Fatal Affray in Woodchester
The Gloucester Journal of 19 September 1835 reports that on the previous Monday, between nine and ten o’clock, a quarrel took place in a beer house at Woodchester – it does not specify which. This disagreement was between Anthony Halliday and David Bishop, described as two labouring men of the neighbourhood (neither of them appear to be natives of Woodchester – Halliday may have come from Horsley). There had been a previous dispute between them presumably unresolved at this point. After several blows had been exchanged, Halliday exclaimed that he was stabbed and almost immediately fell. He neither spoke nor moved again and in a few minutes expired. A post mortem examination was carried out and it appeared that a wound had been inflicted in the lower part of the abdomen by a sharp instrument, which had passed through the intestines and the right iliac artery and vein.
J G Ball (John Garlick Ball) Esq, the coroner, attended on the following morning and the subject ‘underwent the fullest investigation before him and a highly respectable jury’. This took them all day Tuesday and Wednesday. Late on Wednesday evening, they returned a verdict of Wilful Murder against David Bishop, who was committed to the county gaol to stand trial at the next Assizes. More than twenty people were bound to appear and give evidence.
From the statements of the constable and others, it appeared that scenes of the most disgraceful kind had taken place in the village during the Sunday and Monday, at the celebration of Woodchester Feast or Wake. The attention of the jurors and others present was particularly directed to the consideration of means for preventing the occurrence of such violations of peace and good order in which other influential inhabitants of Woodchester expressed their readiness to join.
At the County Assizes on 29 March 1836, David Bishop aged 19, was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to be transported for life. He was held on the prison hulk ‘Ganymede’ along with others convicted at the assizes until 15 August and sailed for Van Dieman’s Land (Tasmania) on 27 August on board the vessel ‘Eden’. In 1849, he was given a conditional pardon. ‘His conduct having been highly correct from the period of his arrival. He was allowed a ticket of leave before the ordinary time for having aided in the capture of some armed runaways who were in the act of committing a felony’. He died in Richmond, Tasmania 18 July 1864.
The Gloucester Journal of 19 September 1835 reports that on the previous Monday, between nine and ten o’clock, a quarrel took place in a beer house at Woodchester – it does not specify which. This disagreement was between Anthony Halliday and David Bishop, described as two labouring men of the neighbourhood (neither of them appear to be natives of Woodchester – Halliday may have come from Horsley). There had been a previous dispute between them presumably unresolved at this point. After several blows had been exchanged, Halliday exclaimed that he was stabbed and almost immediately fell. He neither spoke nor moved again and in a few minutes expired. A post mortem examination was carried out and it appeared that a wound had been inflicted in the lower part of the abdomen by a sharp instrument, which had passed through the intestines and the right iliac artery and vein.
J G Ball (John Garlick Ball) Esq, the coroner, attended on the following morning and the subject ‘underwent the fullest investigation before him and a highly respectable jury’. This took them all day Tuesday and Wednesday. Late on Wednesday evening, they returned a verdict of Wilful Murder against David Bishop, who was committed to the county gaol to stand trial at the next Assizes. More than twenty people were bound to appear and give evidence.
From the statements of the constable and others, it appeared that scenes of the most disgraceful kind had taken place in the village during the Sunday and Monday, at the celebration of Woodchester Feast or Wake. The attention of the jurors and others present was particularly directed to the consideration of means for preventing the occurrence of such violations of peace and good order in which other influential inhabitants of Woodchester expressed their readiness to join.
At the County Assizes on 29 March 1836, David Bishop aged 19, was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to be transported for life. He was held on the prison hulk ‘Ganymede’ along with others convicted at the assizes until 15 August and sailed for Van Dieman’s Land (Tasmania) on 27 August on board the vessel ‘Eden’. In 1849, he was given a conditional pardon. ‘His conduct having been highly correct from the period of his arrival. He was allowed a ticket of leave before the ordinary time for having aided in the capture of some armed runaways who were in the act of committing a felony’. He died in Richmond, Tasmania 18 July 1864.