I recollect, and the public will remember, the notorious Neil [sic] Cream. This man was convicted and executed for a series of murders of women in South London, to whom he gave pills containing poison.
Another well known case is Smith, of the Brides in the Bath murders. These two will suffice for the point I wish to make.
The point is this. Could either of these two men be looked upon as maniacal or insane? On the contrary. Neil [sic] Cream was a person of intelligence and cunning.
He certainly had a vein of cruelty in him, but I think notoriety more than anything else moved him to carry out his designs. I saw this man several times. From my study of him, I wish to emphasise that there was nothing whatever of the madman about him.
And so far as Smith is concerned, his murders were committed for the purpose of becoming possessed of his poor victims’ property. He married them, got their money and drowned them.
It was systematic but, above all, the act of a man who could think out his schemes very cleverly.13
To his credit, Dew did not engage in any speculation that prostitute poisoner Dr Thomas Neill Cream (1850–92) had been Jack the Ripper. He had dismissed the theory in his memoirs, saying ‘Various men who were hanged for subsequent murders [to those of Jack the Ripper], notably Neil [sic] Cream, came under the suspicion of the public, but there were never any real grounds for believing that any one of them had had anything to do with the Whitechapel crimes.’ There had been suggestions over the years that Cream (who was executed in 1892) and the Ripper were one and the same. However, Chief Inspector Mulvaney, who had worked on the Cream case, easily dismissed Cream’s candidature on the grounds that he was in an American prison at the time of the murders, and of his belief that such criminals do not vary their method of killing.14
The Smith of the Brides in the Bath murders whom Dew had referred to was George Joseph Smith (1872–1915). Smith was a bigamist who murdered three women between 1912 and 1914 by drowning them in baths. He was executed in 1915 at Maidstone.15 John Ellis, who had hanged both Crippen and Smith, thought that Smith failed miserably to match the dignity of Dr Crippen, ‘though he tried so hard to ape the gentleman’.16
21
Memoirs
He was a good detective, and he’s a good story-teller.
Daily Telegraph (Sydney)
Over twenty years after his successful libel trials, Dew was once again provoked into defending his conduct in the Crippen case. The perceived slight appeared in July 1934, when the Daily Mail printed an article entitled ‘What a Big Crime Costs the Nation’, in which it said that the cost of the
Crippen case was £10,000, not to mention the cost of the trial.1 Dew wrote an angry letter to the editor of the Mail the same day the paper had run the story. The letter does not appear to have been published. It read:
I was interested to read the above mentioned article in to-days ‘Daily Mail’.
I was more than interested, and indeed staggered, at the statement therein as follows:
‘Dr. Crippen, the murderer of Belle Elmore, his actress wife made a dash for Canada with a woman companion. Before the first wireless used in crime reached England – it revealed the whereabouts of Crippen – something like £10,000 had been spent in the search for him.’
As the officer in charge of the inquiries, and the one who chased and captured him in Canada, I should know something about the expenses incurred up to the time stated. I am puzzled indeed to know how £10,000 was spent?
Not one extra police officer was recruited and the pay of those engaged would still have gone on, whether Crippen had committed a crime or not, so it cannot be said that that was an extra charge on the nation, and I doubt if my own expenses for cab fares up to the time the wireless was received, exceeded £2, and the extra costs, whilst I was making inquiries, as a Chief Inspector, for food allowance, would be 4/- per day, always supposing I could not reach home in time for a meal for a continuous period of nine hours, other officers of less rank would be paid in proportion.
Of course, there was the printing of the Reward bills and other expenses, such as medical men, etc. and I should have thought I was exaggerating if I had suggested that up to the time of the wireless being received the cost would not have exceeded £500.
Maybe, Mr. Hugh Brady [the author of the article] has some information as to the expenses incurred which I am ignorant of, but oh! £10,000 extra cost to the Nation before the famous wireless was received and that in 1910, too!
I really should be glad to be enlightened, and doubtless, so would the taxpayers.2
Shortly after the appearance of the Mail article, Dew’s full-length account of the Crippen case first appeared in the Saturday newspaper Thomson’s Weekly News as a well illustrated series that ran between September and October 1934. It was entitled ‘The Whole Truth About the Crippen Case’, and dramatically promised that ‘nothing more intense and thrilling has been published than the battle of wits between the shrewd police officer and one of the cleverest and most amazing personalities in the history of crime’. Dew gave his reason for writing his memoir straight away:
Many stories have been written about Dr. Crippen and his crime.
Some of them have approached the truth. Others have grossly misrepresented the facts.
As the Scotland Yard officer who handled the case from the beginning to the end, I am the only person who knows every detail of what happened, from the moment the disappearance of Belle Elmore was first reported to Scotland Yard until Crippen was condemned to death at the Old Bailey.
All these years, while others have been giving their versions from second-hand knowledge, I have remained silent.
My reason for speaking now is that I feel I should leave behind an authoritative record of the biggest case I was privileged to handle while an officer at the Yard.3
The Crippen serialisation was the first part of Dew’s memoirs. The following year Thomson’s printed ‘My Hunt for Jack the Ripper’, between January and March 1935, and finally, ‘From Pitch-and-Toss to Murder’ (a reference to the wide variety of crimes Dew had investigated), between July and August 1936, in which Dew recounted several of his more interesting cases, on which he commented: ‘It is not always the most sensational case which gives the biggest kick to the detective.’
These cases included those of Conrad Harms and Harry the Valet. In addition there were also episodes of blackmail, counterfeiting, fraud, theft and manslaughter. Incidents in the various cases reinforce elements of Dew’s character that emerged during the Whitechapel and Crippen murder cases. He showed sympathy and concern to one woman he arrested for theft from dwelling houses. Whenever he saw her, ‘I talked to her and tried to persuade her to lead an honest life’. Then there was his usual refusal to accept criticism of himself or his fellow officers. In the case of a swindler who had been at large for twenty years, ‘the blame, in most cases at any rate, has to be laid at the door of the public rather than of the police’.
Dew’s memoirs were published in their entirety in one volume in 1938, by Blackie & Son, under the title I Caught Crippen: Memoirs of Ex-Chief Inspector Walter Dew C.I.D. They were dedicated to his late son Stanley and his daughters Ethel, (Kate) May and Dorothy, but not to his other son Walter. It was further dedicated to ‘F. for encouragement and help’ – no doubt a reference to his second wife, Florence. The book was a word-for-word retelling of the newspaper serialisation. It included a short additional prologue and afterword, but contained far fewer illustrations than the newspaper version.
When compared with contemporary records the memoirs are revealed to be broadly accurate, but also to contain significant discrepancies, contradictions and errors. But these did not spoil the book, which was a colourful and highly entertaining read and is now a valuable and sought-after item. The irregularities may be partly explained by the fact that the memoirs were originally written for a tabloid newspaper that was perhaps more concerned with sensationalism than accuracy. Dew’s account of the Crippen case was,
however, significantly more accurate in some parts than in others, possibly as the result of the availability of the Notable British Trials volume on the case, first published in 1920, which contained a transcription of Crippen’s Old Bailey trial. Despite this, Dew’s memoirs still contained glaring errors. For example, he wrote that the Martinettis had dined with the Crippens on 10 January, when it had been 31 January. He also spells Melville Macnaghten’s name incorrectly throughout as ‘Macnaughton’.
Dew’s memory may have been a factor. When he wrote about the Whitechapel murders he excused himself by saying, ‘it must be remembered that they took place fifty years ago, and it may be that small errors as to dates and days may have crept in’. Despite this, he also stated that during his police career one of his chief assets was a ‘splendid memory’. Dew’s daughter Kate said at the time of the book’s release, ‘To-day his memory is still faultless. I think it is remarkable that a man of 75 who has led a life so varied and exhausting should be able to recall so many details of his experiences.’4
Some of his contradictions are too obvious to ignore. He described Flower and Dean Street in the East End of London as being so rough that constables were forced to go down there in pairs, because a ‘single constable would have been lucky to reach the other end unscathed’. Just two pages later, Dew angrily wrote:
Autographed frontispiece to Dew’s autobiography. (Stewart P. Evans)
I have seen it stated that there were some parts of the East End the police themselves were afraid to penetrate.
Rubbish!
I could recount story after story of single police officers walking calmly into the very dens of gangs and claiming their men.
Again, Dew mixed up his dates, saying, ‘Three days only had elapsed since the death of Annie Chapman – the date was 30 September, 1888.’ Annie Chapman had died on 8 September.
A good example of the difference between Dew’s autobiographical version of events and that contained in official records is in the story of the arrest of Conrad Harms. In Dew’s words, he could not ‘definitely remember if I arrested him myself or not … My recollection is that Berrett and I arrested him at an hotel in Northumberland Avenue.’ The minutes of the Central Criminal Court stated that the arrest was made by DS Crutchett and DC Bishop at the Crown Emporium. However, Dew did add that this was ‘one of those instances when one cannot remember an important detail, of thirty years ago, and so, to be on the safe side, raise the doubt, as I don’t wish to claim credit for something I have not done.’
The book also contained what appears to be an episode of blatant fiction. Dew told the story of Crippen asking him the favour of being allowed to see Le Neve while on the deck of the Megantic on their return to England. In his autobiography Dew said the following:
The next day I went to see Miss Le Neve and told her of the request her fellow prisoner had made. Her eyes lit up as she eagerly replied: ‘Oh, yes, please arrange it, Mr. Dew. I should like it very much.’
And so it came about that there was staged somewhere in mid-Atlantic one of real life’s strangest little dramas.
Crippen was brought to the doorway of his cabin, Miss Le Neve stood in hers. The distance between them was probably thirty feet. There for a minute or so this tragic pair remained with eyes only for one another.
I had to be present. But somehow as I looked on I felt an interloper. Not a word was spoken. There were no hysterics on either side. Just a slight motion of the hand from one to the other. That was all.
Then back to their impoverished cells to await what fate had in store for them both.
I have often wondered what passed through Crippen’s mind during those tense moments when his little dream was realized, and he was able to gaze again on the face of the woman he loved so devotedly. Perhaps he guessed even then that the association for which he had risked so much would never again be resumed.
This seems to be the first time Dew told this tale. It did not appear in his official, contemporary reports, in one of which Dew stated, ‘They were arrested on 31 July. And I have kept them – as far as I was concerned – apart from one another ever since.’ Dew had allowed Crippen a surreptitious glance at Le Neve on the train from Liverpool to London, which was noted in The Times and in Muir’s opening statement for the Crown at Crippen’s trial. Neither of these mentioned a sighting on the ship’s deck, nor did the story appear in one of the earliest full-length book accounts of the case, in 1935.5 Of course it may have happened. Sergeant Mitchell reported that ‘Mr. Dew promised to see Le Neve if there was an opportunity.’ Dew’s phrase, ‘as far as I was concerned’, is a little ambiguous, and Dew may have chosen to withhold the full story from his report, but it seems unlikely. Dew was known to be a compassionate man, but he also wanted to return his prisoners with as little disruption as possible.
Ethel Le Neve did not speak about the incident when she wrote her accounts of the case for Lloyd’s Weekly News in November 1910, and for Thomson’s Weekly News in November 1920, in which she said that Dew only agreed to pass a message from her to Crippen. Le Neve’s story was told once more by Ursula Bloom in her mushy 1955 ‘factual novel’, The Girl Who Loved Crippen, as told to the author by Le Neve. The book was published after Dew’s I Caught Crippen, and repeats Dew’s story. In it Dew allows Crippen to see Le Neve, who was on a lower deck:
She walked as in a dream, no longer a prisoner, but a girl in love! She looked like some sylvan elf with her cropped hair curling wistfully round her face, her eyes shining, and she held out her arms.
‘Hawley? Hawley?’
But that could not be! It was the Inspector who barred the way. He said, ‘One moment. One moment only, please.’
They looked at each other, she drinking in every detail of his dear face, and the newly grown moustache. She was glad that he looked again like the man she loved so much. He said nothing. Had he not promised not to speak a word? And he was a man who kept his promises. His eyes said everything.6
Another feature of the autobiography was Dew’s discretion. He frequently concealed names, and stated that he would not give any details regarding two of the cases he worked upon, saying, ‘I refrain from going into the details of these lest it should give pain and annoyance to some of the relatives, or those associated with the cases.’
One of these was the Druce–Portland inheritance case. This had involved a bogus claim to the deceased Duke of Portland’s fortune. In a bizarre and long-drawn-out affair, relatives of a London upholsterer called Thomas Charles Druce argued that Druce was in fact the Duke of Portland, and leading a double life as the eccentric 5th Duke of Portland. Their story of Druce staging a fake funeral in 1864 was disproved when his body was exhumed in December 1907.
After the Druce case had collapsed, Dew arrested Mary Robinson in January 1908 for committing perjury during the Druce–Portland case. Robinson hoped to profit from the case, and had claimed that she knew Druce and Portland were one and the same. If the Druce family’s claim had been successful they would have rewarded Robinson handsomely for helping their cause. In her Clapham flat Dew found many incriminating papers, including a diary purporting to cover the years 1861, 1862 and 1868–70. Dew thought it had been written in Robinson’s hand, but in one sitting rather than over a period of years. She pleaded guilty and received a four-year sentence. The newspapers were full of the story at the time, so Dew’s reticence to write about it is a little mystifying. His excuse that it might cause pain to the relatives could easily apply to some of those cases he did cover.
Perhaps Dew was over-zealous in his withholding of names. When writing about Dr. Crippen’s statement, Dew held back the name of the Criterion Restaurant, where Crippen and Le Neve attended the Guild’s benevolent dinner, writing ‘the C____ Restaurant’, despite the restaurant having been named in Notable British Trials. Neither did he name Crippen’s business partner, Dr Rylance, whom he described as ‘Dr ____’.
Upon the publication of I Caught Crippen, Dew’s local newspaper, the Worthin
g Gazette, interviewed their resident celebrity at the Wee Hoose. Dew reminisced:
Twenty-eight years ago to-day Crippen was already safe inside the gaol on the Heights of Abraham. As for myself, I was simply sweltering in the hot and humid atmosphere of the city.
Much of my time was spent evading reporters and cameramen – who knew all about my arrival in spite of our efforts to keep it secret, and who frequently became personal when I did not give them a statement – visiting Crippen in gaol (he was continually asking for new books to read), and making arrangements for the return to England.
Old Crippen took it quite well. He always was a bit of a philosopher, though he could not have helped being astounded to see me on board the boat … He was quite a likeable chap in his way.
The Gazette also found another connection that their town had with the Crippen case, albeit a much looser one. The memorial stone for Belle Elmore was constructed by the father of the monumental mason who had a workshop in North Street, Worthing.7
The book received favourable reviews in newspapers all over the world. The Daily Mail called it ‘very readable’, while the News Chronicle described it as ‘an absorbingly interesting book’. Additional praise came from the Daily Telegraph’s reviewer, who wrote, ‘Inspector Dew tells these stories amusingly, and well … I enjoyed his book immensely’, and Dew’s other local paper, the Worthing Herald, said ‘Mr. Dew has an admirable style, easy, natural and completely free from catch-words or the strain of literary affectation.’
While the book did not appear to receive any bad reviews, there were some that were a little more critical. The Western Morning News’s reviewer enjoyed the ‘From Pitch and Toss to Murder’ section of the book, but thought that it needed more on the pathological side of the Crippen investigation, and also on the finer points of detection. The Sunday Times praised the book for killing a few of the minor myths about the Crippen case, but thought it added little to the reader’s understanding of Crippen’s character.
Walter Dew: The Man Who Caught Crippen Page 23
