party who stabs is deemed guilty of murder, if the person stabbed dies within six months afterwards.' Mrs. Churchill, being convicted, pleaded a state of pregnancy, in bar to her execution; and a jury of matrons, being impanelled, declared that they were ignorant whether she was with child or not. Hereupon the court, willing to allow all reasonable time in a case of this nature, respited judgment for six months; at the end of which time she received sentence of death, as there was no appearance of her being pregnant. This woman's behaviour was extremely penitent; but she denied her guilt to the last moment of her life, having no conception that she had committed murder, because she did not herself stab the deceased. She suffered at Tyburn on the 17th of December, 1708. From the fatal end of this woman we may gather the following lessons of instruction. Her unhappy tem. per induced her first husband to have recourse to strong liquors, which killed him. Hence let married women learn to keep a guard on their tempers, and always to meet their husbands with smiles of complacency and good nature. Marriage is either a heaven or a hell upon earth, according to the behaviour of the parties towards each other. Mrs. Churchill's attachment to Hunt is a strong proof of the capriciousness of the female mind; but she is only one instance amongst thousands of a woman proving a bad wife, and entertaining an affection for a man no way worthy her regard. We wish, for the honour of the fair scx, that these instances may daily decrease; that female virtue may triumph through the land; and that every departure from it may be deemed as criminal in the eyes of the sex in general as it undoubtedly is in the sight of heaven. CHRISTOPHER SLAUGHTERFORD, EXECUTED FOR THE MURDER OF JANE YOUNG. THIS is a very singular case, and will excite different opinions respecting this unhappy man's com mission of the deed for which he was executed. He was the son of a miller at Westbury Green, in Surrey, who apprenticed him at Godalming. When his time was expired, he lived in several situations, and afterwards took a malthouse at Shalford, when his aunt became his housekeeper, and he acquired a moderate sum of money by his industry. He now paid his addresses to Jane Young, and it was generally supposed he intended to marry her. The last time he was seen in her company was on the evening of the 5th of October, 1703; from which day she was not heard of for a considerable time, on which suspicions arose that Slaughterford had murdered her. About a month afterwards the body of the unfortunate girl was found in a pond, with several marks of violence on it; and the public suspicion being still fixed on Slaughterford, he voluntarily surrendered himself to two justices of the peace, who directed that he should be discharged; but, as he was still accused by his neighbours, he went to a third magistrate, who, agrecable to his own solicitations, committed him to the Marshalsea Prison; and he was tried at the next assizes at Kingston, and acquitted. The majority of his neighbours, however, still insisted that he was guilty, and prevailed on the relations of the deceased to bring an appeal for a new trial; towards the expense of which many persons subscribed, as the father of Jane Young was in indigent circumstances. During the next term he was tried, by a Surrey jury, in the Court of Queen's Bench, before Lord Chief Justice Holt, the appeal being lodged in the name of Henry Young, brother and heir to the deceased. The evidence given on this second trial was the same in substance as on the first; yet so different were the sentiments of the two juries, that Slaughterford was now found guilty, and received sentence of death. It may be proper to mention the heads of some of the depositions, that the reader may judge of the propriety of the verdict. Elizabeth Chapman, the mistress of Jane Young, deposed that, when the young woman left her service, she said she was going to be married to the prisoner, that she had purchased new clothes on the occasion, and declared that she was to meet him on the Sunday following. That the deponent sometimes afterwards inquired after Jane Young, and, asking if she was married, was informed that she had been seen in the company of Slaughterford, but no one could tell what was become of her since, and that he himself pretended he knew nothing of her, but thought she had been at home with Mrs. Chapman; which had induced this witness to believe that some mischief had befallen her. Other witnesses proved that Jane Young was in company with the prisoner on the night that the murder was committed; and one man swore that, at three in the morning, he met a man and woman on a common, about a quarter of a mile from the place where the body was found; that the man wore light-coloured clothes, as it was proved the prisoner had done the preceding day; and that soon after he passed them he heard a shrieking, like the voice of a woman. It was sworn by a woman, that, after the deceased was missing, she asked Slaughterford what was become of his lady: to which he replied, I have put her off; do you know of any girl that has any money? I have got the way of putting them off now.' 6 It was deposed by another woman that, before the discovery of the murder, she said to Mr. Slaughterford, What if Jane Young should lay such a child to you as mine is here?' at which he sighed, and said, It is now impossible;' and cried till the tears ran down his cheeks. In contradiction to this, the aunt of Mr. Slaughterford, and a young lad who lived in the house, deposed that the prisoner lay at home on the night that the murder was committed. Slaughterford, from the time of conviction to the very hour of his death, solemnly declared his innocence; and, though visited by several divines, who urged him by all possible arguments to confess the fact, yet he still persisted that he was not guilty. He was respited from the Wednesday till Saturday, in which interim he desired to see Mr. Woodroof, a minister of Guildford, from which it was thought he would make a confession; but what he said to him tended only to confirm his former declarations. As soon as the executioner had tied him up, he threw himself off, having previously delivered to the sheriff a paper, containing the following solemn declaration : 'Guildford, July 9, 1709. "Being brought here to die, ac cording to the sentence passed upon me at the Queen's Bench bar, for a crime of which I am wholly innocent, I thought myself obliged to let the world know, that they may not reflect on my friends and relations, whom I have left behind me much troubled for my fatal end, that I know nothing of the death of Jane Young, nor how she came by her death, directly or indirectly, though some have been pleased to cast reflections on my aunt. How. ever, I freely forgive all my enemies, and pray to God to give them a due sense of their errors, and in his due time to bring the truth to light. In the mean time, I beg every one to forbear reflecting on my dear mother, or any of my relations, for my unjust and unhappy fall, since what I have here set down is truth, and nothing but the truth, as I expects alvation at the hands of Almighty God; but I am heartily sorry that I should be the cause of persuading her to leave her dame, which is all that troubles me. As witness my hand this 9th day of July.' We have already observed that the case of Slaughterford is very extraordinary. We see that he surrendered himself to the justices when he might have ran away; and common sense tells us that a murderer would endeavour to make his escape; and we find him a second time surrendering himself, as if anxious to wipe away the stain on his character. We find him tried by a jury of his countrymen, and acquitted; then again tried, on an appeal, by another jury of his neigh bours, found guilty, condemned, and executed. Here it should be observed, that after conviction on an appeal, which rarely happens, the king has no power to pardon; probably, had Slaughterford been found guilty by the first jury, as his case was dubious, he would have received royal mercy. Some of the depositions against him seem very striking; yet the testimony in his favour is equally clear. There appears nothing in the former part of his life to impeach his character; there is no proof of any animosity between him and the party murdered; and there is an apparent contradiction in part of the evidence against him. He is represented by one female witness as sneering at and highly gratified with the murder; while another proves him extremely affected, and shedding tears on the loss of Jane Young. The charitable reader must therefore be inclined to think this man was innocent, and that he fell a sacrifice to the prejudices (laudable, perhaps) of his incensed neighbours. He was visited while under sentence of death by a number of divines, yet he dies with the most sacred averment of his innocence. GRACE TRIPP, EXECUTED FOR MURDER. In the perpetration of this horrid murder, we are greatly shocked to find base perfidy added to great cruelty in the breast of a female. In order to support the extravagance of a villain with whom this wretched woman had secret amours, she be trayed her trust, and, in hopes of concealing the crime, murdered her fellow-servant. Grace Tripp was a native of Barton, in Lincolnshire, and, after living as a servant at a gentleman's house in the country, she came to London, was some time in a reputable family, and then procured a place in the house of Lord Torrington. During her stay in this last service she became connected with a man named Peters, who persuaded her to be concerned in robbing her master's house, promising to marry her as soon as the fact should be perpetrated. Hereupon it was concerted between them that she should let Peters into the house in the night, and that they should join in stealing and carrying off the plate. Peters was accordingly admitted at the appointed time, when all the family, except the housekeeper, were out of town; but this housekeeper, hearing a noise, came into the room just as they had packed up the plate; on which Peters seized her, and cut her throat, while Tripp held the candle. This being done, they searched the pockets of the deceased, in which they found about thirty guineas; with which, and the plate, they hastily decamped, leaving the street-door open. This shocking murder and robbery became the general subject of conversation, and no steps were left unattempted in order to apprehend the offenders, who were taken in a few days, when, Peters having been admitted an evidence for the crown, Grace Tripp was convicted, and executed at Tyburn on the 17th of March, 1710, at the age of nineteen years. While she lay under sentence of death she entertained an idea that she ought not to suffer, because she did not actually commit the murder with her own hands, but only stood by while the deed was perpetrated. She confessed that an ambition of being deemed a fine lady prevailed on her to admit Peters into the house, as she thought the stolen effects would produce suffi cient to dignify her with that title. From the fate of this unhappy deluded girl two or three reflections naturally occur, not unworthy the notice of the public. In the first place, families that go out of town for the summer should never leave their plate in the care of one or two servants, particularly of the female sex; for this circumstance is at once an encouragement to robbers, and a temptation to the servants themselves to become dishonest. The admission of Peters as an evidence against the girl, though he was clearly an offender of the first magnitude, should teach young peoplein general the danger of making unlawful connexions, and the folly of trusting to the fidelity of a bro. ther thief. In this particular case it was necessary that one of the parties should be an evidence in order to convict the other; and Peters was undoubtedly pitched upon, to teach servants what an enormous crime it is to betray the trust reposed in them by their masters. We have seldom an instance of a servant convicted of robbing his or her master but they are severely punished; and indeed it is proper such convicts should undergo the utmost rigour of the law. The folly of this young woman, in listening to the addresses of a man who persuaded her to rob her master, is truly astonishing! From her sad example let all young women be taught that there is no prospect of that person making a good husband who is not first of all an honest man. Let them remember that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.' DANIEL DEMAREE, GEO. PURCHASE, & FRANCIS WILLIS, TRIED FOR HIGH TREASON. DANIEL Demaree was waterman try having been turned out of, or, in to Queen Anne, whose Whig minis- the modern phrase, having resigned their places, the Tory ministry sncceeded them, and encouraged a young divine, named Henry Sache. verell, to inflame the passions of the public, by preaching against the settlement made at the Revolution, and inculcating all those doctrines which were then held as the favo rite tenets of what was called the High Church party. lished on the following night. Here it should be observed that Dr. Burgess and Mr. Bradbury were two dissenting ministers, who had made themselves conspicuous by preaching in opposition to Sacheverell's doctrine. Captain Orril swore, that, on the 1st of March, hearing that the mob had pulled down Dr. Burgess's meeting-house, he resolved to go among them, to do what service he could to government by making discoveries. This witness, going to Mr. Bradbury's meeting, found the people plundering it, who obliged him to pull off his hat. After this he went to Lincoln's-inn Fields, where he saw a bonfire made of some of the materials of Dr. Burgess's meeting-house, and saw the prisoner, who twirled his hat, and said,― Damn it, I will lead you on Sacheverell was a man of abilities, and eminently possessed of those kind of talents which are calculated to inspire such sentiments as the preacher wished to impress his auditors with. The doctor's discourses accordingly tended to in stigate the people against the house of Hanover, and to insinuate the right of the Pretender to the throne of these realms. This caused such a general commotion, that it became necessary to bring him to trial in some way; and, contrary to all former practice respecting a man of his rank, he was tried before the House of Peers, and was silenced for three It was proved by another eviyears, upon conviction. dence, that the prisoner having headed part of the mob, some of them proposed to go to the meeting-house in Wild Street; but this was objected to by others, who recommended going to Drury Lane, saying that meeting-house was worth ten of that in Wild Street.' But so excited were the passions of the populace in consequence of his insinuations, that they almost adored him as a prophet; and some of them were led to commit out rages which gave rise to several trials, particularly that of Daniel Demaree, who, on the 19th of April, 1710, was indicted for being concerned with a multitude of men, to the number of five hundred, armed with swords and clubs, to levy war against the queen. A gentleman deposed that, going through the Temple, he saw some thousands of people, who had attended Dr. Sacheverell from Westminster Hall; that some of them said they would pull down Dr. Burgess's meeting-house that night; others differed as to the time of doing it; but all agreed on the act, and the meeting-house was demo we will have all the meetinghouses down-High Church and Sacheverell, huzza!' Joseph Collier swore that he saw the prisoner carry a brass sconce from Dr. Burgess's meeting-house, and throw it into the fire in Lincoln's-inn Fields, huzzaing, and crying, High Church and Sacheverell.' There was another evidence to prove the concern that the prisoner had in these illegal acts; and several persons appeared in his behalf; but as, in their testimony, they contradicted each other, the jury could not credit their evi dence, but brought in a special verdict. George Purchase was indicted for |