Below also see: Alice Thompson, 1869
The Newcastle Chronicle, Wed 22 Jan 1868 1
POLICE INTELLIGENCE.
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NEWCASTLE POLICE COURT.
WEDNESDAY, JAN 15, 1868.
Before H Scott, Esq, PM.
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FRIDAY, JAN 17, 1868.
Before H Scott, Esq, PM; and G Hewison, Esq, PM.
STEALING.
Henry Didsburgh, painter, was found guilty of stealing one carpenter’s plane, the property of Alexander Goodsir, and was sentenced to one months’ imprisonment in Maitland gaol, with hard labour.
ASSAULT.
George Pierce, labourer, was sent to gaol for one month, with hard labour, for committing an assault upon his wife within view of the police, on the 16th instant.
OBSCENE LANGUAGE.
Alexander Paul, seaman, was fined 10s, or seven days in gaol, for the above offence.
OBSCENITY.
Alice Thompson, described in the police sheet as a vagrant, for wilful obscenity in Pacific-street, on the 17th inst, was sent to gaol for three months, with hard labour.
BREACH OF THE TOWNS POLICE ACT.
William Gibes, for suffering two goats to stray, and Margaret Hodge, for allowing two pigs to stray in the streets, were each fined 5s and 2s 6d costs.
Alice Thompson, 1869
The Newcastle Chronicle, Tue 19 Jan 1869 2
POLICE INTELLIGENCE.
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SATURDAY, JAN 16, 1869.
Before H Scott, PM, and CF Stokes, JP.
OBSCENE EXPOSURE.
Alice Thompson, alias “Black Alice”, was charged with obscenely exposing her person within view of a public place, in the city of Newcastle, to wit, King-street.
The prisoner pleaded guilty to the charge, and implored forgiveness at the hands of the Bench urging in extenuation, that she would not have committed the offence had she been in her proper senses.
Mr Scott: Were you mad, then?
Prisoner: No your Worship, but I had been drinking
Mr Scott: That is no excuse, but on the contrary, aggravates the offence. Drunkenness is a worse offence than the other; I consider it one of the vilest of crimes.
The Bench found the prisoner guilty, and sentenced her to be imprisonment in Maitland gaol for six months, with hard labour.
ASSAULTING A CHILD.
The same prisoner was then brought up on a charge of violently and unlawfully assaulting her male child, Henry Eckford, aged five years.
Senior-sergeant Donohue deposed to the apprehension of the prisoner on the precious evening. He stated that the child was bleeding from the head when he saw it, and appeared to have received a severe beating on the head. The wounds were bleeding freely.
Rebecca Radford deposed: Last evening, about six o’clock, I went to my back door off King-street, near the house of Mr Smith. I saw the defendant calling the little boy. She said, “You little wretch, if you don’t come I’ll murder you.” The prisoner was perfectly naked at this time; she had a stick in her hand, and could be seen from the street. I directly afterwards saw the child, with blood streaming from its head. I did not see the child assaulted.
Senior-sergeant Donohue, in reply to questions by the Bench, said that the prisoner bore a very bad character. She was a common prostitute, and lived in a perfect den. She had before been convicted of obscenely exposing her person. One of her children was in the Industrial School.
The Bench convicted the prisoner of the assault, and sentenced her to two months in Maitland gaol, this sentence to follow the former one of six months, making eight months in all.
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The Maitland Mercury and Hunter River General Advertiser, Thu 21 Jan 1869 3
DISTRICT NEWS.
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(FROM OUR VARIOUS CORRESPONDENTS.)
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NEWCASTLE.
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BRUTAL ASSAULT ON A CHILD.—On Friday evening a colored woman named Alice Thompson, who resided near the Sandhills, committed a most brutal assault upon her own child, a boy about five years of age. The woman, who was in a state of intoxication, had been on the breaker beach bathing, when the child offended its parents by its doings, and the mother at once commenced to beat it rather unmercifully with a stick about the head and body. The injuries which the boy received were of a severe nature, his head being cut seriously. Shortly afterwards the woman was arrested by the police, and lodged in the lock-up, and was brought up at the police court this (Saturday) morning, and sentenced to six month’s imprisonment in Maitland gaol.
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The Sydney Morning Herald, Sat 23 Jan 1869 4
NOTES OF THE WEEK.
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FROM JANUARY 15TH TO JANUARY 22ND.
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A woman, named Alice Thompson, of Newcastle, brutally assaulted her infant child a few days since.
1 The Newcastle Chronicle, Wed 22 Jan 1868, p. 2. Emphasis added.
2 The Newcastle Chronicle, Tue 19 Jan 1869, p. 2. Emphasis added.
3 The Maitland Mercury and Hunter River General Advertiser, Thu 21 Jan 1869, p. 4.
4 The Sydney Morning Herald, Sat 23 Jan 1869, p. 4.