The Cannock Chase Examiner. — 1876-05-05 (Cannock, Staffordshire, England)

STORY OF THE SEA.  A New York paper has the following :—Mrs. Jersey is at the bottom of the Atlantic, her demented husband is chattering to himself in the sunshine up in Rockland county, Dr. Hammond is dead by his own hand, and a strancely-assorted man and wife, the daughter Of the murdered woman and the son of the man who probably killed her, are left to explain to their curious neighbours and a bon of detectives a drama they its not understand. No more startling story of the sea has costs to hand lately than this f ragmastery history of the woman committed to the waves front the steamship Cuba, November 29, last year. Nineteen yearsrego this woman was a handsome girl of 17, and married a person of "feeble intellect "—that is, a gibbering imbecile—possessed of enough money to be csl'ed rich in the country. Last November she left her home, and came to this chy on her way to Europe, as given out. With her was a friend of the family, Dr. Hammond, the father of her son-inlaw. Here she drew nearly 10,000 dols. in money, and on the 27th of November she took passage on the steamer for Fernandina, Florida. She seemed to be alone. On the first night out she was ill, and a medical passenger went to the rescue, and gave her a dose of hydrate of chloral. One woman, with keen feminine Instinct, sow the two together, and concluded that they were not strangers to each other. From the dose of chloral Mrs. Jersey never recovered. All the neat day she lay tinconscious, bresthing etertorously, the brain oppressed so far that death by paralysis of the muscles that carry on the vital machinery was imminent. Had the medical passenger been so &posed he could at almost any Moment early in that day have eased her life, for strychnia, the efficient antidote, is in every steamer's medicine chest. He was in her room a great part of the time. She died that night, was buried almost immediately, and the medical passenger left at the first port they reached, though he had taken passage for another port. With him went, apparently, the money the woman had drawn front her bankers, as It was not found in her effects, and is not accounted for. Now, the problem of the story is, was this inedical passenger on board the ship the Dr. Hammond who was with her when she left home for this city? Dr. Hammond returned to his home on Denember 10. The stesmer left this port on November 27, and reached Fernandina in ten days, say December 7. It reached Port .Royal the day before, or the second day before, and theme the medical passenger went ashore. Starting from Port Royal on either the Fith or Mb, therefore, he had ample time to Teich Rockland county by Ihe 10th. He gave out on his return thee he had been to Alabama, which would agree happily if he had been seen on a Southern train by any person that kite.. him. If the medic's' passenger was Dr. Hammond, he had every reason to suppose the woman ' would never stain be heard of by her friends. They believed lie its Europe, and he believed that he had de' stroyed that day in her stateroom all papers that could ' ever give aclue to the identity of the woman Co hastily buried at sea. Beta solitary envelope had been over' lookail, on which wae written her daughter's address, in Rockland county. That sent the detectives thither, and when thee appeared Dr. Hammond committed Suicide. Suioirle in such circumstances is confeesion,  Mr. O. W. Ross has in rehearsal, at the Opera Comique. a piece entitled "Prisoner at the op,ra