NUMEROUS OTHER MURDERS COMMITTED BY HICKS.

Daily Southern Cross, Volume XVII, Issue 1349, 13 November 1860, Page 3

NUMEROUS OTHER MURDERS COMMITTED BY HICKS.

The Times' correspondent says : — "The circumstances he has detailed leave no doubt that he has murdered between 50 and 60 persons, many of whom were women, whom he had captured in ships off the coast of Cuba, and to whom death must have been a mercy, if his ghastly narrative is to be depended on. It seems almost a kind of ,yonder that in this age * man so bloody and so remorseless could have pursued his caieer of murder with such impunity, and sti'l carry his lust for blood to the very verge of eterrity. I saw him before I left New York, »nd was told that even at that dreadful time, when the very minutes of his existence were numbeied and fast passing away, he seemed to deiive a dreadful satisfaction in detailing crimes from wliich tHe mind recoils in amazement and horror." Three of these crimes are briefly stated by the New York Tribune as fo"ows : — "A merchant residing at I Paita, Peru, familiarly known as Paddy Hines, owned a vessel called the Union, which was sometimes employed in legitimate traffic and at others in smuggling. The crew was generally changed on each tiip, as many of these beach-combers, or salt-water loafers, would merely ship to reach some one of the many port 3 along the coast from Guayaquil to Valparaiso, at which 1 the Union stopped. Thece men were generally of the worst clacs, for the most part deserters from the English and American vessels (whalers and others) that happened to touch at the coast for fresh provisions. At Arica, on one of the smuggling expedition of Hines's vessel, nearly aH the crew deserted. The captain, to complete his voyage, was forced to engage such material as present3d ifeelf, and among the number that applied for a berth was Johnson, since discovered to be Hicks. He stated that he hid been engaged in an affray at a ' pulperes,' or low porter-house, in which he had wounded, if not Wed, two ' Cholahs,' or half-breeds, and was anxious to get away. He was engaged for the voyage to Guayaquil. " At Paita, where the vessel stopped, the authorities attempted to anest him, information having been sent of the murder. Hicks incited the other seaman to resist the officers, and a terrible scene ensued. After vainly struggling, the would-be captors were driven from the vessel, one of them being thrown overboard and drowned, and the others having received several dangerous wounds. " Before the Union reached her destination information was gained by the crew that the fever was raging in Guayaquil, and that the inhabitants were leaving the town in great consternation. To the appeal the return the captain turned a deaf ear. What occurred further may not be fully known, but in less than two months afterwards the Union was found beached at Albermarle, one of the Gallipagos Islands, deserted, with her decks covered with blood. She was reported by a New Bedfoul whaler, and after a while returned to her owner. But the captain never made his appearance. The conclusion is that he was murdered. Some time after this Johnson or Hicks wa3 seen on the coast, arrested ons usspicion of murder, and sent to the Government mines at Cerro Basco, to a life-long penal servitude. He escaped, and shipped on the Saladin at Valparaiso. These and other facts weie known to a number of Americans residing at that time in Callao and Lima, as well as on nearly eveiy vessel that visited the Peruvian or Chilian ports. 0