The convict said he did not mean the singing-room. It was a little low house, with a shop front. Asked if it was opposite the “Shakespeare,” he answered, “Yes, it is opposite the ‘Shakespeare.’ It is a little beershop, with a passage up the side of it. The window of the snug looked into the passage. One day I was in the snug alone with Mrs. Dyson, and the landlord went out at the front door, down the passage, and peeped in at the window. I want you to get him to come to tell the jury what he saw. He will remember us; try and get him to come.”
Peace was then asked if anything occurred during the fortnight between his leaving Hull after the quarrel with his family, and the 29th of November, when Mr. Dyson was shot.
The convict replied, “I went from Hull to Manchester, and after stopping there three or four days, I went to Sheffield. Oh, yes; I went backwards and forwards to Sheffield several times. I saw Mrs. Dyson more than once,” and he repeated what he had said several times before, that on the evening of the 28th he was at the “Stag,” at Sharrow with her.
The convict was then asked where he went when he left Hull after the affair at Bannercross?
“I went from Hull to Cottingham, then to Beverley, and then to York. I there took train to London; but got out at a little station before I got to London, and went by the Underground to Paddington. From Paddington I went down to Didcot, from Didcot to Oxford, then to Bath, and on to Bristol. They will know that I was down there by this fact, that when going, I think it was from Didcot to Oxford, I travelled in the same compartment as a police-sergeant. He had been some where, and had apprehended a young woman for stealing £40, and he was bringing her to lock her up. I sat next to him, and talked to him nearly all the way, and he told me all about the case. He seemed a very smart chap; but not smart enough to know me. If you can find out the day an officer took a girl to Oxford that is the day I travelled there. I stopped in Bristol a few days and did a little ‘work,’ and then I left for Nottingham, and reached there, I remember, on the 9th January, or about six weeks after I had left Bannercross.”
Peace, apparently proud of the manner in which he had gone shoulder to shoulder with the police, went on to tell them how he once lodged at the house of a police-sergeant in Hull. He also entertained his friends with the story of his escape through the bars of the bedroom at Nottingham. It exactly corresponded with the version given more than a week before, and subsequently confirmed by Mrs. Thompson.
The convict seemed pleased to have someone to speak to, and he would laugh when he told them that he once threatened to report an officer for insulting him.
Willie asked him when that occurred.
The convict replied: In the summer after that affair at Bannercross I went down to York to see the races. The militia were up, and one day I found myself standing by the side of Mr. Cooke, who lived next door to us when we were on the Brocco. I think he was doing duty as a military policeman. I knew him, but he did not know me. A row broke out whilst I was there amongst a lot of the militiamen, who were drunk, and presently a mounted policeman rode up to help to quell it. He rode close past me, and his horse nearly knocked me down. I went after him, got hold of his horse’s bridle, and insisted on knowing his number. A superior officer came up and said, “Don’t stop him now, while the row is on. Come in the morning, if you have a complaint against him.” I replied “All right; I’ll be there; I’ll see if he is to knock people down like that.” Of course, said the convict, I did not go to pick him out. If you mention it to Cooke he will remember it.
On Monday Mrs. Bolsover, the daughter of the convict, with her little baby in her arms, and her husband, visited him. Peace, although dressed, was lying down in his little bed, and by his side were his two warders. The convict heard the visitors enter, and roused himself. Seeing his son-in-law, he said “How art thou, Billy?” The young man appeared overpowered, and he was unable to reply. Seeing his daughter, Peace then said, “Come forward, Jennie, and sit down.” She stepped forward, and sat on the little seat to the left of the door, but still within the barred enclosure.