The Sun.
London, England, 1826-09-09 00:00:00

MYSTERIOUS MURDER.

iingsThen AsinsgsitzedarCoenusret ooffMmonizeerl.ierT, tieedpraistoiltiesrasultvuemren,
osinte-
Baptiste Dimon, and his wife, Margaret Carrat. Their
victim was an Italian of the name of Bonino. The assas-
sination was committed in 1823, but the body of the de-
ceased was. not discovered till the present year. The great
difficulty was to identify the person of Bonino, with the
remains of a dead body which was said to be his. Only
the skeleton remained, and its appearance in Court gave a
most melancholy interest to the proceedings. It was
eessary to look for his assassins among those who had en-
joyed the. closest intimacy with the deceased, Bonino had
served 25 years in the Irene!' army. He had retired at
the end of the war to a place called Supargites, in the de-
partment of the Remit. There he lived in concubine re
with Margaret Carrat, one of the prisoners. When the
last war broke out between Spain and France, Bonino
spoke of going to drive mules during the campaign. His
sudden disappearance, therefore, in May, 1823, excited no
suspicion. The relatives of the assassins were the first to
divulge the murder by mysterious hints. The daughter of
Dimon, the male prisoner, had seen the dead body buried
brother of Carrat, the
on the authority of , his
aiiiiiaolsZthain—that he had first made
in le:
smth,a,erl
thatprisoner,l.i father's
in gardena lwas
n;1
eh
Bonino drunk, and then had killed him by a blow on the
head with a spade ; that Cerra had excited Dimon to the
commission of the crime, as the price of her hand; and
that in fact given him, nine months afterwards, her person
and fortune an the reward of his conduct. This declara-
tion.of Carrat was warn-led by the discovery of the skele-
ton; and the identity of the skeleton was provedi first by
the fracture on the skull, and secondly by a sixth finger
and toe, which distinguished the deceased. The shoes of
the deceased, buried beside his remains, were proved to be
those of Bonino, as likewise a knife 4 Ile was Seen to
istsessottittkteh:.
idnayeowntilolen dlivsaitphptehaeremd.ystTerlitoeusies
avowals
and imprudent declaration of the prisoners, colleted the
e
a verdict
aesveialaneltillit:lietelonlefetenThaaetfitrt77 olcrime'tf4l,r;tassh eajilii:boryeurat pronounces
be converted into
pity for the criminals, when, as the sentence was pro-
on his female
ititoottnit,ceien:,resOcittnieodn
by
yn
tfliiterygetinndan•ewnletism.selif
complice,. and would have killed her on the alag
c 7
he nwtives of thus
woman for exciting one lover to the spot
were the' new passion inspired by the florl.r, and the jell-
lousy- occasioned by the threatened desertion of the letter.
The•trial lasted five days,

TO THE EDITOR OF THE SUN..
SlR—The Public Press of the Metropolis having given
such free and unbounded circulation to the late false and

calumnious ex-parte statements,
_tending to affect my cha-
racter, I trust I need only appeal to your justice to ensure
an early insertion of the accompanying Letter in the
Journal under your direction.
I remain, Sir, your most obedient. Servant,
JOHN WILK% Jun.
New Broad-street, 7th Sept., 1826.

, SIR-I am neither the slave, nor regardless of public
opinion. He who is the slave, respects not himself, and
be who is regardless, is unwarrantably indifferent to others.
1 have, therefore, observed neither with indifference on the
one hand, or needless anxiety on the other, the proceedings
of the public Press, and of some private indiv►+pals, with
reference to myself, during the past month.
To party feelings, peyote pique, malice, envy, and other
similar sources of human action, I have attributed some of

the proceedings which have occurred; to a re-action in
public opinion from an inordinate attachment to a complete
and unfounded abhorrence of all Joint Stock Companies,

o a love of popularity and a bending to the feeling of .the
lay, I also assign a portion of the proceedings which have
:aken place ; and, finally; to disappointed speculators, , on-
ihrtunate share-brokers, and bankrupt stock jobbers, alike

bankrupt in fortune, in character, and in mind, 1 trace no
inconsiderable quantum of the odium which on me they
have ender votwed to cast.

The conductors of the public Press, destitute at this
season of matter:—filling their daily columns with the ab-
surdities or the nothings of Police reports, or the trash of
calumnious letter; writers ; have too easily, and I must add,
most wickedly, lent themselves to .the gratuitous insertion
ofllie most absurd and erroneous, or the most vilifying and
libellous reports, statements, and mis-statements, which in-
genuity, directed by malice and the most unworthy mo-
tives, could dictate or-invent.
Nor has this been all. The allegations, on one side,
have been studiously and faithfully reported, but all ex.
planation or contradictions, owthe other side, hive been
suppressed. The libel has been received with rapture-- •
inserted. without delar—and dwelt upon., without inter-
mission.

New libels have succeeded to the former in rapid Sue-
cession, and the refutations of all have been almost entirely
unnoticed. By this method the country', Nis been made to
participate in the feelings of the town. The Editors of
the Provincial Papers, sure copyists of their respective
London. Mentors, have transcribed into their colunuis the
same slanders, with notes of admiration, and a few addi-
tional units have! magnified what. was bad, even in the
London Press, into the 'worst, and have converted tens

into hundreds, and hundreds into thousands, with the
greatest
If, by these efforts, it has been intended to ruin my cha-
racter, the object will not be accomplished ; if it has been
designed to degrade me in the opinion of my friends and
those who knew me best, the object has failed ; if the cla-
morous, the vindietive,' 'the disappointed, or the partially
insane, have designed either to suppress the truth, to rob
me of my happiness, my comfort, or any ease, they have
not succeeded,-for I yet enjoy the confidence of my friends,
the affection of all whose friendship J desire, and above all,
that peace of mind resulting from an honest conviction of
having acted with rectitude and honour, tut a man, and a
gentleman, which no unfaithful reporter, or unprincipled
Mock Joblter, ran ever hope to possess.
My connexion with Joint Stock Companies Was ori-
ginally ; but in no one with' which I have been
connected have I acted otherwise, than as the moat ho-
nourable of men, viz. any honest, honourttble English mer-
chant, would approve. This. statement. lam now deter-
mined to demonstrate to be true, since I shall not com-
mence one or two, but many prosecutions as well against
the authors as against the promulgators of those inven-
tions, both of fact and deduction, which have been of late
so current. I will endeavour to teach the public press of
this:country,' that private character is held too sacred by the
laws which tolerate that press, to withhold from it their
protection; and will show even through.thst tame,. press,,
which has so diligently and tio wickedly libelled me, that
the licentiousness of the press maust and v.lll bring down .
upon its conductors the punishment which should ever
await the violation of public- decency and of public justice.
NVith respect to the three Companies winch have been
the subject of attack, no real ground for censure or ani-
nualversitin on me exists.—lt is the fashion now to in-
shilge in the most severe strictures on all Joint Stock Com-
panies, and the public press, therefore, more desirous of
obtaining popularity than eliciting truth, in some- cases raise,
and in all continue, the line and cry. The public press of
the metropolis also enjoy the desirable privilege of daily
appearance. The libel repeated often is at length very
generally believed; whilst. tee' refutation appearing but once,
and, I regret, to add, in many instances: not appearing at
all, is either totally or comparatively disregarded,
First, As to the Cornwall and Dcvanshire Mining. I
Company.7,The real history of that Association is at once
the most simple and the most correct.-1 purchased long
before my connection with the Association, or before it
was in any way established, certain mines in Cornwall, for
certain sums, and afterwards that Association purchased
those mines of meat such sums as the Directors and Share-
holders thought fair and reasonable—in which they
acquiesced for nearly eighteen months--which they never
Objected to, until money became scarce, and calls on the
;shares were made ;—or in plain words, until it was evinced
that the Company was no bubble, but was established for
the bona fide purpose of working the mines purchased,
Even the Scripholders have no cause of complaint, for no
,one. paid one farthing towards the Capital of the Company
until the whole prospectus of nearly thirty pages, was first:
,printed and circulated, and no fact or .Mrcintistance con-
mected with the concern has ever been ninde a Matter of

seeresy.
How worse than absurd is it to say, because I sold the
mines ftir a greater sum than I purchased them for, that it
is fraudulmt. If it be fraudulent, it is the fraud .f every
man's transactions in life. Does the merchant fttlfrauciu.

leidly, who purchases his articles of barter for a less sum
Allan he sells them at P Does the Loan Contractor act
...fraudulently, who contracts for a loan at 70, and sells it
p whatorts Id
01 teaudme documents,
givents.
Hto others at 75 ? Does the Stock Jobber act fraudulently
n ftoormt
heedm theLp:colease
who purchases 20,000 Consols at 76, and sells them at 801',
I have done no more than this ; nor. so much, for when I
for them, and the profits I should make; and more than,
stlotlids thles!iluliiimieisttleil
and information which- 1 myself
possessed. The mines
were so bought—have been for fifteen months workedr-=.
have yielded large quantities of ore—and one of them alone,
at a future day, may, in the opinion of one of - the oldest
and best miners, be worth all the d be paid
money agree to
for the whole of the mines. But who finds fault with the
purchase ? The chief person is a William Clark, of whew,
to say any thing that is true, would ben libel, -since-truth
is a libel—who is no Shareholder--who bite 'never-paid any
money towards the capital of the Company-7-who actually
borrowed some scrip , which is forfeited and of _no avail,
to appear to qualify himself to-attend the meeting, bat
who considers that he is fully justified in his interference
by his character of being formerly a merchant's clerk, and
now a itOck broker ;UPI Pitila4llll"Ti!t
t reoce suffici-
ently .„ duo win consider
.nts nmititcr e
w._
in
the
ently amounted for, i will not decide, b , /hey di
December. .
months of Novemilh,4-;
jo;:eish
Iran and [Coal" Alining' Cant-
St""id: ifil,ibi° , .0 I purchased the mines for the Com-
PanY'!---a%Ohl them of course at the price which 1 paid for
Com-
pany, “."- . fault. 'i, fount!, or Oitk be foond, with the put.-
then4o4 u° , 1 sine! hill large,and
vhose. BUt tom it
' • is mywas my .
bitant l No. such dung. A
ebargo esor .n attempt at Once
malicious .and ignorant has been made
to analyse my
Aarges, and to present some in a ludicrous light; but the
truth, and the xi/bole truth, are not always the. same, and I
have no hesitation in saying that the pretended account
published, is riot the real account of my charges. How