BIGAMY AT 77.

Taranaki Daily News, 18 September 1920, Page 9

BIGAMY AT 77.

AGED CONVICTS AMAZING I'IUUDS. London, July (i. The truly astonishing history of a gay Lotliario of 77 was told at the Sussex Assizes a few days ago, when Edward .Dawson, smartly attired and sprightly in spite of hiving left the psalmist's last milestone of life far behind, was convicted of having robbed two "brides" and deserted them within a few months in this present year. Posing as a man of means, Dawson dawned on the vision of the good folk of Lewes in .January last, when he also advertised for a widow to manage" a small fancy goods for him. A buxom widow of Brighton answered this advertisement, and, having deposited £2O as security, entered into the management of the shop. Within three weeks Dawson proposed marriage, was accepted, and the pair went to Worthing for a honeymoon. Dawson left his bride once or twice on "business" trips to Lewes, and finally did not return to her. She then discovered that her furniture, which had been transf-red from her old Brighton hofc to Lewes, had been sold. Another widow who answered Dawson's advertisement paid him a sum of £3O as security, but nothing resulted tram her "engagement," and Dawson later at Bromley, Kent, where he met disappeared, only to turn up a little another lady and went through a form of marriage with her. He professed to store her furniture, but when ho deserted her it was found the goods had been sold. This lady—happily perhaps lor her impressionable sisters—made it her business to set the hounds of the law on the track of the bigamous beau, and when the police haid hands on him they speedily discovered that Dawson was a very old friend, with a verv blackrecord. In his young davs he had performed the'duties of a shorthand writer at the Central Criminal Court, and no doubt garnered there much wisdom of use to him iu his later and less reputable career. Up to 1877 he apparently led a sufficiently blameless life to keep him out of t!,e quillets of the law, but lie strayed from the straight path in that year, and was in 1880 sent to penal servitude for five years for a series of frauds. On release he kept out of the hands of the police for a considerable period, but m lSn-1. under the name of Clark be got three years for further frauds,'and lour yea re Inter qualified' for seven years durance vile for a compound of bigamy and false pretences. Tlemissioiis for good conduct in prison gave him his freedom in ini:i, but a vea'r later Dawson was tried for forgery, and sentenced to six years' penal servitude. In litis lie was again in trouble, and false pretences secured for him a further five years' free board ami lodging. lie was however, released on license in 11117, and duly reported himself to the police three times at the appointed intervals Then be disappeared, but a couple of years later he was convicted of gettin" money by false pretences at Bourne" mouth, and in consideration of his a trellis record being unknown to the Bench —was given a few weeks. Later in the same year, the Yarmouth magistrate awarded liim twelve months' hard labour for a like offence. At the Lewes Assizes this week he received a similar sentence, so, altogether of the last forty years of bis life, Dawson has spent much the better half in gaol his penal servitude sentences alone totalling twenty six years. B