Star.
London, England, 1826-10-23 00:00:00

YURTH 6ft PARTICULARS.

Red Lion Tavern, Leatherbead, Saturday evening.
The Magistrates have been actively employed in•
the examination of persons, against some of whom
much suspicion had been expressed by many of the
inhabitants of Eetcham, and more particularly against.
a man named Bennett. Mr. Williams, the Rev. Mr.
Bolland, and the Baron* Tessier, arrived before noon,
this day, at the Lion'Tavern, at Leatherhead. Bennett,
his wife, and a daughter of theirs, about 11 years of age,
with two young men, John and Thomas Brown, the sons
of Mrs. Bennett by a former husband, were in attend-
ance. It appears that John Brown is in the service of
two maiden Ladies; named Pickering, who reside about
a mile distant from the cottage of Akehurst. The old
man was very much attached to him, and he was in the
habit of visiting the cottage almost ily. Mrs. Haines
was his godmother, and she always evinced a strong
partiality for Johnßrown. About three weeks ago, when
he called at the cottage, he was tpld by Haines, that old
Master Akehurst was very ill, and she did not think he
would survive long. He (John Brown) said to Mrs.
Haines, ‘‘ Well, I hope you have taken careof yourself,"
meaning that she had been able to save a little money
to support herself after the old man's death. Mrs.
Haines nodded a kind of assent, bat made no other
answer. On Thursday last, John Brown went to the
cottage, and said that he was sure the old woman had
concealed some money in some part of the house, and at
the request of Mrs. Ayres, Akehurst's daughter, be COM•
merited a strict search. On lemming some lumber and
rubbish, which were in the wash-house, adjoining one
of the kitchen% an old churn was discovered. On its
being removed from the place where it had in all pro-
bability been standing for a eery long pe& iod, a jingling
noise was heard, John Brown exclaimed “ Here is
money." On taking off the lid and examining the in-
side, ten guineas were found in a piece of an old silk
glove or stocking. Old Mrs. Ayres was quite overjoyed
at the discovery, and she and John Brown proceeded
further in their search. On a shelf, covered with dirt
and cobwebs, they discovered a sort of tundisb, in the
funnel of which they found eleven guineas. It is believed
that this money was secreted by Mrs. Haines. Think.
cumstance of John Brown finding the money, caused
many of the neighbours to be very illiberal in their re-
marks—some of them observing, 41 those who hide can
find." The Magistrates were anxious to give the young
men (John and Thomas Brown) a full opportunity of
exculpating themselves.
Yesterday, the Rev. Mr. Bolland went to the house
where John Brown lived, and searched his boxes, but
found nothing whatever to implicate him in the murder.
The Magistrates afterwards interrogated both Jelin and
'Thomas Brown, and expressed to them their entire con-
viction of their innocence.
Elizabeth Bennett, the girl, was then examined. She
had stated, on a previous day, that bet lather and mo-
ther, who lived in the cottage near to Akehurst, were
up nearly all the night of the murder, and other cir-
cumstances tending to criminate them. Since her last
examination, she had been evidently intimidated, and
we doubt whether it was politic in the Magistrates to
allow bet to go home with her parents, who charged
her with being a wicked liar, and that her statement is
a mere Invention. During the examination of the girl,
Bennett, her father, sat on a form in front of the public.'
house, sad was both load and frequent in his protests,

dons of innocence, using the words di So help me Goo,
I had no hand in that job." He slept with his wife in
a back room on the night of the murder, and, to go
down stairs, must have passed throegh the room in
which his font Thomas Brown (the youth who went to
Akehurst's cottage door, and first discovered the murder),
was sleeping. Thomas Brown admitted that his step-
father told him, that be paned' through his bed-
room in the middle of the night, while he (Thomas
Brown) was asleep, and that he went down stairs;
but he denied the truth of the girl's statement
"' that his father told him to stick to the same story
he had told before." Bennett was asked why he
left his cottage. He said that he went only a few steps
from the door, to a heap of bricks, for a certain purpose.
He must, therefore, have been dressed at the time ; and
on being told that he hat! no occasion to have left his
bed-room for that purpose, he made no reply, except
by reiterating his former asseverations of his innocence
df the charge. Bennett, 'we understand, will be ex-
amined again on Monday next.
The cottage of old A kehurst, since Thursday last, has
been locked up, his daughter and her son having desert-
ed the place, and returned to their former residence.—
Before her departure, she told a person who called upon
her at the cottage, .4 that she believed her daughter,
Mary Ayres, had done it ;" and a brother of Mary Ayres
said, Id it would not give him half so much sorrow to
see her hanged, as it did to see the poor old creatures as
they lay murdered." It ought to he mentioned, that a
very superficial examination of the bodies took place by
the young man, an assistant to a surgeon, who gave
evidence before the Coroner's Jury, and that he was in-
correct in stating that the wounds were given by a
blunt instrument. The Rev. John Bolland, Mr. Wil-
liams, and other Magistrates, discovered injuries in the
heads of the old people which the young surgeon had
not observed. The old man wore a piece of flannel next
his head, over which he also wore two cotton night caps.
The cape and flannel being examined were found to
have been cut through. There were two punctures
parallel with each other, at the distance of half an inch.
On examining the cap and head of the old woman, at
the back, two similar injuries were found,which satisfied
the Magistrates that the same instrument, in form some-
what resembling a coach wiftch, had been used by the
murderer to destroy both victims.
After the examinations terminated this day, one of
the Magistrates gave an intimation to a Gentleman pre-
sent, that be was somewhat sanguine that the plan
which the Magistrates had determined to adopt would
be the means of unravelling the mystery Which at
present envelopes this horrible transaction, and that a
few days would bring to light the real offender.
A matt named Saunders was conveyed before the
Magistrates on Saturday evening. He had been appre-
hended nett. London ss a suspicious chara.cter,and taken
to Leatherhead ; but, after an examination of some
length, the Magistrates were convinced of his innocence
of this crime, and he was set at liberty.

LATZR PARTICULARS.
*ace the bodies have been interred, the cottage where
the inhuman murders were committed, has been com-
pletely deserted, and is now locked up. So great bas
been the terror excited in the minds of the country
people, since the murders, that no human being is to be
seen now within a considerable distance of Akehurst's
cottage after nightfall, every one carefully avoiding the
approach to it; andgoing donsidetably out of their way
kir that purposes
Shortly after the murders had been perpetrated, it was
reported very generally in the neighbourhood of Fet-
cham, that a young Man named Ratcliffe, who, it ap-
peared, robbed Elizabeth Haines about three years ago,
had been seen at Leatherhead prior and subsequent to
the murders. It has been correctly ascertained since,.
that this person was tried, convicted, and transported
for the offence. The parents of Ratcliffe, who are aged
and respectable people, reside in the vicinity of Esher,
and since the perpetration of the murders, they have
been continually annoyed by numbers of people charg-
ing their 'son with being the Murderer, and accusing
them (the patents) with actually concealing him, and
keeping him out of the way of justice. A letter horn
Ratcliffe, however, completely exonerates him or his
parents from the remotest connection with the mur-
derer of the aid people.