Double Murder and Suicide.

Pelorus Guardian and Miners' Advocate., Volume 4, Issue 19, 10 March 1893, Page 2

Double Murder and Suicide.

Melbourne, February 25. Particulars regarding the tragedy at Northampton, which took place last Sunday, show that Lucy Glass told her father that a young man. named Thomas Brown, with whom she was keeping company, was coming to take her away to get married on the Monday morning, and Glass thereupon expressed strong disapproval of the match, and got into a great rage. Subsequently his daughter Lucy and her sister Nellie went to a well which is situated about a quarter of a mile from the house, to which spot Glass followed them with a revolver, and shot them both through the head. The murderer then wrote a note which he addressed to his son James, saying he was going to. take poison, bidding him good-bye, and telling him not to die broken-hearted, as his father had done. When coming to report the murders the son saw his father lying in ambush alongside the road, evidently watching for Brown. On his way down to Geraldfcon, James Glass met Brown coming up with a carnage, and told him what had occurred, as wellas warning him of the danger before him. A man named Shea, who was accompanying Brown in the carriage approached the spot where Glass lay, and as Glass heard him coming, he asked him in a gruff voice, "Who is that?" Immsdiately afterwards the report of a revolver was heard. Shea thought that Glass fired at him, so he ran away. Next morning he went to the spot with a doublebarrelled gun, and saw the murderer dead, with a bullet-wound in his forehead. Glass evidently thought that Shea was a policeman, and was determined to commit suicide before permitting his arrest. The general opinion is that he was lying in wait for Brown. After committing the murders, Glass wrote the following note, which he left at his house • "To James, Bess, and Sail—-I charge you to look after your mother, younger brothers, and sisters, and may you all be happy and better than your heartbroken father." In one of Glass' pockets when the dead body was discovered, another letter was found, addressed to the authorities, and dated 19th February. This stated that the writer had shot his daughters Lucy and Ellen, to prevent the marriage of one of them with T. Brown, whom he described as "the biggest rowdy in Northampton." The letter contained further abuse of Brown and his family, reflecting on their moral character. At the inquest on Lucy and Ellen Glass, the jury found that they died from gun-shot wounds inflicted by their father, concerning whom the verdict was felo de see.