Gillingham Newspaper Report

The Salisbury Times & South Wilts Gazette, Saturday 27 January 1883

At the Dorset Assizes - when there was a very light calendar - the lad John Sargent, who was charged with killing and slaying his sister, Ann Sargent at Gillingham on August 15th, was discharged. The jury threw out the bill. The circumstances were of a peculiarly painful character. A gun, used for the purpose of killing birds, had been placed in a corner of the room. Prisoner took up the gun and his sister, being frightened, ran out of the room. He ran after her and immediately afterwards a report was heard and the poor girl was found by her father in a dying condition, having been shot in the region of the heart. Prisoner said he did not know the gun was loaded. There was no cap on it when he took it up. He was supported in this statement by his father who said he had seen the gun only ten minutes before the sad event. The Judge suggested to the Grand Jury that there might have been some detonating powder left from the last explosion.