THE NOITGEDACHT MURDER. 



By J. A. Veekasawmt, Barrister-at-Law. 



[The following abridged account of the legal side of the Noitgedacht Murder Case 

 has been considered desirable from the historical standpoint. The gruesome details can be 

 found in the local papers. — J. R. ] 



The Scene of the Crime. 

 There are three Noitgedachts in British Guiana. One in Wakenaain 

 Island, one at Anna Catherina on the West Coast, Demerara, and the 

 third on the West Bank of the Demerara Kiver. It is at the last men- 

 tioned place that the crime was committed. The last mentioned Noit- 

 gedacht is five miles up Canal No. 1 at front of which are Bagotville and 

 La Grange, on the West Bank of the Demerara Biver. There are two 

 canals on that bank, dug in the old days by the Dutch, Canal No. 1 

 being four miles from Vreed-en-Hoop and Canal No. 2 about four miles 

 further on. Those run in for a distance of about seven miles. 



The Early Inhabitants. 



Up to 1891 there were very few people in the Canal except the 

 Creole blacks and Africans, but as the work of empoldering was partially 

 carried out East Indians were attracted there. Before that a considerable 

 number of Kroomen and Oku, people of the Oruba tribe from the West 

 Coast of Africa, and Congoes were settled there. A transport of Soesdyk 

 passed in 1886 showed that the place belonged to sixteen persons of the 

 Oku tribe. Those people were liberated slaves captured in slave ships after 

 the abolition of slavery, brought here about 1858 or 1860 and settled on 

 the estates. Most of them were dead and only nine remained alive on the 

 Canal. Their children are there till to-day. The population rose from 

 100 in 1891 to nearly 1,000 in 1911 when the census was taken. If they 

 went up Canal No. 1 they would find estates on both sides and about two 

 miles up they passed Vauxhall. In most cases the estates had been sold 

 out to small holders. When they got to Le Desir, about four miles up, 

 they came to a prosperous cocoa and coffee estate owned by Mr. John 

 Junor who was well-known in the colony. Mr. Junor was born in the 

 colony and was formerly manager of Pin. Vryheid's Lust, East Coast, 

 Demerara. Next to that estate and further west, at Anna Catherina, was 

 Mr. John Martin, a trusted employee of Messrs. Booker Bros, who used 

 to go from Saturday to Monday to look after his place, until five or six 

 years ago when he retired and went to live on the estate. Next to that 

 they came to Noitgedacht and L'Esperance which had a varied history. 



Mr. Schulz took it over in December, 1915, but did uot go to live 

 there until August, 1916; all that time the accused Sewdin was manager 

 of the estate. In the course of about twelve years there was a constant 

 change of managers on the estate and for that period there were no 

 resident proprietors, so that for twelve years they had a property exposed 

 to and suffering wholesale robbery, certainly in the years 1916 and 1917 

 The estate of Noitgedacht runs back from the Canal in a southerly 

 direction for a distance of 1 J miles, the frontage being on the south side 



