Carlisle Patriot January 6, 1844 Cumberland Christmas Sessions cont.

Cumberland Christmas Sessions cont.

CUMBERLAND CHRISTMAS SESSIONS.                                                                                 _____________________                                     Carlisle, January 2, 1844.   ~continued.         Isabella M'MELLON, (aged 20), was charged with having unlawfully obtained three-fourths of a pint of rum, value one shilling, from John COLLINS, of Whitehaven, by a false pretence, in December last.       Mr. RAMSHAY conducted the prosecution, and called:       John COLLINS, who said -- I am an innkeeper in Whitehaven.  I remember the prisoner coming to my tap-room on the 12th December, about half-past four o'clock in the afternoon.  She said she wanted a pint of rum for Matthew IRWIN, and I let her have about three-fourths of a pint of rum on credit, in consequence of her using his name.  She then went away with the rum.  She returned in about a quarter of an hour, and asked for another pint of rum for the same party, and wanted it in a larger bottle.  The prisoner had been so short a time gone that my mother asked her if she had been to Hensingham, which is about 1½ miles from Whitehaven.  She said she had been there, and that she was a servant with Matthew IRWIN, and lived in  Catherine Street; afterwards she said she lived in School-house Lane.  My mother said it was an attempt at fraud, and sent me for a policeman.  I went accordingly.  The prisoner said she had given the rum to Matthew IRWIN, whom she met at the corner of King Street.  This was at the second conversation.       Matthew IRWIN -- I live at Hensingham; I did not send the prisoner for any rum to Mr. COLLINS on the 12th Dec.; she was not in any way authorized by me; she was never in my service.  I was in Whitehaven at about ten o'clock, on the 12th December; I saw the prisoner in the street, but I did not speak to her; I returned home about twelve o'clock, and did not go back to Whitehaven that day.  There is no truth whatever in her statement, that I gave her directions to get any rum, or that I received it from her.       Thomas BELL was called at the request of the prisoner, but she had no questions to ask him.       John COLLINS, recalled by the chairman -- I would not have trusted the prisoner with the rum if she had not used Mr. IRWIN'S name.       The prisoner made a rambling defence, saying that Mr. IRWIN had given her leave to get the rum.       Matthew IRWIN recalled -- Admitted an intimacy with the prisoner previously; but repeated his denial that he had ever given her leave to get spirits in his name.       The Chairman summed up, and the jury found the prisoner Guilty.       Sentence:  To be imprisoned for one calendar month, three days solitary.

 

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