A SINGULAR CAREER.

Thames Star, Volume VII, Issue 2022, 28 June 1875, Page 3

A SINGULAR CAREER.

At (he Middlesex Sessions on April 26, William Clifford, 39, describing himself as an engineer, was charged'with stealing a silver tea pot, a silver sugar basin, and other articles, the property of Mr Norman Wentworth, who has a residence at No. 11, Connaught place, and is also the . owner of Wentworth Castle, in Yorkshire. On the 3rd of November th'ei prosecutor left Connaught place to go to his country scat in Yorkshire, loafing his town house in charge of Miss Polly, his housekeeper. It appeared that the prisoner wa3 a man of good education, and by some means got introduced to Miss Pollyunder the name of Clifford, and ultimately, en his proposing marriage to her, was allowed to remain in the house night and day, and succeeded in borrowing £30 of Miss Tolly and £80 of her sister. The prisoner was a man well connected, and he j represented to Miss Polly that he '"^.was- on intimate terms with the Lord ,; jS^accllor of England ; that he had had tlvrlfi-quarters fof an hour's conversation with him, and that by the decision of that noble lord on a Friday he named he would come s itfto the possession of £13,000. In . tlie; prisoner's /letters to Miss Polly he made use of the most endearing terms, and called her is "Dear Duchess." All went on smoothly for a time, until a discovery was made that, ; unknown to Miss Polly, the prisoner had" taken.;' plate, linen, and other articles' belonging to the prosecutor, and pawned them. It appeared that so completely had the prisoner ingratiated himself into the confidence of Miss Polly that she allowed him to tako a dinner service to pawnonhis promise of redeeming it, but on his failure to'do so she redeemed it herself. The jury, after a short consultation, then returned a verdict of Guilty against th*e prisoner.—Detective George King proceeded to give the prisoner's previous history. ,.. He said the prisoner, whose real name was William Henry Padlock, was born at Brixton, his father being a small tradesman, and he was put apprentice to a stationer, but he left that business, and afterwards became a clerk on th e Great Western [Railway, at .Birmingham, from which Elace he "was dismissed, and for some time c (King) lost sight of him. In. 186S he got married to his first wife, but a few months afterwards deserted her, leaving her penniless. In 1869 he got married again to a widow named Campbell, who had a house very nicely furnished, and afterwards she' found out that he had married her in a wrong name. He had married in the name of Captain Murray, and had sent round cards to his friends in that name. Finding that she had been married in a wrong name she r insisted on another marriage, which took place at St. Nicholas Church, Brighton, on. the 10th of May, 1869, when the prisoner's mother was present. 'On that /occasion he succeeded in getting a quantity of wine from a gentleman, but lie afterwards, on finding out what the prisoner was,, got the wine back. In 1873, on the 18th of December, he met a young woman in the street, and offered her marriage, and introduced her to Miss Polly, which caused a disturbance'between the two. women, but he managed to get £50 out o£ the young woman',- who was pnly a housemaid. When Crofter got married; to a Miss Lardlaw, a friend of Miss Polly, he not ©nly got money out of Grofter and his wife, but jewellery and household linen. He kept company with a young 'woman at Hammersmith, and was about to be married to her. Ho had found on the prisoner upwards of 30 duplicates, all referring to property he had obtained from tradesmen, representing that he lived at Connaught place. By a boot*found on the prisoner he discovered that his receipts for. a few months had amounted to 580Z, besides an equity of redemption of 2007. From January to - March he had expended upon a professional singer 93Z. He could go on with the lisfcj" but he had no desire to fatigue the court, but he might say the prisoner never did any work, and never had any money of his own. —The Assistant Judge sentenced him to be kept in penal servitude for five yeavs. ..,.,,;. " r