Bedfordshire Archives Service Catalogue
  • Reference
    QSR1840/3/5/2-3/b
  • Title
    Depositions of Arthur Bunker of Stanbridge and Henry Bunker of Tilsworth - William Pitkin and James Brandom charged with stealing 2 lambs from Sarah Bunker
  • Date free text
    13 April 1840
  • Production date
    From: 1840 To: 1840
  • Scope and Content
    Arthur Bunker - works for his mother Sarah Bunker who has a farm at Tilsworth and looks after the sheep. On Saturday 11 April about 8am he saw the flock safe in a close called West Mead. There were 42 ewes and 42 lambs. Between 7 and 8pm they were all safe. From information he received from his brother Henry the next morning that two of the lambs were missing he went with him to West Mead. There were marks as if the sheep had been caught near the corner of the field. They tracked footsteps in the direction of Eaton Hassocks. Before they got there there was a tent pitched, with the prisoners sitting inside it. He saw two bits of wool with blood on them lying in the tent under a piece of cloth. His brother found the carcass of a lamb without a head under a cloth, and in a bag tied with a cord 3 parts of another lamb. Brandom said they had found the "mass" in Leighton Field about 1 o'clock on Saturday. He saw the two prisoners at Tilsworth, walking together. The carcass matches a skin found by his brother Jonas. He was present when the skin was laid before the ewe and has no doubt the lamb belonged to that ewe. Henry Bunker - he is the son of Sarah Bunker and assists her at her farm. About 6pm on Saturday he saw the sheep safe in West Mead. About 8am on Sunday he found there were two lambs missing. With his brother Arthur he searched a tent on Eaton Hassocks where the two prisoners were and found the carcass and parts. When he pulled the carcass from under the cloth his brother asked Brandom what it was, and he replied it was "mass" he found in Leighton Field. The stake produced stood at the back of the tent were the prisoners were, and is very like a stake used to fasten the gate into his mother's rick yard.
  • Level of description
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