SERIOUS CHARGE.

Grey River Argus, Volume VII, Issue 488, 2 March 1869, Page 3

SERIOUS CHARGE.

At the Durham Assies, on Doc. 8, before Mr Justice Brett, Henry St. John Montague, aged 30, a schoolmaster, was charged with committing a rape on Isabella Hope, a girl aged 15 yean, at Wellington, on the 23rd July last. According to the statement of tlia pr-osecutris:, she? was a scholar in the prisoner's school, and on the day named he dutiijuod lior after the other scholars had left, at midday, aud ordered her to go on with her study of arithmetic. It was then that he committed the offence. As aoon as she could escape she ran away to the house of an aunt, to whom she told what had happened. The aunt went home with the girl, and then the story was repeated, and information at once given to the police. It was stated that the girl was very excited, and sobbed and cried as slie told what had occurred to her aunt. For the defence it was urged that the evidence went to show that the girl had been in s ime way a consenting party to the offt n:e. The prisoner had only one leg, and if there had been much resistance on the part of the prosecutrix, who was remarkably strong and womanly-looking for her age, she could easily have released herself. Just beneath the school-room was a tailor's shop, in which several men were at work, but none of them heard the shouts and screams of which the prosecittrix had spoken. The jury retired, and were absent for two' hours. On their return into court, the foreman annoixnced that they found the prisoner "Guilty," On hearing this the prisoner's courage gave way, and he had to be supported standing in the arms of an officer of the court. His lordship, in passing sentence, said, after a careful inquiry, Henry St. John Montague had been found guilty of a rape on one of his pupils. Nothing he could say could aggravate the horror of the prisonei*'s position. He seemed to be a mau who had obtained a good character, and held a confidential position. By r jason of that character and position he had taken advantage, on the fh % st opportunity he had, of committing a shocking outrage upon a respectable and innocent girl, the daughter of respectable parents, whose life he had rendered miserable in consequence of the confidence placed in him by her parents. He felt, under the circumstances, he could not reduce the penalty he intended, to pass on him, and that was that he be l^ept in penal servitude for ten years. The prisoner, on hearing the sentence, sank insensible into the arms of the officer holding him, and he had to be carried out of court in that state.