Mr. Flowers: I shall remand the case till this day week. Prisoner, have you anything to say?
Mrs. Peace, who had been accommodated with a seat during the two or three minutes she was in court, then rose, and in a trembling voice, said: I did not steal the clock, nor did I know that it was stolen. I have no question to ask.
She was then removed from the dock.
There can be but little doubt as to her being a woman “more sinned against than sinning,” but the fact of her being the wife of Charles Peace brought her under the ban of the law, and for a long time she was in the depths of trouble, not very well knowing the nature of the charges that were to be brought against her.
It is hardly possible to estimate the anxiety and sufferings the guilty acts of a man like Peace entail upon innocent persons.
When we say innocent persons, we include his unhappy wife, for, despite the array of evidence brought against her, the police failed to prove her complicity in the crimes committed by her husband.
It will be seen by the following report of her second examination that the learned gentleman engaged for the prosecution strove to prove that the ill-fated Mrs. Peace had been guilty of acts which were in themselves most suspicious, if not absolutely criminating.
BLACKHEATH BURGLARIES.—THE EXAMINATION OF MRS. PEACE.
At the Bow-street Police-court, London, on Saturday, before Mr. Vaughan, Hannah Peace, aged fifty-eight, believed to be the wife of the celebrated Charles Peace, burglar and alleged murderer, was brought up in custody on remand, charged with stealing and receiving a clock and a quantity of other articles, which it is alleged are the proceeds of numerous burglaries committed by her supposed husband.
Mr. Poland, barrister, instructed by Mr. Pollard, the solicitor to the Treasury, appeared for the prosecution. Mr. Walter Beard (Messrs. Beard and Son, solicitors, Basinghall-street, E.C.) was instructed for the defence.