The Sun. — 1827-12-26 (London, England)

THE RECENT MURDE ( FRD. EVENING, HALF-PAST Tso OXFORD, MONDAY .1)..!i. o'CLocK.—Up to this hour the examination of the different witnesses in the case 'of John Williams, the young man charged with the murder of Ann Crotch. ley, or Priest, has not terminated. The City Magistrates have been engaged since ten o'clock this morning in the investigation of the cue. The matter has excited the most intense interest here, which is inferred from its, being the sole topic of conversation in this city, and the numerous groups surrounding the Town Hall, anxious to catch a syllable of the testimony. There have been upwards of twenty witnesses ex-, amined, who deposed to the circumstantial facts on which it is intended to make the charge against the prisoner out. None of these in themselves are of a strong nature; but there is a considerable chain of minute details, which, at least, throw a good deal of suspicion upon him. Among them may be noticed the fact of his having been a considerable time alone with the unfortunate deceased on the night in question, between the interval of her first discovery, drunk, in Blue Boar-lane, and the period at which the blood was first perceived under her person, and on her clothes—his anxiety to have her removed to a place of safety—his knowledge of where she lodged, although she had not been in Oxford more than four months, and his declaration that he.hardly knew her. But that which is by far the strongest feature in the case is the finding, on Tuesday morning after the murder was perpetrated, one of the prisoner's shirts, at his washerwoman's, on the righthand sleeve f which were marks as if somethbig red, supposed to be blood, had been attempted to,be washed out. The circumstance is explained for the prisoner, by his washerwoman deposing that his shirts frequently had such marks, as in working at his business -(of a picture-frame maker) the colouring matter, or paint, frequently stained his wristbands and other parts of his linen -in the same manner.  The prisoner, who is a young, genteel-looking man, about 30, the son of a respectable man in Oxford, where he has since his infancy resided, appeared to feel a full confidence in his innocence ;,' and the people here all declare he is the last person in the:world whom they would suspect of committing so atrocious an outrage as that which Was undoubtedly committed on the deceased, the details of which, excite a shudder of horror in all who hear of them, It is likely the examination will not terminate t3is evening, as• the. Magistrates have, as yet, r.o evidence of the cause of the young woman's death ; the physicians not having been examined before them.— It is therefore likely that the prisonet will be remanded, and the further evidence gone into at the adjourned examination.  The Magistrates, aided by the Town Clerk, Mr. Robinson, have been indefatigable in searching the matter to the bottom; and for that purpose they have examined all the persons who have even the most remote knowledgf: of the tranaction, with a minuteness and patience quite remarkable. The prisoner has not bnce evinced a desire to say anything ;but he, underwent a private examination since his apprOiension, at which he made a disclosure of all thc, circumstances he was aware of with respect to the transaction with a candour which is said to have impressed them much in his favour.