Joseph Garde, the young Spanish sailor accused of the murder
of William Watkins, his wife, and three children, at Llangibby, in Monmouthshire, on July 16, was found guilty on Wednesday, at the Gloucester Assizes, and sentenced to death by Lord Justice Bram well. The plea set up in defence of the prisoner was that he had no motive for any such crime,—that he already possessed gold which rendered it quite improbable he would risk so much for gain so trifling,—that there was no blood on his knife,—and that the little blood thPre was on his clothes was due to his having picked up the blood-stained articles dropped by the real rnurtii.rer (unknown), and so transferred to himself some of the maces of the blood. In the absence of any suspicion of any other person. the jury were not inclined to accept these suggestions, but held that the possessor of the stolen articles was the thief, and that the thief was also the murderer. And in this direction cer- tainly Lord Justice Bramwell's charge seemed to lead them. But the crime remains one of the most singularly wanton massacres in criminal history.
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