At an early hour this morning, the all but naked dead body of a female was found freezing in the filthy water of a kennel in one of the most miserable back streets in the town of Douglas, Isle of Man. On the body being turned over, the besotted, bloated countenance was found to be that of the locally notorious “Jenny Keefe,” whose proper name was the Hon. Jane Yelverton, the widow of the Hon. Augustus Yelverton, who was brother to Lord Avonmore, and uncle to the well-known Major Yelverton. The only covering of the unfortunate woman was a thin gauze frock, which did not reach to the knees, an old pair of short socks, full of holes, and a pair of thin slippers. A few hours before the discovery of the frozen body in the gutter she was heard trolling out, in a voice husky with excessive drink, the words of a popular song, called “True blue for ever.”
The history of the career of this wretched woman and her late husband is most extraordinary and painful. About twenty-five years ago the Hon. Augustus Yelverton married Jenny Keefe, a woman of low birth, he having previously had two wives, one a Spanish and the other an Irish woman. They lived together in the Isle of Man during the last twenty years, where they were both notorious for their fearful depravity, reckless conduct, and drunken habits. They had been committed to prison at least one hundred times for drunkenness, disorderly conduct, &c. They were in the receipt of an ample allowance from Lord Avonmore, but they were in the habit of spending it in drink as quickly as they got it, and they scarcely ever had on them sufficient rags to cover their nakedness.
The pair were, curiously enough, almost romantically attached to each other, so much so that they invariably accompanied each other in their orgies, and if one of them was sent to gaol, it was the practice of the other to smash some shop-windows or make a disturbance in the streets, for the sole purpose of getting committed also. They scarcely ever had a place to lay their heads in, and they lived the greater portion of their time either in the streets or in prison. This wretched state of existence was changed, though not improved, by the departure of the husband for Liverpool a short time back, for some purpose or object probably of a private or family nature. About two months ago he was found dead in a low lodging-house in that town, want of food and excessive drinking having had much to do with the termination of his career. The Hon. Jane Yelverton was called to Liverpool in consequence, and waited upon a legal gentleman in order that arrangements might be made respecting a considerable sum of money said to fall to her by the death of her husband.
A few days before her death she returned to Douglas; and, in conversing with a woman in a low public house on the day before her death, stated that her fare from Liverpool back to the island had been paid by the lawyer she had seen at the former place. Little appears to be known of her subsequently until the discovery of her body in the street as above described. An inquest was held the same day by the High Bailiff of Castletown, the woman being well known to all present, and the jury returned a verdict of “Death from exposure.” This unfortunate couple had no offspring, but by his former wives the Hon. Augustus Yelverton had several children, who were long since removed from his care in consequence of his depraved habits.
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