In one instance, by far the most wonderful of its kind, the victim of a
murder has appeared in successive dreams, and played the part of detective
with admirable skill and effectiveness. A Grub Street victualler, named
Stockton, was murdered towards the close of the seventeenth century. Three
men were suspected of the crime, but neither of them could be discovered,
and the affair seemed likely to become one of the mysteries of crime, when
a Mrs. Greenwood dreamed that Stockton, who had been a neighbour during
life, had taken her to a house in Thomas Street, telling her that his
murderer was inside. On going to the house in person Mrs. Greenwood was
told that Maynard, one of the suspected men, had gone abroad. The
following night Stockton appeared and showed her the features of Maynard,
and gave her such particulars of the man's habits and resorts that he was
captured within a few hours. From Maynard the names of his partners in
guilt, Bevel and Marsh, were obtained, but again the authorities were at
fault, until Stockton indicated the house where Marsh visited, and the
yard (afterwards discovered to be the yard of Marshalsea Prison) in which
Bevel would be found. From a crowd of other prisoners Mrs. Greenwood
identified Bevel, and shortly afterwards, through her strange testimony,
Marsh also was arrested. Then, as an old chronicle of the case affirms,
Stockton appeared for the last time, and thanked her for her good offices.
We have given the story as it has come down through two centuries; a whole
body of clergymen attested its accuracy at the time, and present-day
enquirers would have great difficulty, we imagine, in conclusively proving
that the murder of Stockton was traced by other and less extraordinary
means.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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