Читать книгу True Crime Chronicles - Camden Pelham - Страница 48

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THIS offender was the son of honest parents, and was born at North Berwick, in Scotland, where he was educated in the liberal manner customary in that country.

At the age of fourteen years he was taken into the employment of Sir Hugh Dalrymple, a member of the British parliament, whom he accompanied to London; and it was while in his service that he was guilty of the murder of his mistress. It appears that at the time at which he committed this offence he was in his twentieth year, and having accidentally given offence to his lady, by treading on her toe, she rebuked him in no very gentle manner. Offended by the insult which he conceived he had received, he determined to obtain a deep revenge; and seeking an opportunity, during the absence of his master from London, he proceeded to put his intention into execution by murdering his mistress.

For this offence he was brought to trial at the Old Bailey, on the 22d April 1746, when he pleaded guilty, and was sentenced to be hanged on the following Monday, the 25th of the same month. On the night before his execution he made a confession of his crime, from which the following particulars are taken:—Having called the Almighty to witness the truth of his assertion, he proceeded to enter into a history of his early life, alleging that he had always been well treated by his master and mistress, for whom he entertained the most sincere respect. On the evening of the 25th March 1746, all the other servants having quitted the house, he proceeded to bed in the apartment which was appropriated to his use. He had pulled off his shoes, and had tied up his hair with his garter, when suddenly the thought came into his head that he would kill his mistress. He directly went into the kitchen in search of an instrument to effect his object, and he took a small iron cleaver; but, returning to his chamber, he sat during a period of twenty minutes, considering whether he should commit the murder or not. His heart relented when he remembered that his mistress had been so kind to him; but then he thought that there was no one in the house who could hear him, and he determined upon perpetrating the deed. Impelled by a feeling which he could not control, he rushed up stairs as far as the first landing-place, but there he tarried, and in his alarm returned to his bed-room. Again he felt determined upon the course which he had originally proposed, and again he had ascended the stairs on his way to his mistress’s room, but once more he felt irresolute. To use his own expression, he had now determined not to commit the murder, but “the devil was so busy within him,” that, in an agony of emotion, he was unable to prevail against an inward feeling, which drove him again towards his lady’s room. Once he retired—but once again he advanced—and he had now reached the door, by which only he was separated from the object upon which he was about to commit the foul crime, of which in the sequel he was guilty. Had that door been locked all would have been well—but no, the latch turned easily in his hand, and he stood within a yard of his victim. Still he could not kill her, and in trepidation and alarm he crept back as far as the stair-head. Again he felt the devil at work, and once more he was driven onwards to his fate. He entered the room a second time, and could distinctly hear the respirations of the unfortunate lady; he opened the curtains softly, and fancied he could see the outline of her figure. Had he had a light, he was convinced he could never have killed her. At length, however, urged by an irresistible impulse, he raised the cleaver, and yet, hesitating, he made as many as thirteen or fourteen motions in the air before he could determine to strike her—but then he let the murderous instrument fall with redoubled force upon her head. The unhappy lady attempted to escape, but without effect, for he followed up the frightful wound which he had first inflicted with others still more dreadful, until at last she sunk exhausted on the floor and died. The only words which he heard her utter were—“Oh Lord! what is this?” And when she died, she rattled very much in the throat. He was so alarmed at this that he ran down stairs, and threw the chopper in the privy; and when he had returned to his own room, the thought struck him that he would rob the house. The idea had no sooner entered his head than he resolved to put it into execution, and, striking a light, he returned to his mistress’s room. He took away some articles of jewellery from the drawers; but while he was occupied in finding them, he fancied that he heard the death-rattle still in his lady’s throat, and he would have given the world to have been able to recal what had passed.

When he had purloined all that he thought was of any value, he ran out of the house; and as he passed through Holborn, he heard the watchman cry “Past one o’clock,” from which he knew that it was more than an hour since he had first contemplated the murder. He concealed the articles which he had stolen in the lodgings of a female of his acquaintance, and returned home; but on his arrival at the door he found that he had shut himself out. He waited until the maid-servant came at six o’clock in the morning, and then, on their entering the house, appearances were perceptible, which induced the girl to suppose that there had been some strangers in the house. On her going up stairs she found that her mistress had been murdered, and she directly conveyed information of the circumstance to the police, when Henderson being at once suspected, he was taken into custody, and confessed his guilt.

The sentence was carried out in its terms; and the body of the wretched young man, after execution, was hung in chains in the Edgeware-road.