CRUEL CASE OF SEDUCTION.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume III, Issue 533, 13 January 1882, Page 2

CRUEL CASE OF SEDUCTION.

At the Stratford Petty Sessions, lately, Henry Brockhurst, a married man, occupying a good position ait r Chad well Heath, was brought up on a : warrant charged with unlawfully taking Sarah Clark, under the age of sixteen, out of the possession and against the will of her father. Mr Atkinson, who was instructed to prosecute, staled that the 1 case was one of the most heartless of - its kind that had ever come under his : , notice. The prosecutor was a laborer residing in the parish of Dagenham, , and he had a daughter aged 15. She i' was a good-looking girl, and her per- \ sonal charms seemed to -have at- : . traded defendant’s attention. In March last he spoke to her at her : r mother’s gate, and gradually insinuated himself into the girl’s acquaintance. At the end of June she was engaged in y. picking peas, and after the day’s work was over mixed with the people. A good deal of drinking went on; and that night he induced the girl, who had had too much to drink, to go to a barn with him, and he there seduced her. When she came to her senses in the morning the defendant promised .' that she should be well looked after, and in a few weeks, on. • being told that she was pregnant, • the promise was repeated. Without the knowledge of the parents this state - of things went on for some time, when r defendant came to the girl and told; her that her condition was getting such that she must leave home. She consented to go with him, and next day she met him at Romford Station, when he told her that he had a good home for her, and that she would be well taken care of till her trouble was over. Defendant, however, took the girl to Rainham, then to Gravesend, and afterwards back to Ilford, where, at the end of a week, he left her and never returned. The girl then communicated with her parents, who, on learning the distressing circumstances above enumerated, applied for a war- . rant, the result being that the defendant was arrested on the previous evening. —Defendant asked for a remand, and that he might be admitted to bail, as he could produce fifty witnesses to - prove that the girl was the “ aggressor.” —Major Sturt remanded the defendant, and agreed to accept bail, two sureties in L 250 each and himself in LSOO.