The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher

by Kate Summerscale

  It would seem natural for William to be 'dejected' after the death of his brother; for Whicher to note it, the form this dejection took must have been peculiar - a turning inwards, a curdling guilt or fear. Whicher made clear the alternatives he discerned: either Constance was crazy, and killed Saville alone; or she was sane, and killed Saville with William's help. From the start, Whicher suspected that William and Constance had planned and carried out the killing together. By the time he left Road, he was almost certain of it.

  Whicher believed that Constance, as the older, odder and more determined of the two, had instigated the murder plot, but he believed she had done so on her brother's behalf and with his help. William had the clearer motive for murder: Saville had supplanted him in his parents' affections, and his father often told him that he was inferior to the younger boy. If both he and Constance had plotted to kill Saville, the fact that the plan came to fruition was less surprising: the two children together, isolated and embittered, may have inhabited a fantasy world secured by the other's belief, both imagining that they were acting in defence of each other and of their dead mother. Their resolve would have been strengthened by the determination not to let one another down.

  Samuel Kent may have encouraged the police to suspect Constance in order to shield his son. He may have been protecting William when he told Stapleton the story of the children's escape to Bath, twisting the narrative to suggest the boy's sensitivity and the girl's unshakeable nerve. At the time of the investigation, William was often dismissed as a suspect on account of his timidity. Yet Whicher believed that he was capable of taking part in a murder. The press reports of the Bath escapade suggested that the boy had a strong-willed, inventive nature, and his later life bore this out.

  Throughout the investigation into Saville's murder many had argued that two people must have participated in the crime. If William helped Constance, this would explain how the bedclothes had been smoothed down when Saville was taken out of the nursery, how Saville was kept hushed as the windows and doors were negotiated, how the evidence was destroyed afterwards. Constance may have mentioned only the razor in her confession because she herself used only a razor, while William wielded the knife. The letter from Sydney avoided any reference to the murder itself; perhaps this was because there was no explanation that could fail to implicate her accomplice.

  Several of the stories that drew on the case seem haunted with the possibility that Constance and William were still hiding something. In The Moonstone, the heroine protects the man she loves by allowing herself to be a suspect. The runaway brother and sister in The Mystery of Edwin Drood share a dark history. The enigma of The Turn of the Screw lies in the silence of two children, a brother and sister locked together by a secret.*

  Whether William had been her accomplice or simply her confidant, Constance worked at all times to shelter him. As soon as she confessed, she insisted that she had committed the crime 'alone and unaided'. She told her lawyer that she refused to plead insanity because she wanted to protect William, and she tailored her statements about the murder and its motive to the same end. In none of them did she mention him. Though she had complained to her schoolfriends about how he was treated by Samuel and Mary - the humiliating comparisons to Saville, the way he was made to push a perambulator around the village - she made no reference to this in 1865. She said of her father and stepmother, 'I have never had any ill will towards either of them on account of their behaviour to me,' carefully avoiding the ill will she might bear them on anyone else's account. The answer to the mystery of Saville's murder might lie in Constance's silence after all; specifically, her silence about the brother she loved.

  Constance gave herself up in the year before William's twenty-first birthday, when he was due to inherit a PS1,000 bequest from their mother. He hoped to use the money to fund a career in science, but was still hampered by the uncertainty and suspicion surrounding the family. Rather than both of them live under the cloud of the murder, Constance chose to gather the darkness to herself. Her act of atonement liberated William, made his future possible.

  AFTERWORD

  The third chapter of Joseph Stapleton's book on the Road Hill murder is devoted to the post-mortem examination of Saville Kent's body. Among the doctor's many observations about the corpse is a description, in characteristically florid prose, of two wounds on the boy's left hand.

  But upon the hand - that left hand, that beautifully chiselled hand, hanging lifeless from a body that might, even in its mutilation, furnish a study and a model for a sculptor - there are two small cuts - one almost down to the bone; the other just a scratch - upon the knuckle of the forefinger. How came they there?

  Stapleton's explanation for these injuries briefly, violently, pulls Saville back into view. From the nature and position of the wounds the surgeon deduces that the child woke just before he was killed, and raised his left hand to fend off the knife striking at his throat; the knife sliced into his knuckle; he lifted his hand a second time, more feebly, and the blade grazed his finger as it cut into his neck.

  The image makes Saville suddenly present: he wakes to see his killer and to see his death descend on him. When I read Stapleton's words I was reminded, with a jolt, that the boy lived. In unravelling the story of his murder, I had forgotten him.

  Perhaps this is the purpose of detective investigations, real and fictional - to transform sensation, horror and grief into a puzzle, and then to solve the puzzle, to make it go away. 'The detective story,' observed Raymond Chandler in 1949, 'is a tragedy with a happy ending.' A storybook detective starts by confronting us with a murder and ends by absolving us of it. He clears us of guilt. He relieves us of uncertainty. He removes us from the presence of death.

  NOTES

  PROLOGUE

  xix On Sunday, 15 July 1860 . . . for is.6d. From Whicher's expenses claims in the Metropolitan Police files at the National Archives - MEPO 3/61.

  xix The day was warm. . . into the seventies. Weather reports in the July, August and September 1860 issues of The Gentleman's Magazine.

  xix At this terminus in 1856 . . . excelled at untangling. From reports in The Times, 7 & 12 April 1856; and 3, 4 & 12 May 1858.

  xx Dickens reported that 'in a glance' . . . 'chronicled nowhere'. In 'A Detective Police Party', parts one and two, House-hold Words, 27 July 1850 and 10 August 1850.

  xxi 'the prince of detectives'. In Scotland Yard Past and Present: Experiences of Thirty-Seven Years (1893) by Ex-Chief-Inspector Timothy Cavanagh.

  xxi 'shorter and thicker-set' . . . smallpox scars. In 'A Detective Police Party', House-hold Words, 27 July 1850.

  xxi William Henry Wills . . . of the Detective police.' In 'The Modern Science of Thief-taking', House-hold Words, 13 July 1850. Dickens probably contributed to the writing of this piece. For details of the journal and its contributors, see House-hold Words: A Weekly Journal 1850-1859 Conducted by Charles Dickens - Table of Contents, List of Contributors and Their Contributions Based on The House-hold Words Office Book in the Morris L. Parrish Collection of Victorian Novelists (1973) by Anne Lohrli.

  xxii The only clues . . . his eyes were blue. From MEPO 21/7, Metropolitan Police discharge papers.

  xxiii A Great Western Railway . . . less than an hour. From Black's Picturesque Tourist and Road and Railway Guidebook (1862); Stokers and Pokers; or, the London and North-Western Railway, the Electric Telegraph and the Railway Clearing-House (1849) by Francis Bond Head; Paddington Station: Its History and Architecture (2004) by Steven Brindle; railway timetables in the Trowbridge Advertiser of January 1860.

  CHAPTERS 1, 2 & 3

  The narrative of these three chapters is drawn mainly from newspaper reports of the testimony given to the Wiltshire magistrates between July and December 1860, affidavits made to the Queen's Bench in November 1860, and the first book about the case, The Great Crime of 1860: Being a Summary of the Facts Relating to the Murder Committed at Road; a Critical Review of its Social and Scientific Aspects; and an Autho
rised Account of the Family; With an Appendix, Containing the Evidence Taken at the Various Inquiries, written by J.W. Stapleton and published in May 1861. The newspaper sources are the Somerset and Wilts journal, the Trowbridge and North Wilts Advertiser, the Bristol Daily Post, the Bath Chronicle, the Bath Express, the Western Daily Press, the Frome Times, the Bristol Mercury, The Times, the Morning Post, Lloyds Weekly Paper and the Daily Telegraph. Some details of furnishings are drawn from newspaper accounts of the auction of the contents of Road Hill House in April 1861.

  CHAPTER 3

  38 On a visit to the country . . . house is his castle." ' In The King of Saxony's Journey through England and Scotland in the Year 1844 (1846) by Carl Gustav Carus.

  38 The American poet . . . privacy of their homes.' In English Traits (1856) by Ralph Waldo Emerson. Quoted in The English Home and its Guardians 1850-1940 (1998) by George K. Behlmer.

  CHAPTER 4

  43 It was still light . . . green as grass. From weather and crop reports for July in the Devizes and Wiltshire Gazette, 2 August 1860.

  43 the railway station's narrow platform. Rowland Rodway, formerly Samuel Kent's solicitor, was leading a campaign to improve the facilities at Trowbridge railway station. The platforms were dangerously narrow, he argued, there was no raised walkway across the line, and no waiting room. The Trowbridge and North Wilts Advertiser of 21 July 1860 reported on the campaign.

  43 Trowbridge had made money . . . muslin cheap. History of Trowbridge and surroundings from The Book of Trowbridge (1984) by Kenneth Rogers; John Murray's Handbook for Travellers in Wilts, Dorset, and Somerset (1859); and photographs and maps in the Trowbridge local history museum. Reports of wool trade in Lloyds Weekly, 15 July 1860.

  44 Wine, cider, spirits . . . at the bar. From an advertisement in the Trowbridge and North Wilts Advertiser, 4 August 1860.

  44 'I couldn't do better than have a drop . . . courage up'. In 'A Detective Police Party', House-hold Words, 27 July 1850.

  44 Jonathan Whicher was born . . . outright villains. Details of Whicher's family from the St Giles baptism registers in the London Metropolitan Archives (X097/236), and the marriage certificate of Sarah Whicher and James Holliwell. Camberwell's history from the London and Counties Directory 1823-4, The Parish of Camber-well by Blanch (1875), Camberwell by D. Allport (1841) and The Story of Camberwell by Mary Boast (1996).

  45 When Jack Whicher applied . . . good character. Whicher's referees were John Berry, a house painter of 12 High St, Camberwell, later of Providence Row, and John Hartwell, also of Camberwell. From MEPO 4/333 (a register of recruits to the Metropolitan Police) and the census of 1841. Police entrance requirements and procedure from Sketches in London (1838) by James Grant.

  45 Like more than a third . . . submitted his application. The other constables were former butchers, bakers, shoemakers, tailors, soldiers, servants, carpenters, bricklayers, blacksmiths, turners, clerks, shop workers, mechanics, plumbers, painters, sailors, weavers and stonemasons. From Scotland Yard: Its History and Organisation 1829-1929 (1929) by George Dilnot.

  45 His weekly wage . . . a little more secure. Police rates of pay from Parliamentary Papers of 1840, at the British Library; for comparative pay to labourers, see 'The Metropolitan Police and What is Paid for Them', Chambers's Journal, 2 July 1864.

  45 The 3,500 policemen . . . sixteenth century). There was one policeman for every 425 inhabitants of the city. Figures from Sketches in London (1838) by James Grant. Nicknames from The London Underworld (1970) by Kellow Chesney and London Labour and the London Poor (1861) by Henry Mayhew, Bracebridge Hemyng, John Binny and Andrew Halliday.

  46 Whicher was issued . . . sideburns instead. Details of police uniform from: Mysteries of Police & Crime (1899) by Arthur Griffiths; Scotland Yard: Its History and Organisation 1829-1929 (1929) by George Dilnot; Scotland Yard Past and Present: Experiences of Thirty-Seven Years (1893) by Timothy Cavanagh.

  46 At a time when all clothes . . . degree of stupidity.' In 'The Policeman: His Health' by Harriet Martineau, Once a Week, 2 June 1860.

  47 Andrew Wynter . . . neither hopes nor fears.' In 'The Police and the Thieves', Quarterly Review, 1856. Another commentator, James Greenwood, echoed this: 'So long as the common constable remains a well-regulated machine, and fulfils his functions with no jarring or unnecessary noise, we will ask no more.' From Seven Curses of London (1869). Both quoted in Cops and Bobbies: Police Authority in New York and London, 1830-1870 (1999) by Wilbur R. Miller.

  47 Whicher shared . . . King's Cross. From the census of 1841.

  47 This was a substantial brick building . . . recreation room. From the John Back archive at the Metropolitan Police Historical Collection, Charlton, London SE7.

  47 All single men . . . publican on the route. Regulations from: Policing Victorian London (1985) by Philip Thurmond Smith; London's Teeming Streets 1830-1914 (1993) by James H. Winter; and Metropolitan Police rules and orders in the National Archives. Details of a policeman's day from: The Making of a Policeman: A Social History of a Labour Force in Metropolitan London, 1829-1914 (2002) by Haia Shpayer-Makov; 'The Metropolitan Protectives' by Charles Dickens in House-hold Words, 26 April 18 51; and works already cited by Grant, Cavanagh and Martineau.

  48 four out of five dismissals, of a total of three thousand, were for drunkenness. The estimate of Colonel Rowan and Richard Mayne, the Police Commissioners, given to a parliamentary select committee in 1834. See The English Police: A Political and Social History (1991) by Clive Emsley.

  49 Holborn teemed with tricksters . . . burgled houses. Slang from London Labour and the London Poor (1861) by Henry Mayhew et al. and The Victorian Underworld (1970) by Kellow Chesney. Thieves acting as decoys from The Times, 21 November 1837.

  In 1837, the year that Whicher joined the police force, almost 17,000 people were arrested in London, of whom 107 were burglars, 110 housebreakers, thirty-eight highway robbers, 773 pickpockets, 3,657 'common thieves', eleven horse stealers, 141 dog stealers, three forgers, twenty-eight coiners, 317 'utterers of base coin', 141 'obtainers of goods by false pretences', 182 other fraudsters, 343 receivers of stolen goods, 2,768 'habitual disturbers of the public peace', 1,295 vagrants, fifty writers of begging letters, eighty-six bearers of begging letters, 895 well-dressed prostitutes living in brothels, 1,612 well-dressed prostitutes walking the streets, and 3,8 64 'low' prostitutes in poor neighbourhoods. From Scotland Yard: Its History and Organisation 1829-1929 (1929) by George Dilnot.

  49 The entire police force . . . June 1838. The Times, 30 June 1838.

  49 Already the police were familiar . . . an asylum. The Times, 23 December 1837.

  49 Jack Whicher's first reported arrest. From The First Detectives and the Early Career of Richard Mayne, Commissioner of Police (1957) by Belton Cobb and The Times of 15 December 1840.

  50 There had been outrage . . . infiltrated a political gathering. The agent was Popay, the gathering Chartist - see Scotland Yard: Its History and Organisation 1829-1929 (1929) by George Dilnot. Peel had assured the House of Commons in 1822 that he was dead against a 'system of espionage'.

  50 Magistrates' court records . . . buy him off with silver. Court records in London Metropolitan Archive - references WJ/SP/E/013/35, 38 and 39, WJ/SP/E/017/40, MJ/SP/1842.04/060.

  50 The Metropolitan Police files show . . . under two inspectors. Details of the hunt for Daniel Good and the formation of the detective division from MEPO 3/45, the police file on the murder; The First Detectives (1957) by Belton Cobb; The Rise of Scotland Yard: A History of the Metropolitan Police (1956) by Douglas G. Browne; and Dreadful Deeds and Awful Murders: Scotland Yard's First Detectives (1990) by Joan Lock.

  50 ('Dickens later described . . . bags his man'). In 'A Detective Police Party', House-hold Words, 27 July 1850. Thornton was born in 1803 in Epsom, Surrey, according to the census of 1851. He was married to a woman seventeen years his senior, with whom he had two daughters.

  51 Whicher was given a pay rise . . . bonuses and rewards. Informa
tion on pay from Metropolitan Police papers at the National Archives and from parliamentary papers on police numbers and rates of pay at the British Library - 1840 (81) XXXIX.257.

  51 'Intelligent men have been . . . in 1843. Chambers's Journal XII.

  52 In the London underworld . . . classless anonymity. The term 'Jacks' is cited in The Victorian Underworld (1970) by Kellow Chesney. Detective officers also became known as 'stops', according to The Slang Dictionary published by J.C. Hotten in 1864, and as 'noses', according to Hotten's dictionary of 18 74. The 18 64 edition included some of the London detectives' own lingo: to 'pipe' a man was to follow him; to 'smoke' was to detect, or to 'penetrate an artifice'.

  52 The first English detective story . . .1849. In Chambers's Edinburgh Journal of 28 July 1849. This magazine published eleven more stories by Waters between then and September 1853. The twelve were issued as a book in 1856.

  52 'They are, one and all . . . speak to.' From 'A Detective Police Party', House-hold Words, 27 July 1850.

  52 George Augustus Sala . . . questioning them.' From Things I Have Seen and People I Have Known (two volumes, 1894) by George Augustus Sala. More recent commentators, such as Philip Collins in Dickens and Crime (1962), have seen the novelist's relations with the detectives as faintly patronising.

  52 In Tom Fox . . . higher intelligence'. This collection of short stories - sold for Is.6d. - was published in April 1860 and went into a second edition that summer.