The Chieftain: Victorian True Crime Through The Eyes of a Scotland Yard Detective

by Payne, Chris

  Clarke also spoke to the next-door neighbour and to Mrs Clarke’s landlord (who lived opposite), both of whom gave positive accounts of Mrs Clarke and the way in which she treated the children. Thus it seems that Mrs Clarke (no relative of Chief Inspector Clarke as far as is known) was a good ‘foster mother’ to the children in her care, and that the information received against her was malicious or simply ill-informed.

  The second report written on the same day was less comforting. This case had been referred to Scotland Yard by Sergeant Relf, and involved possible infanticide by Mrs Charlotte Davis, who operated as a midwife within a lying-in establishment. Clarke reported as follows:

  I beg to report that I have made enquiry with reference to the alleged Child Murders and attempts to procure abortion.

  Elizabeth Williams persists in asserting that her statements are true, and that when Betsy Harris was about to be confined, Mrs Davis told her to go down stairs to make some tea, and when she left the room she noticed that Mrs Davis locked the door. She did not go down stairs but remained on the landing, when she heard a child cry, and shortly after Mrs Davis opened the door, and said the child was dead. Miss Williams replied that she was surprised, as she heard it cry; she looked under the bed clothes and saw the dead body of a new born child quite naked and much discoloured. This girl is a common prostitute, and is at present in Westminster Hospital suffering from venereal disease.

  Louise Foster, on my first visit said that her statement was an entire fabrication, and she was induced to make it by the girl Williams, for the purpose of revenge against Mrs. Davis for keeping her clothes, and further said that Williams was a wicked liar; but on my seeing her a second time she said the statement she had made to Sergeant Relf was true. This girl is a common prostitute and now resides at 7 Luckington Road, Battersea.

  The girl called Betsy Harris has been seen; her name is Elizabeth Wigmore, and is now in the service of Captain George Popplewell, Headly Villas, Dagnalls Park, South Norwood. She states that she was taken to the house of Mrs Davies [sic] on the evening of the 13th May 1868 by her married sister Mrs Harris who then resided at 15 Colchester Street, Pimlico, for the purpose of being confined … she was confined early the following morning of a still born child. Mrs Davies gave a certificate to that effect, and she was told it was buried in Battersea Cemetery; she had provided proper clothing for the child. Mrs Davies had previously attended her sister in confinement. She further stated that there is no truth in the statement of Elizabeth Williams, and does not remember seeing her in Mrs Davies’ house; that her present master and mistress are acquainted with her misfortune, and assisted her at the time (her sister having been in their service many years), and upon her recovery, also took her into their service; she appears to be a respectable, truthful girl … I respectfully beg to submit that the statements of Elizabeth Williams, and Louise Foster are not corroborated in any particular, and supposing the statements to be true as regards themselves, they are equally guilty, and their unsupported testimony could not be received as evidence.88

  Though Clarke pursued one other potential witness, he failed to find her, and so with the conflicting statements received he concluded that ‘there is no sufficient evidence upon which proceedings can be taken’ against Mrs Davis.89

  It is possible that there was some substance behind the allegations against Mrs Davis. However, it is equally possible that she was a victim of the vilification of groups of women, including midwives and child-carers that followed the Waters and Ellis case.90 The police continued to receive information from various sources, not least from the Revd Oscar Thorpe, against women for being either baby farmers or midwives ‘carrying on a murderous trade’. A modern assessment of the police response was that ‘detectives investigated meticulously, invariably reporting the women to be clear of all suspicion of criminal activity’.91 Clarke’s final report of this kind, prompted by information from Thorpe in 1873, found no substantive grounds for the allegations made and commented with evident frustration: ‘The Rev. Mr Thorpe … with his wife take a very active part in these matters, but they are unable to give one particulars of any cases in which enquiry can be made, and it appears to me that they are inclined to form very extreme opinions upon the subject…’92

  One of the more positive responses to the protestations of Thorpe and others in the Infant Life Protection Society occurred during 1871, when the government established a Select Committee on the Protection of Infant Life ‘to inquire as to the best means of preventing the destruction of the lives of infants put out to nurse for hire by their parents’. The committee’s recommendations were integrated into the Infant Life Protection Act 1872, which amongst other aspects required local authority registration for ‘houses of persons retaining or receiving for hire two or more infants for the purpose of nursing’.93 However, local authorities were erratic in putting the measures into practice, and ultimately failed to deal effectively and consistently with the issue.94 One terrible consequence of this failure was the case of Amelia Dyer whose serial infanticide shocked the nation in 1896.95

  After his enquiries into Mrs Davis had yielded no substantive evidence of infanticide, Clarke turned his focus towards abortionists. He reported on 28 December 1870, that observation had been maintained of a Dr William Harding who had been acquitted at the Old Bailey in June that year for the murder of Isabella Tewson, an actress who, the prosecution claimed, had died as a result of being treated by Harding with a noxious drug to procure abortion.96 The judge in Harding’s trial had concluded that there was insufficient evidence to support the charge and directed the jury to acquit him.97 Clarke had not only arranged for observation to be made, he had also visited Harding. During their conversation, Harding had informed Clarke that he knew who the mother was of ‘Little Emily’ (one of the emaciated young children found in Waters’ baby farming establishment) and had given Clarke the details; Emily was now being looked after at the Parish Schools, Lower Norwood. Perhaps the coincidence that Clarke himself had a young daughter of the same name, and indeed of the same stature, prompted him to ask the commissioner for approval (which was granted) to inform the parish authorities of the details of Little Emily’s parentage.98 Ultimately, Clarke’s observation of Harding yielded no evidence to justify any action, though he did comment that:

  I have no doubt this man occasionally lends his professional assistance in cases of abortion but the operation would take place at the residence of the person undergoing it. No third person would be present and this being so the evidence of the woman being uncorroborated would not be admissible to support a prosecution, both the persons being equally guilty. Thus rendering it extremely difficult to bring to justice persons guilty of this class of offence.99

  In 1871, by adopting a rather risky strategy, Clarke made a breakthrough by securing a conviction for the supply of abortion-inducing drugs. This case had a novel twist to it that could only have taken place in the Victorian era. Events were succinctly reported by the British Medical Journal on 1 July 1871 under the heading ‘Mesmerism and Abortion’:

  At the Lambeth Police Court, on the 22nd June, Charles de Badderley, described as a medical botanist, and Sarah, his wife, residing at Exeter Villas, Kennington, were brought up on remand, charged with selling various noxious drugs, knowing that the same were to be used in order to procure abortion … The attention of the authorities having been drawn to an advertisement stating that ‘the celebrated Madame de Badderley, clairvoyant, could be consulted daily at 4, Exeter Villas’, they placed the matter in the hands of Inspector Clarke, of the Detective Department, for investigation. That officer employed a woman named Hansard to go to the address given, and, representing herself as the aunt of a young woman who had got into trouble, to ask for something which should induce a miscarriage. On the occasion of Mrs Hansard’s first visit, the prisoner said she could say nothing until put into a state of clairvoyance by her husband. This was agreed to; and the male prisoner, having made several passes with his hands, de
clared Madame to be asleep. After some conversation, the female prisoner was recovered from her supposed clairvoyant state, and then gave Mrs Hansard some pills and herbs for the niece, charging half a guinea for them. A second visit was paid at which the same kind of formality was gone through, and more herbs given to Mrs Hansard, who again paid half a guinea. It was, however, stated by the female prisoner that, when in the mesmeric condition, she had discovered that the case was a very critical one, but that she could give some effective medicine for £5. Accordingly, Mrs Hansard took a £5 note, marked by Inspector Clarke, and paying it to the prisoners, received from them some powders and other medicine. On analysis, they were found to contain injurious and powerful drugs. Mr Ellison sent the case to trial at the Central Criminal Court, but consented to take bail of £150 for each.100

  The drugs provided by the de Badderleys to Mrs Hansard included the known abortifacient, ergot of rye. However, as Mrs Hansard’s pregnant niece was a fabrication, it was no surprise at the Old Bailey trial of the de Badderleys (for unlawfully supplying a noxious drug intended to procure miscarriage) that their defence counsel, Montagu Williams, contended that there was no case to go to the jury, as there was really no person in existence who intended to take the drug. Nevertheless, the prosecution team, led by Harry Poland, claimed that the intention by the de Badderleys to supply a drug for the purpose of causing miscarriage was the issue of importance, and the court overruled the defence counsel’s objections. The de Badderleys were found guilty and both were sentenced to twelve months’ imprisonment, but ‘some strong observations were made as to the conduct of the police in laying the trap by which they had been caught’.101 Though Clarke had found a mechanism to secure a conviction for the supply of abortion-inducing drugs, he appears not to have used that means again, though others did.102

  Clarke’s reports rarely betray any emotion, and usually consist of factual accounts of the cases that he had been working on. However, in some of the reports on his inquiries involving children, a few comments, particularly those which express frustration over the difficulty of obtaining adequate evidence against those involved in the crimes of abortion and infanticide, suggest that these were issues of particular importance to him. With five children of his own, and with his first grandchild, Fanny Clarke, having been born on 17 June 1870, it is perhaps not too surprising that signs of some emotion crept into his reporting of offences relating to young children. One must beware of reading too much into this, but he probably gained some satisfaction from finding a mechanism to secure a conviction of the de Badderleys, though he seems also to have decided, probably wisely, that he should not use that mechanism too often.

  Irish Affairs

  Though Fenian activity had dramatically reduced, it had not completely gone away. Irish opinion initiated a campaign for the recognition of the convicted Fenians as political prisoners, and sought their early release. With the change of government at the end of 1868, under William Gladstone a new political attitude started to emerge. During March 1869, forty-nine prisoners convicted of treason-felony in Ireland were freed though this did not include senior members of the movement such as Halpin, O’Donovan Rossa, O’Leary and Devoy.103 Later that year the United States (US) Legation wrote to the government urging the release ‘of all American citizens now confined in British prisons for political offences’.104 As the privately expressed British view was that some of these were the most heinous of Fenians, the US Legation received a negative response, but the pressure for their release remained. Public meetings were held in Hyde Park in support of further amnesties, such as one on 24 October 1869, where 1,504 police were put on duty as a precaution.105 Eventually, in January 1871, a conditional pardon was extended to many of the Fenian leaders, the condition being that they should immediately leave the UK and not return for periods of eleven to twenty years (depending on their individual cases). John O’Leary took exile in France, where he was joined in voluntary exile by his non-convicted sister, Ellen. Others, including O’Donovan Rossa and Devoy, travelled to the United States where they arrived in New York, on 19 January 1871, to find themselves being fêted by large welcoming crowds. On arrival, many of them joined and helped to re-animate Clan na Gael, the most significant of the Irish revolutionary societies that emerged after the failure of the Fenian rising, and which had been formed in the United States in 1867; Devoy would later become its leader.106

  In September 1869, Clarke returned to Ireland, possibly for the first time since April 1868; he was needed to provide evidence at the trial of Peter Barrett (a letter carrier in London) for the attempted murder of Captain Thomas Eyre Lambert.107 On 11 July 1869, Lambert had been returning home at 9.15 p.m. when he noticed a man nearby in the grounds. Approaching him, the man raised a pistol and shot several times at Lambert. One ball struck Lambert’s watch, two shots hit him in the stomach and another hit him in the temple, causing him to fall down, at which point the assailant ran off. A ball was later removed from Lambert’s temple by a doctor, and he survived because he was wearing a hard hat at the time. Lambert claimed to have recognised his assailant as Peter Barrett, the son of a respected tenant farmer on Lambert’s land who Lambert had evicted (apparently for no good reason) a few weeks earlier.108 After the alarm had been raised, Peter Barrett was arrested on a train bound for Dublin. No gun was found on him. However: ‘When the prisoner was arrested the police in London were set in motion, and Inspector Clarke discovered that the prisoner had resided in the house of a Mrs Starling and upon his box being broken open and searched, this document [a receipt for a hired gun] was found.’109 Subsequent investigations by Clarke indicated that Barrett had hired a pistol and bought eight ball cartridges on 9 July 1869 from Thomas Wollams, a seller of surgical instruments and firearms in Tottenham Court Road. Barrett had justified hiring the gun as he was taking care of a house. On 10 July, Barrett had been given leave by the post office for five days following receipt of a doctor’s certificate for a knee injury, and he had then travelled to Ireland by train.110

  Clarke travelled to the trial in Galway in the company of Mrs Starling and Mr Wollams. Barrett’s defence counsel highlighted that Barrett was of unblemished character and questioned whether Lambert could have seen well enough in the dusk to be sure of his identification of Barrett. He also pointed out that there had been other individuals in Lambert’s house grounds that day and claimed that the offence ‘had been committed by … a band of private assassins who now keep Ireland in terror’. The jury failed to reach a verdict.111 The rumour was that only one juror had held out against acquittal and he was mobbed and pelted with stones and had to be escorted to his hotel by police with fixed bayonets.112 A second trial was originally planned to start on 14 October, but this was delayed as the prosecution requested a change of location on the basis that an impartial trial could not be held in Galway. The second trial eventually started on 17 February 1870 at the Court of Queens Bench, Dublin. Clarke, Walloms and Starling once more travelled to Ireland to give evidence. Barrett was defended on this occasion by Isaac Butt, Irish lawyer and politician, who was a strong supporter of Home Rule for Ireland. Once again the jury could not reach a verdict.113

  A third trial was convened in Dublin on 23 June 1870 and Clarke and the other London-based witnesses travelled across yet again. Barrett was again defended by Butt who, on this occasion, was successful in unearthing some inconsistencies in Captain Lambert’s evidence in relation to the timing of the attack, and raised further questions about the limited light levels and visibility at the time that Lambert was supposed to have identified Barrett. At this final trial, the jury took five minutes to reach a verdict of ‘not guilty’, which was greeted by cheers in the court, and Barrett was finally acquitted.114 The trial never satisfactorily dealt with the issue of why Barrett had gone to Ireland at that time with a gun, and had tried to return to London with some rapidity. However, the case illustrates the tensions that existed in Ireland concerning tenant eviction and landlord-tenant relationships at that
time; tensions that were later to lead to the creation of the Irish National Land League in 1879, as a mechanism to protect tenant farmers from the excesses and unfair demands of landlords. Only five weeks before Clarke travelled to Barrett’s third trial, the man who would later be responsible for establishing the Land League, Michael Davitt, had been arrested by Clarke for gun-running.

  On Saturday 14 May 1870, Clarke received a telegram at Scotland Yard informing him that a Birmingham arms dealer, John Wilson, had left the Midlands by train with two suspicious packages in his possession, possibly on his way to hand over the packages to the Fenian arms organiser, Michael Davitt. It was known that Davitt had replaced Ricard Burke in this role, but, though suspicion of Davitt’s activities was not lacking, it was not till 1870 that sufficient evidence was obtained to justify his arrest.115 The flow of arms to the Fenians was considerable and, ironically, assisted by government actions:

  During the year 1869 the illicit introduction of arms into Ireland became a matter of anxiety to the Irish Government. And such is the fatuity of Government methods and ways that this very time was chosen by the War Office to sell off scores of discarded rifles. The Fenians were thus enabled to purchase at ‘knock-out’ prices better arms than had ever been carried by British troops in actual warfare, and quantities of these were smuggled into Ireland for the use of the rebels.116

  Despite, or perhaps because of, the unhelpful policy of selling off army surplus, the arrest and conviction of Davitt and the disruption of the Fenians’ arms supply was a high priority. Thus, after receiving the telegram, Clarke took with him at least three detective sergeants, Lansdowne, Campbell and Foley, and headed for the Great Western Railway Station at Paddington, after first checking the adjacent underground station at Praed Street. Davitt was first spotted at Praed Street, and was followed as he made his way to the arrivals platform at Paddington station to meet the 10.40 p.m. train, which arrived ten minutes late. When Wilson emerged from a third-class carriage he was found to be carrying two heavy packages containing fifty revolvers, and was arrested by Foley. Davitt was arrested by Campbell on Clarke’s signal. When questioned, Davitt would not give his name or address, but papers carried by Wilson gave the police sufficient information to locate the lodgings where Davitt had been staying under the name of ‘Matthews’. When Davitt was searched by Clarke at Paddington, a large amount of money was found on him, about £152 in Irish and English banknotes (worth about £7,000 today). Clarke handed back some of the money to Davitt for use in his defence, and Davitt signed two receipts for the items returned; the receipts later being produced in court as evidence of his style of handwriting.117