A SECRET IM QUEST

Ashburton Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 1642, 22 August 1887, Page 3

A SECRET IM QUEST

AN ATTEMPT TO HUSH UP—TRUTH WILL OUT.

A great Boandal has recently been occupying the attention of the English people. In the little town of Whitton, England, a young lady named Bertha Wall, waa found drowned. She was but 16 yeara old, and up to the t ; me of her death had not left sobool. The coroner decided that ths Inquest should be held with closed doors, and that the press should be excluded. To that the jury objected, and declined to proceed with the icqilry. The inqaeßt had to be adjourned. On the Oourt raMsiembling, ihe coroner threatened the jury if they did not prooeed with the Inquiry, and ordered the' reporters to leave. 0.- c gentleman ot the press declined, and the coroner ordered him to be taken into custody. Great indignation has been expressed at the action of tho coroner. The Inquest was eventually bold iv secret, and the coroner has published what be considered neoeseary of the evidence. A correspondent of tbe '•Pall Mall Gaz.tte" haa, however, made public the chief points m the case. He says : — ' The publio will not get tho real facts from tbe "authorised version" of the proceedings at tbe inquest, for It must be borne In mind that the evidence has been carefully subedited by the coroner " for use m the nursery" end at the Ipswich High School, where the unhappy girl and the coroner's daughter were fellow pupils. Yet that report of the coroner's publishes the poor girl's shame to tho world In language almost cruel In Its bluntness, while it screens a man who haß been guilty not only of the basest ingratitude but of the most infanaouß vlll iy. Now what B re the real farts of the oase? Jeremiah Warren Ia a young man ap parontly between 25 and 30 years of age. He has a wife and three or four ohildren, Somo time bldco he had a quarrel with a publican and nurseryman at Whitton, and In revenge went into his garden m tbe night and destroyed abcut £20 worth of shrubs. For this he waa convicted and s«rt«jncFd to a term of imprisonment. While he was m gaol Mrs Wall, (mothar cf tie girl), out of her own means, kept his wife and ohildren from the workhouse, and when he was rolcased took him into her service as groom and gardener* He had not been ln Mrs Wall's employmeut many weeks when he was observed by the neighbors to be on most Intimate terms with one of the yonng laiieß, tbe unhappy Bertha Wall, who was at that time under 16 years of ag«. It Is very freely rumored ln the village that twelve months ago the girl complained to bar mother that Warren had been interfering with her, but that Mrs Wall did not consider the {offence sufficiently serious to warrant her la dismissing the man. How far this Is true of course it Is impossible to say. Thia much is certain, that six months before hor death Bjrtha Wall was ruined by Warren, and tint it was to escape the oonseqaenoes of that thnt she put an end to her yonng life. Everyone will admit that Warren was morally responsible for her death, and no one can defend him against the charge of base Ingratitude towards his benefactress. Bot that is not all. What has been his conduct since tbe death of Bertha Wall? Day after day he has been seen walking up and down m front of Mra Wall's house, staring Impudently ln at the windows, and at the Inquest he was guilty of a piece of villainy that almost surpasses belief. What Warren actually sud was this. " She followed me Into the stable, locked the door, and aßkod me " — a girl of 16,whoBeoharacterwasunimpe?chedand unimpeachable ! The Infamous charge against a dead girl brands the man aa a liar and a coward. The charge carries with It Ub own contradiction. On the day preceding the sudden disappearance of the deceased, she and the man Warron were seen together at six o'clook m tho morning, engaged In Barloua conversation. The girl was evidently much distressed, and It Is only reasonable to suppose tint she was taking counsel as to the coarse she should pursue. The very next night she left her homo and threw herself into the pond. Did Warren know of her | Intention 1 The facts must speak for themselves. On tho night the girl dieappeared Warren waß not to be found lt waß his coßtora every Saturday night to vIbU the Maypole Inn. The landlord states that he was generally the brat to come aud the l?st to leave. On this fatal night he did not come m at all, and when the reotor, the Rev. G. Stokes, wanted to dlemleß him from Mra Wall's eervioo ha was viable to find him. ' The villain Warren, who first rnlnod a young girl of IB under tbe roof of hiß benefactress, who -mysteriously disappeared the tight Bhc committed suicide io consequence of his crime ; wLo aggnvated hia otlenoe by thrusting hia odious pre senca on tbe Borrowing mother, and who crowned h : s inf«my by the großßest libel on the dead girl, was to bo believed on hia bare word In order that the jury might oorne to a verdict quickly.' The correspondent then describes m detail the browbeating of the jury by tho cjroner and his committal of tbe reporters for contempt. Having got rid of the reporters, the coroner took the jury m cuatody. He shut and fastened tho window, pulled down the blind, and placed a constable outside the door to prevent any of them escaping. At least one of them, Mr Bridges, a working shoemaker, between sixty and seventy years of age, had to be held m hie chair by main force while the coroner lectured bim upon the enormity of bis offence, and threatened him with penalties which he knew he had not the power to Inflict if he did not remain. He threatened to send all the jury who refused to serve to prison for seven days, to summon them again at the end ot that period, and lf they again refused to recommit them for another seven days, and so on, until the time when coroners shall be no more.