50 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.— SUPPLEMENT. 



" John Mills poured out vitriol deliberately, 

 and threw it in his wife's face, because she asked 

 him to give her some of his wages. He had said 

 previously that he would blind her. 



" James Lawrence, who had been frequently 

 bound over to keep the peace, and who had been 

 supported by his wife's industry for years, struck 

 her on the face with a poker, leaving traces of the 

 most dreadful kind when she appeared in court. 



" Frederick Knight jumped on the face of his 

 wife (who had only been confined a month) with 

 a pair of boots studded with hobnails. 



" Eichard Mountain beat his wife on the back 

 and mouth, and turned her out of her bed, and 

 out of their room, one hour after she had been 

 confined. 



" Alfred Roberts felled his wife to the floor, 

 with a child in her arms ; knelt on her, and 

 grasped her throat. She had previously taken 

 out three summonses against him, but had never 

 attended. 



" John Harris, a shoemaker, at Sheffield, found 

 his wife and children in bed ; dragged her out, 

 and, after vainly attempting to force her into the 

 oven, tore off her night-dress, and turned her 

 round before the fire ' like a piece of beef,' while 

 the children stood on the stairs listening to their 

 mother's agonized screams. 



" Eichard Scully knocked in the frontal bone 

 of his wife's forehead. 



" William White, stone-mason, threw a burning 

 paraffine-lamp at his wife, and stood quietly watch- 

 ing her enveloped in flames, from the effects of 

 which she died. 



" William Hussell, a butcher, ran a knife into 

 his wife several times and killed her. Had threat- 

 ened to do so often before. 



" Robert Kelly, engine-driver, bit a piece out 

 of his wife's cheek. 



" William James, an operative boiler-maker, 

 stabbed his wife badly in the arm and mouth, ob- 

 serving, afterward, ' I am sorry I did not kill both ' 

 ( his wife and her mother). 



" Thomas Eiehards, a smith, threw his wife 

 down a flight of fourteen steps, when she came 

 to entreat him to give her some money for her 

 maintenance. He was living with another woman 

 — the nurse at a hospital where he had been ill. 



" James Frickett, a rat-catcher. His wife was 

 found dying with broken ribs and cut and bruised 

 face, a walking-stick with blood on it lying by. 

 Frickett remarked. l If I am going to be hanged 

 for you, I love you.' 



" James Styles beat his wife about the head 

 when he met her in the City Eoad. She had sup- 

 ported him for years by char-work, and during 

 the whole time he had been in the habit of beat- 

 ing her, and on one occasion so assaulted her that 

 the sight of one of her eyes was destroyed. He 

 got drunk habitually with the money she earned. 



" John Harley, a compositor, committed for 

 trial for cutting and wounding his wife with intent 

 to murder. 



"Joseph Moore, laborer, committed for trial 

 for causing the death of his wife by striking her 

 with an iron instrument on the head. 



" George Ealph Smith, oilman, cut his wife, as 

 the doctor expressed it, ' to pieces,' with a hatch- 

 et, in their back -parlor. She died afterward, but 

 he was found not guilty, as it was not certain that 

 her death resulted from the wounds. 



" Fletcher Bisley, a clerk, struck his wife vio- 

 lently on the head with a poker, after having tried 

 to throw a saucepan of boiling soup at her son. 

 Both had just returned home and found Bisley in 

 bed. 



" Alfred Cummins, tailor, struck his wife so as 

 to deprive her of the sight of an eye. 



" Thomas Paget, laundryman, knocked down 

 his wife in the street and kicked her till she be- 

 came insensible, because she refused to give him 

 money to get drink. 



"Alfred Etherington, shoemaker, kicked his 

 wife in a dangerous way, and a week later dragged 

 her out of bed, jumped on her, and struck her. 

 He said he would have her life and the lives of all 

 her children. He gave no money for the support 

 of his family (six children), and he prevented her 

 from keeping the situations she had obtained for 

 their maintenance. She had summoned him six 

 or seven times. 



" Jeremiah Fitzgerald, laborer, knocked down 

 his wife and kicked her heavily in the forehead. 

 He had been twice convicted before. The woman 

 appeared in court with her face strapped up. 



" Patrick Flynn violently kicked his wife after 

 he had knocked her down, and then kicked a man 

 who interfered to save her. He had already un- 

 dergone six months' hard labor for assaulting his 

 wife." 



Here is a case recorded from personal obser- 

 vation by a magistrate's clerk : 



" I attended a dying woman to take her depo- 

 sition in a drunkard's dwelling. The husband 

 was present in charge of the police. The poor,' 

 wretched wife lay with many ribs broken, and her 

 shoulder and one arm broken, and her head so 

 smashed that you could scarcely recognize a feat- 

 ure of a woman. She, in her last agony, said that 

 her husband had smashed her with a wooden bed- 

 post. He, blubbering, said, ' Yes, it is true, but 

 1 was in drink, or would not have done it." 



And here is one that has come in while I have 

 been writing : 



" At the Blackburn police court, yesterday, 

 John Charnock was committed for trial on a charge 

 of attempted murder. It was stated that he had 

 fastened his wife's head in a cupboard and kicked 



