The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1854-05-30 00:00:00

MURDER BY A STEPMOTHER.

AT the Thames Police-court, London, before Mr. Ing-
ham, Mary Anne Alice Seagar, a Most repulsive-looking
woman, 32 years of age, residing at 2, York-street, Philpot-
street, Commercial-road, was charged with causing the
death of William Seagar, her step-son, on the previous
evening. The prisoner, whose second husband, the father
of the deceased child, is a stone-cutter, was formerly a
dresser at the Victoria Theatre, and sometimes went on
in the groups. The details of the evidence were so re-
volting that they drew tears from the magistrate as he
examined the principal witness, the sister of the deceased,
a little girl 13 years of age, who seemed perfectly cog-
nizant of the nature of an oath, and gave her evidence
with a fearfully distinct minuteness. The prisoner, who
paced the dock with a theatrical air, and assumed various
positions, which she intended should be imposing, evi-
dently tried to appear indifferent, but was shaken and
unnerved at some portions of the evidence. After some
evidence as to blows having been heard, Anne Cooper
Seagar, daughter of the prisoner, was sworn. Her ap-
pearance excited the deepest commiseration. She was
miserably clad, notwithstanding her father's earnings,
which are considerable ; and the bones starting through
her skin presented a perfect picture of famine. She had
several marks of violence on her face, and one severe cut
under the right eye. She said—l am 13 years of age. I
was in the room when it happened. My two brothers
were there, Tommy and Willy. [Tommy is the prisoner's
child by her first husband, and is sleek and comfortable;
the deceased boy was quite as much a skeleton as his
sister.] Tommy was seven years and Willy six. Willy
complained to his father that Tommy beat him, and father
chastised Tommy. When mother came in, Tommy told
her Willy had got him into a row. Mother put Willy to
bed, but he got up and sat on the box. Mother knocked
him off with a blow of her fist. He got up again, and
mother strapped him with a strap over his waist and
arms. He got up again and undressed himself, when she
hit him with her hand on the temple. Mother put him
into a tub of water after hitting him twice —once on the
arm and once on the head. He could hardly move before
he was put into the water. She took him.out for he was
not able to move, and my brother Tommy wiped him and
put him to bed. He got up again, and mother told him
to rub a teatray. He rubbed it a little, but could not
do it, so mother took him by the feet and shook him.
She took him up again, I think by his head, and threw
him across the room. He fell on the boards and could
not move. She caught him again, I cannot say how, and
threw him by the box, and kicked him. Mr. Ingham—
Where did she kick him ? Witness—l cannot tell where.
She then threw him on his back in a chair, and his head
was hanging down. She said to me, "Now you‘
you may do what you like with him." I said, `Get up,
Billy, off that chair, and let me wash you," but he could
not. Then mother hit me. She knocked me down and
kicked me. Then father knocked; I did not go down, as
I was washing the slop. Mr. Ingham—What, slop ?
Witness—The water and blood. Father knocked again,
and mother said, "Go down, and let the in." I let
him in. He went up stairs, and stopped about a minute.
I stayed in the yard, that father should not see my face ;
because, if he saw it, I'd catch it from mother. My eye
was pouring blood. All my things at home, and all my
brother's things, are smothered in blood. As I was
coming out of the yard, and father was coming down
stairs, he said, "What is the matter with your eye?" I
said, nothing, sir. When I came up, mother said, "Why
were you not here when your father was here ?" I said
I went into the yard to hide my face. She said, "You
lie, you crafty —. You were outside the door
listening." I said, "No I was not, mother." My
brother Billy was in bed then. Mother told him to get
up and wipe his face; it was smothered with blood. He
could not get up, and as he sat in the bed she kicked him,
and made a lump on his forehead as round as a walnut.
She kicked him half a dozen times, once on the forehead.
She then took him by the hair, and threw him quite
across the room. My eldest brother said, " Don't hit the
poor fellow any more, or you'll kill him, and be hung for
it." My mother took the pepper-box, and threw it at
Tom for saying so. Mother then took Billy up ; he was
dead. His mouth and eyes were wide open, and his face
was pouring blood everywhere. Mother sent Tommy for
four pennyworth of brandy, and poured some into Willy's
mouth, but he could not swallow it. Mother said, " Oh,
I shall be hung," and then said, "Mind, be fell down and
cut his head against the tin box." Mother then wrapped
him up in a sheet, and took him to the hospital. The
prisoner was committed for trial for wilful murder.

EXTRAORDINARY TRIAL Al
NEW_ YORK

A Thur. at New York of several days' duration has excited
great interest in that city. Mrs. Clara Hayes, described as
an accomplished lady, was indicted for the murder of Dr.
Lutener, a physician. The Hayes and Listener families
both lived at Haarlem, near New York, and had been for
some months on visiting terms. Dr. Lutener had an office,
or chambers, in Broadway, New York. The evidence in-
troduces the parties concerned on an evening about a
month before the murder. Mrs. Hayes was ill and in bed.
Mrs. Lutener had been staying with her all day. Dr.
Lutener came in the evening and brought some medicine,
and he and Mr. Hayes played at dominoes in the room.
A dispute arose about the game ; Mrs. Hayes took the
doctor's part against her husband ; eventually the domi-
noes were put up, and the Luteners left. The next morn-
ing Mrs. Hayes sent a message to Dr. Listener who then
went to her, and returned with her to his own house,
where she remained for some days. She informed Mrs.
Lutener that Mr. Hayes had told her to leave the house.
Mrs. Hayes went several times into New York with Dr.
Lutener, with a view to some arrangment with her hus-
band. One meeting at Dr. Luteners office was fully de-
scribed. Mr. Hayes came there and said he wanted to
speak to his wife; she told him, if he advanced another
step she would jump out of the window. High words
ensued. He said he would " show- her up, what she was ;"
she stepped up to him and slapped his face, and said,
" take that for your impudence, " Mr. Hayes talked in a
threatening tone. The doctor stepped forward and took a
revolver out of his pocket, and said, " I am ready for you."
Mr. Hayes also took r. pistol from his pocket ; but eventually
he went out. Mrs. Hayes snatched up the revolver, and
was following him, but the doctor took her by the shoulder
and said that would not do, and brought her back. A
young woman of the name of Shipman, who was living with
the Luteners at the time, doing sewing work, and who
was at the doctor's office, said, " Mrs. Hayes, you could
not use it, could you ? " She answered, " Ah, see if I
can't." The doctor said, "If that was aimed at me, I
should be inclined to dodge a little." Two or three days
after, Mrs. Hayes told Miss Shipman she had had an inter-
view with Mr. Hayes, and she thought she should go
back to him. The doctor told her to do as she pleased,
but that he had done all he could to protect her, and if
she got into such a scrape again she must not come to him.
She did go back, and on the same day Mrs. Listener went
to Mr. Hayes, and demanded an apology for insinuations
he had made to the prejudice of the doctor ; whereupon
Mr. Hayes wrote a note, stating, that he did not believe
there had been anything improper between his wife and
the doctor, and handed the note to Mrs. Hayes, who gave
it to Mrs. Lutdner. We hear nothing more of the par-
ties for some days, except that Mrs. Hayes was very
anxious to get back some letters she had given to the doc-
tor, or left with him, and said to be (or to include) letters
of Mr. Hayes's, written to her when she was in England.
The judge said of these papers, that it was very natural,
if they were the papers produced at the trial, (but not
sufficiently indentified), that she should plead urgently
for the restitution of them, to prevent their publication
by the doctor or transmission to certain parties in
Europe. On the Saturday before the murder Miss Ship-
man found Mrs. Hayes at the doctor's office, and, on
asking her if she was not ill, Mrs. Hayes answered that
she was very ill and miserable, and did not know what
she should do if she did not get the letters—that Mr.
Hayes would kill her. " Yes, " she said, " he would not be
satisfied with killing me, he would chop me up into little
pieces as small as my little finger." She said, "to be
exposed as she should be, she should be ruined ; she was
a woman Mr. Hayes was a man and cared less ; he
could get away." She said, the doctor could not realize
how it was coming on her, but slacould not blame him
because she had given the letters to him. Miss Shipman
observed, "that the doctor would not be forced to do any-
thing." Mrs. Hayes said, " she knew that." Miss Ship-
man asked her, " what induced her to pursue the course
she had, as it led the doctor to think that she had deceived
him from the first ?" She answered, " I know it, but I
did not think of my children. " She asked if the doctor
had gone out of town as he intended, and on being
answered in the negative, remarked, " Well, he'll never
go. " Miss Shipman said, "If Mr. Hayes had abused me
as you describe, I would not be afraid of any man." Mrs.
Hayes answered, "Before, I 41d, no particular occasion to
be. " She was in the doctor's office nearly the whole day,
pleading with him, but in vain. On the Monday, also,
Mrs. Hayes was in New York all the morning, and when
she returned home she told her nurse-girl that the doctor
would not give the papers up, and she said he had nearly
killed her, and she would kill him. On the next morning
Miss Shipman, who had been away for two days, went to
the doctor's office ; she had occasion to go out on an errand,
and left the doctor alone in his consulting room ; when
she returned he was lying on the floor shot dead ; a small
pistol was near him. His own loaded revolver lay in his
drawer close by. Mrs. Hayes had gone out that morning
and said she was going to town ; she was absent from
home all the morning. She had a small pistol in the
house. Early on that morning her nurse-girl saw Mr.
Hayes with it in the yard ; lie fired it off once ; the nurse-
girl did not think she saw the pistol after that day. A
woman, closely veiled, corresponding in appearance with
Mrs. Hayes, was seen to enter the house where Dr Lute-
ner had his office soon after the time when Miss Shipman
must have gone out ; the witness who made this state-
ment thought it was the same woman he had seen a few
weeks before in company with Miss Shipman and Dr.
Lutener in the street. Miss Shipman, Dr. Lutener, and
Mrs. Hayes had been together in the street a few weeks
before, on their way to a police-office, to ask protection
for Mrs. Hayes against her husband's violence. On the
part of Mrs. Hayes evidence was given by a Mr. H all,
that for an hour, including the time of the murder, Mrs.
Hayes was at his office, a mile off. Two other persons
saw her enter his office. Several things tendered in
evidence were objected to and excluded, among them a
paper which the doctor wrote and addressed• to Miss
Shipman the afternoon before his death. When the
evidence was closed, the counsel agreed to let the case go
to the jury without a speech on either side. The judge
therefore at once proceeded to sum up. The jury found
that Dr. Lutener did not die by his own hand, but that
the evidence that was allowed to come before them was
not sufficient to convict the prisoner, Clara Hayes.

A NOVEL MODE OS BORROWING.--A person named
Blake, who, from his military appearance, has earned the
soubriquet of " Capt. Blake," was indicted at the Middle-
sex sessions, on Monday, on a charge of robbing a gentle-
man named Mannock, of a £lO note, at the Imperial
Hotel. It appeared that Mr. Mannock had, just before
the robbery, lent him ; and after he had departed,
missed the note from his cash-box. The prisoner admitted
that he took the note ; but pleaded that he meant to regard
it as a loan. The
jury
seconded the merciful recom-
mendation of the ; but the court severely deprecated
the prisoner's conduct, and sentenced him to six months'
iMPASOninclit (!

IMPERIAL PARLIAMENT.