The Result of an Elopement.

Cromwell Argus, Volume II, Issue 99, 3 October 1871, Page 6

The Result of an Elopement.

—o— Some short time since a man was charged at the Melbourne Police Court with attempting to rob a Collingwood bank, and assaulting the manager. At his trial on the 18th August, at the Melbourne Criminal Sessions, the person, whose name was Charles Marshall, told the following strange story. He said that in 1853 he worked as a miner at Ballarat, and was married to a young and handsome wife. At that time a person named Alexander Jamieson was working in an adjacent claim. Marshall one day on returning to his home, found that his wife had fled, and he was told she had eloped with Jamieson. He visited Melbourne and Geelong in a vain search after her, and then he returned to Ballarat. When he got there one of Jameison’s mates had jumped his (Marshall’s) claim. Several years elapsed, and a short time since, when in Smith-street, he saw Mr Jamieson go into the Commercial Bank there, and it struck him that, in that person, he saw the same man who was said to have taken his wife away. He made enquiries, and ascertained that he was Alexander Jamieson, the manager of the Bank. The prisoner avowed that he then believed, and does yet, that the bank-manager is the person who ran away with his wife. Still smarting under the sense of the injuries he had received, Marshall determined to assault Jamieson when he could find him alone. Ho was anxious to assault Mr Jamieson outside the Bank, but he failed to obtain an opportunity. Ho went into the Bank on two occasions. On the first one, he found that Mr Jamieson was not alone, but on hearino- Ifis voice, when he spoke to the ledger-keeper, he was firmly convinced that he was the same person who was at Ballarat in 1853 ; on the second, he committed the assault. He had no desire to seriously injure Mr Jamieson, and when he saw him turn pale, he ran away from the Bank in horror. The prisoner concluded by expressing regret that his natural violent temper had led him into the commission of the offence to which he had pleaded guilty, and he added that this was the first time that ho had ever been a party in a court of justice. His Honor said the prisoner proceeded on unsupported suspicion. It he had acted in a spirit of manly resentment, on facts actually ascertained, and immediately on the discovery of the wrong, he might he regarded as an object for commiseration ; hut in no case did the law tolerate a man brooding over his wrongs, and then avenging them. The prisoner must be imprisoned for four months, and he hound over to keep the peace towards Mr Jamieson for twelve months, prisoner himself in a recognisance of LIOO and two sureties of LSO each. In the even ; of his not obtaining sureties, prisoner to bo' imprisoned during the twelve months. It will bo remembered that, on the I2tli July, Marshall went into the Commercial Bank in the afternoon, and presented a cheque for payment. On Mr Jamieson telling him that the cheque could not ho cashed there, he took a lump of lead from his pocket and threw it at him, striking him in the ribs and knocking him down. He was rushing round the counter in Mr Jamieson’s direction with a handkerchief with another lump of lead in it, when a clerk employed at the bank, whom the prisoner had not seen, came to Ins manager'.! assistance. Prisoner then ran a l ,’•ay, I hut wan immediately captured.