Crime & punishment > Whinny Park murder

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earth was too shallow, the rock being only about 20 inches below
the surface ; and filled up the aperture immediately. At this time
he threw over the body a sheet which he found lying in the shop.
He afterwards tried to make a grave sufficiently deep on the west
side of the house-door; but found the same obstacles here. He
then went to Collessie (having locked all the doors), and remained
there (either in Robert Lawson’s or the shoemaker’s) till about 9
o’clock. His mind all this time was in a state which he cannot
describe—he says it was terrible : and he did not know what to do;
When he returned, about 9 o’clock, he took a pick and went to the
footpath, leading to the well, where he again dug to make a hiding
place for the.body. He was successful here : and after completing
it, he went to Mr Millie’s bed in the kitchen, undressed, and went
to bed. He was greatly fatigued, but could not sleep; and rose
next morning about break of day. He then went to the shop, in
order to'remove the body. When there, he saw evidences which
convinced him that Millie must have-made efforts to rise' after be¬
ing first felled by the blows : the cloth next the cloth-beam was all
over blood, as if it had been rubbed With a brush ; this, he says,
must have been caused by bis head rubbing against it in the at¬
tempts to rise. Henderson only observed these marks afterwards—
the morning, while he was removing the body, being only a grey
dawn, and not sufficient to give light inside the house. He got
the body out, having brought a wheel-barrow to the end of the
loom, and thus wheeled it along-and down the path leading to the
Well. The sheet which had been thrown over the body in the shop
he kept over it also in the wheel-barrow, and threw into the grave
with it. He then covered earth upon the body, and mO.de the spot
like a footpath, as it had been before: it might be about 5 o’clock
in the morning when this was all finished. He then went back to
the shop, cut the bloodied.clolh Out of the loom, and took it into
the kitchen, where he burnt all upon which he. observed blood:
What appeared unstained * he took up stairs, and laid it into, one
of the rooms. He then returned to the shop, and having strewed
lime on those parts of . the floor where there was blood, he returned
to the kitchen, where he-remained till about 9 o’clock, He did
not during these days cook victuals in the house, but ate any pieces
of bread he found, and*got other food in the houses where he went
to drink. He kept himself during thewhole time in some measure
heated by spirits ; of which, besides what he drank elsewhere, he
found two bottles 4fc Whinny Park. “ Whenever,” he says, “ the
drink began to deaden on me, I got into a terfible State, and then
drank more—and more.” He cannot recollect any of his thoughts
at this time—but felt greatly bewildered. About SI o’clock in the
* This was part of what was sold at Newburgh.
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