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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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« r bBStle * I am wholly- at a loss to discover . The other of those transactions uras , also 3 of a flagitious nature—it was a heinous burglary , committed by the two other criminals , in the house of Mr . Sution . They were convicted , and have suffered the punishment due
to thei * crime . But was this a case for exciting public alarm , or spreading national disquietude , or for causing the ordinary course of the circuit to be inverted , and leading every person to apprehend machinations and
conspiracies of the most deep and desperate Ifind ? From Kilkenny the Commission proceeded to Clonmel . There I presided in the Crown Court—the Calendar presented a sad list , of crimes —one hundred and twenty names appeared upon the face of the Crown
Book . There were several government prosecutions—conducted by able gentlemen of the bar , and by the Crown solicitor ; at the appointment , and by the direction of the government—who kad been alarmed tor the peace of the country . Vet , notwithstanding all this formidable array of crime , and this multitude of p risoners , I had the good fortune to discharge the gaol of that
county in two days and a half . Two persons only wc * e capitally convicted , at that assizes . One of them was neither the subject of a public prosecution nor of a private one . It was a case upon
Lord Ellenborough's Act , far assaulting with weapons ( in that case with a jutjCh-fork ) with an intention to kill , maim , or disfigure . The unfortunate man had been out upon bail ; and , sup * posing that he had made his peace with « is prosecutor , had surrendered himself .
not apprehending any prosecution . The bail had forfeited their recognizance at the assizes preceding—and 1 mention this fact , lest it might be imagined that the conductors of the Crown prosecutions had slumbered on their post , or had been remiss in trreir toty * I do believe they knew nothing oftiie
. prosecutor ' s intention to appear . ¦ The prisoner was compelled to come m by the magistrate who had bailed him , and who had been at the preceding assifees , fined outs hundred pounds for thus bailing a person , charged with a £ JMj >«« i felon ) . The prisoner had the W * fit © liable counsel—his trial was fl ® t biirried on—»~ a jury of hits country , **<*•* that suptrmtendance of a judge
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( I hope , not devoid of humanity ) found him guilty . But , let me ask , what had all this to do with public disturbances ? A people ferocious in their habits and violent in their animosities—when intoxicated with whiskey—formed into
factions amongst themselves , classed by barbarous appellations , may braise each other with sticks , or even slay each other with mortal weapons ; but I would ask any man , what connection could the conviction of that criminal
( under Lord Ellenborough ' s Act ) have with associations against law ^ order ^ and the government ? There was a second conviction at Clonmel , in a case of a rape aad forcible abduction . The prosecutrix was the
principal witness in support of that conviction ; but the credit due to her testimony has been so materially affected by facts since disclosed that I thought it my duty to name a distant day for the execution of the sentence , in order
to afford time for the respectable gen tlemen , who have interfered on behalf of the prisoner , to bring his case fairly and satisfactorily under the consideration of his Majesty ' s government .
But > although those two convictions involved gross violations of the laws » yet what was there of political disturbance ) or of factious contrivance , in either case ? I could not see any thing of the kind .
Next , the Commission proceeded to Waterford , which was represented to us as being in a most disturbed state . But in no one part of the county did it appear , that there was that frequency of crime , from which any systematic hostility to the constituted authorities could be inferred . There was one
conviction for an abominable conspiracy to poison ; but the actuating motive appeared to be , not of a public nature , but mere individual interest . It was the case of a miscreant from the county of Cork hired and sent for the
particular purpose of getting rid of an a ^ ed man , whose life was the surviving life in an old lease , and which lease the vile contriver was materially interested in extinguishing . This was the real history of this crime .
Another conviction was for the murder of Mr . Smyth , in the month of October last . I must observe that this gentleman was a Roman Catholic , What the csmse of this murder may
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Judge Flettfter ' s Charge . 587
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1814, page 587, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2444/page/63/
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