The Sun. — 1862-08-19 (London, England)

MURDER AT CHELTENHAM. Elizabeth Hale, a domestic servant, aged 26, was charged with the wilful murder of her child, aged 3 menths, on the 21st of Jan. last. Mr. Cooke and Mr. Puller conducted the prosecution, and Mr. James defended the prisoner. Mr. Cooke, having opened the case in a very temperate address, caled a number of witnesses, who deposed to facts, of which the following is a summary : The prisoner had been in the service of Mrs. Smith, of Brunswick House, Cheltenham, where she had formed an improper connexion with some person, and at the end of November, being in the family way, she went to the house of a woman named Est, where she was confined, on the 22d of November, of a female child. She remained at Mrs. Est's about a month after this, when she left (just before Christmas-day) to go to her service again, leaving the child in the care of Mrs. Est, and agreeing to pay her ss. a week for its maintenance. The child remained with Mrs. Est until the 21st of January, when the prisoner came to her, and, telling her she wanted to remove it to a nurse nearer to her, took the child away. Mrs. Est dressed the child in the usual way that children were attired, and the prisoner asked to have some more of her clothes sent to her next day. Accordingly more clothes were sent, and three weeks later, when a messenger was sent by Mrs. Est to the prisoner for some money for the maintenance of the child while under her care, she was asked how the child was. She answered it was going on nicely. Nothing was seen of the child after it was taken from Mrs. Est's, and the prisoner remained in her situation up to the sth of April, when the dead body of the child was found in the scullery, shrivelled up. and with a pocket handkerchief tightly tied across its mouth. Suspicion then fell upon the prisoner, who being challenged with it (having previously said that the child was out at nurse with her mother), admitted that the body was the body of her child. The clothes sent by the nurse after the child was removed by the prisoner were found in the prisoner's box, and the child when discovered was proved to be dressed precisely as it had been attired by Mrs. Est when it was taken away. A statement of the prisoner made before the coroner was read. She said she had taken the child from Mrs. Est's to place it with Mrs. Torkin, who had told her she lived near the burying-ground,that she could not find her,and that afterwards she found the child was dead in her arms ; that she then tied up its jaw with a handkerchief and put it in the scullery at Mrs. Smith, where she thought no one would be likely to find it, intending,when she went away in the summer, to bury it. Mr. James addressed the jury in a powerful speech for the prisoner, contending that the evidence was not sufficiently conclusive to convict the prisoner of a charge which would lead to the forfeiture of her life if substantiated. His Lordship, in summing up, pointed out to the jury that there could be no question of concealment of birth in this case. Either the prisoner was guilty of murder or not guilty. He then minutely examined the evidence that had been produced on the trial. The jury found a verdict of not guilty.