SHOCKING TRAGEDY IN CUMBERLAND STREET.

Oamaru Mail, Volume IV, Issue 1220, 15 March 1880, Page 2

SHOCKING TRAGEDY IN CUMBERLAND STREET.

SUPPOSED BRUTAL MURDER. (From to-day's Qtago Daily Times.) ; There appears no reason whatever to doubt that a brutal murder has been committed—that a sleeping, unconscious man has been killed by one stroke ; that an attempt, only too nearly successful, has been made to deal out a like death to that man's wife ; that a deliberate attempt —and this has happily been entirely unsuccessful—has been made to. oonceal all evidence of the crime by burning down the house iu wWch the deed was done; and th.ftt iu this last attempt death from 3usbca,tian has resulted to the infant child of the husband and wife before referred to. And all this, there is every, reason, we think, to believe,, is the delib@Tate.act of a single person, who must, if such a theory is correct, be a oriminal of the most depraved and hardened type. This terrible affair happened in Cumber-land-attest, between Union and St. Davidatreets, in a cottage standing back from the street a few yards, -opposite the entrance to Lambeth place x and almost directly at the rear of In. this cottage 4 VYhjcfe is a nearly, new one, l{v§4 ft Paan, named James Murray Pewar,' with his wife, Elizabeth Dewar, and a child nine months old, named Elisabeth .Murray Dewar. Dewar, howr ever, passed under the name of Grant, his mother having, when he was a child, been married a: second time to a man of :'that name, and amongst their acquaintances Dewar and his wife were always known as Mr. and Mrs. Grau«, By-this , name, therefore, afterwards speak of him. Qn Saturday night, as far as is known, Grant, his wife, and child went, to bed in the usual way, and slept undisturbed until some hour on Sunday mornings Their house then appears to have, been entered by some individual bent on crime. Grant himself was killed outright by a blow from an axe ; Mrs. Grant wast rendered senseless by blows from the same weapon ; and their baby was suffocated by smoke from the fire by which apparently the scoundrel intended to hide all trace of his crime.

The last, thing known of any of the members of this unfortunate, family on Saturday night i§ th a s Grant travelled by a tramea? fv°W South Dunedin to the cojßier- of St. David-street, whence, no doubt, he proceeded home. The next thing we hear in connection with the family or the house is that about 4 o'clock on Sunday morning a neighbor named Henry Haydon, a laborer, who happened to be up for a few moments, saw alight in one of the front oi the house, j Haydon declares positively that this room was the sitting-room, not the bedroom, in whioh the crime, was committed. From this time till close upon 7 o'clock nothing is known. Shortly before 7-o'clock, Mr. Robb, sen., who lives in Lambeth Place opposite .with his son, who was up, noticed smoke js&vwg from the residence of the (grants. His son being a member of the Fire Brigade, the father naturally aroused him. After satisfying himself that smoke was really coming from the house, Mr. Robb, jun., donned his uniform and ran across" the street. He called to the inmates, but got no answer ; tried the front dopr, but found it locked, and, ran ro mid sconce,.to the back. At thia time he was certain the house was on fire, as smoke was issuing from underneath the; eaves j ;frora the window, &c. He found the back door standing open, Rushing in, he went up the pass,agfe and into the bedroom, hearing* a% he did so, a gurgling noise. Jp, ths ?oom he found the smoke sp. as to prevent his seeing anything, and he had to go down on his [ knees. He had not made above a movement op two in this way ere he felt a body lying on the floor. Catching hold of it, he dragged it out, and placed it half-way in the sitting-room. As -he moved it, he heard- a groan, Which convinced him the person was alive, and when he got the body out he found it was that of a wo man v Thernhe ran out to look for water, arid, finding a bucket, placed it under a tap. While it was filling, he went to a house at the back, only a few yards away, inhabited by! Mr. and Mrs. Grant, the stepfather and mother pf th,§ murdered map. He roused the inmates, and then going to the front to look for wore aid, saw a neighbor of his own in Lambeth Place named Freeman coming out of his door. To him he beckoned to come across. Running back, he took the filled bucket and went into the; bedroom again. He threw the water on .where he could see the flame through the smoke. Feeling his way through the room, he found the bed, and in it an infant. THe infant he took in his arms to the. back door, where he met Mrs. Grant' the elder, to whom he gaye the child. B.y this time Mr. Freeman had come over, an 4 Mr, Cjraflt and others also coming, 'they kept Mr. Robb supplied with water, so that the fire was got under. During this time Mr. Robb had found Grant himself lying on the bed, but, seeing that he was dead, arid" having got the fire under, he did not move the body, nor would he allow others to do so. The police and a doctor having been sent for, Sergeant Deane was almost immediately on the scene, and Dr. Niven came shortly.

It was found that Grant was dead; the; child was dead j and Mrs. Grant was quite unconscious. I)r, Niven at once bad her removed to the' Hospital. At the head of the bed was an ordinary American: axe, which belonged to:, the hoqse. Grant had a severe Wow, on his head, inflicted, without doubt, by,.this instrument; for it was covered with blood. Blood was also ori the pillow and over the bed, -! and spattered over the wall,' The wound h?id rga^e,: not by the sharp blade of the axe, hut by the ,butt, , jQr. Brown, who has seen the body at the estates that there can be no Iquestign.. that the blow was given while, Grant was quietly sleeping, and; that it caused' death immediately. Mrs. Grant has three wounds on her head —one on the crown, one behind the right ear, :and,sbe other,on.the temple, These fravfj been inflicted also by a portion of the other than the sharp edge. And they have ', undoubtedly been ' inflicted while the woman was in bed] for she has

-burns about her body and legs, and her nightdress is also burned. Thus, apparently, she must have had a conscious interval after receiving the blows, and have made an abortive attempt to get from the room. The baby has no blow upon it, but has died from suffocation by smoke. This leads us to refer to the fire. Underneath the bed, after the blows had -been struck, and the axe placed at tlie head of the bed, a lighted candle had been, placed. When Mr. Robb' liad' gbt flames under, he fpund that the bedclotheshad been partly burned, the mattress was burned pretty well through, and a holo was also made in the floor. He judgesthat from half an hour to an hour must* have elapsed from the time the thing was: set agoing until he got in ; but of course this is mere conjecture. At any rate, it seems perfectly plain that. the intentiohf of the miscreant who is responsible for the whole tragedy was to burn the house,, bodies, axe, and everything, and thus destroy all trace of his crime. A fortunate chain of circumstances led to Mr. Robb's arrival at the house, however, and thus happily prevented the fulfilment of." such a plan.

Grant, or James Murray Dewar, as wei previously explained was his real name,, was 29 years of age. Up to the time of his marriage, which was about 18 months ago, he lived with - Mr. and Mrs. sen., in the house they now occupy, a few yards behind that in which the tragedy took place. His mother married her present husband, Mr. Grant, over 20 years ago, so that the deceased has lived with his step father since a boy. His wife's maiden name was Elizabeth Aitchoson. She was the daughter of a settler' at Moeraki, and' had been' before hermarriage a domestio servant in the employ pf Mr. W. N. Blair, engineer for- \ the Middle Island. Mrs. Blair gives her* a high character, and she was a great, favorite with' the family. Either oht Friday or Saturday; Mr. Blair's childrem were at her house visiting her. Grant; was a butcher by trade, and had worked! for Messrs. M'Donald and Doring, andi for Mr. Dornwell. We believe he hadl also been in business on his own accountRecently he liad been in the employ off Mr. Howard, of South Dunedin, from whose place it, was that he proceeded home on Saturday night by tramcar. He and his wife lived together on the best of terms, and the pair seem to have been an industrious, quiet couple, in happy and. comfortable circumstances.

' It is a strange thing that none of theneighbors round about heard any noise,, nor that ' anything happened to attract. , attention to the house. This parents of the unfortunate man saw nothing, as it, happened, of any of the family after between 3 and 4. o'clock on Saturdayafternoon. There was not the slightest / sign about the house afterwards of. any disturbance or struggle, or anything of the kind. The windows were hot unfastened, nor the front door. Only tha back door was wide open. There is not the slightest reason to believe that Tobbery was committed. Mrs. Grant's jewellery remained untouched on the chest of drawers in the bedroom. The house was perfectly in order, except that, as wassaid, the back door was standing opeu. The cottage, we may mention, was a, three-roomed one, with a scullery at tha> back.

Rohbery, therefore, was not the motivof' that induced the person committing thei crime to enter the house, for it looks; almost a certainty that the house was. entered by someone from without.! Robbery, then, not being the motive, what could this be 1 One fact that requires to be taken into consideration is that in the house no one slept except the three in the family, so that the murder of those being successfully accomplished, there was no risk of an alarm being given by others in the house. This circumstances would point to an acquaintance with the* household on the part of the criminal, unless he stumbled on such a household by blind chance. In the latter case the supposition that the crime was that of a. maniac would be possible. But against, this there is a deliberate and planned idea* of setting the house on fire. Then comes, in the theory of personal spite. But against this there arises the fact that, so> far as is known, neither Grant nor his. wife had any enemies, nor were on bad terms with anyone. Perhaps a solution of the mystery will prove that this was & orime perpetrated solely out of revenge upon society as a whole. Such cases have been known. Deep, hardened criminals, possessed, almost, it might be said, of a bloodthirsty nature, find a comfort and a consolation, so to speak, for the wrongs and hardships, as they think them, inflicted on them under the laws of society, in devising and carrying out some terrible crime that will startle the world, and horrify that society that has heea so ernel to them. It is a dreadful revenge, but there is a pleasure in it to the criminal mind. We apprehend that this is a possible theory to acoount for'the crime, which has been committed in the presents case. However, whether the murder was committed by a maniac, by an individual wishing to revenge himself upon Grans simply, or by a determined criminal such, as we have referred to—and it seems certainty that it must have been ctim-> mitted by one of the three—it stands un-. rivalled in this city as aa example of ! bloodthirsty ferocity and cruel, pitiless cowardice.

The police hsvve,. we think we are justified in saying, done their utmost to, trace out the offender. The task is, and will b.e, a difficult one, but we have every reason to hope that within a very short time enlightenment will b© thrown upon this, in the meantime, appalling mystery. We write with ©very confidence that our polioa will ere long bring the deed homo to its doer.

DEATH OF MRS. GRAN^ Since writing, the above, we to, hear that Mrs. Grant died at Hospital this morning at 12.30 o'cloqk.. !■)*•., Brown, when she was admitted* once treated her wounds, and aai the. result of during the afternoon sjie brQathed moi « easily, and slight hopes were, theft entei * tained of he<\ possibly recovering consciousness. Had this eventuated, the probability & that some evidence would have been obtained from her that have tended to throw light on the'who\s matter. But unfortunately, during t;hs evening she sank gradually, and t hour stated she expired, never a moment of consciousness.