Blandford, Wimborne and Poole Telegram. — 1876-01-28 (Blandford, Dorset, England)

TALE OF SMUGGLERS.  On Sunday, October 4th, 1747, the smugglers of Sussex find Kent met in force in Charlton Forset (the Duke of Richmond's hunting ground, near Chichester), and resolved, upon Perin's suggestion, to attack and break open the Poole Custotu House. A portion of the gang, under the same Thomas King:slidll as headed the attack on Poole, had shortly before attacked Gondhurst, in Kent, and .only been repelled by a regular force of militia, after having three of their men killed and several others wounded. Others were taken and executed; but Kingsmill escaped, and acted as leader in the attack on Poole. Assembling at Hottlaud's Castle, in Hampshire, armed with swords and tirearins, they marched on Poole, which they reached at eleven :it night, and, receiving intelligence that owing to the ebb-tide the sloop lying off the town could not bring her guns to bear, they proceeded to the 'Custom House, broke it open, loaded their horses with their goods, and rode off, first to Fordingbridge and thence to Brook, where they divided their booty and dispersed. Now follows the tragic part of this affair. A reward was offered for the apprehension of the perpetrators of thir daring act, but for some months with no avail. At length a man named Diamond it as captured and lodged in Chichester Gaol. The chief witnesses against this intra were a Custom House oft er, named Galley, and a shoemaker of Fordingliridge, named Cl:later. On the 14th of February these two were on their way to Major Batten's, a magistrate at Stanstead, to have their evidence taken, when they were induced to stop at the White Hart, at Rowland's Castle, for refreshment, and here something fell f rem them which led the landlady to suspect the business they were travelling on. It shows how general the feeling was in those slays with the smugglers that this woman should have sent for two of the men engaged in the late outrage, named Jackson and Carter, and communicated her suspicions to them. They sent for ethers of the gang, and Galley and Chater being made drunk they were put to bed, and then, in the middle of the night, were woke up to be placed on a horse, their feet tied under its belly, and a journey commenced which, perhaps, ti unparalleled for barbarity in a civilised country. As they rode along the smugglers lashed the unfortunate men with their long whips until in their agony they fell with their heads under the horse's belly, and so the journey was continued, until Lady Holt Park was reached, and here Galley was taken from the horse in order to be thrown down a well. Changing their purpose, ilowever, the brutes replaced the wretched man on the horse, and then, re-commencing their torture of him, whipped hint to death on the Downs, and there dug a hole and buried him. ('hater was still alive, an-i was reserved for further suffering. Being taken from the horse and chained in a turf house, be was here brutually cut about the eyes and nose with a knife ; and then, in the dead of night, he WAS taken to Harris's Well, a noose tied round his neck by Tapner (a native of Aldrington, near Brighton), and he was ordered to get over the palings to the well. Having done so, his murderers tied one end of the rope to the pales, and pushed the miserable man into the well. The rope, however, was too short to strangle him, so after hanging some time and being still alive, he %1,(.g drawn up, untied, and then thrown head-foremost down the well. Still he was not killed. His groans were audible, and to stifle these and finish the horrible deed,nhic smugglers tore up the rails anti gateway round the well and threw them and large stones upon their victim till he expired.