SUSPECTED MURDER IN CUMBERLAND STREET.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume I, Issue 36, 10 January 1884, Page 3

SUSPECTED MURDER IN CUMBERLAND STREET.

Amuzst of William Peajicx. (Otago Timet,) A veby disagreeable sensation was created in the neighborhood of Hanover and Cumberland streets yesterday morning by the presence of an unusual number of detectives and police constables, and the report that a woman of ill-fame had been murdered in one of the right-of-ways off the first-named street. The report proved to be only too well founded, and the police investigation elicited the fact that a woman named Matilda Hancock had died from the result of the injury shortly after midnight. The woman Hancock had been divorced from her husband for a number of years, and for the last four months she had been living with a man named William Pearce, a fish-hawker, who has been arrested since on suspicion of the murder. Recently they shifted from the south end of the town to a small house at the back of the National Hotel, situated in a right-of-way off Cumberland street. Both Pearce and his paramour, it is stated, were of drunken habits, and it appears that on Saturday evening last they commenced one of their usual drinking bouts. The statements current vary as to whether they were alone, or whether there was company in the house, but there seems little doubt that at the time a number of the neighbors were present, and that drinking was carried on to a considerable extent. The difficulty which the police have so far had to contend with is the reticence of the neighbors, and their apparent desire to screen the prisoner Pearce. What particulars have so far been gathered point to the conclusion that a quarrel took place in the house on Saturday evening, and it is suspected that Pearce, becoming enraged at the woman Hancock, seized a knife and stabbed her in the side of the abdomen. The

woman lingered all through the next day, and, according to Pearce’s statement, she became very sick towards evening, and was continually vomiting. Notwithstanding this, medical aid was not procured, and the woman died shortly after midnight on Sunday. At 8.30 yesterday morning, Pearce reported to the police his wife had died suddenly the previous night. The police at once proceeded to the house, and found the body of a woman lying on a mattress on the floor. The body was bruised and cut, and there was a gaping wound about I an inch lone in the abdomen, a little above 1 the hip, on the left side. Dr. Copland was called in early on Monday morning and examined the body, but what remarks he may have made about the matter have not transpired. Subsequently Dr. Coughtrey met him, and the two medical gentlemen made a post mortem examination of the bodv, the result of which will ba disclosed at the adjourned inquest. Meanwhile the result of the investigation led to the arrest of the man Pearce by Detective Bain yesterday morning on a charge of wilful muruer. Pearce is by occupation a fish-hawker He is of a reddish complexion, and about sft. 2in. in height. He has previously been imprisoned in Dunedin Gaol, and it is only six months since he was liberated, after serving a term of 12 months on a charge of stabbing. The deceased was well known in Dunedin a few year* back as the wife of a hotelkeeper who held the license of a house in Prineoa street southi The city coroner (Dr. Hocken) was of course communicated with yesterday, and an inquest was formerly opened in the afternoon, at ths National Hotel, Great King street, The Coroner, in addresina the fury, said he regretted very much that it had been his duty to summon a jury together for such a case on the eve of the holiday. He would not, how. ever, detain them long, as he purposed adjourning the inquest till the Friday following. They had met to consider the death of a woman of ill fame named Matilda Hancock, who had expired that morning in a house in Cumberland Street near the Baptist Church. Evidence to the effect that the woman had been stabbed during a drunken quarrel would be forthcoming. He regretted that there were such a great many of these drunken rows occurring in Dunedin, and that cases now and then came under his notice where women had died after a long period of debauch. If it had been merely one of these cases which, unfortunately, too frequently occurred in their midst, he would not have summoned a jury together, but the case under notice was of a totally different nature. In the present instance it had been discovered 1 that the woman had received a severe wound, and the probabilities were that this wound had been the cause of death. That afternoon, ’ however, he only purposed calling evidence 1 regarding the identification of the body, and ■ then the inquest would be formally adjourned 1 till another date.

William Pearce, the only witness called, deposed that the deceased Matilda Hancock was 42 years old, and a native of Adelaide. She had a daughter seven years of age. Witness had known her for a number of years, and had lived with her during the last four months. She was a woman of very drunken habits.

The inquest was at this stage adjourned till Friday at 3 o’clock. * It is stated that the prisoner was living with the deceased previous to serving his last term of imprisonment, and that it was in her house that he committed the offence for which he was sentenced.