Girl Drunk at Fifteen

    Exemplary Fine on a Colne Landlord.

    At Colne yesterday, Richard Smith, landlord of the Jovial Hatters Inn, was charged with supplying intoxicants to a girl under 16 years of age.

    The evidence showed that the girl named Clegg, who is only 15 years of age, went to the defendant's house, where she had two small glasses of port and a small rum hot.  She went out and was found lying on the flags in a state of speechless intoxication.  An emetic had to be administered before she regained consciousness.

    The girl said her father had first taught her to drink, and she had since purchased rum in bottles at hotels.  She had sent boys for it, drunk it in the street, and thrown the bottles away.

    The defence was that the girl had been given the drink because she was ill.

    Fines amounting to £6 and costs were imposed, and the licence was endorsed.  (Yorkshire Evening Post, April 30th, 1901)