PETERSFIELD.
Agent—Miss DUPLOCK.
TOWN HALL TUESDAY—Before the Hon. J. J. Carnegie and J. Bonham Carter, Esq., M.P.
— James Etherington, remanded from last Bench day on a charge of stealing brooms, reported last week, was brought up for further examination. Mr. Superintendent Fey produced additional evidence as to the disposal of the brooms, and prisoner was committed for trial at the ensuing assizes at Winchester.
— Levi Evenden was brought up in custody, charged with being a deserter from the 15th Regiment of Foot, stationed at Pembroke. He pleaded guilty, and was committed to Winchester Gaol, to await an order from the War-office.
— Moses Marsh was charged with stealing, in August last, one and a-half bushels of barley, the property of the executors of the late Mr. John Mundy, of Heath-farm. Prisoner absconded at the time, and has just been apprehended. Henry Ford deposed: I was bailiff to the executors of the late Mr. John Mundy in August last, and looked after Heath-farm; on Monday, the 30th, I had some barley in a barn on the farm; the barley was winnowed and lying on the floor; information was given to me that morning that there was a quantity of barley in a sack lying under the straw rick on the side next the Common; I went and examined it; I took William Waller and Thomas Hearsay with me; I marked the inside of the sack with ink, and there was about one and a-half bushels of barley in the sack, which was concealed under the straw; I directed William Walker and Thomas Hearsay to watch it during the evening and night; prisoner had worked under me from June up to the previous week; he was working in the barn on the Friday before there had been barley thrashed out there with a machine; on Monday morning about nine or ten o'clock I was down at the farm and prisoner came there, I asked him what he wanted, and he said he came for some hulls to make a bed; he brought an old sack with him, which I helped him fill with hulls; I said nothing to him about the barley, and there was no one then on the premises but myself; he then went away with the hulls; I saw the sack again on Wednesday, Sept. 1st; that now produced is the same; I know it by the marks I made in it. Harriet Hearsay deposed: I am the wife of Thomas Hearsay; I recollect Sunday, the 29th of August last; I was looking for a hen's nest in the rick yard: I saw a sack with barley in it lying under the straw rick partly covered with straw; I called my husband; it was about eleven o'clock in the morning; a bag was brought into my house by my husband on Monday, which I gave to Mr. Fey on the following Wednesday; that now produced is the same. Thomas Hearsay deposed: I recollect the 29th of August last; about eleven o'clock my wife called my attention to a sack with some barley in it lying the straw yard; it contained nearly two bushels; after examining it I put it back under the rick; the next day I had orders from Mr. Ford to watch the sack, and I did so; on Monday night about nine o'clock I was standing on the Common, I heard somebody coming over the fence out of our home meadow; they came between the hedge and the straw rick; I heard them feeling their way along by the bushes; I heard the straw rustle and also the barley in the sack; I then heard them walk away, and I followed them till I came to a gap in the hedge at the end of the straw rick; I then jumped over the gap, and the man fell down or laid down; I spoke to him, and said, ‟Hallo, mate, is that you?” he said, ‟Yes;” l knew him by his dress and also by his voice, and the moon was just then rising; I found some barley in a bag lying on the ground; I said, ‟You are the man I was waiting for, I thought you would have come last night;" he pulled his jacket off and jumped from the rick yard on to the Common; he came back in about two minutes and took his jacket, and said, ‟Oh dear! Tom, l am done; I hope you will forgive me, Tom;” I told him I could not, I was put in that office and I must do my duty; I then took the bag indoors, and also two empty sacks which were lying on the ground; I saw the bag and sack in prisoner’s hands; I afterwards examined the sack that I had seen lying under the rick, and found some of the barley gone from it. Mr. Superintendent Fey deposed: On Wednesday, September 1st, I went to Heath-farm and took possession of the barley in the large sack, and also of a smaller quantity in a bag; I then went to the bulk of barley in the barn and took the sample which I now produce; the large sack was tied with the string which I now produce, and which is similar to a ball of string which I received from Mr. Ford, and which I also produce. Mr. Ford on being re-called compared the barley in the sack and bag with the sample from the bulk, and pronounced them the same; he also deposed that the ball of string produced by Mr. Superintendent Fey was one which he had given to the prisoner to mend some sacks a few days previous. The prisoner was committed for trial at the assizes.