A LONDON ROMANCE. EXTRAORDINARY CHARGE OF FRAUD.

Evening Post, Volume XVII, Issue 512, 17 May 1879, Page 1 (Supplement)

A LONDON ROMANCE. EXTRAORDINARY CHARGE OF FRAUD.

A very romantic charge of fraud has been exciting considerable interest in London. Before the Bow-street magistrate, Vernon Montgomery, aged 42, and Ethel Vivian, a charming young lady of 21, both described as "journalists," are remanded under the charge of obtaining charitable contribution? under false pretences. It would seem that for some time past there have appeared in the agony columns of the various daily papers certain advertisements signed E V., and addressed to V.H. "I entreat you," ran these pathetic notices, "to help me in this time of deepest trial. 111, and friendless, I can look to no one but you for assistance. By the memory of the past, I implore your aid, or I know not what I shall do. My last shilling is expended on this advertisement. Remember me at this season of happiness and reunion. I have no home now, so please address" — and here followed the address of a paste restante, where letters are received for a small charge. It is difficult to imagine anything more suggestive than this touching appeal. Fancy pictures a young girl — possibly and, indeed, probably beautiful — betrayed, deserted, penniless, helpless ; yearning, if not for home, at any rate for sympathy and support ; exposed to the sorest trial and temptation, but yet bravely bearing up against all in the hope that the friend in whom she has too fondly placed her confidence may at the last moment prove loyal. It is hard to conceive a bait more tempting for a middle-aged bachelor with spare time on his hands, or for a young man ignorant of the world and its ways. The police, however, who are prosaic, matter-of-fact folk, had their suspicions ; and it having been found that a number of simple, charitably-minded people had responded to this piteous prayer, a detective was set to work, who made an appointment, met E.V., ascertained her to be a young and fascinating woman, kept his eye upon her, followed her home, and, after allowing her some twenty minutes by way of law, arrested her in comfortable lodgings in the neighborhood of Russellsquare, breakfasting in company with a Mr. Vernon Montgomery, alleged to be no other, than a man of the name of Hitchman, who has from time to time passed himself off as "The Viscount of Montgomery." On being informed by the officer of the nature o£ the charge which would be preferred against them, Mr. Montgomery admitted that he had inserted the advertisement in question for a friend — an admission which Miss Vivian corroborated by adding, " Yes, he inserted it for me " This, of course, does not carry the matter very far. But a little more light is let on the case by the evidence of a young gentleman employed in business in the City, who, out of kindheartedness and inexperience of the world and its ways, replied to the advertisement of E. V., and received a number of letters detailing the distress and poverty of the writer. Touched by the tale of woe, he made, he tells us, an appointment with the view of testing the genuineness of the story, and was surprised to find the writer to bo "an attractive young woman, of apparent respectability. Her artless manner, he adds, so deceived him that he from time to time gave her various small sums of money, amounting in all to fifteen shillings, together with a further donation of one pound, contributed by "a friend better able to afford it than himse'f." He made several appointments with her, and wrote to her himself, deploring his own "sad lot" in being unable to aid her to a greater extent. More than this, he offered to interest himself in obtaining a situation for her in a large drapery establishment at the West End ; and, further, at one interview kissed her, " with her own express sanction." Ho was much shocked to hear from her that she had been sorely tempted by gentlemen who, after replying to her advertisement, had treated her to dinner and taken her to various places of amusement, and had then made proposals of so improper a nature that she had " run away in terror." Thi3 part of her story had led him to believe in her tale. His faith was somewhat shaken when she declined the situation he offered to procure for her in the eminent West End drapery establishment. He is, however, even now, an unwilling witness against her, having been reluctantly brought into Court upon a subpcena. This amiab.e young gentleman is probably but one out of many othera whom Miss Ethel Vivian has — to put the matter mildly — misled as to her real position. It mu3t have been a sad blow for him, after doing his best to relieve her in her hour of sorrow and trial ; after listening with honest indignation to her tale of elderly ruffians who had endeavored to take, advantage of her helplessness, and who, commencing by a hot lunch, had ended with proposals of a nature too shocking to be described ; after meeting her at various railway station? ; after kissing hei* in a brotherly way and with her own " express sanction ;" and after doing his best to procure a situation for her in a West End house, to find that she was in reality living in substantial comfort, if not, indeed, in actual luxury, with a gentleman whose antecedents are, to cay the least of it, doubtful, aud as whose wife she has for some time paassd. What defence the two prisoners may have remains of course to be seen. Evidence has been given which would seem to show that the letters received by those who replied to the advertisement were in Montgomery's writing, and it is clear, on the other hand, that, so far from being in sorrow and distress, Miss Ethel Vivian was in reality living very comfortably.