Joseph Cunningham (Jail)

Joseph Cunningham was convicted of wounding his wife with intent to murder her.

His was found striking her over the head with a hammer whilst holding her head over a pail.

He had attacked her with a hammer and a poker and also assaulted an elderly man that had been living at the same address.

A police constable that went to the house said that when he entered he saw the elderly man coming down the stairs covered in blood, followed by Joseph Cunningham and that he then saw Joseph Cunningham strike the elderly man a savage blow on the head with a pair of tongs, saying:

The police constable said that it was then with some great difficulty that he wrenched the tongs from him and took him to the station.

He said that when he then went back that he found his wife lying in a pool of blood, shockingly injured about the head.

After the asault his wife was taken to Bolingbroke Hospital. It was noted that in addition, his wife had been a cripple from rheumatism for some years.

Joseph Cunningham had been an umbrella maker and had lived in Balham.

The court heard that he had he had previously been sentenced to 15 years' penal servitude for cutting the throat of his first wife who died shortly after. He had been convicted in 1875 but liberated in 1887 on licence.

He was described in the press as a:

The judge sentenced him to 20 years' as a warning to others.