Charles Underhill was one of those little, wild boys that no one can deal with: the Auxiliary County Sessions at the Castle of Exeter (viz. 3 local magistrates) thought the answer was to send this eleven-year-old to prison for six weeks with hard labour (he probably wasn't big enough to sit at the treadmill) and to be whipped twice into the bargain. He was a thief but it was clear that his mother encouraged him to steal as probably did the receiver, Mrs. Downing. These days, and such boys do still exist, he might be sent to the Regional Secure Unit in Polsloe to sit in a comfy armchair and be pampered by social workers, but neither approach can do much to remove the curse that is on Charlie and other such benighted children:
"Charles Underhill, a boy of 11, was charged with stealing, on the 14th Feb., from a vessel called the Flora, belonging to Wm. Fursman, and then lying in the basin of Exeter, 3 lbs. of copper being part of the funnel of the stove of that vessel.
"From the evidence of a boy, named James Rookes, it appeared that Underhill showed him a 'smutty thing' at the Basin which he said was copper - that he beat it out with a stone, and afterwards took a portion of it to a Mrs. Downing, to whom he sold it for 9d, and that another boy, named Beaumont, sold the remainder to a man called Bolt.
"It seemed Mrs. Downing at first refused to receive the property, but was induced to do so by the assurance of prisoner's mother.
"The CHAIRMAN commented severely on her conduct saying she had narrowly escaped prosecution on this occasion.
"He was sentenced to six weeks' imp., hard labour, twice to be whipped."
The little villain was down at Exeter Basin, most likely in the middle of the night, bashing away at the copper sheathing of 'Flora's' stove with a stone just to earn a few pennies. The family were probably starving.
He showed off the 'smutty thing' to little Jimmy Rookes before he, and his mum?, took it to Mrs. Downing.
Source: The Western Times, 4th March 1843.
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