Denton & Haughton Weekly News, and Audenshaw, Hooley Hill, and Dukinfield Advertiser. — 1874-06-26 (Denton, Greater Manchester, England)

THE CAT" REQUIRED.  THE considerable number of kicking cases that have recently come under our notice have been appalling. During last week over half a dozen such cases have been brought under the notice of the magistrates, and the offenders punished with a term of imprisonment. When we consider the fact that these cases are becoming more numerous and appalling every day, we wonder why something more is not done to these apparently uncivilised human creatures, guilty of the tlegro.ding practice of kicking, than merely sending them to prison for a term of three or six months. Almost daily there appears the dreadful announcement, "Another kicking case," and a brief term of imprisonment inflicted on the offender—brief, because what is six months confinement in prison, to the brute who so degrades his humanity as to kick unmercifully his fellow men? We wonder why a severer punishment is not inflicted? Garotting, once a notoriou3 employment for a certain class of men, is now almost sunk into oblivion. Formerly, garotting cases were as numerous, or even more so, than the kicking cases of the present day, but now garotters are seldom heard of. And what has made the difference? Simply the use of the " cat." Little as these hard hearted fellowscare for imprisonment, they shudder at the thought of twenty or forty lashes with the "Cat o-nine-tails," and well they may. But this is not a severer punishment than they deserve for such conduct, and in our opinion we think that if the use of the " cat " was extended to these inhuman "kickers," we have no doubt but we should hear less of kicking, and fewer kicking cases than we have at present. What can be more degrading to society than the .too free use of the "Lancashire arbitrators," alias clogs? Lancashire has long been noted for its clogs, and not unfrequently have they proved disastrous to many an unfortunate human being, though Lancashire is not to take the blame for all the kicking cases that are brought before the public, for be it known that beyond the prozincts of our own county such cases have transpired, and we are sorry to say of an equally brutal character. The other day at Halifax., a most horrid affair took place, where one man felled another to the ground, and kicked him SO severely that he received injuries which terminated fatally. Coming back to Lancashire we find that in one town, Oldham, where kicking is carried on to an enormous extent, a most atrocious and brutal murder was committed there on Saturday evening the 13th, resulting in the death of a man named Metcalfe. Commenting on this fact, the ,Chief Constable said" there were no fewer than nine or ten fights amongst the Irish population on Sunday night, and it was a perfect disgrace to the town. They did not conduct themselves like human beings, and he could see no way of putting an end to the present dreadful state of affairs, unless the magistrates inflicted the severest punishment they could." Mr. Leach, the presiding magistrate at the time the case was brought forward, referred to the use of the "cat," as .being in his opinion the most effective means of curing this great evil, and in this statement we heartily concur.