The Northern Daily Times. — 1857-06-02 (Liverpool, Merseyside, England)

SINGULAR DELUSION.—At tho Mansion house, London, on Saturday, Mr. Hugh Miller, a respectably-attired man, described on the police sheet as a commPrcial traveller, was charged with having threatened Yesterday su'cide. S. Heywood, constable No. 488, said : y afternoon, while on duty, I was called to the Wine Shades in Martin's-place, where I found the defendant in an exceedingly excited state, declaring that he would kill, drown, and murder himself; that he had lost thousands of pounds by betting, and that he and his family and his employers had been ruined by his own act. Finding that I could not pacify him, I procured the assistance of another constable, and after a good deal of trouble he was conveyed to the station-house, where he was taken care of lest he should carry his threat into execution. The Lord Mayor : Do you believe that he would have destroyed his life if precautionary measures had not been taken to prevent his doing so ? Witness : Yes, my lord. The Lord Mayor : Did be appear to have been drinking ? Witness : No ; he was suffering from pure excitement. He had had nothing to drink at the Shades. While in the stationhouse he kept striking his hand with great force against the wall, and we were obli.ied to handcuff him and tie his legs. He bit a brother officer in the arm and tore a piece of cloth out of his coat. Upon making inquiries, I found that, just before he entered the Shades, he rushed into a tradesman's shop in the neighbourhood, and seized a knife, and had it not been for the kind assistance of a passer-by, who seized him, closed with him, and wrenched the knife from his grasp, in all probability he wonld have killed himself. In answer to the Lord Mayor, the defendant said he had not the slightest recollection of the transactions referred to by the officer. He had had nothing to drink, with the exception of a little beer with his dinner ; but said he was very much excited on account of his wife having charged him with speaking to a female of loose character, the accusation being totally groundless. He had never been in any way engaged in better transactions. The defendant's wife here stepped into the witness-box, and, in answer to the Lord Mayor, said that her husband was not in the habit of betting, and that she had never known him make a bet during the five years she had been married to him. She had, ou previous occasions, seen him in a violent rage, but nothing equal to that he exhibited as deposed to by the officer. He bad recently been in the Middlesex Hospital, The defendant was remanded till Monday, but sent direct to the infirmary, in order that the state of his mind might be ascertained. The Lord Mayor ordered 103 to be given to the person who seized ths des fendant and wrested the knife from his hand,  An adjourned meeting of the members of this board was held last evening, for the purpose of performing the usual routine business on the closing of the year. Mr. J. Laird occupied the chair. The other commissioners present were Messrs. Golborne, Baylis, M'Whirter, Park, Mekin, Cooke, Harrison, Bell, Bailiff, Bradley, Aspinall, and Keightley.