MAN AND MAID.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXIX, Issue 3745, 31 January 1907, Page 3

MAN AND MAID.

The Sequel to an Elopement Pigeon Bay (Resident charged! with Abduction. Amongst the various things that taxed the comprehension of King Solomon, was the way of a man with a maid, and Mr V. G. Day, the Christchurch S.M. found a case figuring on his charge sheet recently which would have made the much-married Eastern potentate think hard, says a Christchurch contemporary. ” I know I have done wrong

. . . . My wife would drive a man to do anything,” was the explanation given by George Lyall when arrested by Detective Boddam forabducting Mary Ami Margaret Bryant, a Lyttelton girl under 18 years of age and he appeared this morning to unswer the charge. Mr Cassidy defended.

, Charles Alfred Bryant, the complainant in the case a resident of Lyttelton said the girl in queston was his daughter, and she was born at Lyttelton 011 September 2nd, 1890. He bad seen the accused twice. The first lime he saw him was about twelve months ago. when Lyall visited his house to see if his daughter would go down to service at Pigeon Bay. He told Lyall that the girl could go after the holidays, and his wife said she would give her daughter into his charge on account ot her age. She accordingly went to Pigeon Bay, where she stopped for four months, and then came home. Accused came to Lyttelton shortly after and visited Bryant’s house to see about some clothes bis daughter had left at Pigeon Bay, and that was the last time he (witness) saw him until he was arrested. On September 4th the girl left home with Lyall, and he immediately informed the police as he did not know where she had gone. He never saw her again till Lyall was arrested in a house in Salisbury street. Accused had no authority from him whatever to take his daughter away. Sarah Ann Bryant, wife of the last witness, and stepmother to Margaret Bryant, gave corroborative evidence. When accused visited the house to see if the girl could go to service, she said to him that she hardly liked the girl going to service, as she was so young.

Mary Ann Margaret Bryant, the girl abducted, said she recollected Lyall coming to her father’s house on New Year’s Day, 1905, and went to service at his place a little later. She told him that she would be sixteen years of age in September. On returning to Lyttelton she wrote several letters to Lyall, and the week before she left his house they made an arrangement that after she was sixteen were to meet on the Christchurch Station. The arrangement was carried out on the ath of September, and that same afternoon they lelt for Ashburton and stopped at a boarding-house,, she under the name of Harris, and accused under his own name. The next day they travelled to Gore, where he bought a ring for her, and requested her to wear it. They next went across to Hobart in the Warrimoo, under the name of Mr and Mrs Mills, and occupied the same cabin. Altogether they stayed in Tasmania about three months, and returned to Christchurch early in December, and resided in Salisbury street, where she was known as Mrs Mills.

Dr Symes said that he had examined the girl on the 19th hist., and found traces of a miscarriage. Detective Baddam stated, that in company with Detective Bishop he arrested the accused at Christchurch, in the house in Salisbury street, where he was living with the girl Mary Ann Margaret Bryant. When told, the charge accused replied, “ I know I have done wrong. I knew she would be sixteen on the 2nd September, because she told me so, and we arranged to go away together. My wile would drive a man to anything.” He obtained the ring which was given to the girl by accused. Among the personal effects at the house were two doctor’s prescriptions, which bore the stamp of a Hobart chemist.

Accused reserved his defence, and was committed for trial at the next sitting of the Supreme Court, Bail was allowed, accused in and two sureties of each.