to the pro.
prietor of the establishment that she was still insane.
Nothing more, it appeared, was heard of her until last
year, when Dr. Blandford and Dr. Bennett, gentlemen of
great knowledge in connection with mental disorders,
went to the establishment of the defendant at Elstree, with
an order from the Lord Chancellor to visit the establish-
ment. They ascertained that Mrs. Weston had been
under the charge of the defendant for a considerable time,
and had only been removed just before the visit in
question. The result of the investigations shewed that
the lady was still in the same state of insanity,
and that £6O a year was paid to the defendant
for taking charge of her. Although a lady of position and
respectability, she appeared to have been employed in the
most menial offices, such as cleaning boots and shoes,
knives and forks, &c., and she bad also been required to
work an oat-crushing machine. Upon one occasion she
escaped from the house and wandered about through a
snowstorm, and was taken to the police-station at Barnet,
from whence she was removed by the defendant and his
wife in a dog-cart, and it was clear that the defendant must
have been perfectly well aware of her mental condition, and
that he had kept her without complying with any of those
salutary regulations provided by the Legislature for the
protection of unhappy persons in her condition.—Serjeant
Ballantine interposed in the course of the case for the
prosecution, and said he felt it would be hopeless to strug-
gle against the facts that had been proved, and he felt
compelled to submit on the part of the defendant to a
verdict.—The jury accordingly returned a verdict of guilty.
The defendant was then charged upon a second indictment
with an offence of the same description in reference to a
gentleman named Clode. It appeared that Mr. Clode was
at one time Mayor of Windsor. He carried on the business
of a wine merchant, but unhappily gave way to habits of
intemperance, the resultpf which was a softening of the
brain, and it became necessary to place him in an asylum,
It appeared that he had been under the charge of the
defendant for four years at the time the Com.
missioners of Lunacy became acquainted with the
fact. Upon Dr. Blandford and Dr. Bennett going to
the defendant's house they found the unhappy man in
a most wretched state. He was lying on a straw mattress
in the back kitchen, with no other covering than a piece of
old carpet, and the mattress was completely rotted with
his own filth. It appeared that a woman was paid sixpence
a week for cleaning out his room, and when he was disco-
vered the stench was stated to be truly horrible. It ap-
peared that in the first instance £6O a year was paid by the
friends of the unfortunate gentleman to the defendant for
taking charge of him, but upon his representation that hie
dirty habits and his general condition necessitated
greater attention, and that it would he necessary to have
a male attendant for him, the allowance was doubled.
No attendant was ever provided, and the unhappy man
was kept in the same miserable condition. The evidence
of the medical gentlemen as to the mental condition of
Mr. Clode was, that although he was not in the ordinary
sense of the term a lunatic, still that he was completely
imbecile and incompetent to take care of himself or to
manage his affairs, and that he was undoubtedly a person

of unsound Serjeant Ballantine upon these
facts argued that the patient was not a lunatic within the
term or meaning of the statute, and that the indictment
could not therefore be supported.—The point was reserved.
The jury (there being no defence) found the prisoner guilty.
After consultation, the Lord Chief Justice sentenced the
prisoner to pay a fine of £lOO and to be imprisoned for two
months for the first offence, and to be imprisoned for six
months and pay a second fine of £lOO for the second,
should it be sustained. Imprisonment till both fines be
paid.