It was discovered that Mrs Cotton had visited her old family, the Hamonets, in 1935. The Sureté confirmed this, but added that she was not ‘known to the police’ in that country. A friend in France did tell the police that a man there had been known to threaten her with violence. He was questioned and ruled out.
Initially, there were two men the police wished to locate for questioning. One was her estranged husband, who was then not thought to be deceased. The other was one Harry Cohen, who allegedly paid occasionally visits to her flat. Mrs Neri said that Mrs Cotton was very much afraid of one man, ‘a Jew man’ who had demanded money from her and that she was in love with another man. This was Dennis from Canada, her ‘sweetheart’, though he was never traced. Apparently, she had arranged with her friend to drop a utensil in order to warn her if her enemy had arrived. She added that, on the evening of 14 April, she and Mrs Cotton had gone out together and left a note outside the door, with the following written on the envelope, ‘Mr Cohen. Shall not be long. Gone to Marlborough Street.’ On their return, they found the note was intact. Efforts had been made to locate Cohen, but as the coroner, Oddie noted, ‘Well, we have hunted all over London trying to find out who this man Cohen is. There are thousands of them and it is a pretty hopeless task.’ Could this Mr Cohen have been the Harry Cohen who was released from jail in the autumn of 1934? It was presumably not Sidney Cohen, a costumier, who lived in Hendon and had a shop in the West End, whom Mrs Cotton asked for the whereabouts of James Allan Hall.
Hall was a 28-year-old clerk, paid £3 a week, who was separated from his wife, and who had been a neighbour of Mrs Cotton. Hall had been violent to his estranged wife during the marriage (‘She was frequently assaulted’). In 1935 and early 1936 he lived in one of the rooms in Lexington Street. He was homosexual and often invited men back to the flat, including a Scotsman called Donald Ross and several soldiers. Between them, they had damaged a mattress belonging to Mrs Cotton and the latter wanted compensation for this, amounting to £3. He had left Lexington Street at the end of January, moving to lodgings in Craven Street, where he was having problems with paying the rent. Hall and Mrs Cotton had been in correspondence about the mattress and she had threatened him with a court proceeding. The two had arranged to meet on the day before the murder, but it appears they did not do so. Therefore, he had a motive of a kind and did not have an alibi for the evening of 16 April, claiming he spent it in cinemas and pubs in Charing Cross Road, but ‘it is impossible to verify in every detail the truth of what he says’. He ‘created a most unfavourable impression in the minds of the jury’. Yet there was no evidence that he had entered the flat that evening and he had only a minor grievance against Mrs Cotton. Thus he was ruled out.
Craven Street, 2008. Author’s collection
Another suspect was Lanza. He had been born in Italy in 1892, came to England in 1912 and briefly served in the army 1918–1919. He married in 1920 and had two children. According to Neri, he and Mrs Cotton had ‘frequent quarrels’ and ‘did not get on well together’. Yet she had seen no sign of physical violence. Josephine Pouliquen from Boulogne, a friend of the deceased, told the police ‘I feel certain my friend was murdered by Mr Lanza, he is a brute and often kicked Madame Cotton.’ As he was at work at the time of the murder he must presumably be ruled out, though as Rupert Street is only a couple of minutes away from Lexington Street, he could have just popped out, committed the deed and returned.
Then there were lesser suspects. A man in a prison cell who had a picture of Mrs Cotton with him, and a man seen in Regent Street, who appeared to have recently been in a fight, were both suspected. Sharpe thought that none of these men were guilty, writing that many other men were questioned and ‘Against one of these persons – to whom I have not previously referred [i.e. not Cohen, Lanza or Hall] – there was a strong suspicion’. Sharpe was convinced that he had spoken to this unnamed man in the course of his investigation. It was ‘someone she knew’. Yet not even in the police file is this man mentioned, though some pages are still closed and names blacked out, so perhaps Sharpe’s suspect is mentioned there? Presumably so, as Sharpe noted there was a dossier at the Yard which ‘tells more than I possibly can’.
Sharpe concluded:
We could not get enough evidence to take any action, although it was not through lack of trying. The case is still an unsolved murder mystery, but at the same time the investigation remains and will remain – open. Unless something fresh turns up it is not likely that the murderer of Jeanette Marie Cotton will be brought to trial.
Motive was unclear, since it was neither money nor sexual assault. The police thought that ‘It is clear that the crime was committed by some person who knew the woman and had been to the place before.’ She had no known male friends and did not go to pubs. The communal door to the flats was locked after six. Either she let someone in whom she trusted or perhaps one of Neri’s clients killed her. A man called Alban was one of her regular clients and he was with her after half past six, though the murder probably was committed before then. There is no obvious reason for him to have killed her. Only Hall had any known animosity against her and it seems unlikely she would have let him in; Lanza had an alibi, so both seem unlikely.
Leah Hinds/Smith, 1936
Mrs Smith was the youngest of these victims, aged about 23 or 24 on death in 1936. She was born in the East Ham Infirmary in 1912 and was known as ‘Stilts Leah’, on account of her wearing high heels, and ‘Dutch Leah’. She was illegitimate, being the daughter of Kathleen Hinds and an engineer. She had been a difficult girl when young and lived with her grandmother, as her mother had tried to help her but had failed. She had left home whilst in her teens and had lived with a variety of men, one being a coloured man. This was Jim Rich, an entertainer, in 1930–2, who was apparently only interested in her for her money. Three other men who had made money from her were in prison in 1936. She had also had a baby in 1931 (who was soon adopted by someone else) and had married, in June 1933, Robert Thomas Smith, a Margate waiter. However, in August 1934 she had left him.
Other men in her life were William Sullivan, John Sutton, Alfred an Italian and George a Frenchman. As might be imagined, she moved address often, living in Bloomsbury High Street in 1935–6. At the beginning of April 1936, she met one Stanley King, born in Aldershot in 1912, the son of a soldier. He had come to London in 1931 and had worked in restaurants and nightclubs. Initially he had been a waiter, but by 1936 did conjuring tricks for a living. It was a seedy world in which he lived. One club he worked in was in Old Compton Street and was ‘a low class place and generally frequented by moral perverts and undesirables’. Leah was in love with him and, as a friend declared, ‘She didn’t intend to give him up as he had been very good to her and she loved him very much.’ Yet King, who initially believed Leah was a waitress, when he discovered her profession was unhappy about it and wanted her to cease. They took rooms in Little Pulteney Street, but soon moved.
Old Compton Street, 2008. Author’s collection
By early May 1936, they were living in a flat on the second floor at Old Compton Street, a dilapidated property. King wanted to move again, in the hope that she might discard her old ways, but there was little chance of that. There were arguments between them and King, who worked in the evenings, was unable to supervise her then, at her most active time and she brought men home, as she always had. It was Leah who had the only key between them and so he could not surprise her by arriving unannounced.
She was a well-known figure in the West End and often was seen in Cambridge Circus. Mrs Hinds was well known to the police, too. As the police report declared, she was ‘a low type of prostitute and a habitué of low class clubs in the Soho district’. At the time of her death she had eight convictions for soliciting.
On the evening Friday 8 May, Leah had been with several clients. Late that night she was seen on Old Compton Road, talking to Joan Maymar and another woman. It was about half past eleven. A Greek pestered Leah, who refused him. He
had been a client of hers, but only paid her half of the 10s promised in advance of the transaction. At a quarter to midnight, Leah left her friends, saying ‘I must try and get some money, I’m fed up, I haven’t been off tonight yet and there is no money coming in.’ Leah and Joan walked down Old Compton Street and parted outside the Palace Theatre just before midnight.
Just after midnight on Saturday 9 May, Emilio Piantino, the hall porter of the London Casino Restaurant, Old Compton Street, saw her with a man. He stated, ‘I was in the hall looking out into the street when I saw Leah Hinds with a man on the opposite side of the road walking towards Wardour Street. The man was on the inside of the pavement away from me and I do not think I would know him again.’ Yet he later said that the man was of fair complexion, slim, clean shaven and with thinning hair. He wore a dark raincoat but, eccentrically enough, was hatless. At half past twelve, two girls saw the two of them enter her flat. One of the women was Nellie Few, who had known Leah for six years. Lily Joyce was the other and she recalled Leah saying ‘if you can’t get it in the day, you must get it at night’. The man they saw was probably the same man seen by Piantino, described as being aged about 30, five feet eight tall, with long hair and a slouching gait. Police thought that such a bohemian character must be either a foreigner or, worse, an artist. He was not a known criminal. She was never seen alive again.
Later that morning, King called on her as arranged. He had tried several times from 4 am. At 8.45 am he rang again, but no one answered. After two more attempts to gain her attention, and after he heard her puppy whining within, he gave up. He left and soon found himself in a nearby restaurant where he met James Adams of no fixed abode, a pal from the previous evening. The two went to the flat and Adams broke the door down. The two men soon left and sought a policeman. PC John Davidson was found and Adams said, ’Oh constable, will you come along, I think a girl has been murdered. I have just broken into the flat and I saw her on the bed. Her head was covered with blood. I think her throat is cut. This poor little dog was with her.’
The police investigation was quick to take effect and, as before, Sharpe was in charge. First there was an examination of the scene of the crime. The victim was still partially dressed, though her stockings had been rolled down, probably by the woman herself, and she was lying on the bed, probably ready for her client. She had been strangled, by means of a thin wire, but her face had also been battered and there were bruises on the lower jaw and lower lip. The blows had been first, then the strangulation. She had probably met her death at about 12.55 am; possibly a little later, but not after 3 am. She had not been sexually assaulted. This savage attack led some to believe the attacker was ‘a dangerous homicidal maniac’.
Spilsbury examined her. He said that the head injuries were caused by a blunt instrument, such as the flat iron found in the flat. Any one of these several injuries would have rendered her unconscious. Yet it was the electric light wire around her throat which had caused death.
Elsewhere, her handbag was found on the floor, but there was only two pence there. Sharpe concluded ‘Robbery was the most likely motive for this murder, for Leah was known to have had money in her bag that night.’ Another clue was found on the edge of the wooden mantelpiece in the room. This was a fingerprint, which was shown not to be of anyone who normally had access to the room. That part of the mantelpiece with the incriminating mark was sawn off and carried away to the laboratory. However, the print did not match any of those in the police files. There were also fingerprints of Leah and King, as expected.
Another clue was a set of seaman’s papers. These were of a James Rose, a sailor who had recently visited her, and had lost them. He was soon tracked down and told the police that he had seen her a few days prior to the murder and had not returned for the papers because he could not remember where she lived. He could be proved to have been aboard ship at Margate on the night of the murder, so he was ruled out.
It was thought that six men had seen Mrs Hinds on her last evening. They were asked to report to the police, but unsurprisingly, none did. It was also rumoured that she had a rich Chinaman as a client. He insisted that she wore red stockings, even in public places, which she had agreed to. Mr Smith was questioned, but he had not seen her since she left him two years before. Some men who had previously been seen with her had left their usual haunts.
The police made a list of men who had been convicted of assaulting prostitutes in London in the past 18 months. These numbered 103. Some did not live in London. These men included Herbert Haynes of Hoddesdon, Gerald Barnes of Hertford, and George Brown, an undergraduate of Magdalene College, Cambridge. These men looked like the man seen with Leah. Yet all had alibis; Brown being at his college on the night of the murder for instance.
Magdalene College, Cambridge. Author’s collection
There was one man who does not seem to have been considered as a suspect, though perhaps he should have been. This was Captain Edward Broughton Smythe of the Essex Regiment, aged 35 in 1936. Although he bore an excellent character (he had served on the North West Frontier in 1930–1 and had gained medals there), he had recently retired due to chronic alcoholism and was undergoing treatment by Dr Leonard Brown of Harley Street. He also had no permanent address, but in 1936 was living in a hotel in Sidcup, Kent.
He deserves consideration as a suspect because in late May 1936, he went to a young woman’s flat in Gerrard Street, Soho, in the early hours of the morning. He put his hands around one Miss Bedford’s neck, pushed her backwards and said he would like to strangle her, though he later denied this. He later gripped her around the throat and Miss Bedford’s screams aroused her companion, Phyllis Thompson, who rushed to her aid. There is no doubt that he attempted to strangle her, as fingernail marks were found around her neck, and Miss Bedford claimed that he was laughing whilst he had her by the throat. Smythe was dealt with leniently, being bound over to keep the peace and had to pay costs. One wonders whether he may have committed more serious crimes where his victim was alone, or whether he was copying aspects of the Soho murders. After all, there were numerous similarities. Whatever the case, Smythe rejoined his old regiment with the outbreak of war in 1939 and saw active service again, going onto the army reserve list in 1942.
Gerrard Street, 2008. Author’s collection
Extensive searches were carried out in the vicinity of Soho shortly after the discovery of the crime. Lodging houses and boarding houses were examined. Any discarded clothes were also investigated as the killer might have thrown away any bloodstained clothes. Second-hand clothing shops were told to keep a look out for such. Some women came forward with what little they knew and were assured police protection as the number of officers in the district was increased. It was found that many such women lived in danger of threats of violence. As Sharpe noted, ‘Soho was turned upside down’. Yet he was pessimistic about the outcome, writing, ‘with so little to go on we were pretty well doomed to failure from the word “go”’.
It seems certain that a stranger killed her. Joan said ‘Leah Hinds has not had at any time complained to me of being frightened of any person or anyone ill treating her’. Her mother, who saw her a few days before her death, recalled, ‘She seemed perfectly happy and did not complain of being afraid of any person.’ The motive was probably the little money she had on her person, the police stating ‘It is reasonable to assume that robbery was the motive.’ After all, the handbag was empty and only two pence could be found in the room. The possibility of revenge by a former pimp was not seen as serious because there was no evidence of any quarrels or disorder in the room. The police conclusion was as follows:
The circumstances of the case rather indicate that her assailant was a chance acquaintance who accompanied her home for the purpose of robbery. The ferocity with which he attacked the unfortunate girl suggests he is a dangerous homicidal man.
George Killik, a Danish ex-jockey and an alleged diviner with mysterious powers of visions, was shown photographs of the deceased
by a newspaper. He claimed: ‘I see another girl who is in danger of her life.’ He thought the killer was a poor man, though once rich, who was thin, with large hands and dressed shabbily. Although not a London resident, he occasionally visited the city.
Leah’s estranged husband reported to the police as soon as he knew of the murder. He was resident in Margate and had a strong alibi for the night of the murder as he was with friends and had been seen by tradesmen on the following morning. King, too, can probably be eliminated as a suspect as he was at a nightclub on Little Denmark Street from 11.15 pm to 3.30 am. In any case, he seems to have been on excellent terms with her, despite disliking her calling.
Soho and the girls and women who worked the streets became increasingly frightened after this murder. Sharpe wrote ‘This was Soho’s fourth murder within six months, the papers were talking of a new Jack the Ripper’. This was despite the fact that the Ripper’s victims had their throats cut and were mutilated.
Although Mrs Cotton’s inquest had begun on 21 April, it was adjourned and the inquests on both her and Mrs Hinds were concluded at Westminster Coroners’ Court on 9 June. Neither was conclusive. Both were cases of murder and had been committed by an unknown killer. No one was ever convicted of either crime, nor that of Mrs Martin in the previous year.
It is tempting to conclude that a serial strangler was at work here. After all, the women all lived within a short distance at each other and were all killed within six months. All were strangled. Two were prostitutes. All the murders occurred indoors. The press certainly thought this was a series, but it was uncertain whether any of the women knew one another. Mrs Hind’s mother said, ‘So far as I know, she was not acquainted with the victims of the previous murders.’ On the other hand, some street women, friends of Mrs Hinds, said that she knew the other two victims. Apparently ‘Rightly or wrongly, rumour attributed them to some known hand, especially if that hand had already struck more than once.’ It was said, ‘While some of Scotland Yard’s chiefs are inclined to think that the affairs are in no way related, it is pointed out that the possibility of one man being responsible for them all cannot be ruled out.’ It was not only the press which thought so, because Detective Inspector Edwards, who had investigated the Mrs Martin case, thought that the papers of this case ‘might be of assistance in the cases of Jeanett Cousins and Constance May Smith alias Leah Hinds at present under investigation’.
Unsolved London Murders Page 16
