The Sun. — 1845-01-20 (London, England)

ATTEMPTED MURDER AT UXBRIDGE.  Since Wednesday last the greatest excitement has prevailed throughout the town and neighbourhood of Uxbridge, in consequence of a most diabolical attempt made by a young man, named Thomas Deckman, to murder his wife and child by means of poison. From the inquiries made into the circumstances b♦ Inspector Cooke, T division, and other officers of the metropolitan police, it appears that Thomas Deckman, who is not yet twenty years of age, and is by trade a journeyman baker, was married to his wife, Elizabeth Deckman, last October twelve months, and they have one child six months old. For some time past the husband has been out of work, in consequence of which they had been compelled to remove from their lodgings, and took up their abode at the house of the wife's father. From the period of their marriage they had not been a happy couple, and the husband had often threatened to do for her, and had on one occasion sharpened a razor, and placed it under his pillow for that purpose. On the morning of Wednesday last the husband got up before his wife, and left the bed-room, saying he was going to enlist for a soldier. Before, however, he left the house, and while he was in the sitting-room, the wife heard a rattling of crockery, and thought that her husband was getting himself breakfast. She afterwards got up, and made some coffee, and about nine o'clock sat down with her sister to breakfast. On adding sugar and milk to the coffee she noticed that the milk immediately became curdled, notwithstanding which, she, however, drank the contents of the cup, and, in less than five minutes afterwards, was seiaed with a feeling of sickness. She then poured out another cup of coffee, and again added sugar and milk, when the latter was again curdled, when her suspicions became excited, and :the poured some coffee into a basin, and added some milk, and found that it did not curdle. She then tasted the sugar in the sugar-basin, and finding that it had a strange taste, she concluded that some poison had been mixed with it, and sent her sister with the basin and contents to the shop of Mr. Chave, chemist, in the High-street, who, on tasting and examining the sugar, declared it to be mixed with oxalic acid. The wife was, during two hours after taking the coffee, exceedingly ill, and it was only by administering emetics that the poison was extracted from her stomach in time to save her life.  Information of the occurrence was immediately forwarded to the police station, when a search was made after the husband, but he could nowhere be found. A description of his person was then distributed throughout the police districts, which resulted in his apprehension in the course of the following night. On Friday he was brought up for examination before Mr. T. T. Clark, a local magistrate sitting at the offices of Messrs. Riches and Woodbridge, the clerks to the magistrates at Uxbridge, and, after a short examination, was remanded until the result of the analysis of the sugar remaining in the basin, which has been placed in the hands of Mr. Rayner, surgeon, of Uxbridge, to analyse, can be ascertained. The magistrates' room and the road outside was crowded by hundreds of persons anxious to hear the evidence, and to obtain a sight of the prisoner. On Saturday our reporter ascertained from .k. r. Rayner that he had found in the portion he had already analysed a quantity of oxalic acid.