Stockton Herald, South Durham and Cleveland Advertiser. — 1864-07-22 (Stockton-on-Tees, Cleveland, England)

DISCOVERY OF THE MURDERER OF MR BRIGGS. Very little doubt can be felt, after certain facts which transpired on Tuesday afternoon, that the police are now on the track of the man who murdered Mr Briggs in a railway carriage on the North London line, between Bow and Victoria Park stations. Our surmise that the act was that of a single thief, who.:e object was plunder, in the first instance, but whose reckless villany did not stop short of taking his victim's life, seems nearly confirmed by the evidence which is already before us. It is remarkable that the suspected murderer should have been living in the same police district as that in which the crime was rerpetrated, namely, Bow. his name is Franz Muller, and he is a German, who has beea following the trade of a j .urneyman tailor in this country. The house in which he lodged at Bow is kept by a cabman named Blake. Three days ago Muller quitted his lodgings, and, as is now ascertained, todk a passage on board a sailing vessel, the. Victoria, then on the point of leaving the London Docks. A little girl, the child of the cabman Blake, picked up on Tuesday, in the room which Muller had occupied, a small card-box of the kind used by jewellers; and on the lid was a label inscribed " Death, jeweller, Cheapside." The child gave the box to her father, who, being aware that this was the name of the " jeweller who had changed the watchguard stolen fromG. Mr Briggs, very properly took the newly-discovered lebY piece of evidence to the shop of Mr Death, and the box mr was found to be just such a one as would have been used in which to place the chain that had been given vile, in exchange for the Albert guard snatched from the tri", murdered man Inspector Tanner was then brought in, and he accompanied Mr Doath to the house of the "tr'' cabman at Bow, and here another piece of valuable ton; testimony was discovered. Muller had, with the fatal oversight which betrays the wariest criminals, left a lam ; photograph of himself in the room; and Mr Death had , no difficulty in recognising it as that of the man who had brought him a gold watchguard and taken another in exchange. Further than this, Blake identified the hat left in the railway carriage as one which he himself had bought for Muller about four months ago. With these facts in his possession, Inspector Tanner went to Sir Richard Mayne. who instantly put himself in couununication with Sir George Grey ; and so prompt were the measures taken to pursue and capture the suspected murderer, that within an hour or two a Government steamer was in readiness and the start was made, with Inspector Tanner, a police-sergeant named Clarke, Mr Death, the jeweller, and the cabman Blake, all on board. The vessel is now on her way in pursuit of the Victoria, and on to New York It is not likely that time will be lost in speaking any ships which the steamer may overtake, unless she should happen to fall in easily with the vessel which is known to have Muller on board. The three days' start is a mere nothing, even with the easterly wind which has favoured the Victoria. In the race of steam against sail a longer difference of time might safely be given. It is stated that the chaiu which Mc Death ex.