Marie Jeanneret’s jury found her guilty of murdering six people and the attempted murder of two others by the administration of poisonous drugs.
The Jury, however, found themselves unable to condemn a woman to death and added that the crime had “extenuating circumstances.” This meant the court was unable to sentence Marie to anything in excess of twenty years. If Marie Jeanneret had been born a man, she would most likely have had her head chopped off at the neck.
Following this verdict, it was felt that it would be unreasonable to punish other murderers in a more severe manner than Marie Jeanneret. Shortly after Marie’s trial, capital punishment was abolished in Geneva.
Marie Jeanneret died in 1884 in the prison of St. Antonio, Geneva.
Prison of St. Antonio, Geneva.
UNITED KINGDOM
SARAH MALCOLM
Sarah Malcolm was a middle-class girl born in Durham, England in 1711. Her merchant father squandered the family’s finances away, and Sarah’s life changed from having a secure family home to one of poverty. While still only a teenager, Sarah was obliged to move to London and find work in service. When she left service, she gained herself a job at a public house, the “Black Horse”, near Temple Bar; here, she apparently became enmeshed with London’s criminal low life.
When she gave up her job at the public house, she took work as a cleaner servicing several flats in a building that housed the Inns of Court. One of her employees was a wealthy eighty-year-old widow called Lydia Duncomb who lived with a sixty-year-old companion, Elizabeth Harrison, and a seventeen-year-old maid, Ann Price.
On Sunday, February 4th of 1733 Mrs. Ann Love and Mrs. Frances Rhymer came to visit Mrs. Duncomb. They could get no answer to their continual knocks on the door or see or hear any sign of life. Fearing something was amiss they eventually managed to gain access to the apartment and were met with grisly scenes. They first came across the dead body of Ann Price lying in the hallway. There was a knife wound to her throat, and Ann’s hands were clutching the wound. In the bedroom, Elizabeth Harrison was lying on her bed, an apron string tied around her throat. Mrs. Duncomb was in the living room in her chair and had also been strangled. They also realized that the flat had been robbed of all valuables, and Mrs. Duncomb’s safe had been opened with force.
John Kerrel, another flat owner in the building who also employed Sarah, returned to his apartment unusually late Saturday night/ Sunday morning and was extremely surprised to find Sarah there. He requested that she leave.
After she had left, he discovered that a few of his clothes had gone missing. Moreover, in a linen basket hidden under some sheets, he found a silver tankard that had a blood stained handle. Upon searching some more, he discovered stuffed in a kitchen cupboard a bloodstained dress and apron. Without further ado, he contacted the police who found Sarah by the gate of Inner-Temple. She was immediately placed under arrest and remanded in custody.
Sarah admitted to the robbery but declared that a woman called Tracey and two brothers called Alexander had actually done the murders. The Alexander´s quickly turned themselves into the authorities and proved their innocence.
Upon arrival at Newgate prison during the admissions search, a normal procedure, the guards discovered Sarah had a large amount of gold and silver coins. Sarah admitted they belonged to Mrs. Duncomb. Also found was a purse, stuffed down the front of her dress, containing twenty-one guineas. She offered to give them to the prison officer if he kept quiet about their discovery. He refused and reported Sarah’s attempt at trying to bribe him.
Sarah stood trial at the Old Bailey, on the twenty-third of February in 1733. She was tried alone. Sarah was not represented by counsel but defended herself forcefully. She admitted to participating in the robbery but strongly denied the murders. Witnesses the prosecution brought into the court Sarah questioned in miniscule detail, attempting to discredit their testimony.
Sarah based her defense on the fact that the blood found on her clothing was because she was menstruating the night of the robbery and was, therefore, not the blood of Ann Price, the dead maid. Remember this was in the days long before any laboratory testing.
Sarah Malcolm was indicted for the murders and the robbery. Her trial lasted five hours. The jury in less than twenty minutes found her guilty. The judge ordered her to be hung at the gallows.
Crimes such as this, particularly when carried out by women, were uncommon at the time, and the trial was reported at length in a sensational manner in the papers. Sarah received almost celebrity status.
The famous painter at the time, William Hogarth, painted her portrait in prison a couple of days prior to her execution. Hogarth believed “she was capable of any wickedness”.
In her condemned cell at Newgate prison, she continued to profess her innocence of the murders. However, the night before her execution, newspapers claimed Sarah had confessed to the Reverend Mr. Piddington.
Sarah Malcolm by William Hogarth
On the way to the execution spot, Sarah passed out in the cart and, once revived, she appeared deeply agitated and cried bitterly. On arriving at the gallows, Sarah fainted and was again revived. Before the cart was removed and left her hanging, she looked towards the Temple. She asked Christ to receive her soul as she looked up into the sky. As the cart drove off, she was left hanging, feebly kicking, and died after a short struggle.
She was just 22 when she was hanged for the murders of the three women. Her corpse was dissected and for many years the skeleton was displayed at the Botanical Gardens in Cambridge.
What had made this young woman with no previous history of violence turn overnight into a multiple killer?
ELIZABETH BROWNRIGG
The Torture-Killer
Elizabeth Brownrigg resided in London, in the middle of the eighteenth Century. She was a highly respected married woman, mother, and mid-wife. Her husband, James Brownrigg, was an industrious plumber and housepainter. Between them, they had sixteen children but only three survived infancy. Elizabeth was dark-haired, with a sizable, irregular, hooked nose, a strong chin, pursed mouth, and skinny neck. As a respected mid-wife, she was given custody of several young girls as domestic maids from the London Foundling Hospital.
In 1765, the authorities of St. Dunstan Parish placed into the Brownrigg home Mary Mitchell, who was fourteen, to learn the skills of a mid-wife. In England at this time, with no contraception available, families with many children were normal. Women with midwife skills were much in demand. For poverty-stricken working class girls, this was an excellent skill to learn as it was a way to escape the poverty trap and avoid the brothel. Mary must have considered herself exceedingly fortunate.
The first four weeks of Mary’s time with the Brownrigg’s passed satisfactorily and then another teenager, Mary Jones, from another foundling home joined the household.
Elizabeth Brownrigg’s behavior underwent a change. She was frequently angry with the girls, in particular Mary Jones. Mary Jones would be ordered to lie on two kitchen chairs strapped together and would then be tied down. Elizabeth Brownrigg would then whip her body frantically, pausing only when her arm became too tired. If Mary Jones fainted, which she frequently did, Elizabeth Brownrigg would revive her by squashing her entire head into a bucket of cold water. Both girls would be hit and beaten senselessly for the smallest offense. They were forbidden to leave the house and at night were locked in their bedroom.
Mary Jones managed to escape one night and returned to the foundling home. Here, she told all. The shocked officials wrote to Elizabeth Brownrigg insisting on an explanation. The letter was never replied to and, unbelievably, no further steps were taken.
This left the poor young Mary Mitchell alone, a victim and a prisoner in the Brownrigg home. Elizabeth Brownrigg put in an application to a different district for another girl apprentice, and Mary Clifford, at the age of fourteen, was placed with the Brownrigg family.
Elizabeth Brownrigg began abusing both girls with increasing intensity and severity.
The girls were made to work in the nude. They were hung from a hook in the kitchen and had their naked flesh whipped.
Not surprisingly, the girls would wet their beds. When this happened, as punishment, they would be forced to sleep on straw with no cover in an icy coal cellar. The girls survived their ordeal on bread and water.
Mary Mitchell managed to escape one day, but a son of Elizabeth’s and James’s, John Brownrigg, found her and hauled her back to the house. Elizabeth Brownrigg increased her beatings and cruelty as punishment. James, and his son John, also took their turns in beating the naked girls.
Mary Clifford seemed to be the most picked upon, sometimes receiving up to five lashings a day. Elizabeth Brownrigg would beat her until blood poured down the poor girl’s emaciated body. She would then be ordered to wash in a tin tub filled with cold water. Mary Mitchell was ordered to witness the beatings as a reminder to her as to what would happen if she disobeyed.
One day, after a particularly horrendous beating, Mary Clifford’s wounds contracted gangrene. She was spotted by a neighbor, through a skylight, writhing and groaning in pain.
The neighbor reported his sightings to the authorities. Police officers, accompanied by a doctor, called on the house. They discovered Mary Mitchell. The doctor tried to examine Mary, but the last whipping she had endured had caused her bloodied corset to become firmly adhered to her body. The officers insisted on searching the house. Elizabeth Brownrigg and her son John were both absent at the time.
They found the emaciated Mary Clifford locked up in a broom closet. She was rushed to the hospital and died. James Brownrigg was taken into custody.
When Elizabeth and John Brownrigg returned home, they soon realized that the police were on to them. They hurriedly packed their possessions and crept silently out of the house. The story was widely reported in the newspapers, and it was not long before Elizabeth Brownrigg and her son were apprehended.
The three Brownrigg’s stood trial at the Old Bailey. Elizabeth was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death by hanging at Tyburn, and her corpse ordered to be publicly dissected. Mr. Brownrigg and John Brownrigg were cleared of murder but faced another trial on less serious charges, for which they received only six months in prison, despite their active and willing participation in Mrs. Brownrigg’s abominable, odious crimes. The newspapers were full of lurid stories of the middle-aged midwife who sadistically tortured young girls.
A howling mob accompanied Elizabeth Brownrigg to the gallows at Tyburn. Elizabeth Brownrigg, as she stood with the noose about her neck, prayed out loud for her soul to be saved and admitted her guilt.
A statue of the abominable Elizabeth Brownrigg is on show in the London Dungeon, a London horror museum.
Elizabeth BrownRigg
SARAH AND SARAH MORGAN METYARD
Sarah Metyard and her daughter, Sarah Morgan Metyard, were milliners in London. They lived in Hanover Square. In 1758, they took in five apprentice teenage girls from various parish workhouses. One of the girls was Anne Naylor, along with her sister.
Anne Naylor was not a healthy girl and infuriated Sarah Metyard. It infuriated her so much that she became exceedingly cruel to the girl. Anne Naylor made an attempt to run away but was caught and imprisoned in an attic. She was fed only bread scraps and water. She attempted to escape again and was caught by the daughter, Sarah Morgan Metyard, who grabbed her around the throat and dragged the poor girl back to the house. She was taken to her attic room and thrown on the bed. The mother then proceeded to hit her with a broomstick while the daughter held her down.
Mother and daughter then secured a rope around her waist, with her hands tied behind her. They attached the rope to a door in such a way that it made it impossible for Anne to either lie or sit down. Anne was left like this for three days. On the fourth day, she died.
They pretended to others in the house that she was fine, and they would be seen carrying food up to the attic as if everything was normal. When Anne’s rotting body began to smell, they stuffed it in a trunk. They then told the other girls that Anne had run away. With the smell getting worse, the two Sarah’s dismembered the body. They wrapped the head and body up in one cloth and the arms and legs in another. Under the cover of darkness, they carried the dismembered corpse and disposed of it in various sewers.
Parts of the corpse were duly discovered and delivered to the authorities. The coroner, thought from the butchery that had been used upon them, that the bodies must have been used by surgeons for dissection and dismissed any investigation.
The sister of Anne Naylor mentioned to a lodger in the house that she was convinced her sister had been murdered. When the lodger repeated this conversation to Sarah Metyard, the daughter and mother then murdered the sister in the same cruel manner.
The daughter, Sarah Morgan, was also abused and mistreated by her mother. A lodger, who she confided in, persuaded her to go to the police convincing her that she would be excused of any crime because of her mother’s treatment of her.
Sarah Morgan, after yet more abuse by her mother, did indeed go to the authorities and confess all. Both the mother and daughter were arrested.
They stood trial at the Old Bailey, and both were sentenced to be hung at Tyburn, on the 19th of July, 1768, for the Cruel Murders of Parish Apprentices.
The corpses were then taken in a hearse to Surgeons' Hall, where they were exposed to the inquisitive gaze of the public before being dissected.
CATHERINE WILSON
Catherine Wilson was born in England in 1822.
Nothing is known about her early life. The first working position that we are aware of is when she was a housekeeper to Peter Mawer, a retired sea captain, at his house in Boston, Lincolnshire, England. He was so delighted with her housekeeping skills that he made the fateful mistake of telling Catherine that she would be in his will. A short while later he passed away from colchicum poisoning. Colchicum was prescribed by doctors in small amounts to relieve the symptoms of gout. Taken in excess, it is lethal. As Captain Mawer was a gout patient who was prescribed the medicine, his death was attributed to his accidentally taking too high a dose. In hindsight, it occurred to people that the dose had been administered by Catherine.
Catherine then moved to London with a male character called Dixon who Catherine claimed was her husband. They found rooms in the house of a rich widow, Mrs. Maria Soames. In July, within a short time of being in the house, Catherine’s husband Dixon abruptly fell sick. A couple of days later he was dead. The local doctor was reluctant to issue a death certificate without a postmortem. Catherine cajoled and pleaded with him. Her husband, Catherine claimed, had always had a terror of being cut up after his death. The doctor finally relented and issued a death certificate saying that Dixon had died of consumption.
A short time afterward in October, Mrs. Soames went on a visit to her brother in Islington, London. From him, she borrowed £9 ($13.57). She returned home in excellent spirits and health according to others in the house. Catherine Wilson asked to see Mrs. Soames privately in her room. The two women retired to Mrs. Soames' rooms and enjoyed pork-pie and a brandy and water together. During the night, Mrs. Soames became ill and was vomiting chronically. In the morning, one of Mrs. Soames daughters called on her mother. She found her mother suffering from extreme chest pains and vomiting. A doctor came who prescribed some chalk mixture, clearly believing she was suffering from diarrhea. Catherine Wilson volunteered to nurse Mrs. Soames and ensure that she took her medication. Mrs. Soames died four days later in agony. The doctor suspected poison but was not skilled enough to prove it. A post-mortem found no trace of poisoning, nor was the nine pounds borrowed from Mr. Barnes ever found.
Catherine then moved to Brixton, London. She invited Mrs. Atkinson from Kirby, Lonsdale and a wealthy friend of hers, to stay. A few days into her stay, Catherine sent Mr. Atkinson a telegram telling him that his wife had passed away suddenly after unknown people had stolen all of her money. Mrs. Atkinson had suffered from the same symp
toms as Mrs. Soames.
In 1862, Catherine worked as a live-in nurse, nursing a Mrs. Sarah Carnell. Sarah Wilson became a close friend and companion to Mrs. Carnell. Mrs. Carnell, like the sea captain Peter Mawer, made her plans to leave a legacy to Sarah clear. One day when Sarah Carnell was lying in bed feeling unwell, Sarah brought her a beverage saying it would make her feel better. Sarah Carnell took a mouthful and spat it out, complaining that it had burned her mouth and then watched in terror as her spit burned a hole through the bed linen. The broth Catherine had tried to entice Sarah Carnell to consume turned out to have enough sulfuric acid to kill fifty people.
Catherine beat a hasty retreat but six weeks later was arrested, during which time the police had begun to investigate Catherine’s past. They visited past work and accommodation addresses. A pattern soon emerged that nearly everyone Catherine met had died mysteriously.
She stood trial at the Old Bailey for the attempted murder of Sarah Carnell. She pleaded not guilty. Her lawyer, Mr. Montague Williams, persuaded the jury that a pharmacist had mistakenly filled the medicine bottle with sulfuric acid. The judge summed against the defense by saying, “the theory of the defense was an untenable one,” but astonishingly to probably all in court the jury found Catherine Wilson not guilty.
OLD BAILEY COURT ROOM
As Catherine left the courthouse, the police were waiting for her and quickly rearrested her and charged her with the unlawful killing of seven patients who had been in her care. Catherine denied each one of the charges.
Catherine Wilson began her second trial at the Old Bailey on the 25th of September in 1862 before Mr. Justice Byles. Mr. Montague Williams once again defended her. During the trial, it was alleged that seven people whom Wilson had lived with or cared for had died. All had rewritten their wills to leave her money. This evidence was not admitted.
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