One of these was the night porter of the hotel, the other being a young German, who professed to be a personal and intimate friend of the prisoner.
The murderer of Harriet Buswell has never been discovered—indeed, upon the discharge of Dr. Hessel the matter seemed to drop; no attempt was made to arrest any other person.
As far as the unfortunate woman, Harriet Buswell, was concerned, her fate did not seem to affect people in the slightest degree, the only regret being that the reverend gentleman should have been wrongfully accused.
Taken altogether, the Coram-street tragedy and the circumstances surrounding it must be deemed of an exceptional character.
The sum of money subscribed on this occasion is without precedent in any case of a similar nature.
Some years before this a clergyman of the Church of England was convicted of indecent assault upon the testimony of two little girls.
He was sentenced to a long term of penal servitude for several years, was imprisoned in one of our convict establishments, and was forced to endure all the hardships, labour, and misery to which convicts are subjected.
It transpired afterwards that he was perfectly innocent. This was proved beyond the shadow of a doubt. The girls confessed that they had been tutored by their aunt to give false evidence, and that there was not a shadow of truth in any of their statements.
The clergyman, the Rev. Mr. Hatch, was released, the girls convicted of perjury, and there was an end of the matter.
The injury sustained by Mr. Hatch cannot be estimated with anything like accuracy—it is incalculable; yet we never heard of a single shilling being subscribed for this cruelly used gentleman, who was as guiltless as any one of the readers of this work.