Penistone, Stocksbridge and Hoyland Express, etc. — 1918-03-23 (Penistone, South Yorkshire, England)

VERDICT OF "MURDER."  Nothing in the pages of Dickens, not even I the description of Detheboys Hall, or of the workhouse baby-farm, can be said to surpass, in the power of moving human indignation against cruel Oppression of helpless childhood, the story told to Mr. Justice Roche and a jury at the. West Riding Assizes in the Leeds Town hail, on Monday. The ciroumstances of the Maltby tragedy are fairly well-known from the accounts related to the coroner and Magistrates. .As it was unfolded at the Assizes, where the life-and-death isue was imminent, the tale was doubly shockiug I and impressive. The sordidity of the •en. I vironment iii which the principal actors played their parts does not abate anything o•f the dramatic character of the episode. Walter Gibbins (43), fitter, and Rose Edith Proctor (38), a married woman with when he cohabited, were charged with the murder of Gibbins' daughter Nellie; aged 7, who died on or about December 31, and was secretly buried by Gibbins shortly after. Alternatively the prisoners were charged with manslaughter. In the village of Dragonby, Lincolnshire, in 1914, Gibbins lived with his wife and eight children;• and Mrs. Proctor lived with I,er husband and seven children. Nothing untoward occurred until Mrs. Proctor joined the Gibbins household for the purpose of nursing someone. She And Gibbins conceived an affection for each other, and ultimately Mrs. Gibbins was dusted, and went into lodgings in Bartoneon-Hu.nilper. Gibbins took his seven children, Mrs. • Proctor, end one of her children to Maltby, where he found work, and soon after they settled in Maltby Mrs. Proctor commeneed a course of cruelty and neglect which resulted in the death, after over two Years of extreme wretchedness and misery, of this unfortuea,te child, Nellie. Mrs. Proctor brought with her one of her own children, and she had two more to Gibbons. She looked after these 'three children well, was lazily indifferent to Gibbins's children, with the exception of Nellie, for whom she conceived a mysterious end unaccountable hatred. "You little she said, One day, in a gust of passion, "I hate you like poison." For over two years the poor, unhappy little • thing scarcely ever appeared out of doors, and spent nearly all her time in a filthy back-bedroom; the only companionship she had was at night. when her three little brothers shared the bedroom and the bed with her. She had very little food: how little was never ascertained. She was suffered to pine and die from confinethent, starvation, and misery. Occasionally, it is said, she 'stole downstairs to her father; occasionally, he said, he smuggled food up to her; occasionally, also, the children begged food in the street or stole it from the pantry and conveyed it to her. The attitude and conduct of the father is wholly inexplicable. He pleaded at the trial that he was in bodily fear of the woman. and dare not succour or comfort the • child openly because of his terror of the evil genius that had entered his home.. Whatever of natural feeling he might have had was smothered and subdued by his amazing, and unnatural .cowardice. • The child died, either on New Year's Eve or New Year's night; there was a hurried oonsultation between Gibbing and the woman (they subsequently gave 'conflicting accounts of this ghastly conference), they , concocted the lying story which they afterwards glibly told to the police, and Gibbins took the pathetic little skeleton and buried it in the brickyard, in order, as he said later, with a , sickening affectation of sentimentality, "to have her near him at his Work." But one , of the little boys had seen the Child's dead body, and, eom,ehow or other the news of the death reached the mother in Lincoln.shire, who comniunicated with the police. At the; first breath of suspicion Gib-bins lost his nerve and attempted to commit suicide by taking prussic acid. He made a clean breast , of the affair, and with characteristic.coward-1 ice threw the whole blame on the woman. I  The assize trial occupied- the whole of The man, enfeebled and wrecked by the poison, was put in a reclining position in the dock. At times he appeared to doze, but for the most part he was evidently acutely. conscious of his peril. The woman buried her face in her handkerchief, and remained in that attitude thro-oghout the trial except when she was giving evidence and was required by the judge to take the handkerchief away. She never once ruied her eyes from the ground. She is of slight figure and fresh complexion, and rather hard but not incomely of feature. The pair were ably defended, but their counsel had to fight not only against the facts but against the ever-present picture of that wan persecuted infant, 4Yeaa-ing out her little life from day to day, and from month to - month, in that- noisome bedroom. The prosecution put in a photograph of the body, and in spite of a shrewd objection by Gibbins's counsel, the judge admitted it as legitimate, if, not very essential, evidence, and passed it to\the jury. Mr. Bateman, for Gibbins, pleaded that he man was kindly disposed to all his children, and was only dimly aware of the state of Nellie—in itself a damning circumstance. MT. Coddington, whose task -was even more disheartening, guggested alternatively that the 'child was either the victim of economic inability to provide food, br else died of a wasting disease, whose character was unidentifiable after death. He admitted culpable neglect, however, and asked for a verdict of manslaughter under • the Children's Act.  The pleadings were over at six o'clock, and an hour later the jury returned prepared with their verdict, which was one of "Wilful murder" against both the prisoners. Gibbins received the verdict with an affrighted stare. In answer to the Clerk of Assize lie quavered: "I never committed murder." The woman whimpered something into the eternal handkerchief, and the judge, speaking very quietly, pronounced sentence of death. "It is no use my speaking about the enorinffy of your crime," he said; "the verdict of the jury shows what it is." Sentenioe passed, Gibbins was hurried below. Proctor remained in the dock, and with some difficulty was made to understand that she was entitled to plead her condition as a ground for a stay of execution of the sentence. Then a jury of matrons was cmpanneled, and on their verdict the judge granted a respite in Proctor's case. Mr. John Cutts ICenworthy, ofStocksbridge, was foreman of the jury.