Accident at Cliffton

A dreadful accident happened at Clifton, a young lady having fallen over St. Vincent's Rocks, at the highest part. The consequence was instant death, and her body was dreadfully mangled. The young lady, Miss Martha Welsh, was, it appears, on a visit to a lady who resides at Cotham Hill Villa, West Park, and was in the habit of resorting to the Downs for air and exercise. Yesterday morning she strolled to Clifton Down, and was observed by several persons who were walking in the same direction sitting on a dangerous projection of the rocks at a short distance from the cavern known as the Giant's Cave.

An officer, named Black, was so struck with the danger of her position, that he approached her, and remonstrated with her on the subject. She thanked him, but seemed not to participate in his apprehensions, and contented her self by sitting back a little without moving from the spot. After this she was seen standing at a greater distance from the edge of the precipice, to which, however, she must have speedily returned. The mode in which the accident occurred must remain matter of conjecture, but it is probable, the grass being short, and in dry weather very slippery, that in walking she missed her footing, and slipped over from an altitude of more than 300 feet. Some men who were at work at the bottom of the rocks saw her in the act of falling, and a youth, who was playing in the Zigzag, a serpentine walk, leading from the Hotwells to the Down, states, that as she fell she stretched out her hands, and tried to grasp some ivy bushes which grow from the cliff. The effort was, however, a futile one; in another moment she struck against the rock, and in a few more she lay at the bottom of the precipice a shapeless and inanimate mass. Her remains presented a truly fearful spectacle, her skull being driven in from the front to the base, and there was scarcely a bone in her body that was not fractured. An inquest was held on the body, and an inquiry instituted as to whether there was any reason for believing that she had purposely destroyed herself. The evidence, however, negatived such a supposition, and a verdict of "Accidental Death" was returned.