Weekly News. — 1890-10-30 (Blandford, Dorset, England)

SHOCKING TRAGEDY AT HAMPSTEAD.  MOTH ER AND CHILD MURDERED.  On Friday evening between 7 and 8 the dead hod; sf a woman about 30 years old was found lying la Crossfield-road, South Hampstead, with her head nearly severed from her„body and the skull smashed in, evidently with a heavy, sharp, penetrating In. strument. The police were soon on the spot. and the body was removed on an ambulance te the mortuary and carefully examined by two doctors. , one of whom said that it was evidently a case M murder of the most brutal character. The woman had been dead but a very short time, and the wounds which had caused her death were probably those at the back of the head. In all probability the woman's throat was cut after she had been killed by the terrible blows from behind. The knife used in cutting the throat must have been not only ' large but sharp. About an hour after the tragedy was discovered, a policeman in Hamilton-terrace, a mile from Crossfield-road, discovered on the pavement an empty bassinetto perambulator, in which was a woollen rug stained uith blood. Detective Brown found near the spot where the woman was discovered a nut, and one is missing from the perambulator. On Saturday two women named Hogg and Piercey called at the Hampstead , Police-station and reported that the sisterin-law of the former, of Prince of Wales'sI road, Kentish Town, was missing. They were immediately taken to the mortuary, and identified the deceased afterwards at Portland Town policepolice-station recognising the perambulator. It seems that Mrs. Hogg left home on Friday afternoon to go for a walk, taking her only child, Phmbe, ag MI 18 months, with lier in the perambulator. and did not return. The murdered woman has a niece in service in St. John's Word, and the police communicated with this niece, who thereupon visited the mortuary and identified the body as that of her aunt, Mr. Hogg also identified his wife. At night the police apprehended the woman named Mary Eleanor Piercey, aged 24, of Priory-street, lientis' Town, married, and charged her with the wilful murder of Mrs. Phiebe llogg, and on suspicion with murdering the child of the deceased woman. The accused went to Hampstead with Miss Hogg to see the body in the tuortuary, as has been stated. Subsequently detectives visited the apartments of the accused and searched the ! use. It is ti aid that • blood-stained carving knife was found, windowe were smashed, and other things were discovered that made the police offievrs feel justified in taking the accused into custody. Mrs. Piercey has been for some time on intimate terms with Mr. and Mrs. Hogg and their relatives. It is stated that Mrs. Piercey's bands when she was arrested were cut and scratched, while her clothing shewed stains, to remove wind an attempt bad evidently been made. It is thought that jealousy may have furnished sonie motive for the crime. The body of thee child was found on Sunday by a gipsy hamed Smith in a field just off Finchlermad, the body lying among some fume bushes. The clothes were saturated with rain. The body was removed to Hampstead mortuary and placed beside its mother. A pest-murtem examination of Mrs. Ilegg's holy revealed, in addition to the injuries of the woman which had taosed death, abrasions on the urist, which tuight have been caused in a struggle or in breaking a window. The child's body shewed no mark's of violence. and its death is believed to have been caused by suffocation.