by Sly, Nicola;
On initial examination by the doctor, the woman was found to have numerous head wounds varying in severity, which had bled profusely. Rigor mortis was present in her arms and legs and her hands were clenched and stained with blood, as if she had fought hard for her life. Simmons theorised that some of the wounds had been caused by a fist, others by a blunt instrument, such as a hammer, which seemed to have had a projection of some kind or a curved end. He estimated that the woman had been dead for anywhere between five and thirty-six hours.
At a later post-mortem examination, Simmons established that the woman had several skull fractures and that pieces of bone had been driven into her brain. The cause of death was given as shock and blood loss due to severe wounds to the head and face. Her stomach contained approximately two ounces of partially digested blood and little else – she had not eaten for some time. Although her skirts had been lifted, exposing her underwear, there was no physical evidence of a sexual assault, but Simmons was unable to say that this had not been attempted. If the victim had not been sexually assaulted, then it was difficult to imagine a motive for her murder, since she had been carrying nothing worth stealing.
As soon as the police heard from the Wilkins family, they learned of the telegram that had been sent from Boscombe post office. On checking at the post office, they found that two similar telegrams had been sent to different recipients in the few days prior to the murder.
The first, sent on 17 December, was in answer to another advertisement in the Morning Post. Like the telegram to Irene Wilkins, the words ‘expences’ and ‘Bournmouth’ were mis-spelled. The recipient, Miss Betty Ditmansen of West Hampstead, decided not to follow up on the telegram since she didn’t want to work so far away from London. It was probably one of the best decisions she ever made in her life.
View from Boscombe Pier.
The second telegram had been sent on 20 December to a nursing agency that had advertised its services, again in the Morning Post. This telegram requested that a nurse be sent urgently to ‘Boscombe Grange’ and the agency despatched Nurse Burnside in response. On arriving at Bournemouth, the nurse found no car waiting for her as had been promised. She hailed a taxi and was eventually driven to Boscombe Grange in Percy Road, where the occupants professed to have no knowledge of any telegram and no need for the services of a nurse. Having already enquired at numerous nursing homes in the area and several other addresses that included the word Grange, Nurse Burnside was, by now, tired and somewhat confused. The occupants of Boscombe Grange took pity on her and found her a bed for the night and, the following morning, she went to Boscombe post office to try and locate the sender of the telegram.
By an amazing coincidence, Nurse Burnside was actually in the post office at exactly the same time that the man handed over the telegram to be sent to Irene Wilkins. As she tried to unravel the mystery of her telegram, the very person who sent it must have overheard her!
The police were in no doubt that the same person had sent all the telegrams. They questioned the staff at the post office and found one person, counter clerk Alice Waters, who recalled something of the sender. She had been unable to read one of the words on the telegram form, thinking that the word car looked like ‘ear’. She had queried the wording and had been corrected by the sender, who, she recalled, had a particularly gruff, husky voice. Acting on her recollections, the police issued a description of a man that they wanted to speak to in connection with the murder. Age 28–30; 5ft 6in to 5ft 8in in height; dressed in a chauffeur’s hat and overcoat, blue in colour; having the appearance of a chauffeur; uneducated speech.’
Having spoken to railway workers and taxi drivers who had been at the station in Bournemouth at time when Irene Wilkins had expected to have been met, they also put out an appeal for the owners of a dark blue six-cylinder Sunbeam with the letter X in the registration plate and a large grey car with black wings and a Middlesex registration plate to come forward. Another car that they were anxious to trace – which may or may not have been the Sunbeam – bore the registration XE 5086, and another had the numbers 7006, but no index letter or letters were known.
Two taxi drivers both claimed to have seen Irene Wilkins at the station but their accounts differed. Mr Webb remembered Irene wearing a light coloured cloak, while Mr Brown recalled it as being dark purple. Neither description matched the clothes that Irene Wilkins had actually been wearing when she set out for Bournemouth, which were described by her mother as a heavy brown coat, brown suede hat, blue woollen jumper, navy blue skirt and black shoes and stockings
Meanwhile, at an inquest into the death of Irene Wilkins held on 27 December, the jury returned a verdict of wilful murder by person or persons unknown.
The first real breakthrough in the investigation came on 31 December when Benjamin Barnley, an unemployed groom, was walking on Canford Cliffs, about eight miles from where Irene’s body had been discovered, and spotted a folded woman’s nightdress on the ground. When he looked more closely, he found an attaché case, an empty purse and assorted personal possessions concealed under a rhododendron bush. The effects included an envelope containing an Army testimonial for Irene May Wilkins and the telegram she had been sent summoning her to Bournemouth. Realising the significance of his find, Barnley went straight to the police station. The items were damp and stained with mildew and had obviously been there for some time. Surprisingly, Barnley had walked the same path six times a day for the previous nine days and had not previously noticed anything.
Canford Cliffs, 1933.
On the same day, Superintendent Shadrach Garrett of the Hampshire Police issued a new appeal for information. Accusing the public of apathy, Garrett said that the police had been unable to trace any of Irene Wilkins’s movements after she left home. Reported sightings of a woman matching her description seen at Bournemouth station were conflicting and not conclusive. They were interested in details of any cars seen at the station on 22 December and were now also seeking the driver of a two-seater car seen parked with its headlights on near the woods where the attaché case had been found.
It was estimated that between twelve and fifteen cars had been at the station at the crucial time and, so far, only six owners or drivers had come forward. Of particular interest were the large six-cylinder Sunbeam, another large six-cylinder car of unknown manufacture and also some two-seaters. Eventually, the police decided to examine all the cars in the district, asking owners, drivers and chauffeurs to submit their cars for examination. As tyre marks had been found near to where Irene’s body had been dumped, they naturally paid particular attention to the tyres. At the same time, the police took the decision to publish a copy of the telegram in the local and national newspapers, in the hope that someone may recognise the handwriting.
One man who was interviewed at the time was Thomas Henry Allaway, a thirty-six-year-old chauffeur employed by a Mr Arthur Sutton, who was then resident at the Carlton Hotel, Bournemouth. Allaway lived with his wife and three-year-old daughter in Haviland Road, Boscombe, and routinely garaged his employer’s car at Portman Mews Garage, Boscombe.
Allaway was seen by police on 7 January, and his employer’s car, a Mercedes with the registration number LK 7405, was inspected. The car’s front tyres were both Dunlop Magnums, while the rear tyres were one Dunlop Magnum and one Michelin. Allaway told the police that the car tyres had not been changed since 22 December.
Nothing about the car excited suspicion and Allaway was able to account for his movements on the evening of 22 December. He was asked to write copies of the decoy telegrams, but his handwriting differed from that on the originals.
The case dragged on unsolved, although the police continued to make exhaustive enquiries, staging a reconstruction and even apparently calling on the services of psychics and mediums. With no further leads, in April 1922, Superintendent Garrett ordered a full review of all the documentation pertaining to the enquiry, which by that time numbered in excess of 20,000 items.
Among the statements rev
isited were two made by engineer Frank Humphris. Superintendent Garrett had read the first statement, made within forty-eight hours, in which Humphris described alighting from the 4.30 p.m. train at Bournemouth and seeing a woman resembling the description of Irene Wilkins being driven off in a car by a man. Humphris had given a good description of both the man and the car.
On the morning of 4 January, Humphris had again presented himself at the police station to say that he had just seen the same man and car at the station. This time he had the presence of mind to write down the car’s make and registration number. It was the Mercedes LK 7405, registered to Allaway’s employer.
Allaway was interviewed as a consequence of this statement, but incredibly the evidence linking him and his car to Bournemouth station at the crucial time was misplaced and consequently Garrett didn’t see it until the third week in April.
Over the course of the investigations, various pieces of information about Allaway had reached the police. Walter Randall, who garaged his vehicle in the same place as Allaway’s, claimed that the Mercedes was not in its usual place at the time of the murder and that Allaway had changed one of the car’s tyres on 24 December, just two days later. Allaway’s employer’s son lived at a place called ‘Beech Hurst’, which was a similar name to the ‘Beech House’ used in the telegram sent to Nurse Burnside. And finally, his employer’s sister-in-law lived just a few yards from the spot where Irene’s case had been found and, on 23 December, Allaway had driven Mrs Sutton there to take tea, waiting outside in the car for her for more than an hour.
While these snippets of information about Allaway were purely circumstantial evidence, Humphris’s second statement seemed to link him to Bournemouth station and to a woman matching the description of Irene Wilkins. Allaway was promptly elevated to the top of the list of suspects.
Allaway and his family had recently moved house from Haviland Road to a flat in Windsor Road, Boscombe. He must have got wind of the renewed police interest in him as he began to make preparations to flee the area. On 20 April, he stole his employer’s chequebook and forged Sutton’s signature, obtaining more than £20 from local traders who knew him as Sutton’s chauffeur. He sent his wife and child to her parents’ home in Reading and he himself travelled to North London, using the alias Mr T. Cook.
The theft of the cheques was reported to the police on 22 April and Inspector Brewer was sent to London to arrest Allaway for forgery. However, Brewer was unable to locate his quarry and accordingly a watch was placed on the Reading home of Allaway’s in-laws. On the evening of 28 April, Allaway was spotted arriving at Reading but, as the police moved in to apprehend him, he ran off. A passer-by saw the resulting chase and stuck out a foot, sending Allaway sprawling, thus allowing the police to capture him.
Charged with forgery, Allaway was detained at Reading until Superintendent Garrett arrived to collect him and escort him back to Bournemouth. While in Reading, Garrett visited Mrs May Allaway to obtain some samples of her husband’s writing. With her permission, police later took possession of seven postcards from the flat in Boscombe that her husband had sent to her in the past. These were sent to a handwriting expert in London, Mr Gerald Guerin, along with the decoy telegrams and some betting slips found in Allaway’s pockets on his arrest. Guerin was certain that the postcards and telegrams were written by the same hand and, having examined the betting slips, he also pointed out that the chauffeur had changed his handwriting style since 22 December.
Back in Bournemouth, Allaway was placed in an identity parade with several other men dressed in chauffeur’s uniforms. Witnesses, including Mr Humphris and post office clerk Alice Waters, picked him out of the line up immediately, while newsagent Albert Samways had no hesitation in identifying him as one of two men who had purchased a Morning Post newspaper from him on 22 December. One of the other members of the identity parade was very similar in physical appearance to Allaway and some witnesses initially picked out the look-alike. Most seemed to realise that they had made an error and asked for a second look, this time choosing Allaway.
On 6 May, Thomas Henry Allaway was formally charged with the murder of Irene Wilkins. Asserting his innocence, he asked police for a pen and paper so that he might write a statement. The resulting document was riddled with spelling mistakes and the handwriting was seen to change in style from upright to the right-handed slope of the telegrams.
After magistrates at Bournemouth Police Court heard the case, they committed Allaway to stand trial at the next Hampshire Assizes. The proceedings opened at Winchester Castle on 3 July 1922, with Mr Justice Avory presiding. Mr Thomas Inskip KC MP led the case for the prosecution, while Mr A.C. Fox Davies defended.
No less than forty-three witnesses were called for the prosecution while only eighteen appeared for the defence, including Allaway himself. The accused first denied having written any of the telegrams. The postcards to his wife, written while he was serving in Germany with a motor ambulance convoy in 1918, had been penned for him by another man, after he had sprained his wrist starting an engine. He also denied having changed his handwriting after the murder and was most emphatic in stating that he had not killed Irene Wilkins, saying that, at the time of her murder, he had been in a Working Men’s Club and later the Salisbury Hotel. Yet, in the course of giving evidence, Allaway also proved himself to be poor at spelling. Asked by the judge to spell the word pleasant, he immediately replied that it was spelled like the word present. The telegram to Nurse Burnside had requested a ‘plesent [sic] companion’.
The purpose of most of the defence witnesses was to support Allaway’s alibi. A Mrs Dundee confirmed that she had seen Allaway in Boscombe at 8 p.m. on the night of the murder. She was certain of the date, because she had been going to the Hippodrome to see a performance. Several witnesses recalled seeing the defendant in the Conservative Club and several more remembered that he was in the Salisbury Hotel from 8.05 p.m. to 9.55 p.m. Charles Barrett, the owner of the Portman Mews garage, stated that he had locked the Mercedes in the garage at about 6.15 p.m. Barrett said that he had the only key to the premises, although this particular evidence was disproved as a copied key had been found at the Allaway’s home. Taxi driver George Troke also testified that Mr Sutton’s car had been locked in the garage at the time of the murder. However, although all of these witnesses initially appeared certain of the truth of their statements, it became evident during cross-examination that most were confusing dates and times.
Postman Arthur Elkins was a much more credible witness for the defence. On the night of the murder, he had moved his goats near the field at Tuckton in which the body was found. At 8.15 p.m., he had seen a car with dimmed headlights parked near to the scene of the crime and the car was still there when he returned about half an hour later. His hat had blown off and landed very close to the car, so he had got a good look at and described it as small, dark and looking like a taxi cab, nothing like the large Mercedes driven by Allaway.
May Allaway had stood by her husband all along and now she too gave evidence in his defence. On the night of the murder, she stated that she had left him at the Conservative Club at about 7 p.m. and gone to the cinema alone. She had met her husband by prior arrangement at the Salisbury Hotel, finding him already there when she arrived at 8.50 p.m. His appearance and behaviour that evening was completely normal and she had noticed no stains on his clothing and had seen no changes in him since the murder. She also stated that a screw-hammer and spanner found at Allaway’s home, and thought to be the murder weapons, had been stored in London and had not arrived in Boscombe until the end of January.
The defence witnesses failed to convince the jury, who also managed to ignore a passionate display by Allaway’s mother who, during the course of the Judge’s summing up, suddenly fell to her knees in prayer. After deliberating for an hour, they returned a verdict of ‘Guilty’.
Asked by the clerk of the court if he had anything to say as to why he should not receive judgement of death, Allaway was so shocked
at the verdict that he didn’t hear the question and had to ask for it to be repeated. When it was, he responded, ‘I am innocent of this crime – absolutely’.
His declaration of innocence had no effect on the judge who promptly sentenced him to death for what he described as ‘this foul and brutal murder’. As Allaway left the court, he suddenly glared at the judge with what one observer described as ‘a look of concentrated malevolence, which revealed for a fraction of time the brutal soul within him.’
An appeal was immediately lodged but it proved unsuccessful and Allaway’s execution was scheduled for 19 August 1922. Shortly before his execution, he apparently made a full confession of his guilt to the prison governor, although when visited by his wife and brother, just hours later, he reverted to claiming his innocence.
John Ellis carried out the execution at Winchester and it was not the most efficient execution of his career, since the noose slipped and, rather than dying from a broken neck, Allaway died from strangulation, his death taking a couple of minutes rather than occurring instantaneously. He died without revealing his motive for the murder.
[Note: In various contemporary accounts of the murder, the man who found Irene Wilkins’s body is alternatively named Octavius Nicklen or Charles Nicklen. The finder of her attaché case is named as either Benjamin Barnley or Benjamin Barnby. Engineer Frank Humphris is also referred to as Humphries.]
14
‘YOU WOULDN’T CHEAT ME, WOULD YOU?’
Poole, 1925
It as perhaps a measure of the unhappiness of Frederick Young’s home life that a stay in the Royal Victoria Hospital in Bournemouth with an injured hand seemed to him like a relaxing holiday. Young, aged forty-six, lived cheerlessly in Francis Road, Branksome, with a wife who was seriously mentally ill and their one son, Alfred, who worked as an errand boy. Yet a break from his work and his clinically insane wife were not the only attractions of the hospital stay for Young – the main highlight was a shapely twenty-one-year-old nurse, Flossie Davies.
