The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1842-05-10 00:00:00

EMPLOYMENTS ron WOMEN AND CTILDIiEN.

(From the Morning Herald.)
We have just received two huge blue books, sing Parts
I. and 11. of the " Appendix" to the parliamertry " Com-
mission on Children's Employment." Each "dart" con-
sists of nearly 900 folio pages. Part I. is illustnted by some
lithographic sketches of men, of women, of oildren, em-
ployed in what we may term " brute labour"and " brute
transport." Here are! women harnessed to oal carts, and
dragging them through seams of coal from 22,0 28 inches,
only, in height,—working their burdens some backward—
others forward—over the dismal perforations rather than
roads, with a dip of 1 foot in 3, to 1 foot in f. This infa-
mous, this disgusting, this unsexing employeatit is exacted,
at this day, of wretched, but miserably poor and untiringly
industrious women (!) in some of the mines of i'cotland, and
the north of England, under circumstances to vhich at pre-
sent we cannot trust ourselves further to alltue. We shall
speedily recur to the subject, however, more at large. In
mines in Lancashire, boys are employed sum in pushing,
others in draggingloaded coal trucks through hose miserable
seams or galleries,—the pushers becoming ald, from the
friction of their heads against the trucks, the draggers
maimed from hauling it on their hands and k nes ;—and both
these employments are habitual In mines a Rochdale and
in the vicinity of Preston and Macclesfield, :liners work at
the coal in positions and under restraints ant confinement,
as to space for their exertions, which shock belief, but are
terribly exemplied in the rude but effective litngraphs at pp.
158, &c., of Part I. One of the men shown, and of all re-
presented in the cuts it is said (p. 159) that " hey generally
work "naked,"—) is as destitute of all habiliaents as a na-
tive of the Washington Islands. He was fours working "in
a mine not more than from 18 to 20 inches intMckness. His
chest was brought down so as almost to rest udon the thigh,
and the head bent down almost to the knee !" How strange
that £20,000,000 of money should have bees heaped upon
the fetters of negro slaves in the West hides in order to
break them ; and that not one indignant tongue should yet
have been heard within the walls of Parliament to denounce
a legalised or at least permitted system of plysical degrada-
tion to men, of moral ruin and bodily tonne to women, of
barbarous captivity and toil to children, for which the
bondage of Egyptian taskmasters, the tyraniy of European
" overseers," and the humiliations of Moorsh slavery have
supplied no parallel, and can suggest no type!

DREADFUL ACCIDENT.—On Tuesday norning last, a
shocking catastrophe befel a matt named 13eljamin Taylor, a
slubber, in the employ of Messrs. Armitage and Body, of
Mitnes-bridge, near Huddersfield. It appeas that in conse-
quence of there being something defective about the water
wheel, he went upon it for the purpose of recifying what was
amiss, when, from some unknown cause, thewater suddenly
rushed out and set the wheel in instant maim, and horrible
to relate, literally cut the poor fellow asunter.—Leeds In-
telligencer.

MURDER OF A POLICEMAN IN LONDOL—For the last
three weeks, a series of highway robberies lave been perpe-
trated on persons passing through the fields in and near the
Hornsey-wood House, by a foot-pad said to lave been heavily
armed, and a description of whose persor was a few days
since forwarded to the station house of the xti division, Isling-
ton Green: since which period, Mr. Superirtendent Johnston
has caused additional men to be placed near the spot com-
plained of. Shortly before 4 o'clock on Tharsday afternoon,
police constable Charles Moss was on duly near Hornsey-
wood House, when he observed a gentlemen going along the
path which leads from it towards town„ and a man following
him, wko also answered the description of the party suspec-
ted. He pursued him, and, on approaching within a few
yards, the villain turned round and fired a pistol, and the
ball lodged in Moss's right arm. Moss called loudly for
help, and police constable Mallet, N 341, who was standing
on a hill about a quarter of a mile from the spot, and a jour-
neyman baker, named Charles Mott, and vho also was near
joined in the pursuit. The man Mott had got within a few
yards of the fugative, when the latter drew another pistol
from his breast and again fired, wounding his pursuer in the
shoulder. Mr. Howard, a baker, of Hornsley, who saw the
occurrence, gave chase to the assassin, 'Thom he kept in
sight along the main road in the direction al Highbury Barn,
on arriving near which he jumped over a ditch into some
fields in the direction of Highbury College. Mr. Howard
followed, and whilst doing so observed hire reloading his pistol.
He got into a lane at the end of which there was no thorough-
fare, and in which he was met by police constable Timothy
Daley, who was about to seize him, wher he drew from his
breast the pistol he had re-loaded, and fired at Daley, who
instantly fell lifeless, the ball having penetrated his heart.
By this time Mr. Howard and the other 3ursuers came up,
and the murderer was seized. He exclaimec, " I'm done now ;
I give myself up ;" and he was then asked to deliver up his
pistols, which he did. On being asked it he had anything
else about him, he said "No ;" but, on being searched, a
knife or dagger, sharpened at the point cn both sides, was
found concealed down his fob pocket. The pistols are old
cavalry pistols, with flint locks, and odd ones ; the stock of
one of them was much stained with blood, and the knife also
had stains of blood upon it. The murderer is apparently
about twenty-four years of age, of spare habit of body ; his
teatures are oval, his eyes and hair dark. He calls himself
Thomas Cooper, and says he is a bricklayer: Upwards of
twenty persons saw the murder committed. On Friday the
prisoner was brought up before the magistrates at Clerken-
well. The court was excessively crowded. The prisoner
appeared to be in a state of weakness and suffering, and he
was accommodated with a chair. He spoke, when addressed
by the magistrate, in a low, feeble tone. The individuals
who witnessed the circumstances above related gave their
testimony. The prisoner sat leaning on the front of the
dock, with his face resting on his hands. He declined ask-
ing any questions of the witnesses. As the examination pro-
ceeded, his countenance was observed to assume a ghastly
hue, he appeared to be growing weaker and weaker, and, at
length, fell insensible into the arms of the gaoler, when he
was removed from the court. A communication was shortly
afterwards made to the court that the prisoner had stated
that he had taken poison. Mr. Dwery, the surgeon, who
had been giving evidence in the case, immediately hastened
to his assistance. This gentleman shortly afterwards con-
firmed the opinion that the prisoner had taken poison. In-
spector Penny announced that the prisoner was getting
worse every instant, and that he was at that moment throw-
ing up large quantities of blood. Waddington, the gaoler,
said the prisoner had told him he had pnrchased, on the pre-
ceding evening, two pennyworth of white arsenic and six
pennyworth of laudanum. The crowd in the court was,
during this time, in a state of great excitement. In a short
time the unfortunate man ceased vomiting. He took a little
brandy and water, and some emetics, and appeared to be re-
covering, though he remained in a state of great debility. On
Saturday the prisoner was ao.ain placed at the bar, before
Mr. Greenwood, the sitting magistrate, when the depositions
of the witnesses examined on Friday were formally taken
down by Mr. Mould, the clerk. The prisoner looked rather
better than on Friday, his colour having partially returned ;
and it was stated that he had passed a very good night, and
slept soundly for several hours. During the proceedings,
however, he became faint, and was unable to attend to the
examination of the witnesses. The magistrate, finding him
in this state, ordered the further examination to be post-
poned. Mr. H. Haves Walton, one of the surgeons of St.
Bartholomew's Hospital, told the reporter that the prisoner
had not taken poison of any kind : his present enfeebled
state was the result of mental and bodily exhaustion, pro-
duced by his not having taken any food since the day of the
murder, and his obstinately refusing to take any, and his
great anxiety of mind. The strong emetic that had been
given him, when it was conjectured he had taken poison, was
the cause that prevented stimulating liquids remaining on his
stomach, and of the relaxed state, accompanied with pain, of
the bowels.