The Sun. — 1845-03-24 (London, England)

ERLE.) Samuel Haydon was indicted for the murder of his infant daughter, Mary Hayden, by giving her a quantity of hartshorn. Mr. Tyrrell and Mr. Kekewich prosecuted ; the prisoner was defended by Mr. Cox. It appeared that the prisoner had lived at Bradninch, in this county, and that in February last he had lost his wife in giving birth to the child whom, by the indictment on which he was arraigned, he was charged to have murdered. The wife died about eleven days after the birth of the child. He then made arrangements with his wife's sister to take and keep the child, for which he was to pay her 2s. 3d. per week. In consequence of this, she took the child to her house, and commenced the duties of a foster-mother to it, and up to the day of its death the poor little thing appeared in good health. On the 17th of February the prisoner's wife was buried. He had been ill for some little time, and had kept his bed. He ex• pressed a hope that his sister-in-law, who was coming to the funeral, would bring his child with her, as he said he very much wished to have her with him whilst they were burying his wife. The child was brought and carried to the prisoner, who was in bed. There it was left whilst its foster-mother went down stairs and saw the funeral depart. On her again taking the child she perceived that its little mouth was very much swollen, and found that it refused the breast. She mentioned this to the prisoner, who did not say that he had given it anything, but remarked that it had appeared to suck with difficulty before. The child continued to moan, and appeared to grow worse and worse. The woman took it to the house of a medical man, whom she did not find at home, and consequently she carried the child back to her own house, without any medical advice. At four o'clock that morning the child was aeorpse. Suspicions were awakened. An examination of the child took place, when the cause of its death was discovered to be some irritant poison, which had most dreadfully burnt and excoriated its south and throat, from the effects of which it died. Evidence was given that the father had, a few days before, purchased a pennyworth of hartshorn, and a constable, on searching his room, found concealed in a hole in the floor of the room in which he slept a bottle, which, it was proved, was the one in which the hartshorn bad been fetched. The prisOner had been taken up and examined before the Coroner. When in custody he had gated to the constable and the foreman of the Coroner's jury that the child was crying and appeared ill, that he bad been taking some hartshorn himself immediately before, which had done him a great deal of good, and that thinking it would benefit the child, he had given it about half a teaspoonful ; that he had no idea it would injure it, or he should not have given it, and that he should not have given it at all, had he not been in such distress of mind as not to know what he was about. Medical men had stated that they had no doubt the child had died from*.taking the hartshorn, which was a poison if administered by itself and undiluted with water. But they had never known a person killed by hartshorn before; and it was constantly taken Mixed in water by the peasants in that neighbourhood as a very wholesome medicine. It was proved by another witness that the prisoner had, as he stated, taken some in water a few days before. Mr. Cox addressed the jury for the prisoner. Mr. Justice ERLE summed up, pointing out the rattily circumstances in the case which tended to throw a doubt on the guilt of the prisoner. After a short consultation, the jury returned a verdict of Not Guilty.  Cross-examined by Mr. V.