The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1840-05-15 00:00:00

(From the Morning Herald of Yesterday.)

WEDNESDAY Ev
NORFOLK-STREET, w ENING— e mystery
in which the melancholy and dreadful death of the late
lamented Lord William Russell is enshrouded, appears to be
still as impenetrable as it was on the day theperpetration of
the horrid murder was first discovered. Nothing to justify
a suspicion that the murderer was a person unattached to the
establishment, or unacquainted with the premises, has trans-
pired. The following particulars, obtained from a gentle-
man who has minutely inspected the premises, may not prove
uninteresting to our readers :
The butler and valet's pantry (for Courvoisier acted in
both capacities) is a small back kitchen, exceedingly dark,
having on entering the room, a small glass window in the
corner, on the left hand, looking into a small back area. To
the right of the window in the other corner is a door leading
into an arched or vaulted closet or scullery, which has also
a small window looking into the area, and from that room
is the entrance into a back coal vault. Just under the win-
dow above mentioned in the pantry is a leaden sink, sup-
ported by wooden legs, the part underneath being open,
while a leaden pipe communicating with the sink lets off the
water into the drain. The sink being under the window, the
open space beneath it was consequently very dark and under
that in the right hand corner, it was that Inspector Pearce, of
the A division, in the course of the minute examination he and
the other officers made, found that a small piece of the plas-
tered wall had, above the skirting-board, been recently
chipped away, the result of which was the discovery of the
purse (made of blue and gold-coloured beads, with a
gilt clasp,) the £lO Bank of England note, the five gold
coins, the four gold rings, and a wedding ring. Opposite
the door leading from the bottom of the kitchen stairs was a
large closet, with folding doors, resembling a werdrobc, be-
hind which is a leaden pipe, communicating from the front,
area to a large cistern in the back vault. The closet, which
reached up to within about 18 inches of the ceiling, was higher
by about five or six inches than the pipe, yet it was in the
centre, behind that closet, that the signet ring was discovered,
bent and nearly broken, pushed in between the pipe and the
wall, to accomplish which the person who secreted it must
have crept between the top of the closet and the ceiling, a
thattask naontd vtehr
ey cpaasnyt.
ry Adgeaeirn,,
uonp proi
ps
pi tien
gt hneps ian
ratni de
nbetween
e
flooring, which appeared slightly defective, it was that Ser-
jeant Collier, E 20, found the locket, containing a lock of
the hair of the late Lady Russell, tied together by a bit of
thread, which the late Lord William Russell had believed to
have been left behind at Brighton ; and further, in the vaulted
scullery, between the window and the vault entrance, was a
large plate rack, reaching to within 16 or 18 inches of the
roof, the ends of which were let into the wall, and it was
above one of the upper ends that the seal engraved with the
arias of the Russell family was found, pushed in between the
mortar and the wood ; and in the same apartment, between
some bricks in the wall, has been since found a part of the
gold key which was attached to his lordship's watch. It is
therefore evident those articles could not have been secreted,
as has been described, by any but a person well acquainted
with the premises, who had free access to time apartments in
question.
has been nearly pulled to piecesr,daer
The house during the search, winiidchitiNsvindocteys
te ta ccoonncsliuddeer
ad ,
again, his late lordship.
ble sum to put it in proper o
having taken it on a lease, of which
three years are still un-
expired.in
there is a letter inserted
rise,
a the evi-
which the writer expresses his surp
ise
that
T dmaftern, the valet
In a morning paper of this day
dence given at the inquest by inspecto e_ _
Courvoisier was not hnmediately sp
derer. In answer to that, we can statesuecthdatotfhlemsnugsptiheeiomnsuor-f
inspector Tedman were excited against Courvoisier immedi-
ately on his reaching the house on the morning of the mur-
der, and it was in consequence of Mr. Tedman expressing
those suspicions to the superintendent and other inspectors
engaged in the case, that so minute an examination of the
premises has been made.
Courvoisier will be brought up from the Westminster
bridewell to Bow-street police court to-morrow (this day),
at one o'clock. He does not, we understand, appear in the
slightest degree depressed in spirits, nor has he expressed
any desire to make any communications respecting the mur-
der of his late master, beyond stoutly persisting in his entire
innocence. He has had two interviews with Mr. Flower, his
professional adviser, preparatory to his next examination.
Numerous letters have been daily received at the house by
inspector Tedman, from persons in all parti of the country,
offering suggestions which, in the opinion of the writers,
would lead to the elucidation of the deep mystery in which
the dreadful transaction is enveloped, but, singularly enough,
the whole of them have been previously acted upon by the
police authorities. One letter (from a member of parliament)
expressed the surprise of the writer that the candle-box,
candlesticks, and fireplaces in the house had not been ex-
amined to ascertain that no extra candles or fire had been

used.on .the night of the murder, more especially the former,
as it was in evidence that the rushlight in his lordship's room I
had been blown out immediately after the commission of the
murder. It is, however, almost needless to state, that all
that had been long previously done.
The dog, about which so much has been said, and which
was an especial favourite of Lord William Russell, it has
been already stated was on the night of the murder, as.cus-
tomary, at the stables. He has since been, as usual, daily
brought to the house, but from that attachment so peculiar
to the canine race, immediately on entering the house heap-
pears unhappy, wandering from room to room, laying down
for a minute or two in one, then whining and jumping up
and running into another, and from thence in a few minutes
into a third, and at times he places his head on the knee of a
person next him, looking him in the face imploringly, as if
requesting him to restore his deceased master.
The lamentable and violent death of the late Lord William
Russell is another proof of the uncertainty of human life.
On the afternoon of the day previous to his murder, while at
Brooke's Club-house, in St. James's-street, he met with the
Earl of Erroll, who addressing him, said, " Ah, Russell, how
are you ?'; His lordship replied, "Erroll, lam so well, that
I am going to take a fresh lease of my life," little dreaming
that ere the morrow dawned, he would be deprived of that
life by the hand of an assassin.
The remains of Lord William Russell having now been
removed and interred, the inducement to visit Norfolk-street
is not so strong as it was before, and this day the crowd has
not been quite so numerous as on the previous days. The
desire to ascertain whether any fresh discoveries have been
made tending further to implicate the valet, Courvoisier,has,
however, much increased, and throughout the day the house
has been besieged by messengers from the nobility, &c.,
making inquiries to that effect. Evasive answers have how-
ever been invariably returned by the police having charge of
the premises, and on our reporter applying to them to ascer-
tain the truth of a report which was circulated through the
neighbourhood in the course of the afternoon, that the whole
of the missing property, with a trifling exception or two, had
this morning been discovered in a portion of the premises in
which they could not be anticipated to be secreted, he was
informed they could give him no information on the subject.
The fact of Mr. Commissioner Mayne being hastily sent
for, and his arrival about one o'clock, and also Superin-
dent Baker, and Inspectors Pearce, Tedman, and Beres-
ford, with several serjeants, &c., being for hours busily en-
gaged on the premises, and extending their researches even
so far as the removal for examination of the flowers and
shrubs which adorned the balconies of the drawing-room
windows, tended greatly to strengthen the truth of the re-
port, and in addition we can state, from authority on which
we can rely, that something most important and tending
to strengthen the suspicions against Courvoisier, has been
discovered, and will be made public at the examination to-
morrow (this day).
Between four and five o'clock, Lord Islormanby, Secretary
of State for the Home Department, visited the house, over
which he was conducted by Mr. Mayne. &c. His lord-
ship closely examined the places pointed out to him as being
those where portions of the property had been secreted, and
also those portions of the premises still under examination,
and he expressed his approbation of the conduct and exer-
tions of the various persons engaged in unravelling the
mysterious transaction. His lordship left about six o'clock,
as (lid also, soon afterwards, Mr. Mayne, &c.
The whole of the witnesses have received directions to be
in attendance at Bow-street, to give evidence at the further
examination of Curvoisier.

At a late hour this evening it was stated that the watch
forms one of the articles which have been discovered to-day.