Great Train Crimes: Murder and Robbery on the Railways

by Oates, Jonathan

  PC Edward Dougar was on duty at Wick Lane at 10.20. He heard that a man had been found near the line and went to the pub with the others. After calling for a surgeon, he recalled that:

  I searched his pockets to ascertain who he was. His shirt front was rumpled and there was one black stud in it. A bunch of keys, four sovereigns, and some silver were in his left hand breeches pocket and in the other another bunch of keys and 8s 6d in silver and coppers. In his waist coat pocket there was a first class return ticket, and in his coat pocket I found his letters, papers and a silver snuff box. There was a patent fastening attached to his waist coat pocket for a gold chain, and there was a diamond ring upon his finger. There was no watch or chain on him.

  Inspector Kerressey of K division arrived from Bow Police Station. He looked at the letters found on the body. They were addressed to Thomas Briggs at his business address on Lombard Street. Kerressey sent a man to check at the bank to confirm Briggs’s identity and to find his personal address. This was swiftly accomplished and then the melancholy news had to be broken to the family.

  Thomas Briggs, junior, a 28-year-old insurance clerk, and other family members accompanied Mr Francis Toulmin, FRCS, the family doctor, to the tavern. It was now just after 3 am on Sunday morning. Distressing scenes followed, but the injured man could only gurgle in recognizing the voice of an elderly female servant. News of what had happened had leaked and many people gathered outside the pub, such was their interest and excitement. The four doctors remained with Briggs for the remainder of the night and in the following morning, on Toulmin’s advice, he was conveyed in a litter to his home. Despite his robust constitution, the old man died at 11.45 pm on Sunday 10 July. This was now no longer robbery with violence, but a case of murder.

  Toulmin then undertook a post mortem, in the presence of Brereton and Cooper. There was a jagged wound on the left ear. On the scalp were several severe wounds. The hands and left forearm were grazed and bruised, an indication that the man had tried to defend himself. The skull was also fractured. Some of these injuries would have resulted from the fall from the train. Death was due to the fracture of the skull and the depression of the brain.

  Meanwhile, the police investigation proceeded. The younger Briggs was eager to assist with what little information he could. He told them how his father had left for work as normal the day before. He added that he was wearing a gold watch with an Albert chain, and that he wore gold glasses. The watch had been given to his father by a friend about two years before. He also stated that the hat, stick and bag which were found in the compartment were his father’s. However, on closer examination, he announced that the hat was not his father’s. This hat was to assume great importance in what transpired, because, of course, it must have belonged to the murderer.

  Kerressey had details of the missing watch and glasses sent to all police stations in London. He then examined the compartment where Briggs had been attacked. Once the train of which it had been part of reached Camden Town station, the carriage was uncoupled and brought back to Bow where it was put into a shed. It was composed of three first class compartments. There was blood on the brass handles of the door, suggesting the assailant had opened the window in order to throw his victim out. On the floor was found a link from the watch chain and on the footstep was part of the glasses.

  The initial police theory was that Briggs had been attacked shortly after the train left Bow. His attacker or attackers wanted to throw him into the canal, but had been unable to do so. One Mr Edward Carr wrote to The Times with a theory of his own. This was that Briggs had ruptured one of his arteries and then had jumped from the train in order to procure medical assistance. Others poured scorn on this, pointing out that if this was the case, then whose hat was it that had been found in the compartment and who had closed the carriage door?

  The inquest began on 18 July at Hackney Vestry Hall. Mr Toulmin gave the medical evidence and then Mrs Buchan told what she knew. The question of motive was raised. She did not know of anyone who had threatened her uncle. However, her uncle had refused someone a loan and a third party told her that the man who had been turned down had threatened Briggs, though she had assumed that this was not a threat to kill him. Her husband had also heard of this, but not at first hand. Oddly enough, in Briggs’s pocket book were two IOUs made out from Buchan. William Townsend, a ticket collector at Hackney Wick, said that it would be easy for anyone to leave the station without passing him at the entrance, because they could exit by the embankment and many of the ‘rougher sort’ who used the train there often did so.

  The doctors reported that, on the following day, they were shown a stone near to the place where Briggs was found. It weighed about half a pound and there was blood and hair attached to it. This stone fitted one of Briggs’s head wounds. The inquest was then adjourned until 23 July.

  Further information was being found by the police. A lad told them that he had been travelling on the same train as Briggs. He had boarded at Stepney and noticed a tall, dark man walking up the platform, looking in at the occupants of the train. He then entered a compartment where an elderly gentleman sat. It will be recalled that Lee thought that one of the men with Briggs was tall, too. The police were also keeping an eye on the man (unnamed) who had allegedly threatened Briggs.

  One of the most important witnesses was Jonathan Matthews, a cab driver, who reported to the police on 18 July. He had known one Francis Muller for two years. He recalled that in December 1863 Muller admired his hat. In exchange for a waistcoat, Matthews bought a similar hat for 10s 6d from Mr Walker’s hat shop in Crawford Street, Marylebone. He had seen Muller in this hat in June 1864, and was able to describe the hat before he was shown the one at the scene of the murder. He said:

  I believe this to be the hat that I purchased for him; it corresponds exactly – before I bought it, out of the shop I had it turned up a little at each side – after I had purchased it I said I should like it turned up the same as the one I had the week previous, consequently they did it while I was there – I noticed that there was a little curl in the brim.

  When asked why he did not tell the police until over a week after the murder, he said that he had not seen a newspaper since then, though some claimed he was waiting for a reward to be offered. At that time it stood at £300 and Matthews was in debt.

  What appeared to be another important new development occurred at 1 pm on 20 July. John Haffa, a German tailor, who lived at Park Terrace, Old Ford Road, Bow, went to the offices of the City of London Police. He told Inspector Hamilton that four days after the assault, he had purchased a pawnbroker’s ticket for 12s from Francis Muller. Muller had lodged at the same house as Haffa and the two had known each other for several months. The pawnbroker’s ticket was worth 30s and was for a gold watch chain that had been pledged at Mr Annis’s shop in the Minories on the afternoon of 12 July. Muller and Haffa had recently worked together for a Mr Hodgkinson on Threadneedle Street, but Muller had argued with the foreman, lost his job and decided to start a new life in America, enlisting in the Union army in the ongoing American Civil War (1861–5). To do so, he needed some ready money to pay his fare, so sold the ticket at a loss. Muller had then took a ship to New York, on 14 July, travelling from the London Docks.

  This led the police to the jewellery shop of one John Death in Cheapside. On the Monday after the murder, Briggs’s watch chain had been exchanged for another at Death’s shop. Robert, Death’s brother, who was running the shop on the day in question, recalled:

  On Monday morning, July 11, a young man of about 30, with a foreign accent and having neither beard, moustache nor whiskers, of a pale sallow complexion and rather fair I should think, entered the shop around 10 o’clock. He took a chain from his pocket, apparently not attached to his watch, and asked him if I would let him have a new Albert chain for it of about the same value. Although having a foreign accent, he spoke English so plainly that I perfectly understood him. He wanted to have a new chain, without having to pay a
ny money, for the old one, which was of the best description of gold.

  The transaction was then completed, and later, the new chain which was pawned was identified by Death as the one he had given the young man.

  Evidently Muller had taken the duplicate to Annis’s shop and pawned it. Muller’s lodgings were searched and, hidden in the chimney, was a scrap of silk, such as might have come from a man’s sleeve, with blood on it. It was thought that Muller had used this to wipe bloodstains from his shoes after the murder. Sir Richard Mayne, Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, was told of this and realized that Muller would need to be questioned about the murder. Therefore, on the same day (20 July), Inspector Tanner, Mr Death and Matthews, took a steamship, The City of Manchester, for New York. They took a warrant for Muller’s arrest with them. Because it was feared they might not arrive before Muller, a second warrant was sent on a faster ship and this warrant was endorsed by the American minister in London, as required by the extradition treaty.

  More facts emerged about the top suspect. Muller had been born in Cologne in about 1839. On leaving school he was apprenticed to a gunsmith and came to London in 1862. He was unable to find work as a gunsmith, and eventually began working for Mr Hodgkinson as mentioned above. He also lived at the same house as a Mr Matthews and became engaged to his daughter. The engagement was broken off by early 1864. It was said that he was jealous and potentially violent. In appearance, he was five feet six, slender, with a pale complexion and light brown hair. He lacked whiskers or a moustache.

  Apparently on the evening of the murder, Muller had spent some time with Elizabeth Repsch, the wife of a German tailor of Jewry Street, Aldgate. She was with him until 7.30 pm, when she left him in Haffa’s company. He had not then spoken of any overseas journey. By 8.30, when she returned, Muller was gone. She next saw him on Monday morning, shortly after he had exchanged the old watch chain for a new one. He claimed to have bought both the watch and a ring, which he then showed her and Haffa, from a man at the docks, while enquiring about a passage to America (this man, assuming he ever existed, was never located). He was also wearing a new hat; Muller claimed he had damaged the old one and thrown it away. Elizabeth thought the hat found in the railway compartment was the same as the one Muller used to wear, but was not entirely certain. She never saw Muller again after 14 July.

  Haffa could shed more light on Muller’s movements. When Muller left him, he said he ‘was going to see his girl, his sweetheart’, in Camberwell. This was about 7.45.

  This murder excited a great deal of public interest, even more so than murder usually did at this time. Perhaps not until the Jack the Ripper murders of 1888 did the press give a killing so much attention.

  Muller arrived at New York on 24 August. Inspectors Kerressey and Tanner, with Death, had arrived before him; just as Chief Inspector Dew was to arrive before Crippen in 1910. Muller was arrested and identified. When he was brought before the City Marshal, he told him that he was innocent and could prove it. He was remanded and the extradition process began. His captors searched his belongings and found the hat and watch which seemed to prove his guilt.

  Muller was escorted back to England on the Etna, arriving on 17 September at Liverpool. The boat was met by a steam tug, and angry crowds waited for him by the docks. Muller was taken by cab to a police station. It was alleged ‘The excitement in the town from the time Etna came in sight was very great, and it increased as he was being conveyed to the police office.’ Muller himself ‘appeared very unconcerned’ and had not spoken of the murder on his return voyage. He was taken by train to London and on arrival at Euston met a large crowd. He was committed for trial at the Bow Street Magistrates’ court on the following day.

  This murder case was described by Charles Dickens as one of the two great sensations of the time; the other being a commercial crisis. Those who know the novelist through his books as a liberal humanitarian might be interested in his comment on the case before the trial, when he wrote thus, in a letter to a friend:

  I hope that the gentleman [Muller] will be hanged, and have hardly a doubt of it, though croakers contrariwise are not wanting. It is difficult to conceive any other line of defence than that the circumstances proved, taken separately, are slight. But a sound Judge will immediately charge the jury that the strength of the circumstances lies in their being put together and will thread them together on a fatal rope.

  Muller’s trial at the Old Bailey took three days (27–29 October). The court room was packed to capacity, such was the public interest in the case. As expected, the main witnesses for the prosecution were Matthews and Death, who attested, respectively, to the hat found at the murder scene being Muller’s and the fact that he had sold Briggs’s watch chain to the jeweller. Yet there was the evidence of Lee to contend with; for he had seen two other men with Briggs in the railway compartment just before the train was about to depart and he thought that neither man there was Muller. But there was new evidence, too. On the night of the murder, Muller had told Haffa at 7.45 at Old Jewry that he was going to Camberwell. Apparently, according to Elizabeth Jones, Muller came to her house, which was a brothel, incidentally, at St George–s Road, Peckham. He had come to see one of her girls, a Mary Ann Eldred. Perhaps unfortunately for Muller, she had left the house at 9 pm. The clock gave the time as 9.30 pm, and Mrs Jones remembered it because that was when a telegram arrived for her. If this was true, then Muller could hardly have caught the same train as Briggs, because it would have taken him more than 20 minutes to reach Fenchurch Street station. The Camberwell omnibus which Muller could have caught did not travel through Peckham until 9.55 and did not arrive at King William Street until 10.20. Therefore, Muller must be innocent. Furthermore, Miss Eldred said that Muller had spoken to her before the murder of going to America. The prosecutors did not let these witnesses speak without challenging them. In particular, they cast doubts on the reliability of Mrs Jones and the accuracy of her clock. Perhaps Muller did go there, but if he set off at 7.45, he could have gone there, found his friend was not there, and returned in time to arrive at Fenchurch Street at 9.45. Lee–s testimony to seeing two men in the carriage was also questioned and it was believed that Lee was mistaken as to which night he saw Briggs there. The jury believed the prosecutors’ version of events and, after a mere 15 minutes, found Muller guilty of murder.

  Muller himself was allowed to speak. He said, in his broken English, ‘I wish to say I am satisfied with my trial. I know I have been convict by your law, but not upon the statement – by false.’ A witness later wrote, ‘these last words of Muller’s struck me so very forcibly as containing no denial of guilt, or assertion of active innocence’.

  There was doubt among some as to whether Muller was indeed guilty. There was a penny pamphlet, Who murdered Mr Briggs? published. The writer stated, ‘The object of my pamphlet is to show that he [Muller] did not, or at least that Muller alone, is not guilty’. He argued that the evidence against Muller was circumstantial. For instance, the hat that was meant to be his, could have fitted many other men. James Smith wrote a similar pamphlet, titled, Has Muller been tried?

  Muller returned to Newgate to await execution. His counsel, Thomas Beard, came to see him at once and had a conversation with his client, in the presence of the prison governor, Mr Jones. Muller was told that the fight to save his life would continue, and that the German Legal Protection Society, who had financed his defence, would continue to help him, in finding new evidence and presenting a memorial to the Home Secretary on his behalf.

  After his first paroxysm of grief, Muller was quiet and composed, sleeping well. He spent much of his time reading and spoke but little to the warders. He had no visitors, except Mr Walbaum, a German Lutheran chaplain in London, and Mr Davis, the prison chaplain.

  Muller also came under suspicion of another recent murder – a not uncommon circumstance for convicted killers. In 1863, Emma Jackson had been killed in the St Giles district of London, having been stabbed by an unknown yo
ung man (the case is detailed in the author’s Unsolved Murders in Victorian and Edwardian London). Among the suspects were German sugar bakers in Peckham. It was thought that a handkerchief belonging to the victim had been found in Muller’s hat box. Yet the two witnesses who saw Emma with a man shortly before her death did not think Muller was the same man.

  However, although cleared of that crime, his defenders had no luck with their memorial to Sir George Grey, the Home Secretary, which they had presented on 10 November. They argued that the evidence used to convict Muller was weak and, furthermore, they had new evidence to cast doubt on the conviction. First, on the night of the murder, a man with bloodstained clothes (not Muller) had been seen in Hackney, near to where Briggs had been found. Secondly, Ellen Blyth said she remembered that Muller had been wearing the same clothes on the day of the murder and on the following day. On the latter, there were no bloodstains, nor did it seem that any had been washed off. It was also argued that a small man such as Muller could not possibly have successfully assaulted a larger man, such as Briggs. But their pleas were in vain. Indeed, they actually annoyed some Germans resident in London, one of whom wrote, ‘Most of the Germans in my acquaintance are fully convinced of the justness of the sentence against Muller.’ He added that the German Legal Protection Society only represented a few Germans and that, if they did not like British justice, they could always return to Germany.

  Meanwhile, preparations were being made for the execution of Muller. The scaffolding was being erected outside Newgate and the time for his death was announced. Crowds gathered and the roads nearby were blocked. Respectable people were shocked at these ruffianly and dirty people, numbering about 50,000, who were there for the spectacle. As The Times put it, ‘Such a concourse as we hope may never again be assembled either for the spectacle which they had in view on for the gratification of such lawless ruffianism as yesterday found its scope around the gallows.’ Just before he was taken to his death, Muller confessed to the chaplain that he had indeed killed Briggs, ‘Ich habe es gethan’.