Cambridgeshire Murders

Alison Bruce

For Jacen

Thank you for encouraging me to write and for introducing me to such a diverse and fascinating part of England

First published in 2005 by Sutton Publishing

The History Press

The Mill, Brimscombe Port

Stroud, Gloucestershire,
GL
5 2
QG

www.thehistorypress.co.uk

This ebook edition first published in 2012

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© Alison Bruce, 2010, 2012

The right of Alison Bruce, to be identified as the Author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyrights, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

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EPUB ISBN
978 0 7524 8413 6

MOBI ISBN
978 0 7524 8412 9

Original typesetting by The History Press

Introduction

1  The Flaming Heart

2  Arsenic and Old Laws

3  Prime Minister's Elimination Time

4  The Early Bird Catches the Killer

5  From Waterhouse to Slaughterhouse

6  A Fatal Attraction

7  The One Shilling Killing

8  'Tis Quite Harmless

9  An Ironic Twist of the Knife

10  A Good Night Out and a Bad Night Inn

11  Eat, Drink and be Murdered

12  The Little Shop of Secrets

13  A Different Sort of First for Cambridge

14  The Dog was the First to Die

15  To Love, Honour but Mostly Obey

16  Other Notable Cambridgeshire Crimes

Select Bibliography

Acknowledgements

C
ambridgeshire, which now incorporates its old neighbour Huntingdonshire, is largely rural and therefore not densely populated. Without any major cities, it is understandable that the crime rate for the county is lower than that of many other shires; but this does not mean that the murders that do occur there are in any sense mundane; in fact, many achieved such notoriety that they became cases of national interest.

When I first began to research this book I knew I would come across old and interesting murder cases that had not been fully documented. Those selected here cover three centuries of Cambridgeshire history, highlighting changes in society as well as trends in methods of committing murder. Although most cases were solved, in some the accuracy of the verdict and the fairness of the trial often served as good examples of why the laws allowing the admission of hearsay and circumstantial evidence needed to be changed; ‘Arsenic and Old Laws' is a particularly good example.

Much of the research has involved going back to original assize and other period documents. Unfortunately, Cambridgeshire's inquest records relating to the period between the late 1800s and the late 1930s were destroyed by flooding – having been stored in a basement. Conversely, some of the best surviving documents are the oldest – the Ely Diocese Records include many sheets of beautiful handwritten statements, often signed by witnesses with a shaky ‘X'.

While many of the county's murder cases are covered by the
Newgate Calendar
, I have not used this source verbatim: if you come across a copy you may notice differences between the details reported there and the information used in this book. This is because when cross-checking sources, I often found inaccuracies in the calendar – which of course does not mean that this is not an interesting source from which to initiate an investigation.

One reported murder that I chose not investigate further was the killing of a young lad named George Burnham. Although the case appears to be interesting, contemporary documentation was too limited to shed much more light on the case. The following is from the
Newgate Calendar
and demonstrates the sensationalist and ‘fire and brimstone' nature of the publication:

R
ICHARD
F
AULKNER
A Boy, executed at Wisbech, in 1810, for the Murder of another Lad of Twelve Years of Age

R
ICHARD
F
AULKNER
was, at the Summer Assizes for Norfolk, 1810, capitally convicted of the wilful murder of George Burnham, a lad about twelve years of age, at Whittlesea, on the 15th of February, by cruelly beating him to death, for no other cause than for revenge on Burnham's mother, who had thrown some dirty water upon him.

The prisoner was not sixteen, but so shockingly depraved and hardened that after condemnation he repeatedly clenched his fist and threatened to murder the clergyman who attended the jail, or anyone who dared to approach him. Indeed he was so ferocious that the jailer found it necessary to chain his hands and feet to his dungeon, where he uttered the most horrid oaths and imprecations on all who came near him; and from the Friday to Saturday night refused to listen to any religious advice or admonition.

At length, to prevent the termination of his existence in this depraved state, the expedient was devised of procuring a child about the size of the one murdered, and similar in feature and dress, whom two clergymen unexpectedly led between them, by the hands, into the cell, where he lay sulkily chained to the ground; but on their approach he started, and seemed so completely terrified that he trembled in every limb; cold drops of sweat profusely fell from him, and he was almost continuously in such a dreadful state of agitation that he entreated the clergymen to continue with him, and from that instant became as contrite a penitent as he had before been callous and insensible.

In this happy transition he remained till his execution on Monday morning, having fully confessed his crime, and implored, by fervent prayer, the forgiveness of his sins from a merciful God!

Writing and researching this book has been a hugely enjoyable experience, especially when I have had the opportunity to see artefacts or visit places connected with the cases described. Walking along the narrow street outside Miss Lawn's old shop, seeing the hangman's noose that hanged one of these murderers or standing in a rainy Burwell churchyard next to the Flaming Heart were moments that made me feel as if I were touching Cambridgeshire's past. I hope that the cases included and the illustrations chosen will make some of the darkest stories from our county's history come alive for you too.

O
ne of England's earliest fairs was held at Stourbridge, Cambridge, and was granted a charter in 1211. Many authors wrote about the fair and in 1724 Daniel Defoe gave a detailed account: ‘ . . . it cannot be very unpleasant, especially to the trading part of the world, to say something of this fair, which is not only the greatest in the whole nation, but in the world . . .'.

The fair originally lasted for two days but by the middle of the sixteenth century it ran from 24 August to 29 September each year. A vast array of products was on sale until the last day, which was reserved as a horse-fair. Defoe's description notes:

Towards the latter end of the fair, and when the great hurry of wholesale business begins to be over, the gentry come in from all parts of the county round; and though they come for their diversion, yet it is not a little money they lay out, which generally falls to the share of the retailers, such as toy-shops, goldsmiths, braziers, ironmongers, turners, milliners, mercers, etc., and some loose coins they reserve for the puppet shows, drolls, rope-dancers, and such like, of which there is no want, though not consider-able like the rest.

One of the puppet shows mentioned by Defoe belonged to Robert Shepheard, who was travelling towards Cambridge in the early part of September 1727 with his wife Martha, his daughter, also called Martha, and a couple of servants. Running low on funds, as they were passing through the village of Burwell they decided to raise some money by putting on a puppet show. On 8 September 1727 they hired a barn from a Mr Wosson. It was a clunch
¹
barn with a thatched roof, and situated near Cuckolds Row.

The interior of the barn was approximately 17ft 6in high, 45ft long and 16ft 9in wide. The straw bales inside were stacked up to about 9ft, leaving about a third of the area available for the puppet show. Adjoining the building, and separated by just a lathe and plaster wall, was stabling. This partition was the same height as the stone walls of the barn, about 9ft, and the stable and its hayloft shared the same thatched roof as the barn.

The arrival of the puppet show caused much excitement in the village and there was a rush to gain admission at the price of 1
d
per person. With far more people wishing to see the show than the barn could hold, it was decided to lock the doors from the inside – many reports describe them as being ‘nailed shut'.

The audience numbered in excess of a hundred with over half being made up of local children and families from nearby villages, including Reach,
²
Swaffham-Prior and Upware. Among them were villagers from all walks of life, including John and Ann Palmer, children of Henry and Sarah, who belonged to a prominent Burwell family, and Thomas Howe, his brother and sister Sarah.

At about nine in the evening a young ostler named Richard Whitaker was attending to Robert Shepheard's two horses in the adjacent stable. He was carrying a candle and a lantern. Wanting to see the puppet show but not wishing to pay the entrance fee, he climbed up into the hayloft where he was able to look down into the crowded barn. While there he threw hay down to the stable below; inevitably, some hay caught alight on the naked candle flame and Whitaker rushed from the building to raise the alarm.

In
An Account of a Most Terrible Fire
by Thomas Gibbons (see pages 3–4), young Thomas Howe described watching the show while sitting on a beam inside the barn. He was one of the first to spot the flames, which were ‘so small that he thinks he could have enclosed it in his hands'. This small fire began high up in the building very close to the thatched roof, which was unusually dry due to a recent drought. As well as the straw and hay, the inside of the barn was draped in old cobwebs and the fire quickly took hold, rushing along the length of the thatch – according to the parish register, ‘like lightning flew round the barn in an instant'.

The audience rushed to the door, which was not only sealed but also blocked by an oval table that the puppet master had used earlier in his show. In their desperation to escape they crowded the door and many ended up falling into a great heap behind it.

Outside the barn, the first to give assistance was a Wicken man, Thomas Dobedee, who happened to be in Burwell. Described as ‘a very stout man, in the prime of life', he managed to force the door and began pulling survivors from the blaze.

Thomas Howe saw the doors open and leapt down from his beam on to the pile of bodies below, which he described as being three or four feet deep with not one person left standing. The parish register explains ‘that most of those that did escape were forced to crawl over the heads and bodies of those that lay in a heap at the door'. Thomas Howe's brother clambered over the bodies accompanied by two smaller boys who refused to let go of him; all three of them managed to reach safety. Two men who had escaped helped Dobedee to rescue others. Dobedee stayed so long that his hair was singed, having put his own life at tremendous risk.

The wind, however, remained strong, fanning the flames and sending burning stalks of straw into the air. Five other houses in the neighbourhood were razed to the ground, one of which was home to bed-ridden Mary Woodbridge, who perished.