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DISTRICT INTELLIGENCE.
RINGWOOD.]
—RE-APPEARANCE OF MRS. JEREMY DIDDLER.
—CAUTION TO THE PUBLIC.
—It will probably be in the recollection of many of the readers of the Independent that, at the March Assizes for 1861, a woman named Young, alias Rabbitts, was tried for swindling several tradesmen in this town, and was sentenced to 18 months’ imprisonment, which term of incarceration expired in September last. On her dismissal from durance vile, she went to Weston-super-Mare, and succeeded in victimising the good people of that place without coming within the grasp of the law. About a month ago she made her appearance at Bournemouth, and applied at No. 9. Westover Villa, for lodgings, stating to Mrs. Batt, the proprietor of the house, that she had been recommended to the lodgings by Mr. Cox, a respectable tradesman of the place, stating further that her name was Sarah Edith Caroline Constance Westwood, from Shropshire; that she was the daughter of a clergyman, and had come down from London to Christchurch with Major-General Stuart, and was taken ill at the latter place, and the Major-General had kindly sent her on to Bournemouth in his carriage, and that she intended staying there some little time for the benefit of her health. The plausibility of her tale won the good feelings of Mrs. Batts, who at once entered into arrangements for her accommodation. which required one sitting room and two bedrooms, the bill to be paid weekly. Such was the understanding between the lady lodger and Mrs. Batts, the landlady, who endeavoured to meet her requirements in a manner that was highly satisfactory to Sarah Edith Caroline Constance Westwood. At the end of the first week the bill was presented in accordance with the previous arrangement. The lady was in the act of perusing it, when a sudden spasm seized her so as to render the whole faculties prostrate—the M.D. of the place was sent for, who quickly attended, and applied the usual remedies in such cases; but the enervated state of the patient rendered it impossible for her to go through the items of the bill till the following week. This was readily acceded to by Mrs. Batt, who felt confident, from the lady-like manner of her lodger, that everything was all right; but thought it strange that her luggage had not been brought over from Christchurch, which had been promised to be sent by her friend with whom she had come from London; but still the non-arrival did not awaken any suspicion in the mind of the kind-hearted landlady. At the end of the second week, the bill was again presented, and nothing seemed to occur to prevent its being inspected by the lady, who appeared to thoroughly understand the nature of business, by going into the different items as they were charged, which would, no doubt, have been done, had not an unexpected relapse of the old complaint unfortunately attacked her at that moment, it being much more violent in its effects than the former one. What was the remedy to be applied to render the patient convalescent? A pint of rum and milk was a sure and certain remedy. This, of course, was resorted to, under the directions of the suffering patient, who, no doubt, felt that the invigorating stimulant was calculated to promote her recovery from the late attacks. At the end of the third week, the landlady (who, we must not forget to state, had begun to get suspicious of the truthfulness of her lady-like lodger), presented her bill for payment. The hysteric and spasm trick was, of course, too stale to be resorted to, and another dodge was tried. O! yes, I find that your bill is all right, but I have received a number of half-notes from London, and I cannot pay you till I receive the other halves; but I am going to the bank, and see if I cannot get the money advanced on them at once, in order to settle your account. She accordingly went to the bank to do so, the landlady following her. On arriving at the bank, her landlady wished to go in with her, but she resisted this, by ordering her to stop outside. On her going into the bank, she asked the Clerk if they could not advance her a sum of a certain amount on a number of half-notes she had received from London, as she wished to pay her landlady, and would not receive the other halves till to-morrow. The clerk of the bank, who happened to be in a similar situation at Weston-super-Mare at the time she had carried on her tricks at that place after she had been discharged from Winchester Gaol, at once recognised her as the same person, and, as a matter of course, declined to promise any advance on the visionary half-notes. The police were now resorted to as the proper parties to investigate the matter, suspicion having from a doubt risen to almost a certainty that there was something wrong in the statement of the Shropshire lady. It happened most fortunately that Superintendent Stannard of this place (whose acuteness and energy in such matters is well known) was at Bournemouth on the same day, and the whole of the facts connected with the case were laid before him by the sergeant of police stationed at that place. He at once asked to see the letters which had been received by the lady, and which had come into the possession of the landlady or the police (we are not prepared to say which), and on being shown them at once recognised the handwriting as that of the notorious Miss Young, alias Rabbits, who had victimised the good and easy folks of Ringwood, Wimborne, and other places about two years ago, and for which she had only been liberated a short time ago from Winchester Gaol, after enduring a term of 18 months’ imprisonment, and on application at the establishment of Major-General Stuart, with whom she said she had come from London, and in whose carriage she had come from Christchurch to Bournemouth, it was found that that gentleman had not been to London lately, and that he knew nothing at all about Miss Sarah Edith Caroline Constance. Under these circumstances she was taken into custody on the charge of swindling and obtaining goods as an impostor, and brought before the magistrate at Christchurch on Tuesday last, when after a patient hearing of the case she was discharged, as there did not appear sufficient evidence to warrant her being committed for trial, as she had refrained from infringing the boundary of the law in charges of this kind. After her dismissal she bent her steps towards Ringwood, the scene of her former adroitness, and in the evening called at the house of a person named Palmer, residing in the High-street, to enquire if they could let her lodgings for a few weeks. She was then attired as usual with a thick black veil over her face. The woman told her that at present they could not do so, without for a moment suspecting her to be the Miss Young who had duped the Ringwood folks about two years ago, but a lad, about 12 or 13 years of age, the son of the woman, said to his mother “Why don’t you tell her to go into Up-street where she lodged before, for I am sure that ere is Miss Young, who was sent to gaol for taking in the folks in this town before.” The mother of the boy, as a reward for his acuteness and discernment, lent him a box on the ear, which sent him reeling, for what she considered his impudence in comparing the lady with that swindler. She next called at the house of Mr. Etheridge, the china dealer, opposite the church, to enquire for lodgings, and, to mark the height of impudence and bravado to which she had arrived, Mrs. Etheridge was one of the prosecutors who had appeared at Winchester against her for obtaining an umbrella from her under false pretences, but she did not in the least recognise her former customer, and was sorry that in the present instance she was not able to accommodate the lady with lodgings for a few weeks. She next proceeded to the house of a tradesman, in the High-street, and here she was more fortunate, as, after visiting the room, and requiring some little alteration that she wished to be made, stating that her luggage was at the station, and it would be brought to her on the following morning, she partook of supper, and retired to bed. On the following morning she took breakfast, and requested that some beef might be procured from the best butcher in the town for her dinner. She then said that she should go to the Railway Station and order her luggage to be brought up to her lodgings; her landlord offered to go down for her and procure it, but she replied that it would be no use for him to do so, as the porter would not let him have it without she was there herself. She then started off for what the tradesman supposed to be the railway station to order the removal of her luggage to his house.—He followed some time after to see if it was coming, but it appears that instead of going to the station she took a short turn down the lane leading into Bickersley, and from thence across the common towards Wimborne, as a person answering her description was seen to be going in that direction; so it is more than probable that we shall soon hear more of her tricks in that locality, as Superintendent Stannard has taken care to forward intelligence of her whereabouts, she having played off some of her adroitness at that place on a former occasion, and which materially assisted in her conviction before.
— Hampshire Independent, Saturday 20 December 1862 source