The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette. — 1880-11-02 (Dorchester, Dorset, England)

MURDER IN MANCHESTER.  Leta on Thursday night, the Manchester police made a discovery which points to a murder of a horrible character having been committed, the victim being a woman about 40 or 43 years old. About ten o'clock a policeman named Carroll, while walking along Cheater. road, Hulme, noticed a man pushing a hand-cart in the direction of the city. His suspicions were aroused, and he followed the man. Stopping him in Great- Jackson. street, he raised some blankets on the cart, and saw the dead body of a woman about forty years old, in an almost nude state. In answer to the constable, the man, who gave his name as John Smithson, of Brewery-street, Bradford, near Manchester, said he wasremoving the body for a gentleman, but beyond this he declined to give any information. He was taken to the Park Police-station, and was locked up on the charge of being ooncerned in the murder of the woman. Intimation of the discovery was sent to the chief station of the division, and Mr. Suparintindent Meade has since been engaged with other officers in the investigation of the affair. Until a surgical examination has been completed, the actual cause of death cannot be dated. It is clear, however, that the deceased had been subjected to groat personal violence, and the police do not entertain a doubt that she was murdered. Recognition has been rendered difficult by the disfigurement of the head, which appeared to have been battered with some heavy blunt instrument. The body in other parts bears marks of ill-treatment, and appears to have been recently washed. In their inquiries the police learned that the man Smithson brought the body from the premises of Alfred Hartley, a druggist, Hulme, and that he had been assisted in the removal by another man named Bradbury. The two were seen to take something out of Mr. Hartley's place of business and to place it on a handcart. On going to the house of Smithson the police found Bradry there, and he also was arrested as an accomplice in the crime. Hartley is not to be found. It is stated that he was seen at his shop late on Th,irsday night. Although Smithson and Bradbury will be charged with murder, It is not believed that either of them actually killed the woman. The police look for the murderer in another person, and regard these men simply as accomplices after the fact. The police are understood to be in possession of facts which it would not be wise at present to disclose. The murdered woman turns out to be Caroline Barkam, a widow, of fifty years of age, who has lived with a druggist named Hartley, as his mistress. Hartley's shop, where the murder is supposed to have been perpetrated, is in one of the busiest thoroughfares of Manchester, and was a lockup place. Hartley lived with his wife and family at Southport, and it is stated that Mrs. Hartley had refused to live with him owing to his relation with deceased. The police arrested Hartley on Friday afternoon at an hotel not far from his shop. On being charged he made a long statement, which will be read at the police-court when he is charged on Saturday. The two other man arrested are supposed to have only assisted in disposing of the body after death. The inquest on the body was opened on Friday afternoon, but as a poskutorten examination had not been nude the surgical evidence was incomplete. Presumptive evidence was given, however, that death had not arisen from natural canoes A boy employed by Hartley stated that on Thursday Hartley sent him for a quantity of poison, and that all day he seemed 11•111i0111 to keep him out of the way, and had repeatedly told him not to go nor the room where the woman was.  717 he cam) has aroused great excitement in Manchester.