The Sun. — 1842-03-11 (London, England)

BOW-STREET.-(THIS DAY.) A SCENE IN LITTLE CATHERINE. STREET—Abraham Levy, Sarah So!oinans, and another man, were placed at the bar, charged with creating a -riot and disturbance under the following circumstances :—Police constable F 48, stated that about hallspast one this morning, as he was going his rounds in Brydges-street, he heard a great noise and cries of " Murder" and " Police," proceeding from Little Catherinestreet. He at once hastened to the spot, when he saw forty or fifty persons, principally prostitutes, with a small assembly of men amongst them, who all appeared to be fighting. They did not seem to have any specific object in view. The row was a general one. Blows were indiscriminately given, and as indiscriminately received, and each one seemed to be trying who could inflict the greatest number of strokes in the shortest possible time. Notwithstanding the confusion which prevailed, however, and the general character of the strife, witness singled out a diminutive woman (the female prisoner) as being the most desperate, and, at the same time, the most successful pugilist in the crowd; wherever she went she spread havoc and destruction around; the mast powerful fled before her single arm, aid the stoutest heart quailed at her appreach. Seeking a fitting object for her fury, she had seen the prisoner levy, who now stood by her side, him she attacked; and when a reinforcement of police enabled her to be secured, she was, in the words of the witness, " fighting at him like a tiger." Maria Levy, the wife of one of the prisoners, whose face was much bruised, and who mounted a large black eye, or, as it is more expressively, and perhaps more correctly, termed in Scotland, " a hlue eon," here stepped forward, to prefer a complaint against the ft male prisoner; she stated that, about one o clock this morning, as she was returning from the theatre, and proceeding up a certain court, not mentioned, but which the complainant termed " our court," the prisoner followed her, and, without saying a word, struck her on the eye and lip, which knocked her clown, and, in her own words, " I lost my senses ever since." She called out " siurder," and her husband, who was in doors, sleeping by the fire, came out to rescue her. This was the commencement of the disturbance. The prisoner had struck complainant once before, some years ago, when she was taken before a Magistrate, and in consequence 01 this she had owed her a grudge ever since. Policeman, F 102, corroborated the testimony of his brother constable as to the violence of the female prisoner. The prisoner denied the allegations of Mrs. Levy is tote. She was the most harmless creature in the world, and would not hurt a worm. The fact was that Mrs. Levy bad struck her first.; and this was the way of it. Mrs. Levy and the prisoner, Solomons, both took in lodgers, and a young lady vs ho had previously lodged with Mrs. L. being desirous of leaving what the fair speaker called "dress lodgings" for " private lodgings,',' quitted Mrs. Is.'s apartments, and took up her abode wish Mrs. S. ; Mrs. 1.. feeling herself aggrieved by the young lady's preferring Mrs. S.'s lodgings to hers, determined to make Mrs. S. suffer for it, and to this end she with her husband, son, two dresslodgers, and servants, fell upon the prisoner this morning. Finding herself attacked, and set upon- by so many, she very naturally did her best to defend herself ; how well she succeeded, though opposed to such heavy odds, witness Mrs. Levy's black eye and cut lip. The fact was, said Mrs. ,olemns, " I am an English woman though I am married to a Jew, and that is the reason them Jewesses are always actin me ; they never lets me alone, and I never has no peace a single moment of my life." She concluded by calling what she called a strange witness, to prove that Mrs. Levy struck her first. The strange witness (a woman), was called, and said everything that could be desired of her. Mr. JARDINE said these disturbances could not be allowed to go on, he should however discharge the two men, and he should hold the female prisoner to bail to keep the peace, herself in 101. and two sureties in 'al. each.  lINION4IA LL—(TI118