The Sun.
London, England, 1842-05-31 00:00:00

QUEEN'S LIFE.

LATEST PARTICULARS.

COMMITTAL OF THE PRISONER

TO NEWGATE.
(Continued from our Afternoon Edition.)

The Council remained in deliberation until about
half-past three o'clock. At that hour Sir Robert
Peel left the Home-office by the Park entrance, and
walked through the Park to Buckingham Palace.
The Duke of Wellington, the Lord Chancellor, and
several other Privy Councillors left by the principal
entrance in Whitehall shortly before four o'clock.
At that hour an immense crowd had assembled in
Whitehall, and it had become necessary to send for a
detachment of the A division to keep the pathway
clam In order to deceive the crowd, a hackney cab
was sent for, and kept waiting at the entrance in
Whitehall. All eyes were immediately fixed on the
vehicle, it being concluded that it was waiting to
convey the prisoner to his destination.

At about a quarter after four, Sir Robert Peel re-
turned to the Home-office from the Palace, and almost
immediately afterwards a hackney-coach drew up at
the garden-gate of the office.
At half-past four, the prisoner entered the carriage,
guarded, as in the morning, by three of the officers
of justice. He did not seem the least fatigued, but
was evidently anxious to avoid the public gaze, for, as
soon as he entered the carriage, he threw himself back
in a corner of the front seat, and pulled his hat over
his brows.
" Where am I to drive to ?" said the coachman.

"To Newgate," was the reply of the officer, and
the coachman immediately drove off through the
Horse Guards, towards the City.
On inquiry, we learned that the prisoner had been
fully commttted to take his trial for the atrocious
crime with which he stands charged. There were not
more than twenty persons present when the prisoner
was conveyed away in custody as above stated.
The neighbourhood of Buckingham Palace was
crowded to excess all the morning, and towards the
middle of the day the throng of carriages was very
great.

'We were at the Palace only a very short time, but
during the few minutes we were there we observed
the following among the inquirers :—The Marquis of
Normanby, the Duke of Northumberland, the Arch-
bishop of Canterbury, the Marquis of Clanricarde,
and several other Noblemen and Gentlemen.

THE PRISONER'S RECEPTION
INTO NEWGATE.

At half-past four o'clock the hackney-carriage con-
veying the wretch arrived at the end of the Old
Bailey, on Ludgate-hill, and in consequence of alte-
rations which were being made in the wooden-pave-
ment opposite Newgate, the driver pulled up there,
and the prisoner descended, and walked between two
of the gaolers of the House of Correction, with
Lieutenant Tracy, the Governor of the prison,
behind him. Although a number of idlers had
congregated, viewing the repairs of the pavement,
his appearance attracted not the slightest attention,
so private was the whole affair kept, and he was
brought into Newgate and the doors closed after him,
without one person following him from the end of the
Old Bailey to the prison steps. Upon entering the
anti-room, or hall, his handcuffs were taken off, when
he sat down on a form, and gazed with the most per-
fect sang-froid on the objects around him. During the
time the preliminary arrangements were making pre-
vious to his being taken to his cell, he conversed with
the gaolers with apparent indifference generally; but

once or twice he asked questions in a rather ex-
cited manner. His sojourn here lasted a quarter of
an hour, and owing to the hurry incident to his re-
moval, we had scarcely any opportunity of speaking
with him, but he seemed rather to avoid the notice
of a stranger, and averted his face. His appearance
denoted neither agitation nor the slightest
want of self-possession, and the only point
to indicate a self-sense of the enormous and appalling

crime which he contemplated, was a quickness of
motion in the eye when he met the gaze of another,
that might be called sinister—a sudden averting of
the glance. In stature, he is considerably below the
middle size, and was dressed in a dark brown frock
coat and dark trowsers. His face, on the whole,
is the reverse of what a physiognomist would
call bad, or blood-thirsty in expression, having
dark eyes, which most certainly lacked not specu-
lation, nor in the slightest degree indicated want of
intellect, and we should say intelligence, while the
other lineaments of his face were of rather a soft
and mild character. His complexion was high, and
that of a person in perfect health. As soon
as the warrant certifying his committal from the
Home-office was handed to Mr. Cope, the Governor
of Newgate, by Lieutenant Tracy, he was removed to
his cell, where he will be kept solitary ; but Mr. Cope
intimated that there would be no unusual observance
beyond any other prisoner, with respect to fettering
or ironing him.

On Sunday, about six o'clock, Mr. Dousbery, of No.
5, Brook-street, Holborn, who is well known to Sir
Peter Laurie, requested an immediate interview with
him upon a subject of great importance, and introduced
to Sir Peter two brothers of the name of Pearson, re-
siding at No. 7, Castle-street, Holborn, one of whom
stated that at two o'clock on Sunday, while the Queen
and Prince Albert were returning from the 'Chapel
Royal, a man pulled a pistol from under his coat and
presented it at the Queen ; but whether it missed fire,
or whether he relented, was not observed ; but
the man cried, " I wish I had done it ; and putting
his pistol under his coat he walked sulkily away into
the Green-park. An elderly man who witnessed the
attempt, stated that he would communicate it to the
authorities, but that it was too much trouble. The
elderly man, however, asked Mr. Pearson his name and
address. Mr. Dousbery thinking the facts of very
alarming importance, applied to Sir Peter Laurie on
the subject, and Sir Peter wrote a private letter to
the Honourable Mr. Murray, the Comptroller of the
Household, under the impression that such matters
could not be kept too secret, and that it was likely
to make less noise than if communicated to the
Secretary of State. The private letter was not de-
livered to Mr. Murray, because he was dining with her
Majesty. The two Messrs. Pearson, who are printers,
called on Monday morning and saw Mr. Murray, who
considered the communication of so much importance
that he sent Sir Peter Laurie's note to Sir J. Graham,
and requested the Pearsons to call at two. o'clock ; not
having kept, their appointment punctually, a message
%%as sent to Sir Peter Laurie, requesting that he, would
bring forward the brothers. IVilen Sir Peter went to
the Home-office he found that they had arrived, and
that the authorities were taking their depositions.

COURT Or ALDERMEN.
(THIS DAY.) •
The Lord Mayor convened a Special Court of Alder-
men, at Guildhall, this morning, for the purpose of con-
sidering the late attempt on her Majesty's life. At twelve
o'clock his Lordship took the Chair, but it was nearly
half-past before a Court was formed. On the Court
being opened, the Lord Mayor laid before them the
letter which he had received last night from Sir James
Graham, giving the account of the attempt to shoot her
Majesty, which was ordered to be entered on the journals.
Alderman BROWN then rose, and after thanking the
Divine Power for its providential mercy towards the
Sovereign, moved that a dutiful and loyal address be
presented to her Majesty, congratulating her on the re-
cent escape from the bands of the assassin ; which being
seconded by Mr. Alderman Lucas, was carried una-
nimously.
It was afterwards carried unanimously, that a similar
address be presented to his Royal Highness Prince Al-
bert, and her Royal Highness the Duchess of Kent.
The Lord Mayor has also convened a Court of Com-
mon Council for a similar purpose, to be holden at two
o'clock to-day, at Guildhall.

SPIRIT of the PUBLIC JOURNALS.

FROM THE EVENING PAPERS OF THIS DAY.
GLOBE.--The excitementiiiTi, i of
party has
been again
suspended by an event ‘,
hbut that it is, unhappily,
short period, would be re-
the second of its kind within
v,arded as too improbable faorsa The life of our
hasidenbteice azilawlg‘iurtehingtahlo.es7l)%%liich attended the
ted, under
circum-
stancesbelevcri Queen
alwst
last evening, in a
act of OxtOrd. in 1840.
late edition, in time for a part of ourcountry circuit:-
ticit, the particulars of this truly alarming currence, so
i'ar as it was possible, within a space brief,soocollect
ind ascertain the general authenticity ofetirliceuatatto.tements,
various and confliaing, which were in
of andet
he
flew with almost lightning speed throughosuatrekhonejh
me-
tropolis. The engrossing thought was the
Queen. Until that fact was ascertained, the
.. where,,, and 66 how" of the attempted assassination
the
were regarded as of litk interest. In the House of
Commons, Mr. Charlei7,ood's interruption
Premier in his announcement to the House of the out-
rage—intelligence of which had been just communi-
cated to him from the Home-office--was repeated b7s,
,very one to whom the news waz told—" The Queen";
The Queen ! Is her Majesty safe ?" was heard from
,very mouth ; for anxiety respecting her Majesty's per-
sonal safety sprung up spontaneously in every heart.

That question answered, and the assurance given
that her Majesty had, through Heaven's mercy, been
again preserved, the other inquiries followed with
almost breathless rapidity. Every place at which the
slightest information respecting the act and its perpe-
trator could be obtained was literally besieged—not so
much for the purpose of gratifying curiosity, as to re-
lieve the pressure of conflicting emotions which agi-
tated the inquirers. In the absence et' evidence as to the
state of the individual's mental powers by whom this
horrible design was conceived, the first impulse of cha-
rity is, to suppose that he is some wretched being in
whom reason has been dethroned, and whose insanity—
taking that monstrous bias which is a frequent attendant
upon mental disease—has sought its inexplicable gratifi-
cation in an attempt which, had it succeeded, would have
stricken the nation with horror, such as it has never felt
since it was numbered among the nations. •
STANDARD.—Another madman, or a monster with-
out the excuse of madness, has attempted the assassina-
tion of the beloved Sovereign of this empire. At six
o'clock yesterday evening, as her Majesty, accompanied
by Prince Albert, was returning to the Palace. an assassin
presented a pistol, and tried to discharge it at the Queen,
from very nearly the same spot from wh!ch Oxford fired ;
but the weapon flashed in the pan, and missed fire. The
wretch was instantly seized by a soldier of the Scotch
Fusilier Guards, and is now in custody. He was at
first supposed to be a foreigner, -but it appears, unhap-
pily, that he is ,an Englishman, named John Francis,
son to a scene-shifter at one of the theatres. He is
about 20 years of age. We gave the principal facts
in our Third and Fourth Editions last night, and must
refer for the detail of particulars to our subsequent
' columns. Our readers will be gratified to know that the
Queen escaped even alarm from the atrocious
attempt made upon her, as she was not aware of its
occurrence until after her arrival at the Palace,
and when the assassin had , been some time
in the hands of justice: • When made acquainted
with it her Majesty received the intelligence with the
calmness and self-possession characteristic of her gal-
lant and illustrious race—with less emotion than any
one of the millions of her indignant subjects, disgraced
and outraged by the perpetration of such a crime
amongst us. There is not the least reason, however, to-
believe that any living being is a participator, of the mad-
man or monster's guilt. It at present appears to ,be
the effect, if not of a disordered mind, of that prodi-
gious depravity which Providence permits, as it per-
mits the occurrence of physical deviations with some
inscrutable design, or perhaps to humiliate its creatures,
by showing to what odious shapes their nature may be
corrupted. To reason from such prodigies must be as.
idle as the attempt to account for them. All we can
know is, that an act of surpassing wickedness hasp been
committed ; for the attempt, however unsuccessful,
consummates the crime—that an act as repugnant
to . manhood as to the moral or religious sense,
has dishonoured our name and nation—that an
attempt has been made to murder a young and
lovely woman, a mother of two infants, the happy
wife of a beloved husband, the deservedly adored Queen
of an intelligent and high-minded people—to murder
her, too, at the moment when her hand has been
stretched forth, when all her faculties have been tasked,
to relieve the sufferings of the distressed among her
subjects. This is all that we know at the present ; and,
knowing this, we are bound to believe that the unmanly
ivillany is confined to the one prodigy of wickedness to
whom it can be assigned with certainty.
COURIER.—We had yesterday the painful duty to
perform, in a third edition, of announcing another horri-
ble Attempt upon the life of our beloved Sovereign. Rut
we have also once more to record another signal interpo-
sition of Divine Providence, through which her Gracious
Majesty was happily preserved from the fell intent of the
assassin still to reign over, as she lives in, the hearts of a
loyal people. From the concurring details derived from
various eeurces which have yet transpired respecting
this extraordinary event, it would seem, moreover, that on
the evening before something like a previous attempt at
assassination had been made, on the failure of which the
miscreant concerned, and supposed to be the same per-
son, contrived most unaccountably to make his escape.
Should these statements prove to be correct, it cannot
fail to impress the public with painful apprehensions that
the safety of the Royal Person is not watched over with
'all that unslumbering care and vigilance which under
any circumstances should be
.felt a 'paramount duty ;
but since the meditated atrocity of. Oxford, from which
her Majesty so fortunately escaped, should undoubtedly
be regarded as of first and imperative consideration. As
the examination of the intending regicide was very,ipro-
perly conducted witkelosed doors, we are yet necessarily
in the dark as to the motives, the frame of mind,
and other conditions which may have led to the medi-
tated perpetration of this heinous crime. We would fain
hope that the misgivings which must so naturally gain
abroad upon the subject may be utterly groundless ; but
yet when we reflect upon the extent to which the minds
and morals of a certain class of the community, happily
not yet a numerous class, have been debauched by the
dissemination and preaching of the most abominable and
disorganising doctrines of a naked infidelity, we cannot
be altogether without our suspicions that the guilty
wretch now in custody may
.be found deeply inoculated
with this deeeetable moral poison. We cannot, with our
Contemporaries, Indulge the consoling hope that on the
present occasion the act is that of a wild and raving
lunatic. There was too much ', method in the madness"
to induce conviction of its reality and existence,

THE LONDON GAZETTE

(THIS EVENING.)

ST. JAMES'S PALACE, MAY 30, 1842.
The Queen has been pleased to appoint Charlotte Dueheas
of Norfolk to be one of the Ladies of the Bedchamber in Ordi-
nary to her Majesty, in the room of Sarah Dowager Lady Lyt-
telton, resigned.
The Queen has also been pleaeed to appoint Charlotte Vis-
countess Canning to be one of the Ladies of the Bedchamber
in Ordinary to her Majesty, in the room of Susan Cnuntess of
Dalhousie, resigned.
FOREIGN-OFFICE, MAY 31.

It is hereby notified, that her Majesty's Secretary of State
for Foreign Affairs has received a despatch, dated the 16th
ult., from her Majesty's Minister at Mexico, containing the
copy of a proclamation, said to have been issued by the Presi-
dent of the Republic of Texas, to the following effect :
OFFICIAL.—BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE RE-

PUBLIC OF TEXAS.
A PROCLAMATION OF BLOCKADE.

To all whom these presents shall come : Know ye that I,
Samuel Houston, President of the Republic of Texas, and
Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy, by virtue of my
authority and the power vested in me by law, and for the pur-
pose of more effectually prosecuting the war in which Texas is
uow engaged with Mexico, do hereby order, decree, and pro-
claim, that all the ports of the Republic of Mexico on the east-
ern coast, from Tabasco, in the state of Tabasco, to Mata-
moros, in the state of Tamaulipas. including those Forts
and comprising the mouth of the Rio Grande del Norte,
and the Brazos Santiago, and all the inlets, estancias, and passes
on the said eastern coast of Mexico, and, from and after the
date of this Proclamation, in a state of actual and absolute
blockade by the armed vessels of the nation.
And for the purpose of carrying this Order, Decree, and
Proclamation into complete effect, an armed naval force now is,
and will be continued to be, kept at or near the said ports,
inlets, and passes of the eastern coast of Mexico, entirely suffi-
cient to enforce this Decree. For any breach or effort at breach
of this blockade, the offending vessel and cargo will be liable to
confiscation, and the officers and mariners of such vessel will
be subject to the penalties attached to a breach of blockade,
This Decree shall take effect, as to vessels sailing from New
Orleans, within three days after its publication in that city,
and within five days as to any neutral port in the Gulf .t
Mexico, within twenty days as to any port in the United States
north of the Gulf of Mexico, and in forty-five days as to veices
from any ports in Europe.
In witness whereof I have hereunto affixed my hand, and
the great seal of this Republic, at the city of Houston, this
26th day of March, in the year of our Lord, 1842, and t,f the
independence of the Republic, the seventh.
( Signed) SAMUEL HOUSTON.
Signed by. the President,
(Signed) ANSON JONES, Secretary of State.
FOREIGN-OFFICE, May 31.
The Queen has been pleased to approve of Mr. Timothy
Darling as Consul for the United States of America, at Nassau,
in the island of New Providence.

CROWN-OFFICE. MAY 31.

MEMBER RETURNED TO SERVE IN THIS PRESENT
PARLIAMENT.

County of Londonderry.—Robert Bateson, of Belvoir Park,
in the county of Down, Esq., in the room of Sir Robert Bate-
sun, who has accepted the Chiltern Hundreds.
ORDNANCE OFFICE, NAY 27. •
Corps of Royal Engineers—To be First Lieutenant—Second
Lieut. A. O'Donnel Grattan, vice St. George L. Lyster, de-
ceased ; Second Lieut. M. Vavasour, vice Lloyd ; Second
Lieut. J. S. Baker, vice T. R. Lyster, deceased.
MIniOKANDUM.—The date of Lieut. Jervois's promotion has
been altered to the Bth October, 1841.

Commission by the Lord Lieutenant of Wiltshire.
Royal Regular Militia.—The Honourable St. J. G. P.
Methuen to be Captain, vice Jacob, resigned, May 21.-
DECLARATIONS OF INSOLVENCY. _ _

JOHN HORATIO CLARK and HENRY CHARLES
FARROW, wine merchants, King William-street City.
ROBERT BENNETT THOMPSON, warehouseman,
Wood-street, Cheapside; City.
WILLIAM GREY SMITH, surgeon, Vauxhall-walk,
Surrey.
GEORGE BALDING, coal dealer, Sulhampstead-wharf,
county Berks. _ .