The Sun. — 1852-11-25 (London, England)

CHARGE AGAINST BROOME.  10,535  8,160  73,442  9,20  8,953  The prisoner was sentenced to be transported for ten years.  Harriet Earmaker, 22, a good-looking young woman. was indicted for the manslaughter of her male illegitimate child.  Mr. Platt prosecuted. • The prisoner would have been unprovided with the assistance of counsel, but by the humane interference of the Sheriffs, Mr. Sleigh was instructed to watch the case on her behalf.  It appeared that the prisoner was cook to a gentleman's family in Eccleston-square, and on the morning of the Bth November there were indications about the house, observed by the other servants, of her having been delivered of a child, although the prisoner had always positively denied that she was in that condition. In the course of the afternoon, one of the servants heard . a noise in a cupboard, of which the prisoner had the key, which she supposed to be the cry of a cat which had received some injury, and she applied to the prisoner for the key of the cupboard. The prisoner came from her own room, and while the other servant was gone to fetch a light she was seen to go into the cupboard and come out in a hurried manner, and when her fellow-servant came up with the light and asked her what was the matter, she said that the cat had been caught by the tail and that she had run away. There appeared to be very little doubt that the prisoner had placed the child in the cupboard, and that she had got it out during the short absence of the other servant ; and soon afterwards the body of the infant was found in the yard of the house quite dead. There were, however, no marks of violence of any description upon it, and there was no evidence whatever, except with regard to the noise that was heard in the cupboard, to show that the child was born alive. It appeared that a bill for murder had been presented before the grand jury against the prisoner, but they ignored it and returned one for manslaughter only. Two witnesses were called to depose to the facts above narrated, but in answer to the questions put to one of them, a married woman, by the Court and the counsel for the prisoner, with regard to the nature of the noise that was heard in the cupboard, she said she would not attempt to state, with any certainty, that the noise she heard was the cry of a child. It was also stated that the instant the door of the cupboard was opened the noise ceased, thereby creating a strong impression of the probability of the story told by the prisoner that the cat's tail had been caught in it, and that the noise that was heard was caused by the animal, and was not, in point of fact, the cry of a child. _ _  Mr. Justice Coleridge expressed his opinion that under these circumstances the prisoner could not be convicted. If she had been indicted for murder, the jury might have convicted her, under such indictment, of concealing the birth of the child, which appeared in reality to be the object she had in view ; but this being an indictment for manslaughter, she could not be convicted of concealing the birth, and she must be acquitted altogether. His lordship then explained to the jury, that in the absence. of any positive proof of the child having been born alive, or of any injury likely to cause death being inflicted upon it by the prisoner, he was of opinion that the present in: dictment could not be sustained, returned a 'verdict of Not Guilty. The jury accordingly, under his lordship's direction,