The Sun. — 1842-04-12 (London, England)

TORY OPPRESSION IN BATH. TO THE EDITOR OF THE SUN. Sul,-1 take the opportunity, through the medium of your wide/yr circulated paper, of exposing as heartless a proses eding on the part of some of the Bath Conservatives, as 9s er was. conceived and perpetrated by man. It is of course wed known how signal was the defeat sustained by this party at the last election, but it is probably not in the knowledge, of any save the inhabitants of this place, that on that occasion numerous bands of navigators, from the neighbouring railway, were contendinghired for the express purpose of with the .Liberals, and of making themselves generally useful to tho Blues, or Conservatives, by whom they were fed and paid. On the day of the nomination some fearful outrages vere committed by these men, who in large bodies endeavoured to disturb the proceedings of the day : in this they were defeated, and the result of the nomination was most decisively in favour of the Liberal Candidates. In the evening of that day (23th June last) one of the Liberal voters, in passing down Avon-street, was savagely attacked, and almost murdered, by a party of these men, who immediately afterwards retreated into a low public-, house close by, called the Pig and Whistle : the alarm laavin been given, a party of the Liberals immediately came to the, rescue of the injured man, and finding out to what house his, assailers had retreated, they went to it, and demanded of then landlord to turn them out: this he refused to do, at the same time denying that any of the Blues were there ; upon this the Liberals burst open the door, but not being enabled to get at their opponents, who contrived to make their escape, left the house, and as may have been expected, not without expressing their anger by breaking roost of the windows in the building; here the disturbance ended. A few days after this, fifteen of the Liberals. supposed se* have been present on the above occasion, were apprehend:lds, and taken before the Bails :Magistrates on a charge of havMg begun to demolish the Pig and Whistle. The case of the complainant was fully investigated, and after a most patient and. careful examination for several days, the Magistrates came to, the conclusion that there were no grounds for supporting the, edetd atkoitnig m bailcou n for their capital charge of felony for beginning to demolish, but committed the parties to take their trial for " a riot," at the them T h e due prosecutor, ai e n are not appearance. The next borough quarter sslistsiliefinesd,:ittitiltiheissame oc time e, pr Assizes in August last, and there presented a bill to the Grand Jury (which they found) for the offence again of "beginning to demolish," an offence NV hill is a felony, and was at that time punishable with death. Upon the bill being found, these poor fellows (most of them in the humblest circumstances) were again taken into custody ; some of them, after an expensive application to a Judge in London, were admitted to bail; others, from their poverty, were unable to procure this advantage, and were in consequence confined in gaol from last August to the assizes which are just over. Upon the indictment coming on for trial, a legal objection was taken on behalf of the prisoners to its sufficiency—the objection ultimately prevailed. Up goes another bill for the felony ("beginning to demolish") which the Grand Jury, upon the evidence alone of the prosecution, foutAl. The men, twelve in number, were then put upon their trial, and the case broke down in its infancy. It appeared clear upon the evidence that the prisoners neverd had who, without calling t tedausino n. the aui sense in which the any intention whatever of demolishing the house, and so the Judge stated to the Jury, prisoners for their defence, immedia.hteolicy Nothing could more plainly dings,thanhisrefusingto allow Learned Judge viewed these or po!•-dti°ob y the Conservative Association. en of his expenses; which, cethe prosecutor a large b, at the bottom ofthe whole pro'ours, however, will doulstless be Pal who are, beyond a dovuurt,, ceedings. I am, Sir, 3 A