Two very strange murders have been committed at Horton. Two
women named Squires, mother and daughter, one aged seventy-three and the other thirty-five, kept a small shop in Hyde Street for the sale of prints and stationery, and had, it is now supposed, accumulated a good deal of money. They kept no servant, knew scarcely anyone, were extremely fearful of being murdered, and kept quantities of bank-notes under their mattress_ On Wednesday afternoon both were found dead, the mother be- hind the counter, the daughter in the shop parlour, both with heads beaten in by some blunt instrument. The house had been ransacked for money, which, however, was found hidden, the women's papers were flung about, and a will, made by the old lady, had been thrown under the sofa.. Mrs. Squires' son, who had been in an asylum, was at first sus- pected; but he was an inmate of Shoreditch Workhouse, and had not quitted it on that day, and up to Friday night the police had no clue to the murderer, except some white hair found in the daughter's hand. It seems most probable, however, that the murderer, whoever he was, knew the house well, that he was aware the old woman had money, and that he had planned the murder for plunder. He must have armed himself specially for- it with some weapon, say a life-preserver or a hammer, with which he could kill at once, for else, knowing that he should find two. women, he would have expected one to escape and give the alarm. He has a beard, and he is presumably above the middle height, for- he struck at the women from above.
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