The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1870-02-25

So strong were the circumstances known
to be against him, that several of his friends
advised him to plead guilty on his trial
and to throw himself on the mercy of the
Court. This advice he rejected and when
arraigned, pleaded not guilty. The prose-
cutor swore to his being robbed; but that,
it being nearly dark, the higwayman in a
mask, and himself greatly terrified, he
could not swear to the prisoners person,
though he thought him Of much the same
stature as the man who robbed him. To
the purse and guineas which were pro-
duced in Court he swore-as to the purse
positively, and as to the marked guineas
to the best of his belief, and that they were
found in the prisoners pocket.
The prisoners master, Mr.. Brunell, de-
posed to the fact, as to sending the priso-
ner to change guinea, and of his having
brought him back marked one in the
room OF the one he had given him I'M
marked. He also gave evidence as to the
finding of the purse, and the nineteen
marked guineas in the prisoners pocket
And what consummated the proof, the man
to whom Mr.. Brunell paid the guinea, pro-
duced the same, and gave testimony to his
having taken it that night in payment
from the prisoners master. Mr. Brunell
gave evidence to his having received of the
prisoner that guinea, which he afterwards
paid to this last witness. And the prosecutor
comparing it with the other nineteen found
in the pocket of the prisoner, swore to its
being, to the best of his belief, one of the
twenty guincas of which he had been rob-
bed by the highwayman.
The Judge, on summing up the evidence,
remarked to the jury on all the circum-
stances against the prisoner; and the Jury
on this strong circumstantial evidence,
without going out of Court, brought in the
prisoner guilty. Jennings was executed
some little time after, at Hull, repeatedly
declaring his innocence to the very mo-
ment of being turned off. This happened
in the year 1742.
Within twelve month after, 10 Brunell,
Jennings master, was himself taken up for
a robbery done on guest in his own house,
and the fact being proved on his trial, he
was convicted and ordered for execution.
The approach of death brought on repen-
lance and confession. Brunell not only &C.
knowledged the committing of many high
way robberies for some years past, but the
very one for which poor Jennings had
suffered.
The account he gave was, that he ar
rived at home bya nearer way and swifter
riding, some time before the gentleman
got in who had been robbed. That he
found man waiting to whom he owed
little bill, and that not having quite
enough loose money in his pocket, he took
out of the purse enc guinea, from the
twenty he had just got possession of to
make up the sum, which he paid, and the
man went away. Presently came in the
robbed gentleman, who, while Brunell had
gone into the stables, and not knowing of
his arrival told his tale, as before related,
in the kitchen. The gentleman had only
just left the kitchen when Brunell en-
tered it, and being there informed amongst
other circumstances, of the marked guineas
he was Thunderstorm Having paid one
of them away, and not daring to apply for
it again, as the affair of the robbery and
marked money would soon become public
ly decentralization disgrace and ruin
appeared inevitable. Turning in his mind
every way to escape, the thought of accus-
ing and sacrificing poor Jennings at last
struck him, The rest the reader knows.