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90]

ANNUAL REGISTER

verdict formerly given by Lord Mansfield.

At the same assizes, an old usurer in Surry was convicted of taking 20 l. per cent. of two young ladies for money lent, besides a premium of ten guineas, for which he was sentenced to pay a fine of 1500 l.

The Pretender was married 28th of last month at St. Germains in France, by proxy, to a princess of Stolberg, who set off immediately for Italy to meet him.

6th.  Prince Ernest, of Mecklenburg-Sterlitz, attended by Major Wangenheim, st out for Hanover.

Anthony Welps, an Italian, was this day executed at Kennington-common, pursuant to his sentence at Kinston assizes, for robbing and murdering Antonio Janin, a French gentleman, and afterwards throwing him into the Thames.

One Kennet was executed at the fame place, and at the same time, for the murder of his wife, by throwing her out of a window.  He denied the fact to the last moment of his life.  Their bodies were delivered for dissection, one to ST. Thomas's, and the other to Guy's hospital.

A waggon coming to Leadenhall-market, from Hertfordshire, loaden with beef, pork, &c. was seized by the populace, and the meat sold for three-pence per pound.

A builder of this city was convicted before the lord-mayor and Mr. Alderman Bird, at the mansion-house, in the penalty of 50 l. for building a house near the Fleet-market, with a party-wall not above a brick thick, contrary to act of parliament.

8th.  This day Mr. Sheriff Bull, accompanied only by the city remembrancer, went to the House of Commons, and presented a petition from the city of London, for opening the ports for the importation of corn, on account of the high price of provisions.

A letter from Ipswich, dated April 6, concludes as follows: "Friday last the poorer people, driven to the greatest necessity, assembled in a body at Colchester, and seized some carcase-carriages, a waggon load of wheat, and the like quantity of barley meal, on their way through that town for London.  The meat they sold for three-pence halfpenny a pound, the wheat at 4s. a bushel, and the barley-meal, greatly under the market price; and then gave the money arising fro the sale to the persons who had the care of the waggons.  The soldiers quartered in this part expect to be called out to quell the riot, and are holding themselves in readiness.

Mrs. Mills appeared before Sir John Fielding, and made oath, that on Tuesday in the preceding week, on Gunston came up to her room, and told her that her husband was in trouble.  As he had been arrested that day, she immediately determined to go to his relief, and accordingly accompanied Gunston to a hackney-coach, in which he conveyed her to a mad-house, at Bethnal-green.  As soon as she alighted, she declared her surmize of his having decoyed her; when Gunston pushed her into the fore-court, threw her down, and cragged her up the stone steps to the door by her legs, and when he had got her into th house, he hand-cuffed her, and fastened her hands behind her back with a short chain; the mistress of the house
being

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being present, accosted her with a modest title of mad b——ch, declared she should soon have her hair cut off, and her head shaved and blistered.  Enquiring by whose authority they detained her, she was told, by that of her husband; and at night she was conducted up stairs into a little apartment, the stench of which was intolerable, and the appearance beyond description wretched: here she continued till morning, when a bason of something which appeared like tea, was brought her by a woman, who, commiserating her situation, told her, she had herself been confined there for a considerable time, by the artifices of her husband, and advised her to make herself as easy as possible.  On the Thursday her husband came to her, when she asked him, why he could suffer her to be sent to such a house, and to be so cruelly treated?  He declared his sorrow, and took her home with him.  A day or two after she came home, she thought of attempting to relieve the poor wretch she left in the mad-house, and for that purpose allied to Sir John Fielding for a warrant against Gunston, and at the same time applied to Justice Wilmot to fend for the unhappy woman described above.  The people at the house refused to send the poor wretch; on which the justice went himself, and insisted on seeing her in the apartment which then contained her; he went up, but declared he would not again have done so for 5000 l. the place was so intolerably nasty; he found her apparently sane, and in a truly pitious situation, having a hole quite through her hand, which, it is more than probable, was occasioned by some violence from her inhuman keepers.  Upon farther enquiry, it appeared that her name was Ewbank, that she had been under confinement one year and three quarters, had been taken out of her dwelling-house, her hands tied behind her, and forcibly dragged to the mad-house, by threatening to rip her belly open if she made the least noise, or any way resisted.  The persons concerned are ordered to be presecuted.

10th.  This morning a waggon, loaded with several packs of veal, containing five carcases each, which was coming from Sudbury, in Suffolk, for Leadenhall-market, for this day's sale, was stopped by the populace, who disposed of the whole for 2d. per pound under the market price, and gave the money to the proprietor.

A few days ago, a large number of calves for the London markets, was stopped at Colchester, by the inhabitants of that place, and carried by them to the mayor of the town, who ordered it be sold for three-pence per pound.

12th.  About eleven o'clock at night a mob assembled at Chelmsford, armed with bludgeons, and next day went in a body to visit the mills in that neighbourhood, from whence they took great quantities of wheat, and wheat-flour.  AT Witham and Sudbury, upon the same road, they stopt the cars laden with meat for the London markets, and exposed it to sale at three-pence per pound; the wheat they seize, they sell at 4s. a bushel, and gave the money to the owners.

13th.  The Newcastle post-coach has been stopped within this
fort-