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SUSSEX SMUGGLERS. |
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who had privately made away with or destroyed them, was that exactly at tin- time when they were sent on the abovesaid message, the great coat of Mr. Galley was found on the road very bloody. This circumstance the reader will remember we mentioned when we gave an account of their first setting out from Eowland's Castle, when these tormenters began their cruel discipline of whipping, and that they pulled off Galley's great coat, that he might the more sensibly feel their lashes.
The long absence of.these men from their homes, and the reasons there were to conclude that the smugglers had either murdered them or sent them to France, being laid before the commissioners of the customs, a proclamation was immediately ordered, ottering a reward to anyone who should discover what was become of them, with his Majesty's pardon to such discoverer. However, six or seven months passed before the Government could get the least light into the affair ; and then a full discovery was gradually made by the following means.
One of the persons who had been a witness to some of the transactions of this bloody tragedy, and knew of the death of either Galley or Chater, and where one was buried, though he was no way concerned in the murder, sent an anonymous letter to a person of distinction, wherein he intimated that he thought the body of one of the unfortunate men mentioned in his Majesty's proclamation was buried in the sands in a certain place near Eake (but for some particular reason did not think it prudent to make himself known) ; whereupon some people went in search, where they found the corpse of Galley buried; and the reason why it is supposed he was buried alive, they found him standing almost upright, with his hands covering his eyes. |
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