A Woman Fiend

Feilding Star, Volume XIII, Issue 116, 29 March 1892, Page 4

A Woman Fiend

♦__ — A dispatch from the Coleraine Country, Londonderry, dated February 17th, says that Mrs Robert Montague, daughter-in-law of Lord Robert Montague, was committed tor trial that morning on a charge of causing the death of her little daughter, Mary Holen Montague, aged three years. It seems that the child had been badly used by her governess, in addition to being the object of hatred Vt the mother.. The governess, for some childish escapade locked the ; little girl up in a <iark room as punishment, and then informed tke mother of the child's offence and the punishment she had meted out. The mother appears to have become so earaged at the little girl's conduct that she resolved to punish her still more severely. In the dark room she tied her arms behino her back, the strings cutting deeply into the child's tender flesh, and then forced her up by a' ring id the wall half tvay to the ceiling, and left her so. After being in this position some time, the child's cries grew fainter and fainter, and then ceased entirely. It was three hours afterwards before anybody thought of going to the dark room in which the little girl was confined, and then the helpless infant was found choked to death. The excitement over this tragedy ran very high. The mordere.l child was buried Jin great privacyThe trial of Mrs Montague was held on February 25th, and she was found guilty of manslaughter. The woman appears to be a crank in the matter of disciplining her family . The evidence on the second charge of cruelty to children di&closeq-a miserable state of affairs. Walter Montague hail been , tied to a tree all day. Gilbert Montague showed marks of a cord around his elbows, and pieces of flesh cut from his toes. Austin had been dra-j---ged alonp: the corridor by his feet, and his head trailing the flocr. On oue occasion Gilbert was stripped naked, and beaten with a strap until his •whole body was lacerated, and in that Etate tlirusl into a dark closet, where he lay moaning all night. Mrs 3" J ontague had told one of the servants j that was her way ot punishing, and j she did it to save the children's sou's, end she did not mind their bodies.