Blandford, Wimborne and Poole Telegram. — 1876-03-31 (Blandford, Dorset, England)

COWARDLY MURDERER. A young man named George Rill, groom, was tried a, the Hertford Assizes on Thursday for the murder of his child. The circumstances of the MSC were of a mosi painful and at the same time i.xtraordinary character. The prisoner was in the servi of a gentleman at St. Alban 8 as groom, and he formed a c,,nnection with a girl named Sarah Thrussell, :thou, years of age. She gay, birth to a child in January, 1575, and the offence imputed to the prisoner was that he had wilfully dearoyed the life of this child. From the tittle If the birth it appearol that he had expressed great alive. mid annoy :it tie, ar t I 11, was afraid that it would have Ma, effect of ; iii; ritg. hitt, in the estimation of his master. This feeling iv:is increased when, in June,. the mdlier of the child ol,t ;Lined an affiliation suinmons'against him. She appear' d, however, to have acted with great consideration towards the prisoner, for the summons was not served mien lii mu at his feaster's, but an arrangemeet was made that lie shonld receive it at the magistrate's , Thee. lie then, it appearol. promised to marry the mother of the child, the lanes were published at St. Peter's Church, at St. Albans, anti they "ran out," as it is termed, on the e7th June. The nth of July was fixed for the marriage, and the prisoner informed the girl that he had taken a house for her mid furnished it, and that they should go and live there ilie mediately after the marriage. This story was utterly false, and all the facts in the case tended to show that the prisoner had formed a delPsu ate intention to destroy the life. not only of the child, I i of thu mother also, in order to rid himself of burden of maintaining 'them. Satah Thrussell, the young woman referred to, who gave her evi fence with very gr propriety and in a most becoming lilarktler, WilB of cour, ,•• the principal witness for the prosecution. She detailed the nature of the circumstances that had existed between her and the prisoner, and spoke to his repeated req'i,;- L 4 that she sh, mid come and meet him mid I.,ring the a,w with her. They were to have been married on tho all of July. and on the previous evening, which was SI .'1,1:13, She yielded to his request to bring the child, and it was arranged that the should go with the prisoner to the house they were to occupy after the marriage. She said that the prisoner took her into the middle of a wl,eat tield, and then asked her to stoop down, because le said he was afraid they should he seen. The prisoner then pit his aria round her neck and forced her down, and at the same instant she felt a terrible blow on the head. Ile repeated the blows till she was nearly insensible, and 1111411 her saving to him Oh, George, what are you doing?" he replied, "I ani paying you for sending me that piece of piper" (in allusion, as was supposed, to the summons). When she fell down she saw the prisoner tatikibg the child on the head with the hammer, and when it was quiet he placed the child under her clothe,. Before the prisoner left he said to her 'Are you nearly goner and she replied "Yes." The prbouer then said to her '' !an yell forgive me what 1 have done to you . and she said '' Yes ; go away," and the prisoner then left. 'The learned Judge having slimmed up, the jury retired for about half an hour to deliberate upon the verdict, and upon their return into court the foreman, in an emphatic manner, announced that the Mry came to the unanimous conclusion that the prisoner was guilty of wilful murder. Lord Coleridge then addre sed the prisoner, and said there could he no doubt from the evidence that he was guilty of a most cruel murder upon this poor Lifant, and it w, impossible for the jury to have come to any other decision than they had done, lie then sentenced the prisoner to death. The prisoner, before he left the bar, exclaimed "1 al» innocent.. I didn't mean to do it, and I did not know I had the thing in illy head."