The Amazing Mrs Livesey

by Freda Marnie Nicholls

  She explained to the court the long-term effect the bankruptcy and all the harassment since her highly publicised failed wedding had had on her, emphasising her desire to now lead a quiet life.

  She then made one last appeal to stay out of gaol. ‘I am earning only £2 a week at present, Your Honour, but if you give me a chance, I will pay the money back.’

  Mr Noyes looked at the large middle-aged woman in front of him; her reputation had well and truly preceded her. He took pity, and ordered Mrs Gardiner to make restitution of £5 15s at 5 shillings a week, in default of a month’s gaol.

  Ethel had escaped gaol this time, but not the notice of the police, the Tasmanian police to be precise.

  Three days later, Sub-Inspector Voigt went to see Mrs Gardiner, at her Ann Street residence accompanied by Brisbane Detective Constable Beer.

  ‘I have a provisional warrant for a woman named Mrs Nan Glover, thought to be Mrs Ethel Livesey for having obtained £612 by false pretences at Launceston between February and May 1948 from William Henry Hammersley,’ announced Sub-Inspector Voigt, looking up at her. ‘Is that you?’

  ‘Yes,’ Ethel replied sharply, ‘but I never got anything like £600 from him.’

  Ethel was formally charged at the Brisbane watchhouse at 5 p.m. Soon after 6 p.m., she was taken in a police car to the home of the Government Medical Officer, Dr Cameron, and admitted to the General Hospital.

  No application for bail was made three days later, when Mrs Florence Livesey, 52, again appeared in the Brisbane Police Court for extradition to Launceston.

  Ethel was made to sit and wait in the lock-up for a week until a policewoman could arrive from Hobart to escort her to her next court appearance.

  When he met Ethel, Alfred Glover was a 55-year-old widower, farming at Karoola twenty miles north-east of Launceston in Tasmania’s north. He had advertised for a housekeeper after the recent death of his wife, and in June 1947 engaged Ethel Nanette Stafford, a stout middle-aged woman who had recently moved from England and was looking for a quiet life. The farm at Karoola certainly provided that. They lived as man and wife for nine months, with Ethel taking on his surname, and she became well known around the small community as Nan Glover.

  In February 1948 the new Mrs Glover took a trip to Hobart, the state’s capital, and on her return announced to Alfred that she’d like to set up a business—a cake shop. She liked the harbourside suburb Sandy Beach, the tourist centre of the capital, with swimming baths, wooden piers and some of the best hotels in the state, including the prestigious Wrest Point. She’d found a shop and it was perfect. She told Glover she’d purchase it when funds came through from England, and that when the balance of her funds arrived—£5000 worth—she’d open a joint account in both their names. She then went and leased the shop, Alfred leased out his farm to a neighbour, and they moved south to Hobart.

  When she was brought back to Tasmania in early December 1949, Mr Glover wasn’t much help at her committal proceedings.

  ‘She should go to gaol!’ he angrily told the judge. ‘That would be her place, instead of running around the country dragging people down to the level of a blackfella, the same as she dragged me!’

  The police magistrate, Mr E.G. Butler, fixed bail at £300, with a surety of another £300 for Nan Glover, also known as Mrs Livesey, and committed her to trial for the next sittings of the Criminal Court, on the charge of false pretences on Alfred’s cousin, William Henry Hammersley.

  No one put up her bail, so Ethel sat in the prison, built by convicts decades before, until her trial nearly two months later.

  Ethel Livesey was seated alone at the Launceston Criminal Court on Thursday 23 February 1950, before Acting Judge Gibson and an all-male jury. She pleaded not guilty and was not represented by counsel, having deciding to conduct her own defence, openly stating she didn’t have the money for a lawyer. She’d certainly seen enough inside courtrooms in her life to know how they operated.

  William Hammersley told the court how he had first met Nan Stafford in June 1947 with his cousin, Alfred Glover. Eight months later he was surprised to receive a telegram from his cousin’s new wife, asking to meet him at the Criterion Hotel in Launceston on 13 February 1948.

  At the meeting she had explained that his cousin had contracted debts before their marriage, and she desperately needed money to pay for them. She could not get her husband to be reasonable, and told Mr Hammersley that she had substantial funds coming from England—more than enough to cover the debt, but that she wanted to pay it off as quickly as possible, before Alfred got into trouble with the law. Mr Hammersley gave her £100 in cash that day.

  A week later she met Mr Hammersley again and told him that the £100 had been insufficient and she needed another £50 to cover the old debts, saying she had opened a bank account in the name of Alf and Nan Glover, and deposited £5000 she had received from England into it, but she couldn’t access the funds as Alf had confiscated the cheque book. Mr Hammersley handed over another £50.

  On 9 March, they met again, Mr Hammersley expecting to be repaid, but his cousin-in-law seemed very distressed. Her father and her brother were arriving shortly from England and she needed money to buy furniture, but still couldn’t access the funds from her joint account. Alfred was being unreasonable and she wanted to make her elderly father comfortable when he arrived. Mr Hammersley handed over another £100.

  Over successive weeks, she received additional sums of £100, £50 and £150, the latter amount needed to upgrade an electric stove and equipment in her cake shop, which she planned to sell, saying if she couldn’t access the joint account, she’d pay Mr Hammersley back with the proceeds.

  Mr Hammersley went with his housekeeper, Mrs Rowbotham, to look over the cake business, and said he would take it off her hands for £300, reducing her debt to him down to £250, which she readily agreed to.

  Some time later he asked her about the £5000 in her joint account.

  Ethel suddenly stood up in court. ‘I am sorry, that is a lie!’ she interjected. ‘I never had a joint account with Mr Glover.’

  ‘Your objection is noted,’ the judge said. ‘Please carry on, Mr Hammersley.’

  Ethel sat back down as the prosecutor continued to ask Mr Hammersley about Mrs Glover.

  ‘She represented herself as a wealthy woman, saying she had £5000 in a joint account, more money in a fixed deposit in Western Australia, and that her father was a well-off retired cotton manufacturer in England, whilst her brother was a wealthy brain specialist—and I believed her,’ Mr Hammersley told him.

  ‘Did you ever meet her father and brother?’ the prosecutor asked.

  ‘No, they were supposed to be coming to Tasmania and staying at Wrest Point. She told such a believable story, but much later I figured it was fictitious.’

  ‘Have you any idea where the money you say you gave her went to?’ Justice Gibson asked.

  ‘No,’ he replied. ‘She didn’t seem to live extravagantly, so far as I could see. She used to fly around in taxis and that sort of thing, but I thought she was wealthy and accustomed to spending money, and that a few hundred were nothing to her.’

  ‘When did you find that the defendant was not married to your cousin?’

  ‘Just after I gave her the last £150—she mentioned that Alfred had cleared out.’

  Ethel rose to her feet. ‘That is a lie!’ she stated. ‘I told you on a previous visit that I had a bruised face from falling from a trap. You said it did not look like a fall, and I said “No, Alfred hit me, but I’m not worried as I am not married to him.” That was the first time you knew.’

  ‘A definite lie!’ Mr Hammersley retorted.

  ‘You will have an opportunity to question the witness shortly,’ the judge said to Ethel. ‘Please be seated for now.’ Ethel sat down reluctantly, with Mr Hammersley openly glaring at her as the prosecutor continued with his questions.

  ‘Did you ever receive any receipts or proof of the money lent?’ he asked.

 
‘Of course,’ came the reply. ‘I had signed, hand-written receipts, but after agreeing to purchasing the cake shop it was down to one receipt, for the £250 still owing.’

  ‘Do you have that receipt?’

  ‘No,’ Mr Hammersley said, ‘she took it.’

  ‘She took it?’

  ‘Yes, well I gave it to her,’ Mr Hammersley explained. ‘She asked if she could lend it as her brother was clearing up her affairs, and there were certain notes on it she needed. I gave it to her and did not see it again.’

  It was then Ethel’s turn to ask some questions. All in the courtroom could see the hatred in Mr Hammersley’s eyes as she stood.

  ‘This is an absolute frame-up,’ she began. ‘As I can prove. Mr Hammersley,’ she said, turning to him, ‘is it true on one visit I came to you with a bruised face, and I told you Mr Glover had struck me?’

  ‘Yes,’ he replied.

  ‘Did I say, I need not stay with him any longer as I am not married to him?’

  ‘No,’ he replied. ‘You first told me that you were not married when you came and said Glover had cleared out.’

  ‘Were you friendly with Mr Glover?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Don’t you think if I had said what you say, you would have gone to Glover earlier and asked him why he didn’t pay his debts?’

  ‘I was very ill at the time and was not able to get about very well,’ Mr Hammersley replied.

  She looked at him a moment. ‘I suggest you never had the receipt you say I gave you.’

  ‘That’s a filthy lie!’ stormed Mr Hammersley.

  ‘Glover was certainly on your side about the money,’ Ethel remarked.

  ‘Yes, he was evidently trying to get it back for me.’

  ‘I would like to refer to the negotiations we had in place with my solicitor, Mr Gee, for repayment of the loan,’ Ethel said.

  Mr Hammersley snorted, ‘You kept me dangling on a string!’

  ‘Mr Gee asked if you would accept £10 a week, and you would not say whether you would do this or go to the police.’

  ‘I finally agreed to accept £10 a week, and the balance when the additional £500 for which you cabled to England, arrived,’ he answered.

  The foreman of the jury raised his hand, wondering if he could ask Mr Hammersley a question. The judge nodded in agreement and the foreman stood. ‘Why didn’t you approach your cousin about the old debts?’ he asked.

  ‘Alfred was a sick man,’ Mr Hammersley replied, ‘but I wrote to him three times and never received a reply. He told me later that he never received my letters. I thought at the time that he was trying to avoid me—that he was upset about what had happened and did not want to face me,’ he explained. ‘Her tale was always so good that I believed her—I even received telegrams supposedly from her brother talking about repaying my loan! I thought the woman was really honest,’ he added, ‘and that it was only a matter of time before she would pay me. I thought that if I could help her I should.’

  ‘You are not wealthy?’ the judge asked.

  ‘I certainly am not,’ he replied.

  Alfred Glover was next to take the stand, retelling how he had met Mrs Livesey as Mrs Stafford at her flat in Tamar Street in Launceston, and engaged her as a housekeeper. She moved to his farm at Karoola, and they were never married, even though he let her use his name.

  ‘She told me she was wealthy,’ he said to the prosecutor.

  ‘Did you hold a joint bank account with Mrs Livesey?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why did you move to Sandy Beach in Hobart?’ the prosecutor asked.

  ‘Nan—eh, Mrs Livesey—had bought a cake shop there, but I didn’t realise it was with my cousin’s money!’ Mr Glover replied. ‘I thought it was with money from England.’

  ‘Did you put any money into the business?’

  ‘Yes,’ Mr Glover replied, ‘£80.’

  ‘Do you know how much money the business made?’

  ‘No, all I know is I never got any of it.’

  Mr Glover first found out Mrs Livesey owed money to his cousin in May 1948, while they were living at Sandy Beach; she asked him to stop Mr Hammersley going to the police, saying she was getting her money from England in October.

  ‘Did she mention amounts?’ the prosecutor asked.

  Mr Glover nodded. ‘Yes, big amounts,’ he said. ‘I think at one stage I was to benefit by £27,000!’

  ‘How did you find out her real name was Mrs Livesey?’

  ‘She eventually told me, and we parted.’

  ‘Did you see her again?’ the prosecutor asked.

  ‘Yes, in Launceston,’ Mr Glover replied. ‘She sent me an urgent telegram asking to meet—she wanted to marry me!’ he said with a sarcastic laugh, sending a nervous titter through the courtroom crowd. ‘But I told her, not until she’d paid back Hammersley.’

  Next it was Ethel’s turn to question him.

  ‘Mr Glover,’ she began, ‘is it not true you hit me twice while we were together?’

  ‘That’s true,’ he admitted. ‘Once on the chin, and on another occasion I turned you over on my knee and smacked you hard!’

  The court erupted into laughter. The thought of the large woman before them being placed over the smaller man’s knee was certainly a comical picture to imagine.

  ‘And you got let down lightly!’ Mr Glover continued, yelling above the laughter, ‘lighter than you let down my pocket!’ The laughter started up again, even louder.

  ‘You told me your brother was coming all the way from England,’ he stated loudly, trying to talk over the laughter, ‘with a power of attorney, and I’d get £27,000, with a possible £50,000 when your father died.’

  ‘That is absolute rubbish!’ Ethel scoffed.

  ‘Tell me, Mr Glover,’ she started up again as the laughter subsided. ‘Is it not true that you had once served a prison sentence for causing grievous bodily harm to two men?’

  ‘You know it’s true,’ he growled at her.

  ‘And did you not receive £300 from the sale of the Sandy Beach business?’ she asked.

  ‘No, it was £250!’ he stated, ‘to pay back my cousin. And, you were supposed to pay all the accounts, and you left them unpaid and scarpered off to buggery!’ The gallery burst into laughter yet again.

  ‘Who paid the butcher?’ she demanded.

  ‘Poor little me!’ he replied in a high-pitched voice, as once again the crowd erupted.

  Ethel turned to the judge amid the laughter. ‘Your Honour, the witness is purposely trying to be comical,’ she implored.

  ‘I am not!’ Mr Glover yelled, to more peels of laughter.

  Trying to hide a smile, the judge adjourned the case until the following day, returning Ethel to her cell.

  On the second day of the case, Ethel called Mr W.M. Deavin, who had leased the Sandy Beach property to her, and solicitor Mr E.A. Gee to testify. Both told the court that she had always been honest and straightforward in the business dealings conducted with them.

  When it was time to stand in the dock and give her final address to the jury, Ethel looked sad and resigned. She was about to give the performance of her life, and she threw everything into it.

  ‘Gentlemen,’ she began, ‘I am perfectly innocent. I admit that I received £350 from Mr Hammersley, but never by false pretences,’ she stated in a clear, strong tone. ‘And I plan to work, to pay him back.’

  She paused for a moment, before continuing. ‘As I was working when Mr Glover first met me, I have to ask, how could he or Mr Hammersley ever think me wealthy?’ pausing again for effect. ‘I have scrubbed and cleaned and, while running the business at Sandy Beach, toiled for 48 hours at a stretch. Would a wealthy woman do that?’ she asked, pausing to let them think about it. She had learnt well from her previous lawyers.

  ‘You can see that I did not do the things alleged against me,’ she implored. She took a breath and looked her most vulnerable. ‘I have been battered from pillar to post these last few
years, all because of a splash in the newspapers over a wedding,’ she pleaded, fighting back tears.

  ‘Since then, wherever I have gone and obtained a job, I have been turned out, sometimes before breakfast,’ she added forlornly, ‘after it had been discovered that I was Mrs Livesey.’

  She sadly turned to the jury. ‘I have nothing now but my two hands,’ she implored, holding her upturned hands out towards them. ‘And I can only emphasise that I still wish to pay Mr Hammersley, though not all at once, as I will have to work for money,’ she stated desperately, needing them to believe in her.

  ‘For four months,’ she continued, letting her hands dramatically fall to her side, ‘I have been in custody awaiting trial—much of that time ill in bed.’

  She stopped and tried to look each juryman in the eye as she continued on. ‘I am fighting hard for my freedom, gentlemen. I ask that you give it to me. Please, in the goodness of your hearts, find me not guilty!’

  The jury went out to deliberate at 12.30 p.m. They returned at 2 p.m. with a unanimous verdict: not guilty on all six counts.

  ‘Thank you gentlemen!’ Ethel said to the jury as she left the dock, tears flowing down her cheeks. ‘Thank you!’

  When a reporter from the Truth saw Mrs Livesey in the street a few minutes later, her tears had vanished and she showed no signs of remorse or emotion.

  ‘I haven’t a shilling in my purse,’ she stated, ‘and no idea where I will get a bed tonight. But I suppose I’ll manage,’ she added, looking down the street.

  39

  MRS ETHEL NELSON

  Seven months after she’d been let off in Hobart, Mrs Livesey was back in Adelaide, living in a suburb called Magill, only to be arrested again.