The Great Crime of 1860: Being a Summary of the Facts Relating to the Murder Committed at Road, a Critical Review of Its Social and Scientific Aspects, and an Authorized Account of the Family ; with an Appendix by J.W. Stapleton

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E. Marlborough, 1861 - Crime - 379 pages
An account of the murder of Francis Seville Kent, on June 29, 1860.
 

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Page 71 - Steep'd me in poverty to the very lips, Given to captivity me and my utmost hopes, I should have found in some place of my soul A drop of patience...
Page 71 - A fixed figure, for the time of scorn To point his slow unmoving finger at. — O ! O ! Yet could I bear that too ; well, very well : But there, where I have garner'd up my heart ; Where either I must live, or bear no life ; The fountain from the which my current runs, Or else dries up ; to be discarded thence...
Page 84 - ... windmills. He particularly wished to be tied to one of the arms of the mill when they were going round : he would go any distance to see a windmill, and would sit watching one for days together. His friends removed him to a place where there were no mills, in the hope' that this strange propensity would wear away.
Page 86 - ... wild fruits. He one day caught a rabbit, which he killed and devoured raw. In his lonely abode a desire seized him, according to his own account, to eat human flesh and to drink blood. Seeing one day a little girl near the margin of the wood, he seized her, murdered her, sucked her blood, and afterwards buried her body. Three days afterwards he was apprehended : at first he denied the charge, and invented absurd stories, but at length, being confronted with the body and interrogated, he avowed...
Page 359 - The jury returned a verdict of wilful murder against some person or persons unknown, and the police were put on their mettle to discover the unknown and daring murderer.
Page 84 - ... he might as well suffer for all as for two, he returned to the bedroom, and destroyed the two whom he had left alive. He shook hands with them before he strangled them. He left the house and went to a neighbour's, but said nothing of the murder until he was apprehended the next day and taken before the coroner, when he made a full confession. Not one of the witnesses had ever observed the slightest indication of insanity about him. He made no defence, but several medical practitioners came forward...
Page 84 - In 1843 a case occurred of a young man of mild manners who laboured under a delusion connected with windmills. " He would go any distance to see a windmill; and would sit watching one for days together. His friends removed him to a place where there were no mills, in the hope that this strange propensity would wear away. He...
Page 15 - And he who has not learned to know How false its sparkling bubbles show, How bitter are the drops of woe, With which its brim may overflow, He has not learned to live.
Page 373 - ... opinion relative to the different states of matter; for in both instances that I have mentioned it was capable of producing something strongly resembling the true smallpox, although it afterwards proved not to be so. "As I think the communication of these cases is a duty I owe to the public, you are at liberty to make what use you please of this letter.
Page 119 - It may be to your home, but mine's different." She also led me to infer, though I don't remember her precise words, that she did not dislike the child, except for the partiality shown by the parents, and because the second family were much better treated than the first. I remember no other conversation about the deceased child; she has only very slightly referred to him.

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