The Glasgow Chronicle. — 1847-06-30 (Glasgow, Strathclyde, Scotland)

SHOCKING OUTRAGE AND MURDER AT BAR RILE A D. Last Saturday being the annual fair at Barrhead, as is customary all work in the village and neighbourhood was suspended daring the afternoon, and amongst the rest the railway navies and workmen engaged in the festivities customary on such occasions. As the even. ing advanced a large party of the railway workmen, amounting to from 200 to 300, commenced a sort of riotous procession along the streets; and impelled by that rude spirit of combativeness and nationality which all over the world distinguishes Irishmen, they made a boast of their prowess, and seemed inclined to throw out defiance to the lieges. With all this no breach of the peace was committed, nor the slightest injury inflicted on any individual, till a little after eleven o'clock, when a stout young man named M'Lea, or M•Lean, who had been taking a lead on the head of the navies, and who was a little the worse of liquor, called out that he was stabbed, and in a few minutes afterwards he expired. The deed was, in every sense of the word, done in the dark. No threetening word had been made use of, nor the slightest appearance of squarest manifested. The wounded man was carried away, but a crowd continued about the place, when shortly after two other men, named M'Nally and Flanagan, were also both wounded in a similar mysterious manner, and without an individual being able to discover the hand that committed the deed. A little after this, an aged resident of the name of M'Eechnie came to his door, and, on his asking the cause' of disturbance, a blow from the same fatal and mysterious knife was the only answer he received. WRechnie WAS taken into his residence severely wounded, and an individual, unknown to the inmates of the house, showed great activity in assisting his family to shut out the crowd, and bolt the door. The same person even bunched a pair of tongs in defence of M'Kechnie and his family, but in a few minutes alter, he broke out at the back window, and made off. He was dressed with a blue jacket and cap, with white trousers; and suspicion now rests on him as being the principal perpetrator of the revolting acts which we describe. Another person In the crowd was a short time after stabbed, and slightly wounded, but this last assault, there is reason to suspect, was not committed by the same individual as the others. On information of this occurrence being communicated to the legal authorities at Paisley, a searching inquiry was set on foot to discover the delinquents. Dering the greater part of Monday, Mr Roger, county fiscal. and Sheriff Glasgow were engaged at Barrhead tigating M‘Les,  into the case. A irisi mortern inspection of , and an examination into the cases of the other wounded men, also took place by Doctors Wylie and WKinlay of Paisley, along with the medical gentleman at Barrhead who had first ben called in. From all the inquiry that .has taken place there is every reason to believe, we understand, that the wounds had been inflicted by a clasp hunting knife or some similarly shaped weapon, and there is every reason to suspect that in every case the heart had been aimed at, although it was only in the case of lta*Lea that the murderer had been successful in reaching that vital part. By the latest intelligence from Barrhead and Paisley no trace of the guilty individual hld been discovered. M'Lea was about 26 years of age and of rather a forward and boisterous disposition and this he had manifested to a considerable extent on the evening he was killed.