Halifax Evening Courier – Tuesday 11 April 1893

Charge Against A Servant

A good-looking female, Helen Priscilla Howard, 18, servant, lately in the service of John Ludley Moorhouse, farmer, at Bolton-on-Dearne, was placed in the dock on a charge of stealing £4 10s., belonging to her master. Mr. Walter Beverley, who prosecuted, said the farmer left home on February 22nd for Derby, leaving the money in a locked cash box on the top of a cupboard.

Four days after his return, on the 20th March, he found the box locked and apparently untouched, but opening it discovered that the inner box was missing. It was afterwards found in a pig-stye empty. A sister of the prosecutor spoke to having peeped through the keyhole on one occasion, and to seeing the servant take down the box, take a key from her pocket, open it, and put it back on the cupboard without taking anything out of it. Mr. Beverley said it was afterwards found that one of a bunch of keys in the prisoner’s possession would open the box.

The jury found the accused “not guilty,” and she was discharged. The announcement was received with applause in Court, which was, of course, instantly checked.