The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1854-03-28 00:00:00

ral persons were endeavouring to take the prisoner away,
and witness assisted. The witness asked prisoner to go
home to his boarding house, which he said he would do,
and accompanied the witness. While the witness was
getting the prisoner away, no one interfered with him.
His face was swelled, and he appeared as if he had been
fighting, but witness did not see any blood upon his face.
Witness told the prisoner to go into the house and stay in.
He said he had a knife in the house, and that he would go
in and fetch it and cut the guts out of the first person
(using an opprobrious epithet) who came near him. The
prisoner went into his boarding house. Shortly after-
wards the witness again saw the prisoner in a great crowd
with a knife in his hand. The prisoner was going back-
wards from the crowd, and they were rushing on him.
Witness saw a man named Wallace trying to get the
knife. Witness did not then see the deceased at all.
Witness came behind the prisoner and caught him round
over the arms. Witness endeavoured to throw the pri-
soner, and they both fell.
Other witnesses corroborated the leading features of the
previously given evidence.
Mr. BRETT, for the defence, contended that the pri-
soner was ill-used to such an extent as to justify, in a great
degree, the utmost efforts for his own defence, or to such
an extent, at least, as to remove the charge of murder, if
it not indeed to obviate even the minor charge of man-
slaughter. He called
James Thomas, shipping-office clerk, who knew deceased
by the name of Billy Jones. Saw a riot about mid-day on
the 31st of January ; there was another in the afternoon,
between three and four o'clock, at which there was con-
siderable noise. The deceased was in the crowd, standing
in the street. Witness saw the deceased turn round to
the prisoner, and addressing some foul language to him,
said, " What are you looking at ?" at the same time
seizing the prisoner by the hair with his left hand, and
striking him in the face with his right. The description
given of the subsequent riot and fight, in which deceased
lost his life, by this witness, did not differ greatly from
what had been previously given ; but he was positive the
prisoner did not use the language attributed to him by
the witness Hall. The witness was not certain the pri-
soner did not say something which he (the witness) did
not recollect.
Two other witnesses were called and examined for the
defence. After which, Mr. Blair contended that the pallia-
tion intended to be set up had not been made out.
His lordship summed up, prefacing his observations by
pointing out the distinctions which separate charges of
murder from those of manslaughter. He dwelt at consi-
derable length upon the peculiar features presented by the
evidence, and remarked on the expression of the prisoner
sworn to by Hall. If the jury were of opinion that the
prisoner had had time to cool down from the excitement
caused by the, ill-usage he had received, before he used
the expression, or went into the house for the purpose of
obtaining a weapon and inflicting a wound, which pro-
duced the fatal consequences with which he was charged,
then that would be murder; if, however, they were of
opinion that he was still labouring under the excitement,
and that the expression had been used with a general
reference, the case would be manslaughter. He com-
mented at great length on the particulars of the evidence,
and left it to the jury to say, whether the prisoner's use
of the knife was such as to justify them in finding a
verdict of murder or one of manslaughter.
The jury having considered for a few minutes, returned
a verdict of guilty of manslaughter. Sentence deferred.
MURDER ON BOARD A STEAMER.
John Jordan, steward of the. steamer Trafalgar, was
next placed in the dock, charged with having, on the night
of the 14th March, on board the above-named ship, then
lying in the Sandon Dock, murdered William Hare, a lad
aged about 14,- who acted as assistant steward. From the
evidence, it appeared that on the night in question, about
half-past eleven o'clock, the watchman on duty at the San-
don Graving Dock heard a noise, which was differently
described by the different witnesses, as being like the fall-
ing of a door ; like the sudden shutting of a' door; with a
rushing towards it, accompanied by footsteps ; and as the
sound of some one falling into the hold. On the watch-
man and others going- on board they discovered the body
of the deceased lyinc, on the deck, and quite dead, with
his head between the fore and hind wheel of a gun, with a
small pool of blood under his head, and his Pegs stretched
out straight from the body,one leg crossed over the other.
Deceased had a wound over his left eye, from which blood
had flowed, hut which had not flowed over his right eye-
brow. It further appeared that the deceased was the son
of the cook of the Trafalgar, and had last been seen alive
about a quarter before ten o'clock. On raising an alarm
the prisoner was with difficulty aroused, and he seemed in
a state of stupefaction from the effects of drink. Ori,being
apprised that deceased had been found dead on the• deck,
he made some singular and ;incoherent remarks, and,
taking the deceased's head between his hands,said in a wild
sort of manner, " 0, Billy ! 0, Billy !" and went down•
stairs into the cabin. The body of the deceased was taken-
to the Northern Hospital. On- a post mortem examina
tion, it was found that the deceased had an extensive frac=-
ture of the skull, accompanied by laceration of the brain,,
at the back of the head exactly opposite to the wound'
above the- eye, which the medical gentleman who. con..
ducted the post mortem examination stated to have
been the immediate cause of death. He also said
the fracture• was covered by a contused wound, and that
the injuries might have been produced by a blow, or by a
fall. The injury to the brain was accompanied by effusion
on the brains which is frequently an accompaniment of
apoplexy. He further stated, that if the injury had been
caused by a fall, the deceased might have struggled in an
unconscious state for a yard or snore from the spot where'
lie had fallen. A great number of witnesses were exa-
mined for the prosecution, but they offered no evidence
which showed in any direct way a connexion between the-
prisoner and- any circumstances attending the death of the
deceased. After a trial, which lasted between three and.
four hours, his lordship stated to the jury, that the evi-
dence laid before them was not of a sufficiently conclusive
character to warrant them in convicting on so serious a,
charge. A verdict of acquittal was recorded.