THE MURDER OF MR BLAKE.

Globe, Volume XXIV, Issue 2608, 16 August 1882, Page 3

THE MURDER OF MR BLAKE.

The following additional particulars relating to the murder of Mr Blake were telegraphed from Dublin:—

“ The spot had been chosen by the murderers with great care. On the right hand side of the roadway there is a small plantation which runs parallel with the road. The party must have numbered at least three, if not four, and they had concealed themselves behind the wall, having first loopholed it in three places. The shot and bullets took effect in the back of Mr Blake’s head, which was terribly shattered, though he lived for over fifteen minutes afterwards. Euane’a head also received the contents of more than one gun, and he must have been killed on the spot. The murderers, exactly following the example of their predecessors at Ardrahan, evidently waited until their victims had just passed, and then poured their deadly volleye into the car upon agent, wife, and servant alike. So great was the discharge and so extensive its scope that even the horse did not escape, several pellets of lead lodging in its shonlder. The pain suffered by the animal must have been very great, for it rushed forward wildly, and feeling no restraining hand it was scarcely a couple of minutes in gaining the town. Here a shocking spectacle presented itself to the gaze of the spectators. Bight across the vehicle lay the dead body of the driver, while Mrs Blake, in a state of excitement that may well be imagined, but cannot be described, had one hand across the forehead of the murdered man, and with the other she was endeavoring to staunch the bleeding from her own wounds. Mr Blake, though not yet dead, had fallen off the car about twenty yards from the spot where he was fired upon. Two men in the street seeing the extraordinary spectacle of the horse, the vehicle, and its occupants rushing through the town stopped it with difficulty, and the police coming up, Mrs Blake, who, amid the physical pain and the sickening surroundings of the moment, yet retained her consciousness and presence of mind, stated what had occurred. It would appear that the military were also apprised of what had occurred, for they seemed to have been the first to reach the place of the murders. Mr Blake’s body was picked up yet warm, and with some pulsation at the heart. The body was promptly taken to the military barracks, where all that surgical skill could do was done, but a few minutes sufficed to show the fruitlesaness of earthly aid and to complete the assassins’ work. The body of the servant was taken to the police barracks, where an immediate inspection showed that he was past all human assistance. Medical attention was happily not so unavailing in the case of Mrs Blake, and an examination of her wonnde showed that though serious and painful they were not fatal.

The district, of course, was scoured immediately, but up to eight o’clock at night no arrests of any kind had been made, The locality is a fairly populous one ; the day was not only a Ohuroh holiday, but a fair day. The roads were consequently, if not crowded, at least unusually bustling with people, yet tne old, old story must be told. No person saw or heard the deed committed, no person saw any strangers in the vicinity, no armed men (the murders were unquestionably perpetrated with rides) were observed anywhere in the district, and altogether the event, dire and diabolical as it is, must be relegated to the mysterious but shocking category of inexplicable accidents which the vocabulary of County Galway has improvised for the designation of crimes as fierce and savage as they are daring and appalling. What can have been the immediate cause of this dreadful crime, if it had an immediate cause, cannot be known. There have been no recent evictions on the Clanrioarde property. A number of the tenantry have served originating notices to have a fair rent fixed, but these have not excited any hostility on the part of the office towards the tenants, nor did Mr Blake express any objection to the farmers on any portion of the estate obtaining the decree from the sub-commis-sioners with regard to fixing their rent and a statutory term for its payment, and the consequent permanence of their holdings. It only remains forme to add that Buano leaves a wife and large family, Mrs Blake is a lady of entirely local associations, her father being Dr. Lynch, a medical practitioner in Longhrea. Mre Blake remains almost in a state of collapse, though it is perhaps right to repeat jf that no fear* are entertained of her perfect J recovery from both wounds and the consequent shook.