CONFESSION OF MURDER.

Lyttelton Times, Volume XCIII, Issue 10654, 15 May 1895, Page 6

CONFESSION OF MURDER.

A REMARKABLE CASE. FPbb P»bo8 AUCKLAND, Mat 14. Samuel Evison, tbo :aaa aid? accused cf murdering a woman at Nottingham, le::fc England in 1883, in tbo steamer Ophir, for Sydney. He next went to Brisbane and then to Auckland. He has resided for soma years in tho neighbourhood of^ Hamilton, lately working at the trade o! a carpenter in the township. He was well respected, but was very reserved. The prisoner was charged at the Police Court, at Hamilton, on h'S own confession, with having caused ths death of a young woman .at Nottingham, England, in 3882, by pushing her down, she striking her bead on. the coping stone of an embankment of the River Trout, and rolling into the river. The prisoner was remanded for eight days, and will he brought up at Auckland on Tuesday next. Inspector Hickson has communicated with tho Commissioner of Police at Wellington, itia presumed with a view of cabling to the Scotland Yard authorities in London, and mating further investigations. In his confession Evison esys “In March, 1831,1 was in Nottingham, England. I was walking with a girl named Jenny, whom I had picked up in the street about three weeks previously. I bad a few words about seeing her with another young man, and sho hit me in the face. I gave her a push, and she fell on her head on the stone coping on the edge of the footpath, and fell into the River Trent. The coping was built right up from the river, and formed a promenade close to Nottingham Trent Bridge. It was dark, but I caw her strike the wstsr and float down the river about sis yards. She was struggling in tho water. I then came from the end cf the bridge on to the road. I scarcely knew what to do. I went over the bridge, came back and went home. I have never heard anything more about it. I waa in a passion at the time. I did not know the girl by any other name than Jenny. She was in the lace trade. I did not know whore she lived.” The man Samuel Evison, self-accused of murder in Nottipgton, arrived by train this afternoon from Hamilton, being in charge of Constable Forbes of that township. On arrival at the Newmarket Station the' man was taken up to Mount Eden Gaol; where ha in lodged pending examination before a magistrate next weak, Evisc-u is thirty-six years' of »ge, and is a carpenter by trade. He is spoken of as a very good workman. Although residing in Hamilton for ever two years Evison did not make any friends, in fact, his appearance was always that of the greatest reserve, almost to morosenees. When questioned aa to tho motive which induced him to confess his crime, Evison said that for the lost thirteen yearn he had suffered the pangs of a gailt stricken conscience. “ I have not,” ha said when questioned by the constable, “been able to get rid of the feeling that I was the girl’s murderer. I have been driven nearly mad by it, and have several times felt inclined to go End commit suicide, I have never been happy since I did it. and I thought that the only rent I could get or the only way of making my mind easier would be to confess it all.” Evison, it appears, went up to Constable Forbes in the street in Hamilton, on Sunday morning, and said to him quite calmly, “I.want you to lock, me up.” The constable asked the man to come into the middle of the street be there were a number of persons close by, and then asked Evison why he wanted to bo locked up? “I caused the death of a girl in England in ISS2” was the reply. The constable took the man to the police* station, and subsequently toot down' his statement. It seems that Evison had, been suffering remorse for his self-confessed crime for many years. He was, oa several occasions, seen crying, as if in come trouble, by Hamilton residents, and according to his own statement, he could get no rest. It is not thought that he is of unsound mind; at any rate, the constable who arrested him considers him quite sane.