On 6th November 1859, 22-year-old Sarah Ann Burrow and her cousin Martha Ann Burrow, both of Lee Bank, Halifax, were subject to
one of the most brutal assaults ever known to be perpetrated in the district
The 2 girls and Alan Tweedale, Martha Ann's sweetheart, and his friend Joe Wood, were walking from Brighouse to Elland near Boothroyd when a number of rough-looking men from Brighouse rushed upon them and
used them in a most indecent and shameful manner
The men were sent for trial at the York
On 9th December 1859, Joseph Briggs [aged 27] was sentenced to 25 years' penal servitude, and George Chappell [21], Charles Cookson [20], Samuel Earnshaw [23], John Marsden [33], and William Shaw [23], were each sentenced to 20 years' penal servitude.
Briggs, Chappell, Cookson, and Marsden were transported to Australia. Earnshaw and Shaw may have served their sentences in England.
In December 1859, Thomas Smithies
the young man whose conduct was so praiseworthy at the time of the shocking outrage
was presented with a watch and a Bible
Page Ref: MMB1273
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