THE PYRMONT BRIDGE TRAGEDY.

Colonist, Volume III, Issue 243, 17 February 1860, Page 3

THE PYRMONT BRIDGE TRAGEDY.

(From the Sydney Era, January 28.) A strange mystery hangs over tjxe,fate of the unfortunatelady who perished at thePyrmbnt Bridge a few evenings ago, and the public cannot but regard the whole affair with the strongest feelings of suspicion. The idea that Mrs. Walker intended suicide, and threw herself over the parapet,-cannot be entertained for a moment; and the assumption that she mistook the gate at the middle of the bridge for the end of it, is equally idle and untenable, for the place is well supplied with lamps, and the road is as plain on the darkest night as at noonday. When she left the steamer, Mrs. Walker endeavoured to bargain with a cabman to convey her to her destination; but considering the charge exorbitant, refused to pay it, and intimated her intention of walking. The stewardess sent the steward Hogan to accompany Mrs. Walker to the bridge, and this man made strong assertions at the inquest, which, if true, he should have withheld, and which many believe, in the face of the evidence of the stewardess, of constable Costello, and of the toll-keeper, to be doubtful evidence. He insinuated that Mrs. Walker was intoxicated, that she spoke tor loose characters in the street, and that she was a mean woman,* who paid him^ for his trouble in accompanying her to the l toll-house '-a small coin," the change sha received from ; Mr* Paeey after paying her fare with a

shilling. This piece of information was given by a'person without the feeling or heart of a man, and was at best a gratuitous slander against the dead. When Mr.: Pacey heard the screams, he ran towards the centre of the bridge, and looked into the water. There he saw a commotion which must have struck him at the time as evidently accounting for the screams he had heard. But what does he say about the commotion in the water? * Why, that he did riot think it worth attending to, as he had frequently seen sharks and porpoises troubling the water before near the same spot. No doubt if Mr. Pacey had been a man of courage or energy he would have procured a boat and discovered the real cause of the commotion at once. Had he done so Mrs. Walker might have been still alive, for it is questionable whether sha ever sank to the bottom at all. The screams and the commotion led Mr. Pacey to call the police, and led them to go direct to Mr. Rose's house to learn whether Mrs. Walker had reached home. The screams and the commotion led"Mry^aceyto tell some men in the morning,; to examine the water, for something unusual as they passed along the bridge. The screams also led him to look for something unusual himself, and to the finding the cause of the commotion floating dead on, the surface. But "the whole night passed without a search, and who will say that to this gross neglect. and unmanly delay is not' to be attributed the death of Mrs. Walker ? Mr. Webb stated that he met Mrs Walker passing over the bridge 9 and that he saw a man pay his iare to the toll-keeper, and follow rapidly in the footsteps of the poor 'lady. And Mr. Pacey stated that, after the screams, he distinctly heard a man running on his toes to the other side of the bridge. Yet with all these evidences of foul play before him, Mr. Pacey, did—not think it necessary to see what caused the commotion in the water, because he had seen some porpoises troubling the water in the same way during his life. If Mrs. Walker met her death by foul play, the sole motive of him who did the deed was murder. She was evidently approached quickly, caught up at one, and hurled over the parapet without any other object or design than to kill her. To us this is not a far-fetched opinion, in the face of the at the inquest, and considering to what dreadful excesses the foul spirit of revenge may lead a scoundrel. One cannot read the account of this tragedy without feeling that the city lies under disgrace :. that the blood of the poor stranger, who had only been landed from the steamer about half an hour when she met her death, calls aloud for vengeance, and that the whole community is under reproach till the mysery has been fully investigated.