Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1856-05-08
Curious Trials in India.
OAKLAND, Ohio, 1856.
BY SIR ERSKINE PERRY.

When Mr.. Read, Commissioner of Ben
ares, was collector at Gorak ,ur. he one day
visited the il, and happened to ask a pris-
oner what he was there tor. The man snil-
cd, and said, "Murder." Reade replied th 1t
murder was not joking matter; on which
the man said, '.Yes, but am net guilty; and
what is more, the mar is now alive" There
was something in the mans manner which
made Dir. Reade inquire particularly into
the case; and the story told him was, that
the party supposed to be murdered. who Was
a barkandaz of po!ice, had had an intrigue
with the wife of the prisoners brother, upon
which the prisoner and his three brothers
laid a plot to waylay him one night, and
give him good drubbing. They did so ac-
cordingly, and the policeman either fell, or
was thrown by them into river, by the side
of which they had been waylaying him. The
man being missing, and suspicion being
strong against the four brothers, it was
agreed amongst themselves that, as harvest
time was near, the prisoner should take the
crime entirely on his own shoulders, and SO
get the others liberated. He did So admit
ted the murder, and of course was found
guilty; but probably on the scorce of the
corpse not being found, was sentenced only
to Imprisonment for life, and pension was
given to the family of the murdered police
man This story was told with such vrai
simiitude, that Reade made a careful in
auiry into TIE whole, and found every word
Of it true; and after much trouble discovered
the policeman hundreds OF mics off, acting
as peon at the Court oi Nagpore, glad TO
been well provided lor a. Gorakpur, by
pension from government lor Ills supposed
death. The rogue had no doubt kept pur-
posely out of the way, in order to secure
this provision for his family.
My own experience of famous case at
TAMPA, talliys we'll with the above story; for
there | saw three prisoners standing at the
bar who had given circnmstantiaIe eenfrv--
sion of murder, and pointed out the very
spot where the bones OF the murdered man
would be found. These were produced in
court; and part of the clothes and the east
thread of the murdered man were identified
by his friends and relations Yet the doctor,
my intelligent friend, DR.. Kirk-who ac-
companied Sir w. Harris to Abyssnia-on
examing the bones. ascertained TINT they
belonged to three or four different corpSes;
and as this incident gave sort of hitch t.
the proceedings, and prolonged the trial, the
result was, that before it was over, the mur-
dered man himself walked into ecu t, and, it
is said, was seen to examine his own bones
with infni'e curiosity. The story with he
told, and which accounted for his remarka-
BILE disappearance from his village on the
night of the supposed murder, was not the
least remarkable part of the tale, and is a
good illustration of "Manners in the East y
He had been seen last somewhat near the
house of the prisoners; and he stated that rs
he was going homeward, he met four or five
Arab soldiers, who pressed HIM in their train
to carry bundle, and who made him ac-
C, mpany them for six weeks march into
the interior, somewhere beyond Polna-I
When they dismissed him. he WAS taken i'll
of fever, and laid some months sick at vii
lagc in the Deccan. When, at last, after
four months absence, he got back to his own
village, he found that three OF his neighbors
stood a near chance of being hung, on their
own confession, for numbering him. So,
like an honest fellow, he made his way to
the criminal court, which, luckily for the
prisoners, was not above ten miles off. IL
would seem most probable that the confess
sions in question had been extorted by the
violence of the subordinate native police.