The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser. — 1853-05-24 (Liverpool, Merseyside, England)

EXTRAORDINARY ASSAULT ON A LADY.—A CBSC of a singular nature occurred a few days since on the Stour Valley railway. Miss Prince, a young lady of most respectable family connexions in Dudley, got into a firstclass carriage at the New-street station to proceed by a train for Dudley. Shortly after the train started, and immediately on its entering the tunnel, the door of the carriage in which Miss Prince was sitting alone was opened, and some one entered and took hold of her arm. She screamed out, and the person said he did not want to hurt her, and toll her not to be alarmed. The man seized hold of her, and, after a struggle, kissed her. A. knocking was then heard in the other partition of the carriage, and the man got out, but not until Miss Prince had felt that he had on a belt, and that his coat buttons were very large. In a few moments after the train emerged from the tunnel, and on reaching Dudley Port, Miss Prince made a complaint of the treatment she had received. The company instituted an inquiry into the circumstance, in consequence of which the guard Hayes was discharged from their service ; and the relatives of Miss Prince having made a representation to the Northwestern Railway Company, it was determined to prosecute him for the offence. The case was ultimately brought before the magistrates, when Hayes, who had been aprehended at his residence in Wolverhampton, was brought up in custody. The prisoner having previously admitted that he had committed the offence, the bench inflicted a penalty of £5, which was immediately paid.—Eirminykant Journal. MURDER BY A WlFE.—Early on Tuesday the inhabitants of St. Leonard's-on-Sea were thrown into a state of excitement by the report that during the night a man named Stephen Smith had lost his life in an altercation with his wife. The deceased was a shoemaker, living with his wife in a room over some coach-houses in the Haroldmews, St. Leonard's-on• Sea. On Monday evening deceased and his wife were seen in a beer-shop ; they appeared to be on very friendly terms. They were seer. returning to St. Leonard's shortly before twelve o'clock. This was the last time they were seen together. In twenty minutes after this the woman fetched a pint of beer, which she did not take home. Shortly after one o'clock she called a neighbour, named Mary Cope, stating that she had stabbed her husband. This person ran for a surgeon, who was on the spot in ten minutes. On bis entering the room Mrs. Smith exclaimed, " I have killed my husbavd. I knew it would come to this." She further said that the deceased was always jealous of her; they had been out together to Hastings, and in coming home she "gave him the slip," and did cot get home until after him ; that he spoke to her, and she then threatened to " do for him," upon which he opened his waistcoat and said "Do it." She then took up a knife, having a very sharp point, from deceased's work-seat, and stabbed him in the chest, afterwards throwing the knife out of the window upon a dungheap. From this wound he died in about a quarter of an hour. An inquest was held on the body, and a verdict of " Wilful murder" returned. The accused woman has been of a loose character, of drinking habits, and possessed of an ungovernable temper.