THE WARD-CHAPMAN COMMITTEE.

Evening Star, Issue 3612, 19 September 1874, Page 2

THE WARD-CHAPMAN COMMITTEE.

If the evidence could be illustrated by portraits of the witnesses, from Judge Ward down to the telegraph boy at Oamaru, the increased demand would well repay the extra cost. The Government really ought not to keep such a good thing as this evidence, all to itself. Apart, however, from financial considerations, there are other reasons why the evidence should be published. The publication would undoubtedly tend to unravel the mystery now resting over the matter. Full publicity would probably be more efficacious than a Royal Commissioner in eliciting the truth. So far as we have been able to gather, Mr Macassey has admitted giving what purported to be copies of Judge Ward’s telegrams to the ‘Otago Times.’ His explanations of the manner in which these came into his possession is that Mrs Croker (a lady residing at Oamaru, whose husband is counter-clerk in the telegraph office there) called upon him and gave him the telegrams, assuring him that they were genuine. He alleged that he gave her the sum of LlO for them, and the theory set up as accounting for her possession of them is that being on friendly terms with Judge Ward, she had seen on his table either the original telegrams or copies of them, and had rewritten them from memory. In fact, on this side the evidence is that the judge was betrayed likea second Sampson by Delilah; but the Judge himself upsets this theory by saying be wrote his telegrams in the Telegraph Office, and kept no copies. The morality of the transaction by which, according to this version, the telegrams were published we need not comment on. On the other side, the story is that Mrs Croker was sent for by Mr Macassey, and offered LSO if she would, through her husband, procure copies of the genuine telegrams sent from Oamaru, and that Mr Macassey showed her the copies he possessed, but expressed doubts as to their absolute correctness. Mrs Croker says that she emphatically refused to have anvthing to do with the affair, and the next day the copies she had been shown appeared in the ‘ Daily Times.’ Here are two stories, and of course it is evident that, both parties having given their evidence on oath, one or the orher must have committed the most deliberate perjury.— ‘ Post.’