Feilding Star
August 24th 1907
BARONET GANGER
SIR JAMES GOOLD’S HUMBLE
WORK IN AUSTRALIA
London Express correspondent cables
from Adelaide.
I have succeeded in tracing Sir James Stephen Goold, the brother calling himself Vere Goold now accused of the grisly crime at Monte Carlo. He is a permanent repairer on the State railways at Gladstone, a township on the Spencer Gulf in South Australia. The baronet lives in a four-roomed cottage with nothing but the stamp of birth to mark him above the ordinary type of working man.
I found him in charge of a repairing gang at work on one of the lines of railways which intersect at Gladstone. He is an old man of sixty, now bent with years of manual toil. His face is deeply lined, and his hands are hard and rough. When I showed him the cabled messages related to the arrest of his alleged brother Vere St Leger Goold, he was much distressed, but made no concealment of the relationship.
“I am the baronet,” he said, “my father was George Ignatius Goold, second son of Sir George Goold, the second baronet. Sir Henry, the third baronet was my uncle, but he never married, and when he died at the age of 90, the title came to me, all my elder brothers having pre-deceased him. I have always, however, endeavoured to conceal my rank. What is the use of being a baronet, if you have no means to keep up the title or maintain an appearance which will enable you to mix with your equals?”
“When did you come to Australia?” I asked.
“In 1863,” he replied. “During the gold rush I was a midshipman on the sailing vessel Murray and when we reached Australia I thought there were possibilities, so I remained. I have not seen my brother Vere since childhood and heard little of his life either in England or abroad. I cannot bring myself to believe that he committed such a crime as imputed to him in such messages. There is some dreadful mistake, which I am sure will be cleared up as the inquiry proceeds.”
“Have you any other near relatives in England?” I asked.
“Only one that I know about who lives in London,” was the reply. “I married ten years after I came out here, but am now a widower. I have three sons and a daughter. My eldest son is married and has a little boy.” In Gladstone the Goolds are held in high respect. Mr Goold is known as a silent, reserved old man, who is believed to have seen better days.
The Goold family were settled in Cork for centuries.
The present head of the house is described in Lodge’s and Debrett’s Peerage as ‘Sir James Stephen Goold of Oldcourt, Co Cork, who succeeded his uncle in 1893 and married Mary daughter of Patrick of Adelaide in 1873, has three sons, one married and one daughter and now lives in Gladstone, South Australia’.
If his last statement is correct, the man who has been living in Monte Carlo as Sir Vere Goold is a brother of Sir James and has a perfect right to the title he uses. He is the fifth son of George Ignatius Goold a resident magistrate in Co Waterford and daughter of Major General Webber Smith. His grandmother was a daughter of the Earl of Kenmare. He was born in 1853 and is described in the peerages as having married on August 2nd 1891 Violet, daughter of Hippolyte Girondin of Château de la Sône, Saint-Marcellin, Isére. As a single man, Goold was well known in the West End as a genial man who spent money freely and had claims to a baronetcy.
Those who knew him then described him a man of perfect breeding and of courtly, charming manners, cultured and generous. He was wont when coming home late from the club or theatre to collect stray cats and bring them in to share his supper.
Mrs Goold before her marriage conducted a highly successful business as a milliner and costumier under the trade name of ‘Madame Giroudin’ in Hereford Rd, Paddington. Mrs Violet Wilkinson, widow of a British army officer was a stoutish woman, with dark hair who had very high class clientele. She carried on her business at that address for over ten years and left not long after her marriage. After marrying, the couple took a large house in the West End, where they gave numerous dinners and lived extravagantly.
Early in 1902, the couple found themselves in debt and disappeared from the rented mansion. When the landlord visited the premises a fortnight later he found that all the furniture had been removed and presumably sold.
From London the Goolds went to Canada in 1904 where she resumed her dressmaking career at an address 56 Drummond St, Montreal for two years. Goold according to an employee was a hard drinker and heavy gambler and lost sums of money including the failure of the Thomas Fay Company importers of millinery in the city. Her business was prosperous but the profits were lost through the gambling sprees and poor business investments. Goold went to Liverpool and set up a steam laundry business and bought out several other laundry businesses in the city.
Their movements in that city were somewhat mysterious. They were both known as ‘Sir Vere and Lady Goold’. Both were distinguished looking and attracted attention from their neighbours. They established a laundry at Seacombe on the Mersey and did so well that several more were set up as a limited liability company.
They returned briefly to Montreal where the business was left in charge of a Miss Charlotte Shranz. Goold spent his time there working on a scheme to break the bank at Monte Carlo. They then returned to Liverpool. They had of course in typical fashion left the business awaiting a large amount of incoming bills, which they were conveniently absent to settle. At some stage word was sent from Algiers that Lady Goold had died there from fever. It was of course far from the truth.
The Goolds left Liverpool for Monte Carlo.
Irish Times
August 27th
Reuters Telegraph
Monte Carlo August 26th.
It having been decided to extradite Mr and Mrs Goold from Marseilles to Monaco, final formalities to this end will be carried out and prisoners will be shortly transferred. The Superior Court which will try them will be composed of a President and two judges to be named for the occasion. The court will be changed to one of criminal nature and according to the law of the Principality, three additional judges will be added. The penal code provides for the death penalty in the case of murder.
Friday, August 30th, 1907
MONTE CARLO MURDER
TRUNK NEARLY DESTROYED BY FIRE
Press Association Special
Marseilles, August 29th
A fire broke out in the vaults of the Law Courts here today and nearly destroyed the trunk in which Mr and Mrs Goold are alleged to have placed the remains of Mme Levin. The trunk forms one of the most important pieces of evidence in connection with the Monte Carlo crime.
The court attendants, having noticed smoke coming out of the vaults, were able to master the fire at an early stage with little trouble. The extradition of Mr and Mrs Goold is now merely a matter of hours. The Marseilles judicial authorities are awaiting the arrival of various documents establishing Mr Goold’s identity and furnishing proofs of his marriage to Marie Giroudin. If the papers arrive tomorrow, the prisoners will be taken to Monaco in the evening.
Irish Times
September 15th
Marseilles
The Goolds were taken from St Pierre and Presentines prisons and conveyed to St Charles Station where they were put into a prison car, in separate cells under the charge of three warders. The car was then attached to a train which left Marseilles at 7.45 a.m. Vere Goold seemed to be in a state of collapse and unconscious of his surroundings. Mrs Goold had more self-possession.
As the prisoners were conveyed across the station, several angry voices were raised by the passengers on the platform. The crowd gradually grew until when the train started the prison car was surrounded by several hundred persons.
Monte Carlo, Saturday
The transfer of the Goolds today created extraordinary interest along the coast. When the news spread by telegraph that the prisoners would travel on the 7.45 a.m. train, large crowds assembled at the stations along the line, particularly between Toulon and Nice. At the Station des Ancs a number of pe
ople climbed onto the steps and buffers of the prison car in the hope of seeing the prisoners.
Soup was served to the prisoners on the journey. Goold was still in a dazed condition and Mrs Goold remained absorbed in some illustrated papers until the train was approaching Nice when she had become somewhat nervous. A huge crowd pressed around the car at Nice station and blinds had to be lowered. When the train arrived at Monte Carlo, shouts of “Death to Them” were raised by the immense crowd.
The Times
Thursday September 25th
THE MONTE CARLO MURDER
This morning, the Goolds were photographed by the detective anthropometric service. Fresh light may be thrown on the crime by a communication addressed to the magistrate by Vere Goold. This communication alleges that the crime was premeditated, having been arranged between Goold and his wife, who took the leading part in the murder. In order to verify those assertions, the magistrate intends to subject the prisoners to further interrogation.
Irish Times
Saturday, September 28th, 1907
THE TRUNK TRAGEDY
JEWEL RECOVERED
There have been some strange and startling developments in connection with the Monte Carlo trunk tragedy; but in one instance at least they should be accepted with reserve.
‘The Daily Telegraph’ Paris correspondent says:
One of these facts is concerned with the alleged theft of jewellery; another with a similar theft of money and a third seems to be further evidence that Mr Goold told the truth when he says that his wife had a share in the murder. It should be remembered that at the beginning the Goolds frequently mentioned a certain young man by the name of Barker as having been implicated in the crime. No trace of a young man of that name could be found. Now, however, it turns out, according to despatches from Monte Carlo that a Mr and Mrs Barker have a villa at Cap Martin and the Goolds occasionally visited them. They returned to their villa recently and M. Savard was informed that they had something to tell him. The magistrate invited them to pay him a visit and they made the following statement:
“We occasionally met the Goolds last June and one day after Mr and Mrs Goold had paid us a visit we found that a locket worth 300 francs had disappeared.” As this statement was calculated to throw new light on the case, M. Savard had the jewels of the Goolds brought to him for inspection and Mrs Barker picked out the locket that had belonged to her. She added that she had thought it strange that Mrs Goold at the time of her visit had counselled her to deposit her jewels in her safekeeping.
The Goolds were at once confronted with the witnesses. Mrs Goold energetically denied having stolen the locket. When asked by the magistrate how it had come into her possession she replied that she had found it on the beach.
Monte Carlo, September 26th
Vere Goold was re-examined by M. Savard the examining magistrate today and he made a fresh confession, in which he admitted that he and his wife had determined to rob someone, as they were at the end of their resources. They had not intended to murder Mme Levin, but merely to stun her, and it was her unexpected resistance which led her to being stabbed by him after he had tried to fell her with a kitchen pestle. Mrs Goold, on being confronted with her husband, said she had nothing to say in reply to his confession. She fainted and had to be carried back to her cell.
October 10th
The usual formal preliminaries to the trial of the Goolds for the murder of Mme Levin were gone through today and the prisoners were remitted to the criminal court. The date for the trial will be fixed by the President of the Court.
12
LA HISTOIRE
MARSEILLES, SEPTEMBER 1907
Professor Lacassagne, Dr Grasset, Dr Dufour, Inspectors Dupin and Garonne and examining magistrates Malavialle and Savard met to consider the documents received from archive material and newspaper reports elicited from the professor’s contact in University College, Cork, Ireland. Dr Grasset would interview Goold with the assistance of Dr Dufour on the basis of what they had been presented. The purpose of the exercise was to find some reason why the prisoner Goold had embarked on such a horrendous crime. Notwithstanding his obvious state of financial desperation at the time, something else in his history must have led to such an appalling result.
Professor Lacassagne in particular but in fact all participants in the inquiry were concerned with not just the crime but the criminal mind. The professor, in all the cases he had been involved in, most notably that of Vacher and the Gouffé Affair, had established from the backgrounds of the perpetrators facts which would be of primary interest and evidence in the trials that followed. Not alone that, such facts were valuable contributions to the growing body of knowledge and expertise in the field of psychological profiling. The Monte Carlo murder, they all knew, was more than a suitable case for such treatment.
Professor Lacassagne noted that one aspect of the information in the files had eluded the close attention of the press, which was quite extraordinary. This was the prisoner’s impressive sporting achievements.
“This history is quite extraordinary,” he said, “and I can say that in my long experience I have not come across a perpetrator of such a monstrous crime from such a distinguished family line. A man who on the surface, it would seem, was presented, as a result of his privilege, with every opportunity in life. Education at the famous Trinity College and secure employment in Dublin . . . a city with large municipal financial problems and areas of dire poverty, side by side as always with power and wealth. It can justifiably be observed that Vere St Leger Goold had it all.”
The professor suggested that they quickly review the assembled antecedent history and then go on to an open debate. The material at the gathering’s disposal included archive material, newspaper reports and photographs.
They began to look through an abstract prepared most helpfully by the professor’s contact in Cork which presented what he judged to be the most pertinent sections of the archival material.
Brief History of the Goold Family
(Various Sources)
Item 1:
Goold is one variant of a surname which has had several in the course of its history: Gould, Golde, Gold.
Item 2:
Records find the Goold family in Cork, Ireland, from the time of the Norman Invasion in 1172.
Item 3:
John Golde, the Crusader, was a soldier from Somerset who distinguished himself at the siege of Damietta in the Holy Land and as a reward granted an estate at Seaborough in 1229. He is believed to be related to the Goolds of Ireland.
Item 4:
The Goold family were at an early period established in the County Of Cork. In 1356, Nicholas Gold was one of those influential persons commissioned to allot a state subsidy of that county as was David Gold a few years after. With the municipal history of the city, they were, during the years previous to the first civil war, intimately connected, Golds having been Mayors of Cork from 1442 to 1640, no less than thirty times; but afterwards ceased to fill any corporate office there.
Queen Elizabeth’s instruction to her Lord President Of Munster, Sir George Carew, in 1600 directed that “William Saxey, Chief Justice, and James Golde, Second Justice of the said province, being of special trust appointed to be of his council, shall give their continual attendance thereat, and shall not depart at any time without the special licence of the said Lord President.” The salary of the chief was fixed at £100 and that of James Golde at one hundred marks, subject to deductions in case of their absence from the duties so imposed upon them. A manuscript Book of Obits in Trinity College, Dublin, supplies some links with the family of William Goold, Mayor of Cork in 1618, and who died in 1634.
The attainders of 1642 include the names of Garrett Goold of Castletown and of James and John FitzRichard-Goold of Tower-Bridge, merchants. James Goold was the only member of the family who attended the Supreme Council in 1647. The attainder of 1691 include the names of James and Ignatius Goold described as of Cork, esquires; John Goold, o
f Kinsale esq; Richard of Cork, merchant; Patrick of the said city; James Goold of Galway and Eileen Bagot, otherwise Goold, wife of John Bagot of Cork.
Item 5:
Ignatius Goold was a supporter of King James and was Jacobite Mayor of Cork in 1687. He and his family forfeited estates in Ireland after the defeat of James.
Item 6 :
Vanderplas Cork Deeds, 1598, 1610-1677, 1694. By the end of the 16th century the area and population of Cork City was not much greater than that of medieval times. It was largely in the hands of the merchant princes of Old English descent. Despite some advances by the Reformation, by the end of the 17th century the merchant rulers were again predominantly Roman Catholic.
The English authorities regarded Cork’s merchant classes with suspicion due to their religion and thought that they were in league with Gaelic and Catholic forces in Cork County. On the death of Queen Elisabeth in 1603, the leading Catholic families in Cork refused to proclaim James I as king. Lord Mountjoy soon put down what was termed the Recusant Revolt, which was mirrored in other Irish cities.
The 17th century was a turbulent period in the history of Cork and Ireland. It was characterised by the re-establishment of the power of the Crown, a power aligned with the Protestantism of the Reformation.
While the civic government of Cork City remained in the hands of the merchant classes, tensions with Crown officials continued to simmer. Members of the leading Catholic families such as the Meades, Tirrys, Goolds and others were fined for non-attendance at formal religious ceremonies conducted according to Anglican rite. The James I charter of 1608, while it created the County Of Cork and the City Of Cork which covered a much larger area than the old medieval walled city and suburbs, also retained for the Crown the right to poundage, tonnage and customs in the port of Cork.
Murder in Monte Carlo Page 23
