The Sun. — 1860-11-14 (London, England)

TIIE CONVICT MULLINS.  No answer had been received at Newgate last night from the Home Secretary to the different memorials and representations that have been transmitted to the Government by the prisoner, through his solicitor, Mr. Hubert Wood, and it is expected that no reply will be made until the Saturday before the day appointed for the execution, when the usual formal notification will be  sent to the Sheriffs, that all the facts of the case have been considered, and that there do not appear to be any sufficient grounds for recommending the prisoner to the clemency of the Crown. There is no foundation for the rumour that the prisoner had received a respite from the 12th to the 19th of November, and the rumour appeared to have arisen from the fact that according to the ordinary practice the execution would have taken place on the second .clear Monday after the trial, and this would have been the 12th. As, however, the prisoner was only tried at the end of the week, and sentence was not passed upon him until late on the Friday evening, if the Sheriffs had adopted the usual course the execution would have followed upon the sentence in the very shortest time allowed by the law, and they therefore deferred the execution for another week, the law giving the Sheriffs the power to fix any time not within the period mentioned. The culprit still continues to' assert his entire innocence of the crime for which he is to suffer, and upon every occasion when he has been visited 'by the authorities of the prison he con' tinues to delare that he did not commit the murder. He is permitted the flee use of pen, ink, and paper, and he occupies a good deal of his time in writing, and has addressed several letters to his wife and his children. It will be recollected that  at the trial a person named Barnes was called as a witness on his behalf, and she stated that about half-past ten or eleven o'clock on the Tuesday morning, the murder being supposed to have been committed on the previous evening, she saw one of the windows of the house of the deceased opened by some one. It appears that the relations of the prisoner have discovered that a tradesman named Davidson, living in the neighbourhood, was with Mrs. Barnes at the time she saw what she represented took place, and he conirms her statement, and the prisoner relies upon this as a confirmation of his assertion that he did not commit the murder, and this is one of the facts that he has transmitted to the Home Secretary in support of his application for a remission of the sentence. The prisoner is visited three times a week by his wife or some members of his family. His wife and daughter were with him on Monday, and they conversed for some time upon family matters, and also in reference to the murder, and Mullins again asserted his innocence of the crime, and in allusion to the possession of the cheque for £lO. which was the principal point of evidence against him, said this could be accounted for without his being in any way connected with the murder. He has never attempted to give any reasonable explanation of the circumstances under which the property belonging to the deceased, and which undoubtedly must have been stolen at the time the murder was committed, came into his possession. As the period approaches nearer for the carrying out of the sentence, the culprit appears to become more restless and excited, and within the last day or two he has expressed his intention, if he should suffer, to address the crowd from the scaffold, and he says he hopes that his strength will be sufficient to enable him to do so. He is visited every day by the Rev. Mr. O'Callaghan, a Roman Catholic priest.