Curiosities of Street Literature. Various
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Calendar for the Winter Sessions of 18—
Hodges, Printer (from the late J. Pitt’s) Wholesale Toy Warehouse, 31, Dudley Street, 7 Dials.
THE LIVERPOOL TRAGEDY.
Showing how a Father and Mother barbarously Murdered their own Son.
A few days ago a sea-faring man, who had just returned to England after an absence of thirty years in the East Indies, called at a lodging-house, in Liverpool, for sailors, and asked for supper and a bed; the landlord and landlady were elderly people, and apparently poor. The young man entered into conversation with them, invited them to partake of his cheer, asked many questions about themselves and their family, and particularly of a son who had gone to sea when a boy, and whom they had long given over as dead. At night the landlady shewed him to his room, and when she was leaving him he put a large purse of gold into her hand, and desired her to take care of it till the morning, pressed her affectionately by the hand, and bade her good night. She returned to her husband and shewed him the accursed gold: for its sake they mutually agreed to murder the traveller in his sleep.
In the dead of the night, when all was still, the old couple silently creaped into the bed room of their sleeping guest, all was quiet: the landlady approached the bedside, and then cut his throat, severed his head from his body; the old man, upwards of seventy years of age, holding the candle. They put a washing-tub under the bed to catch his blood. And then ransacking the boxes of the murdered man they found more gold, and many handsome and costly articles, the produce of the East Indies, together, with what proved afterwards, to be a marriage certificate.
In the morning, early, came a handsome and elegantly dressed lady and asked, in a joyous tone, for the traveller who had arrived the night before. The old people seemed greatly confused, but said he had risen early and gone away. “Impossible!” said the lady, and bid them go to his bed-room and seek him, adding, “you will be sure to know him as he has a mole on his left arm in the shape of a strawberry. Besides, ’tis your long lost son who has just returned from the East Indies, and I am his wife, and the daughter of a rich planter long settled and very wealthy. Your son has come to make you both happy in the evening of your days, and he resolved to lodge with you one night as a stranger, that he might see you unknown, and judge of your conduct to wayfaring mariners.”
The old couple went up stairs to examine the corpse, and they found the strawberry mark on its arm, and they then knew that they had murdered their own son, they were seized with horror, and each taking a loaded pistol blew out each other’s brains.
Printed by J. Catnach—Sold by Marshall Bristol. Just Published—A Variety of Children’s Books, Battledores, Lotteries, and a quantity of popular Songs, set to Music. Cards, &c., Printed cheap.
THE MASSACRE
OF THE WHOLE OF THE
PASSENGERS AND PART OF THE CREW
OF THE SEA HORSE,
On her Homeward Passage from Sydney, and the Plunder of 18,000 ounces of Gold by the Murderers.
We have just received intelligence of one of the most daring cases of plunder and wholesale murder on the high seas that it is our duty to make public for many years. It appears that the crew and thirteen passengers of the ill-fated ship, the Sea Horse, some of whom had been seeking to better their condition by toiling at the diggings of Ballarat, Bendigo, and the several numerous diggings of the surrounding country, whilst others had gained a respectable position in life by mercantile and other pursuits, all returning light-hearted and elated by their good success to the land of their birth, and to look on the dear faces, and gladden the hearts of the dear ones they had left at home, but whom they were doomed never to meet no more on earth. Among the crew was a Spaniard known by the name of Digo Salvesata, and three others, who were tempted by a love of gold to gain possession of the valuable cargo, to do which, they conceived the horrid idea of putting the whole of the passengers and that part of the crew who would not join them to death. The following are the facts of this demon-like outrage:—It appears that the Sarah Ann, of North Shields, on her passage home, was driven by the gales into the German ocean, and it was in sight of the white cliffs of Old England that these horrible murders were committed. As the Sarah Ann was laying at anchor on the morning of the 12th, at day break they saw through the fog the ill-fated vessel, and not seeing any one on deck they hailed her, and on receiving no answer a boat was immediately lowered, and they went on board, and on getting below a shocking sight met their gaze, with one exception the whole of the passengers and the remainder of the crew were in their berths stiff and cold, with their throats cut, and otherwise dreadfully disfigured. One poor man had a piece of dirty sheet tied tightly round his throat, and about eight inches of it stuffed tightly into his mouth. On this being removed, there was a large wound in the throat four inches in extent from right to left; there were five incisors on the right side ending in one deep one on the left. The windpipe was cut through and the muscles of the neck on the left side; the forehead was contused and scratched. The hair was covered with blood. On the back part of the right hand there were several scratches. Most of the victims were more or less mutilated. On going to the Captain’s cabin another shocking sight presented itself, he was laying completely hacked to pieces, his tongue was completely cut out at the root, and his entrails strewed on the cabin floor, showing that there had been a terrible struggle; it appears from the statement of a man who had stowed in the hold to escape the slaughter, that the second mate, who is one of the murderers, treated the passengers and the rest of the crew with some grog in which some laudnum was mixed, which rendered them senseless, and while in that helpless state murdered them in the manner described, they afterwards went to the Captain’s cabin, who fought bravely but was overpowered by numbers, they then took all the gold they could find and lowered the long boat and made off with their ill-gotten gains. The tiller of the boat has been found, so whether they have escaped and sent the boat adrift is not known, but search is being made after the murderers, and we hope they will soon be taken, and meet with their just reward.
COPY OF VERSES.
You landsmen and you seamen bold,
Attention give to me,
While I a tragedy unfold,
Upon the briney sea;
In the German ocean it occurred,
Near the sight of land,
Twenty-eight fell victims
To the cursed murderers hands.
The Sea Horse it from Sydney sailed,
Bound for Old England’s shore,
With crew and thirteen passengers,
Whose fate we now deplore;
Returning home with hard earned gold,
Across the briney main,
But alas! the ones they loved at home,
They ne’er will see again.
Four of the crew they laid a plan,
The passengers to slay,
And with the gold they dearly earnt,
O’er the seas to bear away;
These murderers were led away,
All by their thirst for gold,
And their victims they did cruelly slay,
Most shocking to unfold.
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