3-074-568 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

O'Donnell, the alleged murderer of James Carey, at Bow-Street Police Court, 1883. Patrick O'Donnell was '...charged with the murder of James Carey, on board a British vessel at sea, on July 29...Mr. Flowers was the presiding magistrate. Mr. Poland appeared to prosecute on behalf of the Treasury; Mr. Stephenson, solicitor to the Treasury, and Mr. C. E. Howard Vincent, Director of Criminal Investigations, were seated on the bench. Chief Superintendent Williamson, of the Detective Police, was also present. A statement was made by Mr. Poland, relating to the circumstances under which this crime was perpetrated, on the high seas, on board the steamer Melrose, between Capetown and Port Elizabeth...Mr. Poland made a more detailed statement, relating how the prisoner, on July 4, went out to the Cape in the Kinfauns Castle, the same ship in which James Carey, under the assumed name of James Power, took a passage for himself and his wife and children...and how, when the prisoner and Carey were together in the cabin, O'Donnell suddenly drew forth a revolver and fired three shots at Carey, who died in about twenty minutes...O'Donnell is stated to...have been in America from 1859 to 1879; he served in the Federal Army during the American Civil War...'. From "Illustrated London News", 1883.