----- Original Message -----
  From: Jackie L
  To: Genealogy-Cumberland@googlegroups.com
  Sent: Sunday, May 18, 2008 8:32 AM
  Subject: [CUL GOOGLIES] John Metcalf

  Does anyone know if this death would be recorded in the 'normal' way - and where John would go for execution?
  One of my Watsons married into Metcalf(e) but I have so few details that I don't know how to find a link, if there is one.
  I have; Arthur James Anthony Watson born 1902, married Marion Robinson.  Their daughter Barbara Watson married  George A.R. Metcalfe.  (no dates or places for anything here, except Arthur's family is from Kirkoswald.)  George's father is Sir Ralph A Metcalfe.
  Best wishes,
  Jackie

  Barb Baker <bbake...@sympatico.ca> wrote:

    MURDER OF A STEPMOTHER.

    JOHN METCALF, a landownder and farmer, was tried at Westmorland assizes on
    Thursday, for the murder of ROSANNA METCALFE, his stepmother, on November
    23rd.

    The evidence tended to show that the prisoner and the deceased had
    frequently quarrelled.

    On the day of the murder the prisoner returned home from Appleby market, and
    when he asked for his dinner, the deceased told him that he must get it
    himself, whereupon an altercation arose.

    The servants heard the report of a gun, and on entering the room where the
    quarrel took place, they found their mistress lying upon the floor dead, her
    head being battered as if with a heavy instrument, like the butt end of a
    gun.

    The prisoner was found in a barn about a mile from the house. His clothes
    were wet, suggesting that he had tried to drown himself.

    The defence was that the prisoner was attacked by the deceased with the gun,
    that she fired a shot at him, and that he then struck her and inflicted
    fatal injuries.

    The jury, after consulting for an hour and a half, returned a verdict of
    guilty, with a strong recommendation to mercy. Justice CHARLES passed
    sentence of death.