Famous Detective Stories #4 - January 1949

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FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
NEW SERIES No'. -4
IN THIS ISSUE
THE DOCTOR TALKED TOO MUCH 5
INFORMATION RECEIVED -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 21
THE MYSTERY OF 29 WOLVERTON ST. __ __ __ __ __ 26
THE BEAUTIFl'L LADY IN BLACK 39
THE LONG CHANCE 48
CASH v. PRICE 58
THE WOMBAT'S BURROW AFFAIR ____ __ __ __ __ __ 67
SYDNEY'S SINISTER FIRST CHEMIST __ __ __ __ __ __ 77
THE DEAD HORSE __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ 81
PISTOL PACKING POLICEMEN __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ 90
MURDER IN SECRET 98
THE TRAGEDY AT VILLA MADEIRA __ __ _ _ 121
Contributions dealing with true stories

of Crime and Detection should be
sent to the Editor of PTank Johnsvn
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THE DOUTOR 'TALKED TOO MUUH
By C. K. THOMPSON
He might have got away with his crime if he

hadn't been so insistent on bringing it to the
attention of the authorities. In Buck Ruxton's
case, silence would have been indeed golden.
DOCTORS, popularly, are suppbsed to be strong silent men,

sober, steady and reliable saviours o[ human life, preserving
strinly the secrets of the consulting room and, above all things,
never allowing their passions Lo get the better of them.
Maybe the average member of the B.M.A. fulfils all these re
quirements of the profession; but it is not with the average doctor
tliat we have to deal in this story o( jealousy. passion and horrible
murder. One doctor talked too much, acted like a lunatic and in
his theatrical, ferocious and tigerish dementia, not only murdered
two unfortunate women but made such a confounded nuisance
of himseU to all and sundry, including the police, that what he
had intended to be the "perfect crime" was nullified. In other
words, he acted and talked his way into the hangman's noose.
Doctor Buck Ruxton of the North of Engl;;nd town o( Lancaster
I
• FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
has no peer in the criminal annals as a horrible murderer. Others

may have equalled him, but none excelled him in method and
procedure.
Born in Bombay, his correct name was Bukhtyar Ratanji Hakin.
He obtained his medical degrees in both surgery and medicine in
Bombay and London and practised with the Indian Medical Ser
•ice in Bombay and Baghdad. To improve himself, he sat for
the Fellowship examination conducted by the Royal College of
Surgeons in Edinburgh and though he failed in the exacting tests,
he did gain a de facto wife in the person of Mrs. Isabella Van Ess,
the Scots wife of a Dutchman, whom she had married in 1919.
Mrs. Van Ess, then 27 years of age, was working in a cafe in·
Edinburgh in 1928 when she met Bukhtyar Ratanji Hakin, who
had by then anglicised his name to Buck Ruxton. Ruxton fell in
Jove wtth her and she with him. Ruxton removed to London
·and :\frs. Van Ess went. with him. They lived together as man
and wife and although the Dutchman divorced his erring spouse,
she did not trouble to go through the marriage ceremony with
Ruxton. She merely adopted the formal title of Mrs. Ruxton
and in due course presented him with three children. In 1935,
the significant year in their lives, these children were aged six,
four and two.
By all accounts, Ruxton was a very able exponent of his chosen
profession. Having purchased a practice in Lancaster, he succeeded
m building it up to a very substantial property. ,
Though there is little excuse for the actions of the Hindu
doctor, it is well to examine the personal relations between him
and his de facto wife in view of what occurred later. Ruxton was
described by those who knew him as of small stature, lithe and
darkly handsome, with curly hair, peaked eyebrows and penetrat
ing eyes. Mentally, he had an intellect of iveat subtlety while
spiritually he was filled with the intense emotionalism that charac
terises so many Orientals. ?\frs. Ruxton has been described as a
r.i.ther attractive woman in spite of her prominent upper teeth
and severely-styled hair-do.
According to evidence produced at Ruxton's trial, they lived
dangerously. Ruxton was a supremely jealous man and Mrs.
Ruxton constantly kept him on tenterhooks. .He frequently pro
claimed to high heaven that she was unfaithful to him, _and al-
THE DOCTOR TALKED TOO MUCH T
though there is scant evidence that she ac111ally was, nevertheless

she let him think so. Deliberately she led him on an<l teased him,
revelling in his outbursts 0£ passion and resentment. That she
was playing with fire she did not stem to realise. That she was
dealing with a tigerish Eastern personality and not a colder Saxon
tvpe she did not pause to consider. Frequently she would ask him
what they could have a row about and i£ he could think 0£
nothing, she would drop hints that she had been un[aith[ul. Then
the skin and hair would fly. It must have been an interesting
household.
Police intervention was not uncommon. On one occasion they
found the good doctor threatening his de facto ,-·ife with a kni[e,
to be followed by strangulation. On another occasion the doctor
was hinting darkly about using on her a gun he kept hidden in
his room. He was shouting vulgar language and abusing his wife
for her alleged infidelity. One night the maid heard howls and
curses and crashes and when she rushed to the marital room she
found the doctor weeping and swearing. the telephone in pieces
on the floor and Mrs. Ruxton, her nightdress hal! torn off, arguing
the toss with her half-dement¢ "husband."
Following one more than unusually tough brawl, Mrs. Ruxton
left home. The doctor confided to a friend that she would not
come back alive to the house-that he personally would see that
she landed into the mortuary. But she did come back, lively and
ready for· the next domestic round.
It must n�t be thought that the Ruxtons were �ontinually
brawling. They did have their periods of sweet conciliation. Both
were movie £ans and often went to the pictures. Added to that,
they both worshipped their three children who never in any cir
cumstances were drawn into the brawls or harmed in any way. A
queer household.
This brings us up to the fatal 1935. Both Ruxton and his de
facto had very_ expensive tastes and notwithstanding the lucrative
practice-a practice that had not i\, the least diminished because
of their domestic troubles-the Rt•xtons were on the financial
rocks. Buck even toyed with the id�a of mortgaging the practice.
Ri,xton's financial worries, coupled with his insane jealousy,
were probably responsible for the crimes he committed. Mrs.
Rnxton was very friendly with a Lancaster family named Edmond-
I FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
10n. The family comprised Mr. Robert James Edmondson, his

wife, daughter and son. For some reason, Ruxton got the idea in
his head that Mrs. Ruxton and the son were carrying on an illicit
love affair. Actually they were not. Mrs. Ruxton Jr.new of her
husband's suspicions, but instead of trying to allay them, she de
liberately fanned them by accepting an invitation to go with the
family on a trip to Edinburgh. She thought she could handle the
jealous Hindu, but how wrong she was! It was her last mistake.
On September 7, 1935, the four Edmondsons and Mrs. Ruxton
drove off to Scotland in two cars and put up at the Adelphi Hotel
in Edinburgh, all occupying separate rooms. They did not know,
of course, that Dr. Buck Ruxton was hot on their trail in a fast
car. He traced them to the hotel and though his inquiries re
vealed that they were innocently occupying separate apartments,
he regarded it as a plan to hoodwink him. He guessed that there
would be visits exchanged between Mrs. Ruxton and young Mr.
Edmondson.
Buck did nothing then. Instead he went home and brooded
intensely for a whole week. On September 14 Mrs. Ruxton bor
rowed the car and drove to Blackpool where her two sisters were
having a holiday. She left Blackpool at I J.30 p.m. to drive the
25 miles to Lancaster. When she reached home Dr. Buck Ruxton
was waiting for her. That was on a Saturday nighL
While Mrs. Ruxton had been away, her three children had
been cared for by a 20-years-old nursemaid, Mary Rogerson. A
hard-working, gentle and popular girl, Miss Rogerson's features
were marred by a slight malformation of one eye. Mrs. Ruxton
was last seen alive on Saturday, September 7, and that was the
last time Miss Rogerson, too, was seen in one piece.
It was some time between midnight and 6 a.m. on the Sunday
morning that Ruxton murdered both the women. Ruxton em
ployed no less than three charwomen to clean up his large home
and at 6.30 a.m. the husband of one of these women was awakened
by the doctor who told him to tell his wife not to come that day
as Mrs. Ruxton and the maid Miss Rogerson had gone away for
a holiday to Scotland.
Ruxton did not want any interruptions on that Sunday, but he
p them in plenty. lt must have driven him crazier than he
THE DOCTOR TALKED TOO MUCR I
always was. First pestering came from a newspaper girl who kept
her finger pressed on the bell until the doctor came and answered
it. Later on another paper boy arrived and disturbed him. Then
a patient arrived with a child upon whom the doctor was to
perform a minor operation by appointment. Dr. Buck emptied
her into the street after saying that his wife had cleared· out,.
leaving him and the maid lo take up all the carpets in prepara
tion for the decorators. Later he went out and bought four
gallons of p etrol in tins and also had the tal}k of his car filled.
Returning home, he began to rip up the carpets on the stairs and
landings. At 1 l .�O a.m. he le£t the house with the three children
whom he took to Morecombe, leaving them with a family named
Anderson to care for for the day. He had one hand heavily ban- ·
daged and told the Andersons that he had cut it with a tin opener.
After leaving the Anderson home, Ruxton went to the home o(
a patient, Mrs. Hampshire, in Lancaster and asked her if she would
help him clean u p his house as his wife was at Blackpool and the
maid was on holidays. Mrs. Hampshire had never worked for
Ruxton, but she consented to help him. She found the house
·upside down. The carpets were missing from the stairs and land
ings and had been replaced by pieces of straw. Ruxton asked her
to concentrate on cleaning the bath which was badly stained a
yellowish col(?r, but none of the energetic elbow �ease used by
J\lrs. Hampshire could remove the ominous markings.
D u ring her perambulations around the house, Mrs. Hampshire
noted that the maid's bedroom door was unlocked and the room
empty. The other two rooms were locked. She didn"t know it, but
behind those locked doors lay the dismembered corpses of the
late Mrs. Ruxton and the equally late Miss Rogerson. While Mrs.
Hampshire was pondering over a bloodstained carpet in the wait
ing room, her husband arrived to see how she was progressing
with the cleaning job, and he observed in the back yard some
carpets heavily bloodstained, a blue suit, equally bloodstained, a
towel and some shirts. Noticing his interest, Dr. Ruxton told him
that if the suit and the carpets were any use to him he could
have them. Hampshire thanked him and grabbed them.
Later in the day, Ruxton drove over to l\forecombe and asked
the Ande.rson family to take care of the children for the nil!;hL
They agreed to do so. On his way back he called into Mary
Rogerson's home and told her father and stepmother that she had
10 FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
gone away for a week's holiday. He then got Mrs. An<lerson to

buy for him 2 lb. cotton wool and some disinfectant. He then
went home.
At 9 a.m. next day, Mrs. Hampshire found the good doctor
sittin'7 on her doorstep. He needed a shave and was minus collar
and ue. Told by the good lady that he looked sick, Ruxton replied
that the pain from his cut hand had kept him awake all night.
He then said that he had called o,·er to see her about the blue
suit he had given her husband the previous day. He said that the
suit had on it a tab bearing his name and that of the t_ailor. He
asked her to cut this off and burn it because it was very undigni
fied for a man to wear another's suit and for other people to know
about it. He waited until Mrs. Hampshire cut off the tab and put
it on the fire. He then asked her tc come around and open the
door to his patients. Though she was puzzled by the requesi.
lhe agreed.
After Ruxton had gone, Mrs. Hampshire took the three carpets
into the yard and examined them carefully. They were all stained
-..·ith blood, one badly so. In all she threw 30 buckets of water
over this carpet, but could not get rid of the stains. Even when
she hung it over the clothesline and went to work on it with a
scrubbing brush, the stains remained.
Aniving home, Ruxton found a charwoman, Mrs. Oxlev, on
the doorstep patiently waiting to get in to clean the place up.
Ruxton, with an ill grace, let her in and told her that his wife
and Miss Rogerson had made up some story between them to
account for their absence. Mrs. Oxley did not know what he was
gassing about, but said nothing. Instead, she made him some
coffee, while he was bandaging his hand. During a visit to the
yard, Mrs. Oxley noticed that a rubbish fire had been used re
cently.
Mrs. Hampshire arrived at the house to find it in much the
same state .is when she had left on the previous clay. The two
bedrooms were still locked and the keys missing. Ruxton was not
there and did not arrive back until I p.m. Mrs. Hampshire. very
annoyed, asked him why he had dragged her over to his house
when there was nothing for her to do.
"'I ha,-e 9ent for you because you give me courage,- he replied.
THE DOCTOR TALKED. TOO MUCH 11
"Where is your wife?" she asked. "Why don't you send her a
message and get her back home?"
"She is in London," muttered the doctor.
"That is not true and you know it," she replied boldly.
"Yes, I'm telling lies," said Ruxton, bursting into tears. •1 am·
the most unhappy man on earth. My wife has gone off with
another man and has left me with three children.
"You make a friend of a man," he went on, ceasing his weeping
and getting hot under the collar, "you treat him a a friend and
he eats from your table and he makes love to your wife behind
your back. It is terrible." His angry mood suddenly changed to
self-pity and laying his head on the table, he wept long and
loudly.
�'hen council men came in the afternoon to collect the garbage
they noticed on a rubbish heap where a fire had been started,
some half-burned carpets, a shin and some towels. A second heap
of rubbish had a co,•ering of what looked like plaster. The garbage
men mentioned the bloodstains and Ruxton told them that he
had accidentally cut off a finger. He then said that his wife had
taken the car away on a tour, leaving him with three children to
care for.
Shortly after this incident, Ruxton drove his car to a garage
where he gave instructions that it be overhauled. He then tried
to hire a car but refused all those offered on the score that they
were too small. He then went to another garage where he suc
ceeded in hiring a large fawn and brown saloon. As he was driving
back home he met young Mr. Edmondson, the man with whom
he suspected his wife of having had an affair. Dissembling his
jealousy and dislike, he told Edmondson that Mrs. Ruxton and
Miss Rogerson had taken the children away to Scotland for a
holiday, using the family car. That, he said, explained why . h e
himself was dri,·ing another car. H e and Edmondson parted with
mutual expressions of goodwill. Ruxton then drove to l\lore
combe, where he persuaded the Andersons to take care of the
children for yet another night.
He collected them on the following morning and took the two
eldest to school. He then called on an interior decorator named
Holmes and asked him why he had not fulfilled his contract lO
decorate the doctor's home on the l\fonday. Holmes denied the

existence of the definite promise and Ruxton could not convince
him otherwise.
Driving northwards Ruxton, proceeding at a fast !? ace in an
unfamiliar car, skittled a cyclist at Kendal. The cyclist was un
hurt though his machine was smashed beyond repair, and he
managed to get the number of Ruxton's car. He told the police
who telephoned ahead and the doctor was stopped along the road
by a constable. Ruxton told the officer that he did not stop be
cause the cyclist was not injured.
When he landed home late that same afternoon he found his
waiting room filled with cursing patients. There was also a char
woman, Mrs. Smith, pottering around the house. If the patients
were cursing, Ruxton was cursing more. He could have strangled
Mrs. Smith. He tried his best to sit in his consulting room and
listen to his patients' tales of woe, but the sound of Mrs. Smith
wandering around outside, no doubt poking her nose into things
that did not concern . her, nearly drove him frantic.
In between listening to patients, he kept dashing out of the
consulting room to give 1the charwoman contradictory instructions.
At first he told her to strip the paper from the wall on the land
ing and when she started to do that, he whizzed out of the con-
1ulting room and told her to knock off-that he would do it him
�lf. He then told her to get a step ladder, only to countermand
the order on his next dash from the surgery. She was to clean up
the blood in the bathroom. Mrs. Smith told .him there was blood
on the casement curtains too. Ruxton replied that he knew all
about it and promptly tore the curtains down.
Having eventually got rid of the patients and Mrs. Smith, the
good doctor locked up and then made a fire in the backyard. It
was observed by two sisters who lived nearby and who, in due
course, related the incident in the witness box.
Mr. Holmes, the decorator, next came under fire again. This waa
en the Wednesday, September 19. Ruxton called on him and
TRE DOCTOR TALKED TOO MUCR 13
demanded that he start work immediately on re . papering and

painting the house. Holmes said he was too busy and refused.
Ruxton threw in his hand and decided to take the children 10 a
carnival.
Next day the doctor informed charwoman Mrs. Oxley that he
was going to visit a specialist to have his hand examined. She
was in the kitchen and Ruxton carefully shut the door on her.
She, however, heard him make several trips up and down stairs
to his car, which was waiting at the· front door. After he had
gone she found that the two rooms previously loc:ked were now
open and a most unpleasant smell pervaded the house.
About 3 p.m. that afternoon, the doctor was obser\'ed entering
LanC'aster from the direction of the north. He called on Mrs.
Hampshire and, after urging her to have the blue suit cleaned
immediaiely, werit home to start another fire in the yard. In fact
fires were a regular thing in the Ruxton home for the rest of that
week. He burned off large quantities of clothes, p:.pers and couoaa
wool.
Up to this time the Rogerson family had remained quiet over
Mary's long silence, but now they began to get restless. Mary
had been on the best of terms with her father and stepmother
and whenever she was away from home always had written to
them every day; They had received no word from her nor from
Mrs. Ruxton and they began to wonder if everything was as i&
ahould be.
Ruxton's latest explanation of his wife's absence was that she
and her sister were visiting relative.s in London. Mrs. Ruxton had
been after a football pool agency and Ruxton alleged that she had
secured it and was using the office as a meeting place for her
nrio"" lovers. The Rogersons could not see what this had to
do with Mary's silence and said so. Ruxton countered with tbe
11Kprinog statement that Miss Rogerson w;u pregnanL . _ , _1
H FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
"Did you know she was going with the laundry boy?" he asked
.Mrs. Rogerson when that lady called at his home on Monday,
September 23. Mrs. Rogerson replied, in effect, that she knew of
no such damned thing at all.
Just about this period a woman named �frs. Smalley had been
found dead in suspicious circumstances a't !\forecombe and during
their investigations the police interviewed one of Ruxton's ser
vants. It was a routine inquiry which had nothing to do with
Ruxton, but the doctor's nerves were now in such a state that
he was ready to suspect anything. Visiting the police station, he
·created a scene. He accused the police of pumping his servants
about his movements because people were accusing him of ha,· ing
something to do with the Smalley death. The station constable
calmed him down with assurances that he was not suspected and
then Ruxton flared up, accused all the other doctors in the town
of ganging up on him and trying to ruin him because of his
success. He wound up by moaning that his wife had run away
from him. The constable again calmed him down and gently edged
him out of the station.
On the following day Ruxton visited the Rogerson home and
told Mrs. Rogerson that Mary was going to have a baby and that
was why she had gone away with Mrs. Ruxton. Mrs. Rogerson
said she did not believe a word of it. l\fr. Rogerson was most
_indignant and told Ruxton that if i\fary ·were not home by the
following !\fonclay he would put the police on to Ruxton.
"Don't do that," said Ruxton in obvious alarm. "I will see that
they are back by Sunday."
Mrs. Ruxton and Miss Rogerson did not return on the Sunclav,
which was September 29, but an incident of the greatest signifi
cance did occur on that fateful clay.
A woman tourist staying at a hotel along the Edinburgh to Car
lisle road was out walking and when crossing a bridge over a
ravine, chanced to look downwards into a stream called the
THE DOCTOR TALKED TOO MUCH II
Cardenholme Llnn which ran through the thickly wooded ravine.

To her horror she noticed a large parcel with a human arm stid·••
ing out o( it. She broke all running records back to her hotel
two miles away, where she told her brother what she had seen.
The brother hot-footed it for the ra\'ine and, opening the parcel.
was horrified to find it contained pieces of human body. He in
turn hot-footed it for . the police station and soon a squad of
detectives were searching the ravine. They found four parcels,
including two human heads, in the ravine and then, following the
stream to jts junction with the River Annan, came upon another
couple of bundles. Widening their search, they picked up remains
1'·hich had been thrown over various bridges on the Edinburgh
Carlisle road.
When police surgeons were endeavoring to reconstruct the di�
membered bodies they were interested to discover a Cyclops eye.
This is very rare in nature-two eyes joined together in the middle
of the forehead. It occurs sometimes in human beings and more
often in pigs.
The bones of the two bodies were pieced together by the famous
Edinburgh anatomist, Professor Brash. Finger tips had been
shaved off, making fingerprinting impossible, but the doctor com
pleted two skeletons, those of women, one aged about 20 and the
other between 35 and 55 years of age. The younger skeleton wu
later proved to be that of Miss Rogerson. As stated earlier, she
had a "glide" or slight malformation of one eye. This eye had
been removed from her skull and a tumor she had had on her
foot had been cut off. But this did not trick the doctor.
Ruxton read the newspaper account o( the find on the Monda,
morning. The paper stated that the remaim were those o( a
man and a woman.
"Thank goodness,• be said to Mrs. South. wine other in lhe
case was a man and not a woman, or diey would be saying ti••
H FAMOJJS DETECTIVE STORIES
· He held up his bandaged hand and added, "What could I have

done with a hand like that?"
"People must be daft to say things like that," said Mrs. Smith.
Mr. and Mrs. Rogerson called to see him on October I and
asked where Mary was. He told them that Mary and Mrs. Ruxton
had broken open his safe and stolen £30 before they left.
"No doubt they will come home when the money gives out," he
said.
Unconvinced and uneasy, the Rogersons left, muttering some
thing about going to the police.
Instead of keeping quiet, Ruxton began to talk and talk a loL
Also, the utter fool began making a nuisance of himself to the
police-the people he should have kept miles away from.
His wife, he told the long-suffering constabulary, could not
have any love for the children to callously desert them.
"And that young Edmondson," he said. "You ought to inter•
cept his letters in case she writes to him."
"Listen, Dr. Ruxton," said the weary seargeant in charge, "how
, many more times must we tell you that your domestic affairs are
,
no concern of ours. .
"My name has been talked about in connection with the find
ing of those two bodies up in Scotland," said Ruxton. "Jt will
ruin me and the police should issue a statement absolving me!"
At that time young Edmondson was away on a business trip
to Edinburgh a11d could not defend himself against the doctor'•
insinuations, but his father called on Ruxton to try to reason with
him. Ruxton gave way to tears and whined about his wife's
unfaithfulness. Finally he and old Edmondson shook hands and
Ruxton undertook to lay off young Edmondson.
"To teach her a lesson," Ruxton next got rid of all his wife's
clothing and begged Mrs. Hampshire to burn the blue suit he had
given her husband. He then wrote a note to Mrs. Ruxton's sister
telling her of Mrs. Ruxton's infidelity-a letter which, incidentally,

made the sister suspicious. She had read all about the finding of
the dismembered bodies up in Scotland and it looked pretty
odd to her-Mrs. Ruxton and Miss Rogerson vanishing all ol a
sudden. She told the police about it.
By this time the police wera beginning to sit up and take a
bit of notice. They could not understand why Ruxton should
keep pestering them unless he had something to cover up. Then
Mr. and Mrs. Rogerson visited the station and poured out their
suspicions. Detectives began to check up on Ruxton, particularly
concerning the disappearance of Miss Rogerson.
When they commen_i:ed to question Ruxton about the girl, the
doctor in his turn became suspicious and wary. Hitherto his com•
plaints to the police had concerned only Mrs. Ruxton. He had
never dragged Miss Rogerson into it directly, except as a travel·
ling companion of his wife. Why, therefore, should the police
suddenly become interested only in Mary and not in Mrs. Ruxton?
But he did not change his tactics at all. In his pesterings of the
polire he had acted deliberately like a man who was off his head
with worry over an unfaithful wife. He continued in this strain,
redoubling his efforts and stepping up his output of stories con•
cerning her affairs with other men. Not only to the police but to
evervone he came i n contact with he told his stories. But he
never mentioned Miss Rogerson.
The only occasion he did drag her in was in an abortive attempt
to prove an alibi. An electrician named Hall had done some
electrical work at the Ruxton home during the week commencing
on September 2l. Ruxton called on this man and endeavoured
by the power of suggestion to convince him that he had done the
work on Saturday, September 14, and that Mary Rogerson had
opened the door to him. Hall stoutly refused to fall for it, stolidly
pointing out that he was at home on September 14 and could
prove it and that when he did the electrical job during the later
period, Miss Rogerson did not open the door.
Foiled in that move, Ruxton went completely off his head. He
rushed around the town trying his best to confuse everyone who
mattered concerning his movements over the previous few weeks.
He tried to tie them into knots and shake their memories of
events, but not i n one case did he succeed.
Then, on Saturday, October 12, he sat down and wrote out a
long statement which he titled "J\fy Movements." This w_as a
wholly fictitious document designed to cover up his tr:Kks and to
hoodwink the police. . He took this document to the police
station and made them a present of it. In return, the police shoved
him in a ceV for the night.
Ruxton was charged on October 14 with having murdered
Mary Rogerson and on November 5 with having murdered Isabella
Ruxton. Once he was charged, his previous mode of procedure,
his ravings, accusations and passionate bearing dropped away
from him. He became calm and collected, wily and watchful like
a stag at bay.
Though he had been charged with two murders, Ruxton was
arraigned only for the killing of his de facto wife. The task of
the prosecution was to prove that the remains found along the
Edinburgh to Carlisle road were those of die so-called Mrs. Rux
ton.
And, thanks to the efforts of Professor John Glaister of Glasgow
University, the Crown did prove it. The professor's painstakin g
and intricate reconstruction of the crime is now world famous and
has become standard practice in similar cases.
\Vhen his colleague Professor Brash reconstructed two almost
complete skeletons from the bones found in the ravines, it was
proved anatomically that they belonged to two women of diffuent
ages-ages corresponding to l\frs. Ruxton and Mary Rogerson. But
the heads were a different matter and presented their own pr�
lem. And it was there the the experts achieved their greatest
triumph. A photograph of Mrs. Ruxton wearing a tiara was ob
tained. Then the two skulls were photograph�d. Knowing how
easy it is for a photo to be faked, how a slight variation of the
angle or distance can enlarge, elongate or distort or otherwise
throw a subject out of perspective, the experts meawred the tiara
on Mrs. Ruxton's head and were able to calculate the exact dis
tance she stood from the camera when the portrait was taken.
The sk.ulls were photographed from the same distance and then
the prints were superimposed over the studio portrait. One print
fitted perfectly, nose, mouth and eyes in the portrait coinciding
with the bone structure of the photographed skull.
The Crown had little difficulty in connecting Ruxton with tbe
murder of his wife. Apart from the bloodstained clothes and
carpets in his home and the evidence of his carryings-on before
and after the disappearance of his de facto wife, there was the
damning piece of evidence that an article of clothing belonging to
one of his children had been used to wrap up part of the remains
found in the ravine. Circumstantial evidence certainly, but strong
enough to hang Ruxton. It did.
The presence of the Cyclops eye was never fully explained at
the trial. It had nothing to do with the corpses. It was believed
that the eye was either included deliberately by Ruxton with the
object of providing a red herring, or that it had been included· by
mist,ik.e. The generally accepted theory after the trial was that
Rnxton had had the eye in his medical museum preserved in
spirits. He had possibly used these spirits on the remains to help
preserve them while they were lying in the room at his home
awaiting transportation to the ravine. Thus the eye may have been
mixed up with the remains without Ruxton knowing it.
Evidence at the trial disposed of the doctor's allegations that
Mary Rogerson was pregnant. Though he was tried only for the
murder of his de facto wife, evidence concerning l\fary Roger-
son's disappearance and death was admitted by the trial judge,

Mr. Justice Singleton.
Ruxton was defended by one of Britain's most able senior coun
sel, Mr. Norman Birkett, K.C., who fought a grim but losing
battle for his peculiar client. · Ruxton in the witness box was not
much different to Ruxton in ord.inary l ife. He was in turn arro
gant, tearful, pleading, passionate and bombastic. Describing his
wife's alleged infidelities and the arguments they used to have, he
quoted the French proverb, "He who loves most, chastises most."
This was tossed at him by the Crown as a damning admission
that he had injured his wife. Ruxton took refuge in tears and
said that he had never done anything wrong.
Questioned as to Mary Rogerson's alleged pregnancy, Ruxton
claimed that his de facto wife had told him of the girl's condition.
"But Mary, my Mary, she was one hundred per cent. loyal," he
said. "But I would not say my Bella was fond of the children
because if she was she would not leave the parties, the children
and everything to Mary and go away."
Of the Crown witnesses in toto, Ruxton complained to the
judge, "I have never done anything wrong to anybody, sir, and
then they come and tell these stories."
He denied all knowledge of the death of his wife. He said h e
knew nothing about it.
, The jury did not believe him. They found him guilty after a
retirement 0£ just over one hour. Mr. _Justice Singleton then pro
nounced the death sentence. Ruxton's only comment was, "Bell a,
Bena, my Bella."
The Hindu doctor was hanged in Strangeways Prison, Man
chester, on May 12, I 936, and went to his death still calling 011
his "Bella."
INFORMlTION REUEIVED
By F. J. C.
Figuring largely in the list of solved crimes are

those which are listed in the police files under the
heading of "Information Received". An ex-police
officer tells how he was aided by a "phiz-gig".
.
"A N ACCOUNT of the technique employed by the small-time
nook intent on getting something for nothing in an un
orthodox way should be of interest to you crime students," said
ex-Detective P-- at our little Crime Club the other evening.
"Some crooks adept with the pen," he went on as we sat back
to enjoy his yarn, "prefer to pass the valueless cheque on the
unsuspecting storekeeper, whilst others think up an ingenious
scheme which, when carried out successfully, is a puzzle-tempor
arily at least- to us 'D's'. In the days when the disappearance of
a motor car from a city street was considered as a plain case of
theft, and not as appears no,,adays as just a joyriders whim, two
Sydneysiders purloined a car left parked in the city and hy so doing
&1arted a sequence of events which had surprising results-for
themseh·es.
11
"In the early hours of the morning of December 30, 1934, the
flatties at Central Station were called to an all-night service
station which at that time occupied the basement of a building in
King Street. On arrival they found the night attendant stuttering
with shock. After quietening him down they got his story. It
appears that he had retired to his bed at the side of the office
some two hours previously, a£ter locking the roller shutters at the
main entrance and extinguishing the li,;hts in the service station.
About an hour later he was awakened by the flashing of a torch
in his eyes and saw two men at the side of his bed. Before he
could cry out or move they had seized him and tied him up with
rope in such a way that he was unable to move from the bed.
Shortly a[ter he heard the office till ring, the rattle of petrol tins,
the petrol bowser being operated, a car being started, the roller
shutters being operated, and a car being driven up the ramp and
out of the service station. Unable to cry out because of a gag in
his mouth, he managed with difficulty to free himself, and then got
a startled passer-by to telephone the police. An examination of the
premises revealed that the money m the till and a petrol con•
tainer had been stolen. A[ter taking particulars of the occurrence
in their little black books, the cops returned to the station and
notified the C.I.B.
"l was assigned to the case by the Chief and naturally J. am
able to tell you something about it.
"I first of all read the report of the flatties, then went to the ser
vice station to interview the attendant. As he had been questioned
by the flatties until he was tired of answering their questions, he
seemed to think that I was doubting his word by getting him to
repeat what -had happened, but after reassuring him on this point
I got the full details.
From questions I put to him after this recital, he told me that
at 2 p.m. that day a Chrysler car was driven into the garage and
parked. Did he have the number of the car? Yes. It was entered
by him in the book provided. Could he remember what the
driver looked like? No • • • but wait a minute, he remembered
something now. It was a youth who supplied him with the num
ber 0£ the car for he remembered that some 15 minutes after the
youth had supplied him with the number and left the service
INFORMATION RECEIVED 23
station, he had returned and said that he had left his latch key
in the car, went to the car, apparently got the key and again left
the service station.
"Later it turned out that the car was driven into the service
station by a man and that the youth wa., hiding on the floor of
the car. After the car was parked the man hid in the back seat
of the car whilst the youth gave the number to the attendant.
This was, of course, unknown to me at the time but it was obvious
that the man who planned the hold-up and hid in the car wanted
to give the impression to the attendant that only the driver was
in the car and by observing what was going on in the service
station planned the hold-up.
"As it had all the earmarks of the non-professional job I didn't
trouble getting the attendant to sift through the pile of photo
graphs we keep in the rogues' gallery at headquarters, but simply
got the number of the car and phoned the traffic office. One of
the jokers there told me that the number plates were issued to a
woman in the eastern suburbs who owned a Chev. car and after
getting her address I hung up. It was a very surprised woman who
discovered that the number plates on her car which had been
parked in the garage for some weeks and unused due to some
mechanical fault, had disappeared.
"After getting a list of all her male friends I returned to the
oflKe and sent out a call_ to the flatties around the suburbs to keep
their eyes skinned for a stolen Chrysler car with false number
plates.
"The owner of the Chrysler told me he left the car in Liverpool
Street at I p.m. and when he returned half an hour later it was
no longer there, so it was obvious that the thieves had driven the
rar from Liverpool Street via a back street to change the number
plates, and then on to the service station in King Street, no doubt
with the idea in mind that no one would think of looking for a
stolen car in a service station.
"A day or so later a 'phiz-gig' told me that a chap named
Arthur Thompson (that's not his name but it will have to do for
the purposes of this yarn) had been hanging around the service
station for over a week prior to the hold-up and hadn't been seen
in the vicinity since. would possess a knowledge of the working of
the station and might be one of the roves involved.
"As he was one of the male friends of the woman from whose
car the number plates had been filched I got his address and
dropped round to see him, but he wasn't home and as those in the
boarding l1ouse said that he had le[t for a holiday �ome days pre
viously but didn't say where he was going, they weren't very help
ful. I got a 'phiz-gig' to watch his place to tip me off if Thompson
returned from his .holiday, but the days passed and there was still
no sign of him nor any reports that the stolen Chrysler had been
located.
"A week later as a result of 'information received' I went in a
police car to Bulli and parked off a road leading to a bush track.
About an hour later a Chrysler with the number plates I was look
ing for came along the road, but the driver saw the police car as
soon as we saw him and hit the accelerator hard. But our driver
stepped on it and we went after him. Just as we were overtaking
him near a level crossing a coal train loomed up and we had what
might be termed a very close shave. The Chrysler missed the
engine by inches and got across in front of the train whilst our
driver swung the car side on and ran parallel but i_n an opposite
direction to the. train and I can tell you my heart was in my mouth
as we skidded to a stop.
"The driver of the coal train had braked hard to avoid a col
lision anl1 by the time he had halted the train it was completely
covering the crossing and the Chrysler's driver made the best of the
opportunity and speeded away but we caught up with him some
thirty minutes later and ran him into the kerb. \Ve drew our
guns and ordered him out of the car. put the bracelets on him
and took him to the police car for questioning. He came dean.
It appeared that he had a holiday camp at .\finnamurra where
we proceeded after one of the police took over the Chrysler.
"At Minnamurra we found the camp in the bush and a tent
used to garage the stolen car_. Lying down asleep on a camp
stretcher in the camp was a youth who said his name was Bertie
Jameson, and in the camp we found a petrol container with the
service station brand on it.
"Thompson was later identified by a witness as the man who
drove the Chrysler into the service station on the afternoon of the
hold-up, whilst the attendant identified the youth as the one who
lllpplied him with the number of the car, after it was parked.
INFORMATION RECEIVED 25
"Thompson and Jameson were both charged with assault, rob

bery and stealing, and subsequently Thompson_pleaded guilty at
the Sydney Quarter Sessions and was sentenced to two years hard
labour on each charge, whilst the Crown on my submission did .
not proceed with the charges against the youth. For you see he
was the one who gave us the tip (having had a heated argument
with Thompson) which enabled us to proceed to Bulli and make
the arrest, a fact which was not disclosed in court, and only men
tioned in e,,idence that we acted 1rom information received,.' •
The Mystery of No. 29 Wolverton St.

By CHRIS B. LES.4NDS
It had been declared by a noted British criminolo

gist that this crime has no solution, and has all
the maddening, frustrating fascination of a chess
problem that ends in perpetual check.
THERE is a decided possibility that had Mr. and Mrs. Johnston

decided to leave their house at 3 1 Wolverton Street for an
outing at any other time than a quarter to nine on the night
of January 20, 1931, few outside their circle of friends would have
ever heard of them, but circumstances-nil i_t fate if you like
brought them out through their back door at that fateful hour on
that fateful night, and the English-speakin!( world WdS to hear
plenty about them, for they were to be the first disinterested per
sons-albeit horror-stricken-to view the bodv of the victim of a
near '·perfect" murder, a murder carried out ·so mysteriously that
the solution of the crime still puzzles the wortd·s leading crimin
ologists.
l\lr. Johnston was an engineer and he and his wife lived in a
semi-detached brick cottage, which wa.s part of a row of similar
cottages in \\'olverton Street, Anfield, a suhurb of England's Liver-
THE MYSTERY OF NO. 29 WOLVERTON STREET 17
pool, and although they knew .the names of their immediate

neighbours, they were only on nodding terms with them. Not
that the Johnstons were snobs-far from it-but they minded
their own business and spoke to their neighbours only when
spoken to. On this particular evening they had intended visiting
fr!ends, and were to leave home about eight o'clock, but tro.uble
with a furnace held them up, and as they walked out the back
door at a quarter to nine they were met by their neighbour at
No. 29.
"Good evening, Mr. \Vallace," said Mrs. Johnston amiably.
"Good evening," replied Mr. Wallace. "Have you heard any
thing at all unusual going on tonight?"
"Unusual?" Mrs. Johnston replied in somewhat surprised tones.
MNo, I don't think that we have. But why? What has happened?"
"Well, I've been around to the front door," he explained in a
somewhat nervous tone, "and I've also tried the back one. But
they're both fastened against me. I can't get in. I'm wondering
if my wife has heard something which has made her nervous about__
being in the house by herself and has fastened both the doors."
Mr. Johnston felt a little puzzled at Wallace's remarks. "Try
the door again, Mr. Wallace," he suggested, "then if you can't
open it, I'll get my back door key and see if that will open it."
\Vallace and· his neighbours were standing in the entry by the
door to the yard as they were ·talking, and when Mr. Johnston
suggested that he should try again, Wallace strode across the yard
to the back door of the house.
"It opens now," he told the by now curious neighbours who
waited outside whilst \Vallace went inside the house to see if
everything was alright. They saw the gas lights go on in the
house and heard \Vallace calling "Julia," his wife. A few minutes
later he came rushing frantically out of the house.
"Whatever is wrong, Mr. Wallace?" Mrs. Johnston asked.
"Come and see," he exclaimed breathlessly. "She has been mur
dered."
From that moment the curtain rose on a brutal and apparently
motiveless murder, one ,of the most mysterious that ever captured
the imagination of a nation. ___,
The "Wallace Murder" (as it came to be known) says noted

British criminologist and brilliant crime writer, Edgar Lustgarten,
"has no solution. Other crimes have other qualities in far
greater abundance; more phsycological interest, wider human
appeal, greater social significance. But as a mental exercise, as a
challenge to one's powers of deduction and analysis, the Wallace
murder is in a class by itself. It has all the maddening, frustrating
fascination of a chess problem that ends in perpetual check."
William Herbert Wallace was fifty-two years of age when
tragedy came into his life. For more than eighteen years he had
shared married life with a woman as undistinguished as himself,
and for sixteen of those years he had been a whole-time agent
for the Prudential Insurance Company. Highly trusted by his
company, and ;well and favourably known in Liverpool, he and
his w,fe were, according to neighbours, "a very loving couple."
Judging by the evidence brought out at the trial the first move
in this mystery murder occurred twenty-four hours before Mrs.
\\'allace died. On Monday, January 1 9, there was a chess match
- scheduled to take place at tli.e Liverpool Central Chess Club, at
which Wallace was to play. Shortly after seven p.m., when the
players were assembling, but before 'Wallace had arrived, someone
telephoned the club and left a message with Mr. Beattie. the cap
tain of the c:hess team. "Please ask Mr. \Vallace to come out at
7.30 tomorrow night and visit Mr. Qualtrough . . . Mr. R. M.
Qualtrough of 25 Menlove Gardens East. I want to see him
urgently on a maller of business."
. About half an hour later, although Mr. Beattie did not see him
come into the club, Wal!ace was sitting down playing chess so he
went over and handed him the message.
"Qualtrough," he said. "Never heard of him. 25 Menlove Gar•
dens East. Where is Menlove Gardens East?"
"Frankly," replied the captain of the chess team, "I don't know,
but wait a minute I'll try and find out."
Mr. Beattie spoke to other members of the team and then
told Wallace: "Caird (another member) knows of :\lenlove Avenue,
Menlove Gardens West, but he has never heard of Menlove Gar
dens East, but he thinks it must be in the Menlqve Avenue area."
"Don't bother," replied \Vallace. ''I'll find it l',/lllehow or other."
The next evening Wallace returned from work at about six

o'clock. At half past six a milk boy called and handed Mrs.
Wallace the milk, and at about seven or shortly after Wallace
was on his way to visit Mr. Qualtrough. He went to Menlove
Avenue by tram, then roamed around the neighbourhood for the
best part of an hour, making numerous enquiries, but nobody
had heard of Menlove Gardens East, nor of anyone living in the
neighbourhood of the name of Qualtrough, so he returned home
disapp<>inted that the business which he anticipated would bring
him m at least ten or twenty pounds did not eventuate.
By the time he reached his home it was a quarter to nine.
Mr. and Mrs. Johnston hurried into the house after Wallace
made his startling announcement. They followed him through
the kitchen into the parlour and there they saw a sight which
horrified them. The body of Mrs. Wallace was lying huddleµ up
in a heap before the gas fire. The fact that she had been done
to death in the most brutal manner was obvious since blood was
everywhere. She had been hit repeatedly on the head and her
skull was smashed. Whilst Wallace and Mrs. Johnston felt the
dead woman's hands, Johnston went for the police.
"Something terrible has happened, officer," said Wallace when
Johnston returned with a policeman.
After the latter had viewed the body he asked: "How did this
happen?"
"I don't know," replied Wallace and then explained, "I left the
house at a quarter to seven in order to go to Menlove Gardens
and my wife came down to the backyard door with me. She
walked a little way down the entry with me and she went back
and bolted the backyard door. She would then be left alone in
the house. I went to Menlove Gardens but found that the address
that had been given me was '\nong. Becoming suspicious, I re
turned home and went to the front door. I put my key in the
front door, to find that I couldn't open it. I went round to the
back and tried to open the door, but it wouldn't open. I tried the
front again with the same result, then tried the back door again
and this time it opened. I came into the house and this is what
l found."
Superintendent Moore, who took over the investigation of. the
It FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
murder, was quickly on the scene. He considered that Wallace was

"too quiet and collected" for a man whose wife had just been
murdered. There was no sign that the murderer had broken in
by force. One bedroom was found in some disorder, but to the
experienced eye of the Superintendent, it did not look as though
a thief had been searching round for valuables, in fact it looked
as if the bedroom had been readied up to make it look as if a
thief had been searching for money.
After exhaustive enquiries the police believed that Wallace had
made the telephone call himself and that on the following night
shortly after half past six he had murdered his wife, then gone
out and engaged in a search for an individual that did not exist,
in a place that did not exist in order to provide himself with an
open and shut alibi.
A week later--on February 2-\Vallace was arrested and
charged with murder.
The trial o[ William Herbert Wallace opened at the Liverpool
Spring Assizes, on April 22, 193 1. The Judge sitting with a jury,
was Mr. Justice Wright. Mr. E. G. Hemmerde, K.C., appeared
for the prosecution, whilst \Vallace was defendeq by !\Ir. Ronald
Oliver, K.C.
The court was crammed to capacitv, since the press reports had
shown the public of Li,·erpool that this was to be one of the most
dramatic murder trials ever heard in that court. After the jury
had been sworn in \Vallace came into court and after the clerk
of assize made the customary statement of the charge against the
accused: 'William Herbert Wallace, you are indicted and the
charge against you is murder, in that on the twentieth day of
January, 193 1 , at Liverpool, you murdered Julia Wallace. How
say you, are you guilty or not guilty?" and \\Tallace had answered
in a firm voice "Not guilty," Mr. Hemmerde rose to his feet and
addressed the court.
"May it please your lordship, members of the jury, the ' charge
against the prisoner, as you heard, is murder." Then after outlin
ing the visit by \\'allace to the Chess Club, the telephone call
from a Mr. Qualtrough and Wallace's endeavours to locate him,
and the return home to find his wife murdered, he continued.
"The evidence for the Crown will not show you any motive.
Nevertheless I suggest it will carry you almost irresistibly to the

conclusion, that in spite of everything one knows about the
relations of these people, this woman was murdered by heir
husband."
He then went on to speak about the telephone call and im
mediately created a sensation by saying, "In the ordinary way,
it would not be possible to tell from where the call came, but iu
this case we do know. There had been some trouble on the li1.e
and the operator in the telephone exchange had to get the number
for the caller, and as a result,.we can trace the call to a telephone
box four hundred yards from Wallace's home. You may think f:
curious that a total stranger to the prisoner speaking from a place
four hundred yards from his home should have run� up the chess
club. It is a club that does not advertise; a club the meetings t :
which are known only to its club members. There he leaves a
message that Wallace is expected to call next night on someone
he does not know at an address which does not exist. You will
have to consider whether this was part of a cunningly laid scheme
to create an alibi for the next night."
After several witnesses had given evidence 0>, the position of
the telephone box with relation to Wallace"s house, Miss Kelly,
the telephone operator, testified to the call from the telephone
box. She said that the man speaking from the telephone box had
said to her, "Operator, I have pressed button A, but have not
had my number yet." Thereupon she connected the two numbers,
and had no further conversation with the man.
Mr. Beattie, the captain of the chess club. told the court that he
had known Wallace for eight years, that W allace was not a regular
attendant at the club, but if there was a match on he used to come
along about once a week. He had been in the club, which was
in the City Cafe premises, about an hour when the message for
Wallace arrived, and it was about half an hour later that he first
noticed that Wallace was present, and gave him the message.
"Do you know Mr. Wallace's voice well?" asked Mr. Oliver.
"Yes."
"Did it occur to you that the voice on the telephone w• any
thing like Wallace's voice?"
"Certainly not."
"Does it occur to you now it was anything like his voice?"

"It would be a great stretch of the imagination for me to say
anything like that."
The prosecution was trying . to show that Wallace h imself had
made the telephone call, but 1t was clear from the evidence that
the voice of the man making the call hore no resemblance to the
voice of Wallace.
Alan Close, a milk boy, probably the last one lo sec Mrs. Wallace
alive. described· to the court his handing of the milk to Mrs.
,\Vallace. He. said that the time thei1 was six-thirty or a little later.
"Did you speak to her?" asked Mr. Hemmerde.
"\'es.''
"What did she say?"
�she told me I had a bad cough and to hurry home."
"How do you know the time was six-thirty?"
"Because I passed Holy Trinity Church at twenty-five minutes
past six. and it would take me five minutes to get from the church
to the home of Mrs. \\'allace."
Then followed various witnesses who gave evidence that \\lallace
had asked them for directions to Menlove Gardens East on the
n ight o[ January 20 between the hours of seven-thirty and eight
thirty.
Mr. .Johnston told the court that he had not seen l\frs. \Vallace
that year, but that he well remembered the night of her murder.
He and Mrs. Johnson had left their house by the back door when
they met Wallace. He described the discovery of the body of Mrs.
Wallace, and the way in which his wife held Mrs. Wallace's hand
whilst he went for the police. He was followed into the witness
box by Mrs. .Johnston who told the court that after her husband
left the Wallace's home to get a policeman, she and Wallace went
into the kitchen, where Wallace broke down and wept. She did
not think there was anything suspicious about \Vallace·s behaviour
or manner during the time she and her husband were in the
house with him.
There was a sensarion in court during the cross-examin:ition
by Mr. Oliver of Professor McFall. He appeared for the Crown.
A Professor of Forensic Medicine in the Liverpool University and

Examiner in Medical .Jurisprudence in the Universities of Glas
gow, Edinburgh, Manchester and Birmingham, he was one of the
most distinguished men of science of his day, and his description
of the frightful injuries inflicted on Mrs. Wallace, and of the way
the room was splattered with blood, caused a murmur of horror
to run around Jhe court. He added that he was very struck by
Wallace's demeanour whilst he (the professor) was examining the
body of Mrs. Wallace, "it was abnormal."
"Why?" queried Mr. Hemmerde.
"He was too quiet, too collected, for a person whose wife had
been killed in the way described. He was not nearly so much
affected as I was myself."
"Do you happen to remember anything particular that led you
to that conclus1on?"
"I think he was smoking cigarettes most of the time. Whilst I
was in the room examining the body and the blood, he came in
smoking a cigarette, and he leant over in front of the sideboard
and flicked the ash into a bowl under the sideboard. It struck
me at the time as being unnatural."
"Could you say from your examination of the blows on the
tmfortunate woman, the type of person who would inflict them?"
"I formed an idea of the mental condition of the person who
committed this crime. I have seen many crimes, many of them
of this kind, and know the mental condition. I know it was not an
ordinary case of assault or serious injury. It was a case of frenzy."
Here Mr. Oliver quickly got to his feet and questioned the Pro
fessor.
"With reference to the last matter, you have noticed that my
client has been under medical observation as to his mental con
dition ever since his arrest."
"I know that he will have been."
"If there is anything to be said as to his mental condition there
are then people competent to say it, who lived with him?"
"Yes; I do not wish to expr�ss any opinion."
"If this is the work of a maniac, and my client is a sane man,
he did not do it. Is that right?"
S4 FAMOUS -DETECTIVE STORIES
"He may be sane now."

"If he has been sane all his life, and is sane now, it would be
some momentary frenzy?"
"The mind is very peculiar."
"It is a rash suggestion, professor, is it not?"
"Not the slightest, I have seen this sort of thing before, exactly
the same thing."
"Rash to suggest in a murder case, I sug·gest to you'""
"I do not suggest who did it at all."
"The fact_ that a man has been sane for fifty-two years, and has
been sane in custody for the last three months, would rather tend
to prove that he has always been sane, would it not?"'
"Not necessarily."
"Not necessarily?"' echoed Mr. Oliver in incredulous tones.
"No. We know very little about the private lives of people or
their thoughts."
"At what hour," asked Mr. Hemmerde, "did you examine the
body. professor?"
"Nine-fifty on the night of January 20."
"Can you tell us when death had onurred?"
"At least four hours earlier-six o'dock. There is always a
certain amount of possibility one way or other; but the opinion
I formed then was that it was over four hours sinre this woman
had been dead."
Mr. .Justice Wright pointed out that this would bring the time
back to six o'clock, which in view of other evidence available,
was far too early. "We have the evidence of the milk boy who
said she was alive at six-thirty."
The next witness who was called for the defence gave opposing
views as to the time of Mrs. \Vallace's death. He was Professor
Dible, Professor of Pathology in the University of Liverpool. He
told the court that rigor mortis was a very unreliable and in
accurate guide as to the exact time of death. He thought that
a frail, ill-developed woman of fifty-three would show signs of rigor
much sooner than a well-developed, strong, healthy young person.
He agreed that the whole subject was enormously diflirult, and full
of pitfalls, but said that from the evidence of Professor McFall he
would have estimated death as being from three to four hours

previously-i.e., between six and seven o'clock, though he thought
that it might well have taken place after seven.
It was quite obvious from the evidence of this witness for the
defence that if the murder took place after snen \Vallace did not
do it, for he was out of the house and on his way to Menlove
Gardens by seven o'clock.
Recalled to the witness box bv Mr. Oliver, Superintendent
Moore said in answer to question� that there was no blood on
\Vallace's clothes, and that he examined the towels in the bath
room and none of them was wet.
"If Wallace had committed the murder, he would certainly
have had many bloodstains on his clothes?"
"Yes."
"And if so he would have had some on his body?"
"Yes."
"Probably a bath would have been necessary in order to get rid
o( the blood, but the fact that the towels were dry was a good
indication that nothing of the kind had occurredi''
"Yes."
"Then the murderer was some intruder Crom outside who had
subsequently washed himself in his own hm�e. where he would
be secure alike from observation and Crom the interference of the
police?"
"I object!" said Mr. Hemmerde and the witness did not answer.
At the conclusion of the case for the Crown, Mr. Oliver rose to
conduct the case for the defence.
"This case," he said to the jury, "has been put to you like this:
If the accused did not commit the murder, who did? That is not
· the way to approach it. It should be asked: Who is this man?
\Vallace, the accused, is a man fifty-two years of age, a delicate.
mild man, liked by everyone who knew him. There is no sugge.,.
tion of ill-feeling between Wallace and his wife. He had nothing
to gain, and there. was no suggestion of any other woman. It has
been suggested that this crime was committed by someone in a
state of frenzy. The suggestion was made because it was realised
that this motiveless crime, alleged to have been committed by a
ll6 FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
devoted husband, presented insuperable problems. In fifty-two

.years no one had ever suggested that the accused was not perlectly
sane. He has been under medical supervision ever since his arrest
and I ask you to disregard the suggestion!"
Mr. Oliver pointed out the extremely limited time in which
the crime, with all its necessary n1inor actions, would have to be
committed. As he pointed out also the boy who delivered the
milk placed the time at its earliest when Mrs. Wallace was seen
alive, at six-thirty. It was <1uite possible that the time _was six
fortv-five, and if this was imleed true, then there was no doubt at
all i.f his client's innocence. In any case the time for committing
the crime could not have been more than twenty minutes, or even
Jess, and it was difficult to imagine a man committing a murder,
having a bath, dressing, creating some chaos, to suggest an intruder
from outside, and all of it within a mere twenty minutes.
"I have no need to submit an alternative theory," Mr. Oliver
told the jury, "but I shall do so. The suggestion is that when
Wallace left the house, a watcher called and was admitted for the
purpose of 'leaving a note' for Wallace. The wife would light the
parlour fire, and as she arose was struck down. I ask you to re
member Wallace's undoubted affection for his wife, the utter
absence of motive, his condition of comfort so far as money was
concerned, his character-a gentle, kindly man of refined tastes,
who could congratulate himself on seventeen years of married lite.
That is the man you are asked to convict for murder, and that is
the man to whom I am going to ask you to listen. I need not have
called him, for his story has been told over and over again to the
police."
The sensational fact that ,vallace was to be asked to tell his
story in the witness-box was greeted eagerly by those who realised
that this was to be one of the great criminal cases of the century.
The first examination of Wallace in the witness-box bv Mr.
Oliver elicited little that was new. He denied, with some iniligna
tion, that he could have been held to have any motive for murder
ing his wife. On the night of the murder he said he got home at
six o'clock, had tea with his wife and left at a quarter to seven in
order to be in reasonable time to meet the stranger at half past
seven, with whom he had some hope of doing some profitable
insurance business. Returning at a quarter to nine after being
unable to locate Menlove Gardens East he met the Johnstons who
were going out their back door just as he was trying to get in by
the back door of his own house. He then described the finding
of his wife's body and the subsequent action of the police in
arresting him and charging him with murder.
"Wallace in the witness-box," says a contemporary report, "was
confident and he gave little chance for the sensation-mongers to
fasten upon his personality. His sheer stoicism enabled him even
to face the great ordeal of cross-examination by Mr. Hemmerde,
one o( the most skilled advocates in the country, without flinching.
If he was not, as he claimPd, a man conscious of his complete
innO{ence, then he was one of the most remarkable actors of his
time.I Certainly those in court who tried to look at the matter
from an impartial and unbiased point of view were inclined, for
the most part, to say that this man was not guilty. Just what
influenced the jury it is difficult to decide; but the sequel will show
the way in which events occurred which no one could reasonably
have forecast."
In his summing up Mr. Justice \Vright gave a clear indication
to the jury that he felt considerable doubt about Wallace's guilt,
yet despite this, they brought in a verdict of guilty and Wallace
was sentenced to death.
The appeal against the sentence was heard on May 18 and 19
before the Lord Chief Justice (Lord Hewart), 1\Ir. Justice Branson,
and Mr. Justice Hawke. On the second day the Lord Chief Justice,
one of the clearest legal brains of his day, delivered the judgment:
"The appellant, William Herbert Wallace, was charged at the
assizes in Liverpool with the murder of his wife on January 20.
In the result he was convicted, and on April 25 last he was sen
tenced to death. He now appeals against that conviction . . . .
Now, the whole of the evidence has been closely and critically
examined before us, and it does not appear to me to be necessary
to discuss it again. Suffice it to say that we are not concerned here
with suspicion, however grave, or with theories, however ingenious.
Section 4 of the Criminal A ppeal Act of 1 907 provides that the
Court of Criminal Appeal shall allow the appeal if they think
that the verdict of the jury should be set aside on the ground that
it cannot be supported having regard to the evidence. The con
clusion at which we arrived is that the case against the appellant,
which we have carefully and anxiously considered and discussed,
was not proved with that certainty which is necessary in order to
justify a verdict of guilty and, therefore it is our duty to take the
course indicated by the Section of the Statute to which I have
referred. The result is that this appeal will be allowed, and the
conviction quashed."
\Villiavi Herbert Wallace was set free and returned to his em
ployment at' Liverpool where he was mercifully transferred to
mside work, but he was ostracised and hounded so u nmercifully
that he retired to a small house in Cheshire, where he died some
two years later, a victim of despair.
The mystery which surrounds the happenings at No. 29 WolYer
ton Street on the night of January 20, 1 93 1 , remains one of the
greatest pu�les that ever confronted the crime student. Either the
murderer was Wallace or it wasn·t. If it wasn't, then it was the
"perfect" murder.
THE BEAUTIFUL L.4DY IN BLACK
By C. J. FREDERICK
Her beauty was the magnet that drew him to . . .

murder ! Was there any significance in the fact
that the gown she wore the first time he met her
was black?
MOST murders which take p�ce in this sophisticated age are

sordid affairs, caused either by greed, hate, lust or jealousy,
which seem to be universal impulses for homicide. One rarely
comes across a murder case which is divorced from sordidness by
its psychological interest, but a murder trial which took place in
sophisticated Sydney was truly lifted from the sordid and common•
place, because in its telling it unfolded a story of intense jealousy,
w hilst it revealed the incredible love-<lespite all-of one of the
principal actors in a murder drama, for the undoubtedly undeserv
_rng young woman in the case.
\Vhat strange twist of fate brought three people together in
Sydney, a really beautiful young Australian girl, a young and
handsome "New Australian" from far off Czechoslovakia, and an
equally young but rugged American?
What strange twist o[ fate indeed • , •
39
" FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
As the orchestra played "The Beautiful Lady in Blue" and

couples danced to the slow strains of the music, Merik Tuma, '27-
year-old part proprietor of a Sydney nightclub, could not help
but notice the beautiful young woman who was at that moment
being escorted to a table by a young male companion.
Wearing a lovely sheer black silk gown, which fitted her form
to perfection, it made striking contrast to her blonde hair, causing
him to whisper under his breath "what a stunner." Afthough h e
had seen many beautiful women i n Europe before coming t o Aus
tralia three years previously, he had to admit to himself that . this
Sydney girl whom the nightclub habituees were to dub "The.
Beautiful Lady in Black," was the most gorgeous creature he had
ever had the pleasure of feasting his eyes on.
Beckoning to a waiter he told him to attend to the wants of the
newcomers, and from behind a shading p alm tree set in a huge
flower pot he watched her as she talked excitedly to her lucky
companion.
Round about eleven nearly each night for the next two weeks
this charming woman attended the nightclub escorted as usual by
the sanie companion and Tuma, anxious to speak to her to see if
she was as charming close up as from a respectful distance, ap
proached her table one night and enquired in his foreign-accented
English. I
"Madame is hap-ee with the service? Yes?"
"Thank you," she replied in°a well-modulated and cultured voice.
"lt is marvellous."
A close up view of her revealed that she was even more beautiful
than from a distance, and he determined to find the opportunity
at all costs to tell her personally how beautiful she was.
But before he could put a plan he had in mind into action she
did not put in an appearance again for another five weeks, and
this time she was escorted into the nightclub by a different ma le
companion than the one who had attended with her previously.
Tuma made discreet inquiries and found that the young woman's
name was Kathleen Biliski, that she was married to the young
American who previously escortea her into the nightclub, that
three weeks after the wedding he had deserted her and returned
THE BEAUTIFUL LADY IN BLACK Cl
to the States, and that her escort was 34-year-old Al Dahlberg,

engineer from the American steamer "Pioneer Lake," then in port.
How good-looking Czechoslovakian Merik Tuma and 27-year•
old Australian beauty Kathleen Biliski came to be sweethearts is
not hard to fathom, but they were more than that, for it is a fact
that they were living as man and wife in a flat in Elizabeth Bay
until March, 1 952, when due to some trifling disagreement she
left him and took a flat at posh Darling Point.
Was this disagreement wilfully brought about by this beautiful
young woman? It seems possible, for the American ship "Pioneer
Isle," a sister ship to the "Pioneer Lake," with Al Dahlberg who
had been promoted to Chief Engineer aboard, was shortly due to
tie up alongside a buoy on the Sydney waterfront.
,vith the arrival of this ship a slumbering resentment was to
flare- up into · a consuming flame, leaving nothing but the ashes
of remorse in the heart of at least one of these three who made
up the eternal triangle.
On April 4 Kathleen Biliski returned to her flat to find her
former lover Merik Tuma waiting for her. He had entered
through a window. Professing his great love for her, he implored
her to return to him. But she told him coldly, "We are fimshed."
,vhereupon he was consumed with anger and said, "You make
a beeg fool of me. Last week I was going to keel myself, but I
will wait for you and keel you, too."
Bv some pretence she got him to leave the flat just before the
arri,·al of Al Dahlberg and the parting shot of Tuma, "I knew
when the ship came in you'd be with heem," frightened her more
than his threat of killing her.
Naturally she told the ship's chief engineer what had happened.
"Don't worry, honey," he said. 'Tl! fix him if he comes snooping
round here."
But fate had other things in store for Al Dahlberg, for early the
following morning he was lying critically wounded in St. Vincent's
Hospital where a chamber magistrate had been hurriedly called
to take his dying depositions.
The events of that early morning are best told from the news
paper reports of April 5. 1 952, which made headlines, one of
which read, "MAN SHOT, WOMAN BASHED IN FLAT
BRAWL," whilst the other read, "BEDSIDE COURT HEARS
STORY OF FLAT SHOOTING." The more reliable of these
two newspapers reported the occurrence thus: "An American ship's

engineer was shot in the stomach and a woman was bashed over
the head with a rifle during a brawl in a Darling Point Hat early
today. Al Dahlberg is· in a critical condition -in St. Vincent"s Hos
pital where a chamber magistrate was called to take his dying
depositions.
"Kathleen Biliski is in the same hospital suffering from severe
abrasions and lacerations to the head. Her condition ·is not serious.
"The shooting occurred after 3 a.m. at the door of a ground
floor flat in a large block of flats which runs through Mona Road
to Darling Point Road. Occupants of other flats heard one shot
fired and called the police and Central District Ambulance. When
the Eastern Wireless Patrol arrived Dahlberg was lying moaning
on the concrete yard just outside the door of the rear Hat. He
was bleeding from a bullet wound in the left hip near the groin.
Miss Biliski, wearing a black nylon nightdress, was sprawled on a
bed in the flat semi-conscious and bleeding from head wounds.
Dahlberg arrived in Sydney yesterday on the American steamer
'Pioneer Isle'."
When Detective-Sergeant Molloy arrested Tuma he said, "Yes,
I shot him. He was with my girl friend and I love her very much.
It was driving me crazy."
An emergency Court of Petty Sessions was held in a ward of St.
Vincent's Hospital the next night. In custody at Al Dahlberg's
bedside was Merik Tuma, who had appeared earlier at Central
Police Court, charged with having shot at Dahlberg with intent
to murder him, and also charged with having assaulted Miss Kath·
Jeen Biliski occasioning her actual bodily harm. Previously the
doctors had operated on Dahlberg and removed a bullet which
had pen('.trated a bowel. At 7 p.m. doctors gave police permission
to talk with the American, and a Court .of Petty Sessions was
hastily convened.
Mr. J. J. Loomes, Bail Magistrate, convened the court after
police brought him to the hospital from his home at Kingsgrove,
a Sydney suburb.
After hospital authorities had screened off Dahlherg's bed f rom
the view. of other patients in the ward, Dahlberg told them: "About
one o'clock yesterday morning I was in the room with Miss Biliski
when someone knocked at the door. I yelled out, 'Who is it?'
"Some person said 'Merik.' and then added 'Kay, l want to talk.
to you.' "
THE BEAUTIFUL LADY IN BLACK ,s
Slightly raising his head from his pillow Dahlberg nodded
towards Tuma and said: "Merik-that's his name." Then con
tinued: "I opened the door, and he came rushing in. He was
shouting in a loud voice. I told him, 'Calm down and we can talk
like human beings.' He kept on shouting in a loud voice, and
finally I grabbed and shoved him out the door, which I closed and
locked.
"Shortly after he came back. He knocked again at the door
and finally the door flew open-he must have broken the lock.
I went to rush across and that's all I remember. I remember hear•
ing a gun go off. It seems to me I saw a rifle."
There was a long pause whilst Dahlberg sucked some pieces of
ice, then he continued, "I was lying down and I saw him (nodding
to Tuma) holding on to the rifle barrel and beating Kay on the
head with the stock. That was out in the yard." Then he whis
pered dramatically, "I want to go to sleep. There is nothing more
-can I go to sleep now?"
The Court adjourned, a quarter of an hour after people visit
ing patients had left the ward.
At 3 p.m. the following day Al Dahlberg died, and on April 7
Merik Tuma was brought before Mr. Harvey, S.M., at Paddington
Court and charged with murder. After outlining the case against
the accused the Police Prosecutor asked the Magistrate to refuse
bail.
"It is not a case where bail could be granted," said Mr. Harvey
and remanded Tuma to appear at Centrai Court on May l .
At the inquest held on May I , at which Tuma was present i n
custody, the Coroner, Mr. Forrest, adjourned the hearing until
May 18, and on that day after hearing the evidence, returned a
verdict that Dahlberg died in St. Vincent's Hosfital from general
peritonitis caused by a bullet wound feloniously mflicted by Tuma.
He ordered that the young New Australian be held without bail
for trial on the murder charge at the Central Criminal Court
sittings on May 26.
Outside the court Kathleen Biliski, ,Vhom reporters referred to
as "Soft-spoken Kathleen Biliski, an Australian girl who has the
p oise and screen-star looks of a youthful Rita Hayworth.� told
them: "My marriage to Biliski lasted only three weeks. Al and I
" FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
planned to marry. I was in the process of moving for a divorce

when the tragedy . occurred."
When the trial opened in Central Criminal Court on June 20
before Mr. Justice Kinsella and a jury, the court was packed to
suffocation po1nt. Mr. Alan Jenkins defended Tuma whilst Mr.
Rooney, Q.C., prosecuted for the Crown.
After Miroslav (known as Merik) Tuma had pleaded "Not
Guilty" in a firm voice, Mr. Rooney addressing the jury said: "'The
accused found Dahlberg at a flat with Mrs. Freda Kathleen Biliski,
aged 27, on the night of April 5 and shot him. Mrs. Biliski had
been the accused's mistress for a year, but the American Alfred
Dahlberg had won Mrs. Biliski's affections and Tuma, inllilmed
with jealousy, had committed the crime which if he is found
guilty of carries the sentence of death."
All eyes in the court were on Mrs. Biliski as she entered the
witness box. Dressed in black with a Dutch-type black hat hiding
her blonde hair, she gave her evidence in a clear and well
modulated voice, and her narrative unfolded a drama which one
only associated with the movies.
She told Mr. Rooney, in answer to his questions, that her name
was Freda Kathleen Adele Biliski, that she was an Australian-born
mother of a young child. She said that she was married in 1948
to an American who had deserted her and returned to the United
States. She said that she met Alfred Dahlberg when he was in
Sydney as an engineer on the American freighter "Pioneer Lake,"
but he was chief engineer on the American freighter "Pioneer
Isle" when he met his death.
She said that she lived with J\f iroslav Tuma as his wile until
March when she left him and went to live at a flat at Darling
Point. On the night of April 4 she returned to her flat to find
Tuma there, but he left as she went to the telephone. Dahlberg
earlier had contacted her and said he would be out to see her later
in the night. He arrived about midnight and had been there
only a short time when Tuma knocked on the door. There was a
fight and Tuma left. Three quarters of an hour later he returned.
kicked the door in, shot Dahlberg in the stomach and hit her
over the head, arms and back with the rifle when she wrestled
with him. She and Dahlberg were taken to hospital, where Dai.
berg died later.
THE BEAGTIFUL LADY IN BLACK 4S
Cross-examined by Mr. Jenkins (for the accused) sht admitted

that she had been intimate with Dahlberg.
Aller a detective gave evidence of the arrest of Tuma shortly
after finding Dahlberg and l\Irs. Biliski injured, a doctor gave
evidence of the injuries which caused Dahlberg's death. Then
Tuma caused a sensation in court by his frank statement from
the <lock.
He said that he had met Mrs. Biliski at the nightclub of which
he was part proprietor, and later they had lived together. They
often quarrelled, mostly due to her actions in suddenly going away
without giving any reason for her going. Two months before the
tragedy they were living as man and wife at the Commodore Pri
vate Hotel, King's Cross, whe_n they had a quarrel, and the manager
finding they were not married threw them out. But they found
.other accommodation and li,·ed together agai,i.
At this time his business was going very good, he had a nice
car and was very much in love. Kay and he were going to be
married but they had to'. wait until her divorce came through.
They were living at Elizabeth Bay when she went away again.
He heard that she was living in a flat in Darling Point and went
along to see her, but the landlady told him that she had gone to
her mother at Goulburn.
On the Sunday before the tragedy a man named Bill who looked
after Kay's baby asked him if he had found Kay. I say, 'Yes. She
left home for Goulburn.'
"He laughed at me and say, 'You are not the first and you won't
be the last. To me she did this three times before. All her interest
is just for nice dothes-particularly black silk ones-and going
. to. nightclubs.'
"I say, '\Ve are very much in love and she is very nice to me.'
"He say, 'She was very nice to me, too. I was taxi driver before.
I made good money and she was nice to me as long as I had the
money. She did not bother coming to see her baby. She was not
here for three weeks.' "
Tuma then told a tense court that he visited Mrs. Biliski's
�arling Point. flat each day awaitin&" her return. On the night of
· the tragedy he climbed through a wmdow j ust before she came in.
He continued, "I took Kay i n my arms and kissed her cheek and
FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIF,S
said, 'I love you very much and I missed you very much.' I was
crying. She tell me she been to hpspital.
"I say, 'Kay will you return to live with me?' She say, 'I think I
like living on my own.'
"I say, 'Kay, one day you tell me you come back to me. Another
day you say you don't know. You go away for a week. I don·t
know where you are. You make joke of me, and fool of me and
you make me crazy.' "
After describing the incidents leading to the shooting Tuma
said, "I am not guilty of this charge of murder. I did not intend
to shoot the American. We had fight this night, as you have heard.
I did not hate him and I did not wish him any harm. I am sorry
he is dead:'
Addressing the jury Mr. Rooney told them, "This is a story of
lust and vengeance. The only relieving feature was !\frs. Bili,ki's
extraordinary courage in wrestling with Tuma for the rifle, other
wise there would have been a double tragedy."
Mrs. Biliski wept when Tuma was found guilty.
The young New Amtralian again caused a sensation when he
said, "I am sorry Al Dahlberg is dead. I know it is my fault and
I know I must pay for it. I apologise to his people and to his
friends, and I appeal to all my friends and to everybody who
knows me not to blame Mrs. Biliski in this case. It is everything
my fault. But I know I have no intention to kill him. I wish to
pray for good luck and all the best in this life for my friends, for
Kay and the same for her baby."
In sentencing Miroslav Tuma to death l\fr. Justice Kinsella
said: "You are indeed in a tragic situation-an able and intelligent
man o�ly 27 years of age. At the outset of your career in a new
country you stand convicted of murder. There is another tragedy.
Your Victim Alfred Dahlberg, himself a man of only 35 years of
age, is now in his grave. You deserve credit for what you have
jusf said and for the way you expressed your regret to the relatives
of the man who is dead. You have had a fair trial. You have been
capably defended by your counsel. But the evidence pointed so
clearly to your guilt despite your very capable defence. The jury
had-in my opinion very properly-found you guilty of murder.
In your hate and jealousy at being supplanted by another man as
the lover of the woman with whom you had been associated, you
deliberately sought out and shot him.M
THE BEAUTIFUL LADY IN BLACK
After hearing the death sentence the youthful Tuma-who no

doubt many people in court felt extremely sorry for-turned.
looked in the direction of Biliski, and walked through a trapdoor
in the dock to the cells below the court.
As the Labor Party in New South Wales opposes capital punish
ment, the death sentence was later commuted to liie i'mpriaoa,
ment.
.. FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
THE LONG CHANCE

By ALLAN BRENNAN
Luck pla:rs a part in many enterprises. The

chances were many millions to one against the
crime of Frances Horweg ever being discovered,
but the millions-to-one chance came off, and
brought him to the gallows.
'fHE drama of death which forms the basis of this story was af',
ranged and carried through by Frances Horwcg out on the
lonely steppes of the Australian Far North-West in I 885.
As you will see, the murder of Johansen, a Norwegian, wa1
coolly planned, well-managed and deliberate-all possible con
tingencies foreseen and checkmated in advance. Even when the
odds against discovery stood at the fantastic figure of three-hundred
rnillions-lo-one the particularly careful brute yet continued cir•
cumspect.
The way of the narrative will be to retail the "'acts" in thia
tragedy of the great North-Western IOfleliness; and if you consider
�.h em, I think you will agree that Horweg the German produced a
erogramme. of strength. Personally I think. he was entitled to think
that it held an edge over Providence.
THE LONG CHANCE n
But perfect murders are as uncommon as perfect alibis, and
just to ease reader's minds I shall state that it came to pass that,
in his latter moments, H orweg duly passed from life in a limp
condition , supported by a rope tied to a perfectly reliable beam in
Perth Gaol.
Before I set the narrative moving I shall invite you to consider
the curious marvels of the human mind-a decided turn for music
in its loftier reaches and an appetite for murder cradled in the
one brain! Thus was Horweg outfitted. Nature is a sardonic
jokis1, for it was the first attribute that stirred to life the second
and, as you have just read, enabled a Perth judge to inform the
owner of this queer duo that his end would be precipitate.
Big Franz Horweg met Johansen on a golden patch in the north
west long before the famous Golden Mile.called into being the last
of the world's great gold-rushes. As mentioned, it was in '85.
It was evening, and as Horweg rode into camp he heard the
tinkle of bells on a bridle swaying in the breeze .in unison with
the bough on which it was hanging. On occasion a sequence of
three bells challenged the German's attention, for he saw musical
p ossibilities in the chance arrangement. Did not the great Beet
hoven himsel£ base his immortal 5th Symphony on a sequence of
four notes, struck fortuitously on a piano by a person he never saw.
There later grew a suspicion that Horweg's path in life was
marked by illicit graves; but when not actually engaged in murder
the man was companionable enough, and he soon formed an easy
going friendship with the Norwegian.
Even today more than 600,000 square miles of our Western vast
ness averages less than one person to eight S<JUare miles, whilst
the North-West does not attain even this "density." Now consider
the· isolation of the lonely wanderer abroad in all that vastness in
1 885, and you will see how welcome was company. How could
friendly little Johansen know that the company was deadly.
The gold hunt was fairly successful, with most of the luck
attending Johansen. Ever his chamois-leather bag grew heavier,
which fact doubtless strengthened Horwag's intention to murder
and rob the man. But there was an odd prospector or two abroad,,
and when on murder bent Horweg detested company.
H FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
Shrinking returns provided him with a reason for suggesting a

move, and he succeeded in persuading Johansen that there was
likely to be more gold Oil the Mary River away to the northward;
and on the following day the pair started out for the new alleged
El Dorado.
As they moved across the droughty desolation the bells oil the
bridle made music all the way and, ever and again, Horweg heard
the tuneful sequence that had attracted him at first hearing. There
in he built melodies, and later committed them to paper, which
scrap of artistry later assisted the Crown Prosecutor in Perth. So
to speak, Horweg composed his own Dead March.
At the l\fary River they found that somewhere in the geologic
past that obl,iging stream, then a more energetic torrent, had
eroded many a bed for itself and sprinkled them with fine water•
worn gold. Locate a discarded bed, long levelled off by the drift
ing sands of the desert, and fair returns were a distinct pvssibility.
Oddly, most of the richer finds were again uncovered by Johansen,
which fact probably did not worry Horweg, for in stark truth
-Johansen was working for him-for nothing.
It has been said that news of gold literally flies through the air,
and in this instance so it seemed. One day a prospector pushed a
barrow into the camp, shared a billy of tea meanwhile discussing
golden chances, and thereafter went to work. Soon the pJpulation
of the adjacent half-dozen square miles increased to seven, includ
ing the original pair.
Plainly enough Horweg decided that five strangers was a greater
number than convenient for the transaction he had in mind, for
on the following day he suc,eeded in luring his intended victim
farther out into the solitude, to a remote depression l:.nown as
Hairs Gully. As already hinted, Horweg was a particularly careful
and indeed a painstaking murderer.
Those paths of greater distance! Ever in human hoping 'tis at
the distant end that fields are greenest, and so in this instance.
The Norwegian listened to his partner's eulogies of Hall's Gully,
and soon was cager to be off. On the following d;iy th� musical
tinkle of the bridle-bells sounded along the line of march acr<»a
lhe desert-
THE LONG CHANCE 51
The pair arrived in the Gully just in time to make camp and
boil the billy before darkness closed about them.
Since he fell in with Johanscil there had been no point of the
compass that wasn't as silent and deserted as all the others, but
Horweg wanted to be certain that the isolation was complete and
unabridged. There is definite evidence that Hall's Gully satisfied
even this connoisseur in loneliness; for on the following morning,
in the calm and businesslike way of long experience, he commenced
arrangements for the murder of Johansen. Consider them.
When finally the German decided where first to test the ground
he took hold of the shovel. By way of the gift of a shower there
was a green shoot of grass, and he marked and removed the "turfs"
till something more fhan a square yard of soil was exposed. "You
never know when you might want to blind a patch," said he. He
then handed the shovel to Johansen saying that it was as likely
a spot as any other, and told him to go down a foot or two.
Naturally he didn't tell him that he was sinking his own grnve.
He himself went to work at a slight distance, as later inspection
showed.
The murder was silent. Probably only that uniquely lonely
ocean, the Pacific, could have produced a patch to match Hall's
Gully for isolation, but Horweg was a man who took NO chances.
Why split the silence with the report of a rifle, when a pick handle.
swung like a nullah, was just as effective.
His head almost pulped by the smashing blow Johansen collap�ed
in death.
Horweg· lost not even a second. The excavation was not long
enough for normal burial, but this did not trouble the awful man
on top. Poor dead .Johansen was forced down, his rug thrown
over him, and the rude hole filled in. Nearing completion Horweg
firmed the sandy mixture, and with the skill born of his days as a
professional gardener in his native. Germany he replaced the turfs.
This careful murderer then went to work to remove all external
traces of both Johansen's work and his own.
He next "blinded" his own shallow shaft, using the same tricks.
Within a day or two an average bushman would have passed by
all unsuspecting, whilst at the end of a week even a blacktracker
might have been deceived.
Even N ature helped Horweg, for on the following day lhere
fell another brief shower, which helped to bind the turfs and
encourage the shoot of grass.
One square yard in the wide-spreading West's 300,000,000,000,000
with nothing to distinguish it!
Frank Butler, whose private cemeteries spread over Australian
wilds from the Golden West to the New South Wales Blue Moun
tains, and also dotted about South and North America, was careful
to disguise his burials. So was Deeming, who performed so daintily
in cement, but Horweg of Germany left these artists far astern.
Good bushmen though he was, he himsel£ couldn't have found the
grave he had .filled in not a week before!
On the following day Horweg left the vicinity and turned south
ward. He carried Johansen·s bridle, but there was no tinkle of
bells. That sound in any company other than Johansen's would
have amounted to a confession that the bearer had killed and
robbed that man.
"Jock" Aci\llister, prospector at large in the North-West, ap
peared to prefer loneliness. Be that as it may, he lived, worked
and travelled alone. Along in 1885 he decided to "take a bit of a
stroll," as he phrased it. Jock's strolls usually stretched out to 500
miles or so; but this one was destined to cover 2,500, including
a steamer trip to Perth and back to Derby at Government expense.
Hall's Gully was in all probability the bed of a prehistoric
river, and the depression extended across country for many miles.
It so happened that the lonely traveller crossed the depression at
the site of Horweg's and Johansen's camp of some weeks before.
As I have stated, Horweg performed a ca pable best to destroy all
trace of human habitation thereabouts, but the keen-eyed Scot
noticed some grass-blades out of true, so to speak.
By far the greater number of people read books about Nature,
and some few read . . . Nature, of which select number the wande,:,.
ing Scot was a unit.
McAllister examined the small patch of grass which had drawn
his attention and discovered the faint imprint of a boot. Keen
examination showed others that matched it. Next he detected a
different footprint, made by smaller feet in two heavily-worn boots.
Clearly the pair were white men, and the absence of "wear" ill
the vicinity proved that their stay had been brief.
THE LONG CHANCE 51
Why?
The latter fact was a challenge to common sense. Hall's Gully
was quite a journey from anywhere in the North-West, yet here
were two men who had just dropped in for afternoon tea, as it
might be, and almost immediately returned by the way they
had come! The whole thing was against reason.
Indeed the episode was full of q uestion marks, and standing
there in the sun of late afternoon the puzzled Scottish-Australian
considered the problem which the desert had submitted.
Suddenly it crossed the man's mind that though there had
been recent rain, as the green shoot of grass proved, it hadn't
rained heavily enough to greatly soften the ground; yet his boots
had sunR deeply!
Yes, you've guessed it! The · questing prospector had come to a
standstill on the one square yard that mattered-the fatal yard in
Western Australia's three hundred million millions! It almost
matched picking the correct wave in a Pacific Ocean gale.
Close examination by this skilled investigator showed that great
care had been taken to "blind" the spot. Again, why? A pointed
stick, forced downward and then withdrawn, in unmistakable
language answered this second why, and in quick-march time
McAllister was making his way in the direction of the nearest
Police Depot. More than 145 miles of tough going lay in front
of him. He arrived on the third day, and told his awful story.
Sub-Inspector Troy was in charge of N orth-Western gold areas,
and of course he was a man competent for all problems that his
wide domain might submit.
Early next m"orning the Sub-Inspector, together with Trooper
Mallard, Jock McAlister (by .special request of the Sub.), and a
black-tracker, started for the scene of the suspected tragedy at
Hall's Gully.
Throughout the long day the party held steadily on its way.
There was no track to follow, but McAllister's bushcraft was never
in doubt. All the skill of modern navigation could not have set
a straighter line, and at late evening on the second day the men
arrived at the scene of the murder.
"This is the spot, Mr. Troy," said McAllister, indicating it.
The Sub. knelt, iQspected the surface, and noted the skill with
which the pieces of turf had been matched and replaced. "This
gentleman must have been a gardener at one time, I'd say," he

commented. "H so, I think the fact will assist him in the direction
of the gallows." ,
Night closed down, and in the circumstances the awful job that
lay ahead of the party was postponed till daylight.
With the cause of his death frightfully clear, the body of Johan
sen the Norwegian was later laid upon the surface. The rug which
his murderer had thrown into the excavation was used to cover
it. "It's a nasty business we're engaged on, Jock," said the Sub. to
McAlister. "Still, there's no help for it. We've got to get that body
to Derby."
The remains were packed and strapped to the back of the pack
horse brought for the purpose.
Meanwhile the tracker had been searching for tracks to the
southward, and returning to camp he announced success.
Shortly the earty split. The Sub. and Jock McAlister returned
to Derby, whilst the Police-trooper and the tracker travelled
nearly due south, on the track of the suspected killer.
Success attended them. Had he dropped the body of Johansen
into the Pacific, weighted with 2 cwt. of lead, at a point where
the largest unit of earth is a mile deep, Horweg could not have
been more serenely confident of getting clear.
Of course he didn't throw himself away like a bucket of
slops. For instance he didn't call at camps into which he had
dropped when bound north wi1h Johansen. Instead he passed
them away off, and in Perth at a later date he was asked why. But
his confidence reacted to the extent that he didn't attempt new
figures for the distance; and this in turn assisted the trooper and
the tracker day by day to come up with their quarry.
One day the tracker announced that the man they were after
was only one day ahead, whereupon the Trooper became more
cautious.
There was i:i fact little need for caution. Serenely unconscious
that the dark smouldering eyes of an aboriginal tracker were hold
ing two men on his track as surely as though he were in plain
view, Horweg held southward.
Came the time to bring off the "kill." The trooper and his
partner in the chase themselves circled; and whilst the aborigine
held the horses in a scrub-grown patch the Trooper moved on to
the line of march and waited for Horweg.
, Horweg's surprise was absolute. The first · intimation that he
THE LONG CHANCE 55
was not ;done came in one wor<l: "Stand." He could not even see
the speaker, who was standing to one side of the line, but perforce
he obeyed the brief order, which he could be certain was rein
forced by a J)Ointed rifle in the hands of a man who had proved
his ability to use it.
"Drop your rifle on the groun<l," came the next instruction
from the unseen.
Horweg demurred, and in angry tones demanded to know what
right the other had to interfere with him.
"If you don't drop your rifle I 'll wing you," came the reply.
"You've got five seconds to think it over."
Horwcg capitulated.
"Now keep you hands in the air and come this way," said the
Trooper, as he showed himself clear of the scrub, "and remember
that if you try any tricks you'll be dropped."
"What's the meaning of this?" demanded the burly German.
"That you stand arrested on a charge of murder at Hall's
Gully," replied the troo per. .
Senire in his belief that the police could not prove anything,
H orweg attempted bluff; and when the trooper made no reply he
gathered courage and demanded to be released.
At a whistle from the trooper the tr;ocker approached, leading
the horses; and Horweg's "swag" was unrolled and searched. The
mosical bridle! " I 'm afraid you'll have trouble explaining your
possession o[ this," said the trooper, as he held it up. Nor was
that the only dangerous exhibit, for secure in his opinion that
he h;od brought oH the perfect murder Horwcg had taken nearly
everything that .Johansen possessed.
That night Horweg slept handcuffed around a sapling.
In the morning the prisoner · complained at the brightness of
the stars! Perhaps, as he pondered the doom which he knew was
inevitable, with eyes of dread he saw pendant from every one of
them a rope-a rope with a loop at the deadly end, and his own
11eck grotesquely compressed in every loop! Awake-thQughts, and
stKh thoughts; asleep, dreams, and such dreams! And the sum of
lour nights tethered to a sapling was a decision that suicide was
a better wav out of life.
h so ha ppened that Or\ the next evening Trooper Millard,
whilst unpacking, temporac'ily hung .Johansen's bridle on a bough.
There was a breeze, which set the bridle swinging · and the bells
tinkling.
"Throw that damn thing away," called Horweg, in a temper.

In truth the man was in an ungovernable rage. Plainly enough
the tinkle that from his first hearing had interested him now
tortured him. Its every tinkle reminded him of tae doom that
was in truth rushing at him, and the man at the sapling came to
a great decision-that night he"<l end it all. There was but one
way of escape-suicide! Better die by his own decisive act than
wait for the slow processes of the law, for the measured tramp
of the hangman.
Fate helped him, for that night at his sapling he found a flint
with an edge akin at any rate to a sharp pocket-knife. Probably
he found the decision easier than the deea, but after many erforts,
as his arm showed, he jabbed deeply, and accurately, and the red
blood flowed.
The aborigine, sitting at the fire, heard no sound from the
sapling, but a sigh from Horweg, as he verged into unconscious
ness, stirred suspicion in the wakeful Trooper's mind, and he
looked to his prisoner.
Action was swift, intelligent. A ligature, ,hastilv applied, stanch
ed the bleeding, and Horweg's effort to cheat .Justice failed.
In 1885 Perth was but a smalJ place compared with the fine
city of the present time, but even in that long ago day the whole
population made a big crowd; and that about tells the size of the
reception-committee w·hich awaited Horweg's arrival. The
cowardly nature of the murder of .Johansen stirred popular hatred,
and the whole city turned up to vent it!
A capacity attendance forced its way into Perth Court to weigh
the dramatic performance provided free of charge by a paternal
Government, and to watch the Scales of .Justice at work.
Twelve men sat to audit the merits of the Crown case and the
points for the defence respectively.
· When �keel the usual question, Horweg pleaded the automatic
Not Guilty in a trial for murder, and added that he would trust
in Providence, but as the case advanced it became clearer and
clearer that Providence was extremely unlikely to rise to the level
of Horweg's hopes.
Early in the hearing it became obvious that the earthly chances
,£ the accused man were being ground exceedingly smalJ to a
atal extent. Long before the end Horweg probably would ha,·c
THE LONG CHANCE 67
preferred to be in New Guinea, being chased by cannibals.

It took the j ury only 23 minutes to say that they failed utterly
to appreciate the man in the dock, whereupon the Judge announc
ed his entire accord with their decision, and also to1d Horweg that
llhortly he would be deaft with after the usual fashion in the
circumstances and he outlined the treatment.
Had the attendance expressed iu feelings normally it would
have filled the Court with a yell of appreciation.
CASH v. PRICE
By J. H. M. ABBOTT
It was a private little engagement that had to do

with the breaking of a man's spirit. The author
tells another fine story of the early days of
Australia.
QNE sunny day in 1 848, the Governor Phillip brig, with stores,
prisoners, military and civil reliefs and an important per
sonage from Van Diemen's Land, came beating up to the anchor
age off Sydney Bay at Norfolk Island, in the five-mile strait lying
between that green oasis of the Western Pacific and the red pyra
mid of Phillip Island to the south.
Full of interest to every one in the settlement was the arrival of
the Government vessel. ·For the Civil Commandant, Major Childs,
was to take his departure in her and his successor was to be the
redoubtable John Price, Chief Magistrate at Hobart Town.
As his career in Van Diemen's Land had shown, what John
Price did not know of the ways of prisoners of the Crown
whether on ticket-of-leave, in assigned service, or as members of
the gaol and road gangs-was not worth knowing. He had a
CASH v. PRICE 59
reputation for reartessness, and for thoroughness. No better man,

in the opinion of Authority, could have been chosen to put an
end to the state of chaos in Norfolk Island, which had arisen as a
result of Major Childs's regrettable leniency. He was such a tamer
of the homo ferox as had never before been seen in any of the
four colonies of Australia-l',ew South Wales, which still stretc'.,ed
from Cape York to Wilson's Promontory, South Australia, West n
Australia and Van Diemen's Land. If anyone could be depended
upon to reduce Norfolk Island into terrified submission, it was
John Price.
But throughout all Lagdom his name and his reputation were
execrated. There were thousands who would have considered
themselves blessed in being permitted to take his life; there were
other thousands, who, though most of them had never seen him,
would have rejoiced at the news of his violent death. When, in
185i, the convicts from the prison .hulks at Williamstown slaught
ered him with their shovels, these people were unanimous and
fervent in the "Hooray!" which they uttered, muttered or merely
breathed to themselves as a sort of prayer of thanksgiving.
Amongst the many inhabitants of the island who watched the
brig take in her sunlit canvas, as she bore up for the anchorage
out beyond the reef, was a tall and muscular Irishman, with a
red head, clad in prisoners' clothing, who is still remembered not
without some measure of affection. For in the bushranging records
of early Tasmania Martin Cash stands out as a decent fellow, in
marked contrast with s_ome other of the freebooters such as Michael
Howe, who had no decency whatever. In fact, it might not be
an exaggeration to s�y that, of all the bushrangers who have ever
flourished in Australasia, the big Irishman with the red head, who
had achieved what was reckoned the impossible by escapi ng from
Port Arthur, was altogether the most likeable.
Up on the roadway that leads from Kingston to Longridge,
Martin Cash and three other prisoners, harnessed to a handi:art,
were returning from the agricultural settlement at the latter place

wi.th a load of garden stuff for Government House and the officers'
mess. The road is steep, as it descends the narrow valley on to
the strip of flat country by the seashore, where today you may still
wander over the remains and ruins of the old gaol and the new,
inspect curiously the hospital, storehouses, soldiers' barracks and
the street, still known as Quality Row. So steep is it that the four
human draught animals were compelled, as it were, to hang back
in the traces, lest the heavily-laden vehicle should run over them.
When he caught sight of the brig, overseer Clancy bade them to
halt and rest a moment, whilst he speculated a little as to her
passengers, and the news that she might be bringing. So they
chocked the wheels and stared down at the brig.
'Well now, Martin"-this to the big fellow in the "off" lead
"they do be sayin' th' new Commandant's a-comin' down in th'
Gov'nor Phillip. Have ye had anny expayrience of him at all?
Of Mr. Price, I mean."
Clancy was a prisoner who had come direct from England to
Norfolk Island, and had never been in Van Diemen's Land.
Martin Cash spat reflectively in the dust of the roadway, as he
stared down at the blue waters where the brig was bringing to,
and considered for a few moments before replying.
"Faith then, Mister Clancy, if 'tis Jack Price it is who's a-comin'
in her, I have that same experience. 'Twas tlu·ough him I was
nabbed in dobarton, an' I seen plenty o( him, an' to spare, whilst
I was a-waitin' me trial, an', after that, when I was a-waitin' for to
be hung. He was always in th' gaol, a-crackin' his jokes, an'
yarnin' wid th' boys, an' givin' 'em 'baccy-an' all th' time a-spyin'
an' a-findin' things out. I know him well. Which of us doesn't
that's been in Van Diemen's Land this ten year past?''.
-An' how d'ye think he'll do here?"
I -Wid th' Major an' them others as Commandants, Norfolk
CASH v. PRICE
Islan<l"s been no happy place for to be doin' time in. But with
John Price as master 'twill be very hell of hells. Ye're a dacint
man, Mister Clancy, an' 'tis glad I am, for y'r own sake, y'r time is
up here. Ye'd never last a wake, as an overseer, under John Price.
He'll have all th' blaggards in the Island in such billets as yourn
before he's been here a month. Every man'll be a-layin' and a•
watchin' for every other man. No overseer or super'll be safe in
his job, unless he brings cases to the office. The blasted Hoggers'll
be at work be day an' be night. I know John Price, an' I know
,too well what he'll make o' Norfolk Island!"
•
For a time, however, the new Civil Commandant belied the
reputation that Martin Cash had given him to Overseer Clancy.
Before the departure of the latter for Hobart, on ticket-of-leave.
he took occasion to remind the ex-bushranger of his prophecy.
"Sure now, Martin," he said, " 'tis a too bad character ye seem
to have given him. Why, he's been as mild as cud be, an· th'
perfect gentleman. He says to me in the office, in front o' Major
Childs: 'Well, now, Clancy, me man, I'm sorry to lose ye, an' I
wish ye l uck. Here's y'r ticket, an' I hope ye'll do well in Van
'Diemen's Land.' He shook hands wi' me, an' was rale pleasant an'
nice. 'Tis meself is thinkin' ye run him down too hard the other
day."
Cash smiled sourly.
"I've naught to take back. He can be just what you say, when
he likes. He's the llash cove, an' he's th' deadly cove, an' well
them that's here will find it out. Ye're lucky to be goin'.''
Two days after his arrival, Mr. Price had recognised Cash, as
the latter passed by him at the prison gate. The Commandant was
in the company of a couple of military officers, whom he could
not resist impressing with his knowledge of his charges individually.
He stared for a moment or two through his eyeglass at the prisoner
as he saluted. _,
6% FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
"Well, Martin," he said genially, "and how are you?"

•1 thank y'r honor kindly. I'm very well, sir."
"Indeed, you look very well-remarkably well. But it appears
to me you have got very stout since last I saw you in Hobart Town.
Let me see what you have got about you."
He took a step or two forward, to where Cash stood at "atten
tion," and ran his hands down the prisoner's sides, in the manner
of a convict constable searching a suspect. It was obviously done
to impress the two officers with the way in which John Price
dared to deal with the lately-dreaded bushranger of Van Diemen's
Land.
"Ah," he laughed. "I see your condition is entirely due to good
living, Martin. Better place this than Port Arthur, heyi But
not so easy to get away from."
"Now, God help Martin Cash!" muttered the prisoner, as they
passed on. It was in his mind that such a greeting from the Com
mandant, at their first meeting, was, to make the least o[ it, a
little ominous.
For close upon two months Mr. Price did nothing that was
markedly disagreeable, or outside the ordinary routine of penal
discipline. But this attitude of mildness deceived few of his sub
jects. With an uneasy apprehension of what was in store for them
in the future, "they awaited the inevitable shedding of the sheep"s
clothing that would display the bristling hide and snarling fangs
o� the wolf they knew the Commandant to be. They realised only
too well that he was merely biding his time.
John Price had extraordinary gifts as a penologist. An unfail
ing memory, an uncanny faculty for thinking along the same lines
as the most degraded of his charges, and an instinct for the detec
tion of guilt that almbst amounted to a sixth sense made him a
formidable enemy indeed to those prisoners who sought in any
fashion to circumvent him.
At length the clouds gathered, and the storm broke.
CASH v. PRICE 83
Immediately after he had assumed office Price reorganised the

gaol gang by placing in it all the ablest and strongest prisoners
on the island. They were mostly old hands. He sought an oppor
tunity for putting Cash in it also, and it was not long before such
opportunity presented itself.
For some time Cash had been accustomed to employ his scanty
leisure in making straw hats, which he would trade for small
luxuries, such as tea and sugar, to the families of the civil officials
and the soldiers. The superintendent of the gaol gang, one Aaron
Price-no relation to the Commandant- asked Martin to make
a hat for his little boy. The practice was, of course, contrary to
regulations, but had always been winked at, so he made. and de
livered the hat.
A day or two afterwards while attending to his work as a sort
of sub-overseer of the masons who were building the wall round
the new prison, he was accosted by the Commandant during
his inspection of the work.
"Well, Martin, how are you getting on?" said Mr. Price, smiling
at him in a fashion that Cash has described as "demoniac."
"Very well, thank you, sir," replied the prisoner, saluting
humbly.
"I am very glad to hear it. When did you make that hat for
Mrs. Price?"
"I've made no hat for Mrs. Pric'e, y'r honor."
"Now then, Martin, 'tis no manner of use your lying to me
about it. I know you did make a hat for young Aaron Price.
If you'll tell me the whole truth I'll let you keep your billet
here. If not, well-" •
Cash lost his head and continued to prevaricate. �I've made no
hat, sir, not a one."
"Ah, very welll" Mr. Price looked round, and beckoned to
a constable. "Here you, Parsons, take this man to the gaol, and
6( FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
tell Mr. Honey he is to be sent over to the office. I'll be there

soon, and will attend to him."
The Civil Commandant's court was one of summary juris
diction, where prisoners charged with any offence against the
regulations received the mockery of a trial. Presently Cash was
brought before Mr. Price in his magisterial capacity, and charged
with making a straw hat for Mrs. Aaron Price, contrary to orders.
How did he plead?
"Not guilty!" obstinately persisted Martin Cash.
So a prisoner named Barrett was called as evidence, who swore
to Cash's having made the hat for Mrs. Price, and when it was
done.
"\Vith y'r honor's leave," asked Cash, ''I'd like to have the hat
produced in court."
"No," said John Price, grinning. "Four months in the gaol gang.
I'll teach you, Martin, 'tis not wise to lie to me."
The· sentence was severe, as at that time the gaol gang was
engaged in building the massive stone jetty along the end of the
ref, )Vhich is still the· landing place in the little boat harbor clo5e
un�r Point Ross. It was constructed of massive blocks of sand
stone, and those who were building it worked in heavy irons up
to their armpits in water. The work was the heaviest and most
dangerous being carried on in the island.
But Martin Cash was not quite done yet.
When they had changed his clothing from the grey uniform of
a good-conduct prisoner to the yellow flannel suit worn by the
gang, and fitted him with a heavy pair of irons, he requested to
see the medical officer. Taken before that functionary, who was
something of a martinet and a good deal dreaded by prisoners,
Cash informed him that, owing to wounds he had received during
his bushranging career in Van Diemen's Land, he did not consider
himself [it for such labours as had been allotted to him.
CASH "· PRICE 65
After examination, the M.O. gave the constable who had charge
of him a ticket marked "Permanent light labor."
So Cash was set to breaking stones in the gaol yard, and round
two in his contest with Mr. Price went in his favor.
But neither was Mr. Price done. It was not his way to let
convicts best him in such a fashion as this.
Martin Cash had scarcely been an hour at work on the stone
heap when the Commandant and his secretary visited the prison.
Looking at his victim malevolently, Mr. Price was pleased to
remark:
"Ah, Martin, my man, you don't look the flash pebble they used
to talk so much about in Van Diemen's Land. That you don't. I
think we'll tame )'OU htre before we've done with you. Don't
you think so, too?"
This was too much for the Irishman's temper. He looked up
and cursed his gaoler defiantly.
"By God, sir," he said, "if you'll give me one of the pistols you
have at your belt I'll run you into the seal"
The Commandant made no reply, and walked away, but when
he reached the office he ordered that l\fartin should be fitted with
the heaviest pair of irons on the island.
So when Cash came to the mess-house at dinner-time he found
a blacksmith waiting for him with hammer · and anvil.
"I was invested," he wrote afterward in his interesting reminis
iences, "with the largest pair of leg-irons I ever saw, the basil which
encircled each limb being th'cker than a man's arm, and the
l inks of the chain nearly equal proportion. And although I was
then as strong and vigorous as most men, I experienced the great
est difficulty in moving my feet from . _ ground, and, being
obliged to wear them in bed, I felt as if my feet were riveted
to the boards. At work I did not feel so much inconvenience, for,
being then in a sitting posture, I could rest the irons on the

ground."
So round three seems to have gone to John Price. He kept
Cash in these tremendous fetters for fourteen days, and then restor
ed him to the lighter irons which the prisoners called "trumpet
ers," but which were, nevertheless, heavy enough to weigh down
any but the strongest men.
It was an unequal contest, and Price seems finally to have won.
He made the former bushranger an overseer again-which he
would never have done had he not considered that his victim
was beaten.
But in the end, after he had become a [ree man, and was settled
in Tasmania, Martin Cash wrote the story of his life, and to its
obviously truthful pages we owe a knowledge more intimate th�
we can obtain from any other source of the rule of John Price
at Norfolk Island between 1848 and 1853. The little fascinating
book survives as an indictment of the harsh and brutal Comman
dant, who, able and fearless man as he was, must ever remain
one of the most cruel human figures in a system of convict disci
pline that is a disgrace and a blot upon British civilisation.
,
THE WOMBAT'S BURROW AFFAIR

By STUART BURT,ON
Like Buck Roxton, whose story is told earlier in

this issue, Mr. Malachi Martin also spoke out of
turn . . . and with the same result.
TH E wombat is one of Australia's most imeresting marsupials.

He lives in a burrow generally sunk in the side of a hill.
Sometimes he sinks his shaft as deep as fifLy feet with a nice
cosy nest of bark, grass and leaves at the end. The circumference
of a wombat burrow is capacious enough [or a child to crawl into.
This, by the way, is not a zoological treatise on the habits of
the marsupial wombat, but just to plant in the reader's mind
the idea that the animal's burrow might make a most convenient
hiding place for an inconvenient corpse.
Just on one hundred years ago Mr. and !\!rs . William Robinson
conducled -a roadside shanty in the small settlement of Salty Creek
on the road from Mount Gambier to Adelaide. It was a shanty
typical of the times-bad grog and woiie accommodation for
man and beast. One evening in the year 1 855, a wayfarer named
Bull sought and received accommodation for the night at thia
68 FAMOFS nETECTIVE STORIES
bush inn, being allotted his bug-ridden bed by Mrs. Robinson

in person. Old man Robinson was away somewhere. But there
was another man around the joint, a bad looking type whose well
whiskered dial reminded Bull strongly of a bad-tempered gorilla.
Mrs. Robinson introduced him as her good friend Malachi Mar•
tin. From what Bull saw of the couple. he formed the opinion
that i f Mr. Robinson was a wake-up he would immediately file
his petition for divorce.
Be that as it mav, Bull decided to bolt and bar his door that
night before he hit the hay. And he was glad he did so. He
could not be certain who the character was who tried to break
into his room, but he guessed it was the Biblical-named !llartin.
All Bull knew was that not long alter the bugs permitted him to
drop into an uneasy slumber he was awakened by a noise at the
window. Framed in the ;1perture was a dark figure. Bull did
not ask who it was, but sprang out of bed and fetched the intruder
a left hook to the jaw. The figure used bad language and with
drew, while Bull barred the window and sought refuge in more
uneasy slumber.
Now Mr. Robinson was not due home for some days. However,
he had managed to get through his business with remarkable
celerity and lobbed back an hour or so after Bull had repulsed
his visitor. Entering the bedroom he was i ntrigued to find the
marital bed well and truly occupied. Apparently Mrs. Robinson
did not fancy sleeping alone.
With a roar .• of rage, the indignant. shanty keeper grabbed the
cuckoo in the nest and dragged him from the bed. The gentle
Malachi (of course it "·as he) objected to this rude awakening
and i n the subsequent rough-and-tumble gave Mr. Robinson the
father of a hiding. He bashed him and belted him until the
shanty keeper looked as if he had been through a chaff-cutter.
When he recovered sufficiently to take in interest in things,
Malachi was no longer among those present.
Seizing his shotgun. Robinson dashed into the night intendin g
to fill him full of holes but as Malachi was then miles away and
running like Marjorie Jackson, the shanty man decided to make
a corpse of his lawful wedded wife. Instead of putting his threat
into immediate effect, however, he shouted his intentions to the
stars, creating such an uproar that a girl rouseabout in his employ
THE WOMBATS' BURROW AFFAIR 69
was awakened. She took one look at the gun in her employer's
hand and then proceeded to have hysterics. The bout was a brief
one. Recovering. she made a dive for Bull's room and commenced
to kick the door down. The irritated Bull, jerked back into
wakefulness, got up. intending to murder the latest intruder, but
when he heard the howls of blue murder, he opened the door
and went outside. Advised by the screaming female rouseabout
what wa, dcung, he proceeded to the front of the shanty where
he sighted Robinson.
Robinson was still voicing his threats bm not putting them
into operation. Instead of going inside and filling his wife with
shotgun pellets, he was daring her to come outside and collect
the dose. Wise woman that she was, she stayed put.
"What the hell is all this about, you mug?" asked Bull, i n
effect. Robinson gave him a comprehensi,·e ea rbashing about his
wife's infidelity. He had, he said, caught her red;handed doing
a line with that son-of-a-female-dog Martin who. when taxed with
his offence, had proceeded to belt the daylights out of her hus
band. Martin, said Robinson, had escaped temporarily, but Mrs.
Robinson hadn't and he i ntended to fill her so full of lead that
if she went for a swim she would sink.
"That would be murder," said Bull pointing out a self-evident
fact. Robinson agreed that it would be, but that both Mrs.
Robinson and Malachi Martin deserved it.
"That Martin tried to break into my room tonight to rob me
hut I punched his ugly ·face," said Bull and ga,·e Robinson the
details of the incident. Robinson expressed his gratification that
somebody had managed to take a poke at the great, hairy ape.
"V.'ell. I think it was Martin," amended Bull. "I couldn't see
in the darl:.."
· "It was him all right, the thieving, wife-stealing cow," snorted
Robinson. ·: well, I'll now go and shoot my blasted no-good
missus."
Bull, alarmed, reasoned with the man and Robinson allowed
himself to be persuaded to permit his erring wife to live just
a bit longer. Truth to tell, he was a soft-hearted cove and had
little if any intention of corpsing his beloved. So for about the
hundredth time he forgave her "£or the last Lime." He also squared
off with Malaclh Martin who promised to keep away from Mrs.
Robinson and refrain from making love to her. He did for
quite a long time-about a week. But the erring couple were
very circumspect. They did their illegal courting in secret.
But it was a wearing business, keeping out of Robinson's way.
It is hard to determine just when Malachi decided that Robinson
was superfluous around the shanty, but the fact remains that
one bright day in 1 856-12 months after the shotgun incident
the Biblically-named Mr. Martin saw a chance and apparently
took it. "Apparently" took it? He took it all right, though no
body could prove it.
It chanced that Robinson had a few cattle running in his scrub
and one day he decided Lo round them up and count heads. He
mentioned the matter to Manin, who showed interest.
Robinson pondered the matter and then voiced the opinion that
it would be a hard job to do alone, but it had to be done. Whether
he was throwing out hints to Martin to lend a hand, or just try
ing to persuade himself to J?OSLpone the job, is open to question.
But Mr. Martin saw his big opportunity. Or "apparently" saw
it. After all, he was never arrested for what transpired.
His offer to help in the round-up was accepted with alacrity by
Robinson and next day the two men took to the bush to hunt
for the cows and bulls and calves.
Not very long after their departure, Mr. Martin arrived back
at the shanty. He told Mrs. Robinson that he and her husband
had parted company to search inde_pendently and he had lost
track of Robinson. He had rounded up a few head himself and
no doubt Robinson would complete the job and return in due
course.
But when a week had passed and there W)IS no sign of the miss
ing man, people began to wonder what had happened to him.
But they did not trouble to organise a search party. It was none
of their business. Neither �falachi nor Mrs. Robinson worried.
They were too engrossed in their private affairs. And so time
passed. Robinson had a few friends, but they did not bestir them
selves on his behalf, though one of them did casually mention his
disappearance to the police. The troopers were not very inter
ested, but thought they should make some kind of a gesture. So
' THE WOMBATS' BURROW AFFAIR 71
they told off a black-tracker to have a look round and didn't even .
bother to send a white officer with him. That is the imporiance
the authorities attached to it.
Black Jackie wasn't very interested either, but he had to earn
his pay so he visited the shanty to interview Malachi Martin.
J\!alachi took time off from doing a line with Mrs. Robinson to
tell .Jackie all he knew, ·which wasn't much. And when Jackie
asked him to come and show him around the scrub, Malachi said
he couldn't be' bothered. Jackie pressed him and after describing
the tracker as a "black illegitimate," Malachi consented to lend
a hand.
So off they went into the scrub. Malachi soon grew weary of
wanderin� round the countryside and said he was going back to
Mrs. Robinson. Jackie looked gloomy and replied that he'd have
to stay on himself. anyway. Then Martin made a significant
remark which the police tried to make something out of later on.
.Jackie was about to prepare a feed but Malachi stated, "You'll
only be wasting time. Robinson's body is not far away." Neither
it was. Malachi took .Jackie through the bushes and presently
they came u pon . a corpse lying on its face. It was Robinson. His
throat had been cut and he had a wicked-looking pig-stabber
clutched in his right hand.
"So the poor old coot committed suicide," said :O.falachi. "Well,
well, what do you know about that?"
"What do you know about it, boss?" asked the daring Jackie.
Malachi again described the tracker as the highly-coloured son
o[ a bachelor and strolled off. Jackie high-tailed it for the police
station and reported to his superior officers.
The police were far from satisfied that it was suicide. For one
thing, Robinson had no reason to take his own life. But the big
point was that there was a knife in the body's right hand when
everyone knew that Robinson was left-handed. The police grilled
J\!alachi but got nowhere. so the matter was allowed to drop.
l\fr. Martin, who had been living openly with Mrs. Robinson
ever since the day Robinson vanished. continued to do so. He
gave up his job of mail carrier and took over the management of
the grog shanty. Give the bloke credit for this - he improved the
72 FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIF.S
joint and ran it rather well for a couple of years. Then he came
all over respectable and turned Mrs. Robinson legally into J\Irs.
Martin-yes he married the woman. Business prospered and he
engaged a couple of servants-a girl named Jane McNanamin
and a young fellow called William Wilson. Wilson was a useless
clod of a bloke with hardly enough brains to qualify as a human
being but Jane was a hard-working girl, bright and merry.
Martin did the right thing by his staff for a time. He paid
them their wages and did not overwork them. Then Jane, for
some obscure reason, fell in love with the brainless Mr. Wilson
ancl. decided to put by a bit of cash against the nuptials and future
home. Wilson, the clod, also saved a few bob, but nothing to
talk about. Jane managed to collect the huge sum of £50, which
she handed over to a friend in the distant hamlet of Meningie for
safety. Possibly she doubted the honesty of Malachi Martin, or
his wife, or possibly their no-good customers.
And then Malachi did the dirty on Jane. He ceased to pay
her. He didn't tell ·her that she wasn't getting any more dough.
He just wasn't there when pay day came round. Jane had joined
the hotel staff in the year 1 858. Malachi paid her until 1860-
two solid years.
One day in January 1 862, Miss McNanamin sought an inter
view with her employer, which graciously was granted. When
Malachi asked her what she wanted, she replied briefly but
forcibly, "Money."
"Money?" asked Martin, as if he had never heard of that use
ful commodity.
"Yes," said Jane. '':\foney. You owe me two years wages and
I want it. I'm going to get married and I want my money. I've
earned it and I'm entitled to it. When do I get it?"
"When I'm good and ready to give it to you,'' said Maiachi.
"Now get on with your work and don't be cheeky.''
"Cheeky!" screamed Jane. "Cheeky? When do I get my money?"
"Later on," said Martin.
"Later on, my foot. I want it now," said Jane. "You'd better
give it to me or I'll talk."
"About what?" demanded Malachi.
"About what happened around this place a couple o[ years

ago when Mr. Robinson disappeared," said Jane darkly.
"You weren't here then," said Malachi. "Anyway, you're not
gelling any dough out 0£ me at present."
"We'll see about that," said Jane grimly as Malachi walked
away swearing.
l\liss l\lcNanamin immediately went and told her boy friend,
the dumb Mr. lVilson, exactly what had transpired. Wilson was
scared stiff and told the girl to watch what she was about because
Malachi was a holy terror when roused and might take drastic
steps. He might even kill her!
l\liss McNanamin was not convinced. She reckoned she had
Malachi Martin jhst where she wanted him . As for Malachi. he
knew where he wanted Miss McNanamin and he decided to make
certain preparations.
Later that day when a visitor arrived to see l\falachi he wasn't
at home. Mrs. Martin explained to the caller that her husband
was out in the bu.sh digging for wombats. The caller thought the
woman had bats, not wombats, in her bel[ry, or her husband had
them. Digging for wombats, my foot! Mrs. Martin explained
carefully that somebody had asked Malachi to show him a worn·
bat's burrow and how the interesting marsupials made their nests,
so Malachi had gone out to dig up a wombat for the coming
demonstration.
The last time anyone saw Jane l\!cl\'anamin ali,·e was on Febru
an· 2. 1862. On that day, the mailman, Peter Nicholls, called at
the shanty and had a yarn with the girl while he was there. \\'hen
he called again on February 8, Jane was absent.
In reply to Nicholl's casual questions, Malachi stated that Miss
Md',,mamin had cleared out. He said she had boarded a covered
waggon · which happened to be passing the shantv on the way to
Mount Gambier. It was a damned nuisance, especially as Mrs.
J\fartin was away. N icholls thought it passing strange that he
had not 1ilet the girl on the road over which. he passed every day.
He had not laid eyes on a covered waggon for donkey's ages. Anv-
wa,·. it was no business of his, he told himself.
Nicholls called again on his round a week later. Jane was
still absent, but nobody was worrying. In Salty Creek nobody
seemed to worry about anything. They didn't care a hoot when

Bill ,Robinson disappeared and they didn't care a continental
red cent about Jane McNanamin. Malachi couldn't understand,
he said, why Nicholls was concerned. Hang it all, girls threw
up their jobs and cleared out every day of the week.
N icholls kept on worrying. Something told him things were
crook somewhere. So he interviewed Mr. \Villiam \Vilson, whose
future bride Jane �fcNanamin was supposed to be. Weren't
they actually engaged?
Dumb-cluck Wilson, true to the Salty Creek tradition, wasn't
worried. Jane would turn up some time, he said. If she didn't,
who cared a damn?
A strange attitude, thought N icholls, and threw his hand in.
And then, all of a sudden, rumors began to fly around. One
moment nobody cared at all, next moment, dark things were being
said. Malachi Martin maintained that Jane had hopped a covered
waggon and shot through. But liars must have good memo1 ies
and when Malachi began to change the direction taken by the
alleged covered waggon, people began to wonder in earnest.
And then Ratbag Wilson came into the picture with a hop,
skip and jump. He paid a visit to the nearby township of Welling
ton and proceeded to get well and truly intoxicated at Butcher's
hotel. To the interested publican he confided that Malachi l\Iar
tin had been playing tricks with Jane l\IcNanamin.
The publican, bad-minded coot that he was, jumped to the
obvious conclusion, but Mr. Wilson informed him that sex had
not reared its ugly head in the case at all, although Malachi un
doubtedly had done "something dreadful'' to the missing Jane.
Having extracted a solemn promise from Butcher that he
wouldn't tell a soul, N it-wit \\Lllson confided that Malachi "might
have done her in."
By this time \Vilson was as drunk as an owl and Publican
Butcher did not take much notice of his mumblings.
Next to voice their doubts as to the continued existence of
Miss McNanamin were the people in Meningie with whom she
had left her £50 for safe-keeping. They argued that if the girl
had cleared out, why had she failed to collect her fifty quid? That
was a lot of dough and would be handy to a girl out of work and
searching for a new job.
That was the last bout of energy in the matter. Salty Creek
lapsed into its usual apathy and Jane was forgotten.
Time marched on and then one day two aboriginals who were
wandering around the bush not far from Malachi Martin's shanty
noticed a flock of crows circling around a certain patch of ground.
They investigated and found Jane McNanamin s body. It was
buried in a wombat's disused burrow.
The two abos immediately informed the police and Trooper
Rolleson was put on to the case. He visited the spot and verified
the blacks' find. Needing tools to excavate Jane's body, he rode
over to Malachi Martin's shanty and asked for the loan of a pick.
To Malachi's inquiry why he wanted it, the constable said that
two abos had found a girl's body buried in the bush and he needed
the pick to <lisinter it.
And then Malachi began to talk - in fact he talked himself
into the hangman's noose. He told Rolleson that he. would not
need a pick as the soil was very sandy where the body was buried.
"How do you know that?" exclaimed the policema[\.
"Because I dug out a wombat's burrow there for a man who
wanted to see its nest," explained Malachi.
"But I haven't told you ,where the body is buried," exclaimed
Rolleson and slapped the handcuffs on Malachi before he woke
up to himself.
"Those blacks did it," said Malachi, when he got his wits back.
"Rubbish," snorted the trooper. "Who helped you to carry
the body there?"
".\'obody," howled Malachi. "I know nothing about it."
Dumb-cluck William Wilson, who had been standing nearby,
opened his mouth to say something, and then closed it agai n.
but not before Constable Rolleson had seen it.
"What do you know about this?" demanded the trooper.
"I'm afraid of M<1lachi," sniffed Mr. Wilson.
"Martin isn't in the position to hurt anyone," said Rolleson.
"He is a dangerous man," said Wilson. "I would have spoken

out sooner only I was afraid of him."
·wilson took time off to tell the interested constable that the
two rings Mrs. Martin was wearing belonged to the dead Jane
McNanamin.
'"Malachi strangled Jane" said Mr. Wilson, as if he were speak•
ing of a stray dog and not his ever-loving fiancee. "I saw her after
she was dead and helped Malachi cart her over to the wombat's
hole."
Grilled by the police, Malachi came clean and admitted that
he had not paid Miss McNanamin any wages for two years. He
also admitted that the wombat hole he had excavated had served
as a tomb for Jane.
Malachi Martin was duly tried for the murder of the girl and
after the jury had returned the obvious verdict the authorities
went and hanged him.
They should have hanged Mr. Nit-wit Wilson while they wae
about iL He deserved it.
SYDNEY'S SINISTER FIRST CHEMIST
By FREDA MACDONALD
In its early days, Sydney was peopled by the

oddest of human beings. Of them, Mr. Tawell
was probably one of the oddest. The story of how
a murderer was hanged by telegraph wires.
THE story of a certain Tawell, Sydney's first apothecary. is so

packed with melodrama that it might ha\'e been written i n
Hollvwood.
The life of an English commercial traveller was too common
place for Tawell and although he was a married man with a
family he risked his livelihood an1 more in forging a cheque.
In the nineteenth century forgery '\as pun ishable by death so
it was lucky for Tawell that his crune was against a firm of
Quakers or mavbe he knew the Quaker's religion did not hold
with ,·apital punishment and so he chose them for his little experi
ment to gain wealth. At any rate this crime was a failme, and
Tawell, although he escap�d the death penalty bc,·ausc of the
Quakers' refusal to sue him for forgery, faced a serious charge and
was transported for fourteen years.
77
78 FAMOFS DETECTIVE STORIES
The dread ·of transportation and all that it implied held no

terrors for Tawell, for he let it be known that he was a "Chemist,"
and was accordingly assigned as a wardsman to the "Rum"
Hospital, Macquarie Street, for the humane Governor, Lachlan
Macquarie, was ready to give every man his chance, and at the
same, time make use of all possible talent in his convict colony.
Then from the Governor he received a ticket of leave, and al
though he had nothing more than a commercial traveller's work
ing knowledge of drug lines, he set himself up as Sydney's first
apothocary.
This was right down his alley, for there was nobody to oppose
his status in this far flung infant colony, and when he had worked
up an excellent business he sold out at a handsome profit, invest
ing his money very shrewdly. This is what he had always wanted.
\Vhy he in fact had committed forgery in England. He wanted
to be a man of wealth and property and to strut on the stage of
life as someone to be reckoned with.
There are conflicting stories about his domestic life, but he
had an extraordinary passion to be accepted by the Quakers.
\.Vhether it was his .Jekyl and Hyde opposing characteristics war
ring for supremacy, or whether the man planned it as a cloak, no
one can tell. He built a .\Jeeting house for them in Macquarie
Street at his ow.: expense, and he adopted their particular style
bf dress. Just in case any doubts lingered as 10 his piety, he
emptied many gallons of spirits into the harbour, for he also
posed as a tee to talier.
After amassing a considerable fortune, Tawell returned to Eng
land, his wife having died (though some go so far as to sav he
murdered her). He married a iespectable woman in Engl.and,
who had not the faimest idea of his convict background, or the
cause of it. _ He also kept a lady friend aJ Slough, and it was this
unfortunate woman he murdered.
It was a clumsy crime. First he tried morphia, and being unslll e
of the ultimate result of this particular drug, he became bolder
and put cyanide into her stout (for he was in a hurry to get her
out of his way).
SYDNEY'S SINISTER FIRST CHEMIST 79
Before she collapsed, the woman had time to warn her friends
o[ the intent to murder. These people lost no time in pursuing
Tawell for he had made straight for the railway. By the time
they reached the station, they found ·that the train had le[t, and
at that time, trains were rather a novelty, and did not run to con
itant, timetables such as we have become accustomed to.
Think o[ their dilemma! The train had gone, and there was
nothing to compete with the speed 0£ a train - horseback being
possibly the speediest means apart from the railway.
Tawell took no chances. He guessed he would be pursued, and
so he took a first class ticket, but escaped into a second class car
riage, for the porter might well remember the quaker having
bought a first class ticket to London!
•
Finding the train gone, the little band of friends were at their
wits' .end, when one of the more enlightened suggested consulting
a prominent citizen. Ah, what a relieC. He knew just what to do!
Immediately he composed and despatched a cumbersome tele
gram for them, and this telegram WAS THE FIRST TIME
THAT THE NEW TELEGRAPH SERVICE HAD BEEN USED
IN THE DETECTION OF CRH\IE.
I t was a .-lengthy message for such an urgent purpose, and the
task was made more difficult because there was in those far off
days no cypher for the letter "Q." Seeing that the whole descrip
tion hung on the one word quaker, something had to be done to
overcome the lack of the letter, and so they coded it "KWAKER"
and hoped for the best.
Now this was something that Tawell never dreamed would
occur. How could it? Since it was the first time that a. telegram
had ever been used to track down a criminal. The message reached
the police station in time · to warn them of Tawell's presence on
the train. There he was, sure enough, still in his Quaker garb.
He was shadowed through London and arrested at his lodgings.
Although sensational headlines were unknown i n those Vic•
.. FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
torian days, the news of the criminal's arrest by the aid of the
still new Telegraph Service created considerable interest, and
as the case went on, the public's interest increased. They were
grim days, when a hanging was an outing to which many people
looked forward. In the case of Tawell, so much publicity had
been given to him and his crimes that no less than 2,000 people
turned out to see the execution. Nevertheless, it was a passenger
in a train who summed up the trial, pointing out the window
IO the telegraph wires: "Them's the cords that hung TawelL"
•
THE DEAD HORSE
By J. H. M. ABBOTT
When Corporal Bastable's horse was slain he

swore vengeance. In this story of the early days
of Australia's history, the author reveals how
Bastable found his revenge.
CORPORAL BASTABLE, of the Mounted Police, stood at the

Lagoon Mountain and watched his troop-horse die.
If you had known Corporal Bastable as he was in 1 845, his big
bay gelding Whitefoot, and had seen them both there, on that
summer morning, close by the right hank of Page's River, you
would hardly have known which of them to be the sorrier for.
The dying horse was pitiful enough as he raised his head feebly
to look at his master standing helplessly by with his carbine i n
h i s hand, the red blood welling through the great hole torn in the
horse's chest by Tom Nankervel's bullet; but tears were running
down Corporal Bastable's face, and it is a pitiful thing to see such
a man weeping.
As Whitefoot's beautiful head came to its last rest, and his fine
limbs quivered and were still, Bastable shook his list up at the
densely wooded mountain side and swore.
81
"Ye dog, Tom Nankervel," he shouted at the mountain-''I'll

follow ye to Hell for this, and, by God, ,vhen I get ye, ye'll need
no hangman."
Up in the timber a musket cracked, and Corporal Bastable's Oat,
peaked cap jumped from his head and fell upon the grass. A
little drift of white smoke eddied up through the ironbarks 011
the steep slope, hardly a hundred yards away.
Bastable walked to his saddle after picking up the perforated
cap, undid the girths, and lifted it from the dead horse. He
carried his load of saddle, holsters, saddle bag and quart-pot
towar� a great spreading apple-tree whose trunk had a thickness
nearly four feet. Just before he reached the cover, another bullet
struck a flat stone in front of him, and, humming angrily, rico
cheted across his path. Again the white smoke drifted through
the tree-tops.
"Shoot away, me beauty," growled the corporal as he deposited
his I_oad behind the tree. "Shoot away. . As ye know, it's you or mer
It was nearly noon, and the long, dark green length of the
mountain seemed t o lie asleep beneath the dome of blue sky
arching over all that beautiful wild valley and forest-clad flat
through which the river twisted and sang from waterhole to
waterhole beneath miles and miles of dark and graceful she-oak
trees. Across the narrow entrance to the G orge, other great
mountains towered up into the sky, and to the westward there
were more. Everywhere, wild rugged ranges piled themselves one
on top of the other to make a horizon rugged beyond description.
Just where the dead horse lay, the forest was fairly open up
to the first abrupt slopes of the mountain that sheltered Thomas
Nankervel, escaped convict from one of the roadgangs down
the Hunter Valley, a murderer, bushranger and outlaw with a
price of £50 upon his head. Great apple-trees and other eucalypts
grew about the flat, and the tree behind which Corporal Bastable
THE DEAD HORSE 81
sheltered himself, whilst he thought out a plan of campaign, waa

one of many.
High up in the sky above the mountain, an eagle hovered, poised
and circled .as though keeping a watchful eye upon the two men,
hunter and hunted, who hid themselves in the forest far below
him, while they planned each other's death.
Bastable took out h'is pipe and lit it with flint and steel and
tinder-box as he sat with his back to the rough bole of his tree
fortress. Carefully he examined the cap on the nipple of his
carbine--percussion caps were still something of a novelty in
1845. Lowering the hammer, he laid the carbine on the ground
beside him, and drew the two pistols from the holsters on the
saddle. They, too, had percussion caps, and he saw that they were
ready for instant use ere he thrust them in his belt. He smoked
and pondered for a while, muttering his thoughts, as many do
who live or travel much in their own company.
"And what'll he be doing now? He doesn't know this country
as I know it. His best plan would be to keep down the river
through the gorge, and down to the Isis River and the Hunter.
If he could wing me, he might easily bail up Waverley homestead,
or Gundry, or even Belltrees itsell, and get himself a horse, and
all he wants beside. But he doesn't know, and so he's puzzled
which way to go. I could swear I winged him, back there on
Cameron's Flat, where he tumbled over and got u p again. He
was limping after that. Oh, cunning-damn cunnmg to make
sure o' Whitefoot. We're both afoot now, he'll be thinkin'. Well,
I'll get him. But I'll have to be careful he doesn't get me. He
can shoot, and no mistake about that. Let's see if he's still there.''
He scrambled to his knees and picked up the carbine. Putting
his bullet punctured cap on the end of the barrel, he poked it
out on the left hand side of the tree trunk. Ten seconds later a
bullet sent the bark flying a foot above it, and the crack of the
shot echoed back from the mountain. Hastily peeping round the
other side, th!! corporal saw the smoke rising again in about the
· same position as it had floated up before.
"Good eyes he's got, too!" muttered Bastable as he withdrew
his hat. "Well, I've got 'em too, me lad-as ye'll find out later
on, when ye've got to make for the water. And I know the country.
Laddie, I think ye'd best be sayin' a prayer. There'll be no
IIC FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
chaplain to see you up the gallows outside Newcastle goal, Mr.

Long Tom Nankervel."
Twice in the next hour he put his cap round the tree, and twice
the outlaw came within a foot of hitting it. Once he fired his
own carbine at a point below the drifting smoke, and heard the
smack of the bullet, sharp and distinct, as it struck a rock. A
yell of derision came from the mountain side, and Bastable smiled
grimly.
"What"s that they say?" he muttered. M 'He laughs longest who
laughs last'-yes, that's it, Long Tom. You wait a bit."
Through the long afternoon he waited, now and again drawing
the other's lire, and once or twice sending back a shot himself.
Ju the sun sank behind the western ranges long shafts of golden
light lit the arcades of the forest, and Bastable felt certain that
a grey boulder now lit by the level rays was the shelter behind
which the bushranger lay. He knew that his man would not move
until darkness had set in. So he ate some bread and meat, and
took a sup of brandy from the flask in the saddlebag.
When the tumbled ranges to the westward had changed from
purple into dark indigo and then into a black silhouette of peaks
and domes and camel-backs against the red afterglow of sunset,
Corporal Bastable set about the business of the attack.
He felt sure by this time that Long Tom must have been rather
seriously hurt, else he would never have lain behind his rock
through all the precious hours of the afternoon, when the dense
forest afforded such complete cover for a retreat towards the
river.
So Mr. Nankervel's progress towards ;he much-needed water in
the Page would be more like a crawl than a run. Corporal
Bastable felt certain of that, and he knew that no little trickles of
water could lay in any o[ the gullies in this dry time. The river
was the only place where a man might drink. His tactics must
be shaped accordingly.
Picking up the carbine, and with his pistols in his belt, Corporal
Bastable left the big app le-tree and made his way noiselessly
through the timber to the point on the river bank which was
nearest to the place where the bushranger had lain at bay. The
huge dome of tl1e mountain l oomed up blackly against tllo
THE DEAD HORSE II
radiance of the rising moon, already beginning to light up the

hills and ridges to the westward, but the foot of it lay in deep,
impenetrable black·ness. Jn half an hour the full disc would swing
over the top and flood all this dark space with silvery light
deceptive and uncertain, but sufficiently strong to permit him to
make sure of any moving object in a print shirt that approached
across the liule flat above the river-bed. He would see Long Tom ·
coming. There could be no doubt of that either.
Several times he paused to listen. The ni �ht was full of the
ceaseless liule noises of the bush-the chirpmg of crickets, the
scratchings of 'possums climbing up or coming down tall tree
trunks, the occasional hooting of a mopoke, the soft thudding
of a kangaroo returning to the mountain from his evening drink
but otherwise was very silent and still. Once a stick cracked with
a sound like a pistol-shot, and he almost imagined he could hear
a human voice muttering curses. Just before he reached his post
he felt certain that he heard a deep groan somwhere along the
track Long Tom must then have been painfully travelling. But
Corporal Bastable, mourning his dead horse, felt no pity lor the
s tricken creature from whom it had been wrung.
When he came to ihe edge of the .steep bank he sat down
behind a log, a little way upstream from the spot where he knew
his man must come into sighc. Presently the moon rose dear
of the black mountain crest, and he saw with delight that fully
fifty yards of the narrow strip of alluvial, covered with white
bleached grass, was visible to him. Long Tom would need to
change himself into a snake to cross that zone unobserved.
Half an hour maybe he sat still and watched whilst the round
lamp o( the moon climbed higher in the clear sky. Little sighing
breezes made mournful music in the tall she-oaks, and there wu
the continual splashing and gurgle of the river as i t poured in
a series -of rapids through the rocky bouom of the Gorge. Then
Tom Nankervel came crawling into the moonlight.
Evidently he was in a good deal of pain, and his right leg
dragged after him as he pulled himself along like a three-legged
dog. The corporal could see his white face in its black frame
of unkempt beard as he drew himself groaning into a patch of
moonlight. Jt was twisted into a snarl ol pain, and his tongue
tried to moisten his dry lips. With his left hand he dragged hil
musket beside him.
Bastable was in deep shadow, and knew that he was invisible

to the other, scarcely now five yards away. Long Tom paused and
stared at the edge of the high bank in front and began to mutter
to himself, but clearly enough for the corporal to hear. Stifling
a desire to fire his carbine into the black beard, he sat and
watched his prey, and listened to the weary profanity, the half•
wandering soliloquy.
"Strike me!" mumbled Long Tom. "Listen- to th' -- water
an' me perishin' for a drop of it! • • • How'm I agoin' to �it down
th' blarsted bank? . . , I must ha' got him . • , . Sink his soul
I'll go an' cut his liver out when I've had a drink. If he ain't
dead, I'll roast him alive . . • , Gawd, I can't git down with me
gun. I'll have to chance it."
He left his musket lying in the grass and crawled slowly past
the log towards the river bank, passing hardly six feet from where
Bastable crouched. He came to the edge and lay on his belly
staring over the little precipice of the bank at the glim!fiering
water, sparking and splashing in the moonlight. Bastable softly
rose to his feet and leaned his carbine against the log. Noiselessly
he got out his handcuffs, stepped over the log and stood behind
Long Tom. For a second he looked, then he jumped, landing in
the small of the bushranger's back.
A howl of rage and pain split the quietness of the night; there
. . .
was a brief struggle, the handcuffs clicked, and Bastable dragged
his prisoner back from the bank, with his hands secured behind
him.
..
Soon after sunrise Corporal Bastable stood over his manacled
prisoner beside the stiff carcase of the dead horse. N ankervel
was still handcuffed ·and still thirsty. His lips were swollen, and
his face pale and drawn. A few yards away Bastable's quart-pot
stood upon the ground full to the brim. The bushranger asked
for a drink.
"Gawd, Trooper," he begged hoarsely, •jest a mouthful F�
th' love o' Gawd-on'y a mouthfull"
Bastable shook his head.
"Not a drop till ye dig that grave. Come, the sooner ye finish.
th' job th' sooner will ye drink."
Long Tom growled an oath. "How'm I to dig it without a
spade?"
THE DEAD HORSE 87
" 'Tis sanely. Scrape a hole with your two hands, Long Tom.
lt needn·t be a <leep one-only a couple ol leec. Just enough to
hold poor \Yhiteloot's body. He was my best friend, and 'tis
i-ight I should make ye dig his grave, since 'twas you killed him.
Murdered him. There was no need lor to shoot the horse-ye
might have shot me. Will ye dig?"
The bushranger groaned. "Oh, yes," he muttered thickly.
"Loose me hands an' I'll scoop out a -- hole. Will ye give me
water then?"
"Yes, ye'II have a drink when ye've finished."
"Then take off these darbies an' I'll do it."
Taking the key from his pocket the corporal stooped and
unlocked the handcuffs. Then he stood back and levelled a pistol
at the man before him.
"Now, no nonsense,- Nankervel. Begin under his belly and
scoop _outwards. Ye'll have to mak� two trenches for his legs. You
.
needn t go so deep. Get to ,t ·now.
The bushranger crawled between the outstretched limbs ol the
dead horse and began to scrap away the loose, soft soil, working
in silence. Bastable walked up and clown, his carbine in the crook
of his elbow, between his pnsoner and the pot of water.
For an hour the man toiled; then the corporal said: "That'll do.
Hold out your hands."
The bushranger did as he was told, and the handcuffs once
again were snapped upon his wrists.
"The drink!" croaked Long Torn.
Corporal Bastable pi�ked ·up the pot, poured a liule brandy
into it from his Rask and held it to his prisoner's lips. Greedily,
his teeth biting on the side of the quart as though he !eared
it might be snatched away, the outlaw gulped the draught down to
the last drop.
"Ah," he gasped-"rnorel"
"No, ye'II have no more. Now you sit still there. If ye so much
as move I'll shoot ye dead. I've two pistols here, as ye see. Keep
quiet while I put Whitefoot in his grave. 'Tis you should do
this by rights, but I'm not a hard man. Lie down and keep
quiet."
Wearily rolling himself on to his back. the wounded man
dosed his eyes and lay still whilst the other took off his jacket
and began to drag with his hands at the forelegs of his horse.
Slowly, inch by inch, he managed to lay the carcase into the
88 FAMOt:S DETECTIVE STORIES
----------
. hole. Then he pile<l the earth tlial Long Tom had scraped out
with his fingers. This done, he took his jacket and filled i t with
broken fragments of basalt, and in another hour he had made a
cairn above the buried horse.
All the while the bnshranger lay upon his back with his eyes
closed .
Corporal Bastable hunted around for a suitable branch, which
he began to carve with his pocket-knife. When he had finished,
he stuck it upright in the pile o[ rocks. Along its length in rude
letter he had carved:
"WHITEFOOT-DEC. 3, 1845."
This task completed, he· sat down with his back to a tree an<l
took out his pocket-book in which he wrote busily for twenty
minutes. This is what he wrote. It was addressed to Lieutenant
Moriarty, O.C. the Upper Hunter Detachment of the Border
Police, Muswellbrook:-
"Sir-I have to report that about midday on the 3rd instant I
came np with the escaped prisoner and bushranger Thomas f\.:an
kervel, per Stirling Castle, and succeeded in effecting his arrest
on Page's River, close to the Lagoon \fountain. He was slightly
wounded by a bullet from my carbine in the right leg. Unfortun
ately 011 the following morning he attempted to make his escape,
when, after calling upon him to halt, in the Queen's name, I was
compelled to fire upo11 him with fatal results. I have the honor
to request that you will be good enough to forward an ap plication
on my behalf to the Hon. the Colonial Secretary for the reward
of £50 offering by Government for the apprehension of the said
Thomas Nankervel, dead or alive. I have conveyed 'the head of
deceased to the Police Office at \lurrurundi, where i t is 110w
available for identification. I ha,·e the honor Lo be, Sir, your
obedient servant.-CHARLES Bs\STABLE, Corporal, Border
Mounted Police."
HaYing finished his writing Corporal Bastable bid the pocket
book. down upon his jacket and picked up his carhine. H e
walked over t o where Long Tom lay in the grass, a n d stood
looking down at him for a moment or two in grim silence. Then
he stooped, unlocked the handcuffs, and stirred the bushranger
THE DEAD HORSE •
"·ith the toe of his boot. The man opened his eyes and sat up.
"Come," said the corporal. 'Tm going to take you down to the
river. Stand up and walk in front of me. You can hobble all
right."
Long Tom got eagerly on to his feet; Bastable pointed with hi1
carbine in the direnion he was to go, and the outlaw began
to hobble across the Hat., the corporal marching after him.
High up in the blue skv the same great eagle that had soared
there yesterday was the only witness of what happened next.
A hundred yards from Whitefoot's tomb Corporal Bastable.
lix yards behind his prisoner, went down upon one knee.
"Halt-in the Queen's namel" he shouted.
Tom Nankervel turned round.
The bullet took him squarely ia _the centre of the forehead.
,. FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
PISTOL PAUKING POLIUEMEN

By V. W. HENDERSON, J. P.
The author discusses a contentious subject when ;

he considers the pros and cons of whether a
policeman should own his own pistol. The story
of a case that created much interest in Victorian
police circles.
S HOULD a policeman own his own pistol, or should he depend

entirely on the weapons issued to him by the Police Depart
mem? This is a question that has been asked again and again
by the members of the Victorian Police. Following the recent
epidemic of armed hold-ups, the police have felt that they should
not only. be armed whilst on duty, but when off duty as well.
Following this feeling there have been a number of applica
tions for the registration of pistols owned by the men them
seh·es. In the majority of cases this has been refused and has led
to proceedings in Courts of Petty Sessions. These appeals have
been rejected and the policeman still depends upon the antique
weapons issued to him when on duty only.
A typical case of appeal took place in the Coburg Court on
February 9, 1954, when Sen. Constable Frederick Francis Wor•
PISTOL PACKING POLICEMEN 91
cestor, of Dorset Road, Pascoe Vale, appealed against the decision

of Superintendent \\'illiam John Aitcheson to deny him the right
to re-register his privately owned pistol. \Vorcestor had owned
the pistol since 1 95 1 and had had it registered for two years.
Mr. Campbell Turnbull, · a solicitor of Coburg, appeared for
Worcester and Mr. A. P. Aird for the Police Commissioner. Mr.
H. C. Mohr, S.M:, heard the proceedings.
l\fr. Turnbull said, in opening his case, that even an auctioneer
has the right to register a pistol for the protection of his property
whilst a policeman. whose life can be endangered, is not allowed
to do so. The duty of a policeman was to protect life and
property and it was an understood law that he was on duty at
all times. Sen. Constable \Vorcester claimed that he was entitled
to carry a pistol at all times to fulfil his duty. There were people
who had vowed to "get their own back" on the police and they
had a right to carry some protection from these people. It was
not the intention of the appellant to press that every policeman
should be armed but that each case should be dealt with on its
merits. A man owning his own pistol would naturally become
familiar with it, just as a man playing golf would become familiar
with his own sticks.
Inspector Ernest Charles James, in charge of the Licensing and
Gaming Branch in :\felbourne and also president of the Police
Association, was the first witness called to the stand. He said he
felt it was necessary for a policeman to carry a pistol at all times
and that the pistol should he an efficient weapon. Worcester had
called on him in October, 1 953, and had shown him a 0.32 pistol
which had been issued to him from police headquarters. The
pistol was in a disgraceful condition, it was clogged in the barrel
and generally dirty.
In reply to Mr. Aird, James said it was the policy of the Asso
ciation that its members should be armed. He admitted that this
b.d been rejected by the Minister responsible in two separate
9% FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
governments. When the i nstruction came out some time before

that policemen should be disarmed he threw the pistol which
he owned in the Yarra rather than surrender it. He had used
firearms often in the pursuit of criminals as he had been a member
of the C.I.B. for 15 years. In those days it was not necessary to
return a pistol at the conclusion of duty. You were able to look
aher it and keep it in good condition. Since the application of
Worcester had been refused a number of permits had been issued
to other poiicemen.
Frederick Francis \Vorcester said that he was the owner of the
pistol which was the subject of these proceedings. He had made
ari application for the pistol to be registered and this had been
refused. He was appealing to the Court against that refusal. He
bad joined the force in 1938 and had received training in handling
pistols. In 1939 he had been stationed at Carlton where he had
purchased an automatic, following an incident in connection. with
an armed robbery. He was transferred to the Wireless Patrol i n
1940 and had been there ever since. I n I 9'12 h e had disposed of
his automatic to the armed forces and had used pistols issued
by the Department ui;nil 195 1 . He had then purchased his present
pistol. On one occasion he had had to go to Mt. Evelyn where
there had been a gunman who had shot it out with the police.
The pistol he took on that occasion had not had · a firing pin in it.
Other pistols he had used on various instances had jammed.
One night he had seen two men assaulting an old man. He had
arrested them and taken them to the watch house, one had escap
ed. He had been taken to Russell St . and severely reprimanded
for allowing a prisoner to escape, even though he was off duty
at the time.
In 1951 he was issued with a permit to carry his present pistol
and had had it renewed in 1 952. The type of gun he was using
was similar to that used by the N.S.W. Police, a 0.38. Last year
his application was refused, the reason given that there were a
number of guns on issue at Russell St. and that it was not

necessary for him to have one· of his own. Since then he had
had to arrest a man at Elsternwick who had robbed a taxi driver
under the threat of arms. He had effected the arrest of the
man despite the fact that he was threatened with a revolver. He
had later been commended, both by the l\fagistrate and the Chief
Commissioner of Police.
When Superintendent Aitcheson had refused his application he
had gone to see him, hoping he would change his mind. He had
been unsuccessful. Only a short while after this he had been
instructed to go out and arrest a man, who was known to be
armed and had threatened to shoot the first policeman he saw.
During his service in the wireless patrol he had taken 25 pistols
from armed men. The present set up was unsatisfactory in regard
to the issuing of pistols to policemen. It was necessary to cross
the road to the reception office to get one. This at the greatest
speed usually took about five minutes. The instruction from the
Department was that members of the force were not allowed to
do anything to the pistol except see that it is loaded and unload
ed. There had been 29 hold-ups since last October. Between
February I, 1953, and May of the same year there had been 35
calls relative to pistols and he presumed he would use his revolver
on an average of twice a week.
In the \Vireless Patrol, at present, there were four members who
had permits to carry pistols. A sergeant, two seniors and a con
stable. The sergeant was engaged principally in administrative
work. On the 6th September, Worcester said, his application waa
refused and on the 8th, the sergeant's was renewed.
In reply to Mr. Aird, he said he based his application in
relation to his police duties only. He admitted that, as a senior
constable, he had no trouble in getting pistols for his patrol. He
knew there was an armourer who was supposed to keep the pistols
in order. If a policeman fires his pistol he is expected to furnish
a report as to why he did so. He thought a pistol was the last

thing that should be produced, but when they are, they should
be in good order.
Constable William Robert Ashfield said he had been in the
wireless patrol since 1949. Prior to that he was a member o[
the Metropolitan police in London and was an expert in small
arms. On several occasions pistols had been issued which were
defective. Fluff, grease and tobacco clogged the pins· of some.
Working parts were bone dry and barrels heavily oiled and on
two occasions he had seen rust in the barrels. He felt that police
should have pistols that they had every confidence in. They
were often called to places where the offence was still in progress
and the offenders were armed. The lives of the police were en
dangered at times like these. He had fired 12 rounds with a pistol
in 1950 and that was all the practice that he had had.
He told Mr. Aird that he had reported the condition of pistols
on two occasions but had fixed them himself about 20 times. He
had not asked for a practice as he knew it would be useless. You
would get one gun at the depot and another at the station. The
police needed to use the same gun all the time to become arcus
tomed to it.
Senior Constable William Craig Caldwell, of the Motor Traffic
Branch said that prior to his present appointment he had been
attached to the control room at D24, where he had recei,,ed a
number of calls relative to violent crime. In 1951 he had had
occasion to fire a pistol at a felon escaping from custody. After
firing three. shots into the ground the pistol stopped firing; it
had ejected the three l ive rounds as well as the expended shells.
He had experienced delay in getting a pistol and on one occasion
had complained to the sergeant who said that pistols could only
be issued to the officer in charge of the patrol. He had experienced
a delay of more than ten minutes under this procedure.
He had joined the force in the same year as V.'orcester and
PISTOL PACKING POLICEMEN
haJ only fired 12 practice rounds and had not had the or,>portunity
to practice since. He did not consider himself a competent man
with a pistol.
When asked by Mr. Aird had he seen any lack of firearms
Caldwell said that on a Samrday afternoon all pistols were taken
out and the night shift could not be fully armed until these were
returned. He had not reported the condition as he assumed the
Department was well aware of the fact. He believed a p oliceman
would know when he should use a pistol and when he should noL
This concluded the case for the a ?pellant.
In opening the police case Mr. A1rd said that the Commissioner
was objecting on four grounds. I. The restrictions placed on
firearms by the Fireanns Act. 2. As far as appellant was concerned
it was unnecessary. 3. He was forbidden to do so. 4. The issue of
firearms was against the policy of the police and the Government.
Mr. Mohr said he felt there was a case for the. police to answer.
Mr. Turnbull said that he wanted it clearly understood that if
His Worship gave an order of the Court that there was no police
authority that could countermand that order.
Superintendent Aitcheson said that he had refused to g,-ant
Worcester a permit because he could not provide a good reason
why he should have one. Since the 1951 Act the attitude had
been more stringent than before. Firearms were available at Rus
sell St. and since he had been in charge of the office, at no time
had they all been issued. He had been 37 years in the force and
had had no occasion to use a pistol, though he had not had any
dealings with armed men. He had been, in brawls and had
found the baton an effective weapon,
In reply to Mr. Turnbull, he said that he was a clerk in a
superintendent's office for se\' eral years and had never been i n
the wireless patrol. H e was a t the reception desk in I 942 and
pistols were not disassembled then, He admitted he held a permit
for a pistol himself, but intended to surrender it when the regis
tration expired. He did not consider that a policeman should
be armed at all times, only when on duty. The wireless patrol
were considered the "'shock troops"' of the police force and were
mostly picked men, He knew they should be men who could be
trusted with pistols, but he did not think it would . make much
difference if they use various pistols. According to evidence he
had used more pistols than the previous witnesses had. When in
the ranks he had had pistol practice twice a year. He haµ used
·one at Benalla to destroy animals. He had refused a nuinb�r of

appellanis and this was the fourth appeal against him. He
· had granted one to the secretary of the Police Association because
he claimed that he had to take money to the bank.
The case was then adjourned to the Brunswick Court. for
hearing on February 1 6.
Gilbert James Halsall said he was superintendent of the district.
to which the wireless patrol wa., attached. He had joined the force
in 1 91 8 and was 20 years in the C.I.B. He had fired one shot at a
felon in his whole career and that was at a youth in a bank
hold-up at Eltham when a teller was shot at. There were 48
pistols at the reception office at Russell St. which could be picked
up at any time. Another eight were J1eld in reserve. He had
never heard of a complaint that there was a shortage. In reply
to Mr. Turnbull he said that there were usually about 400 police
around Russell St. on duty at the one time.
Mr. Turnbull: Supposing there was a riot?
Halsall: Quite a number of police would refuse to take a gun.
He felt that 40 pistols for 350 to 400 men was quite adequate.
When asked to give figures he said there had been 8 crimes in
195 1 with violence, U in 1952. and 40 in 1953. A couple of gangs
had been responsible for most of these. It was quite in order to
carry firearms when oq duty hut no need for it otherwise. A
pistol would not get out of order unless some shooting took place.
The job of the police was to go out and make an arrest, not to
go out shooting. lt was very necessary that a p ol iceman should
be accurate when shootmg 111 a crowd. ·
Inspector Frederick Hoppy said he was in charge of the firearms
at Russell St. and had an armourer for an assistant. There had
been about six pistols reported as being in a bad condition. 1£
the pistols were pri,·ately owned the onus of condition would
be upon the owners. He considered the Department pistols were
quite adequate and efficient weapons. Twenty of the pistols were
purchased new last year and the other twenty eight were i n
good condition. l\' o report o f a pi>tol being in bad condition
is ignored.
When questioned by Mr. Turnbull the Inspector said he had
not done any street work since 1925, he had never apprehended
an armed criminal. he had never been in the armed services and
was not an armourer. His qualifications were based on experience.
He said he knew that his present armourer was a bicycle repairer
five years ago. No policeman would want to fire his own pistol too
often for practice at 6d a round H a constable felt the pistol
was inelfioent he could refuse to take it. A prudent man would
always look at his gun before taking it out.
;\fr. Mohr said that he would dismiss the appeal on the grounds
that the appellant had not shown good reason why he should
carry one. He would also have to consider the memorandum
which says that a policeman must not carry his own pistol while
on duty. He considered that where permits had been granted
there must have been some reason for this.
It will be interesting :to see whether the publicity attending this
case, with its stressing of the poverty in numbers ol effective fire
arms available, will have its effect on the criminal element in this
Stale.
MURDER IN SECRET
By V. F.
This story originally appeared in one of the early

issues of "Famous Detective Stories". Since it has
long been out of print, the fu)l story of Louisa
Collins, murderess, is now repeated by special
request.
THE home o( the Andrews' at Popple's Paddock. Botany, N.S.\V.,

in the year 1886, appeared to be an extraordinarily happy
one. Charles Andrews, fifty-year-old head of the family, was a man
who enjoyed first class health. Added Lo this he was moderate in
all things: fond of a glass of beer, or rum, he never over-indulged,
was never known to be under the influence of drink. He was a
hard-working man, too, labmiring his full fifteen hours a day, as
a washer of sheep skins after the wool had been stripped from
them.
His wife, Louisa, was an admirable woman, too. Even though
she had her hands full with the care of her home. husband, and
five children, three sons and two daughters, ranging in ages from
fifteen to three, she also supplemented the family income by
taking in boarders.
MURDER IN SE('ltET 99
They were popular people i n the distri, L . and their house was
the fre'luent rendez\'ous of neighbours and friends. Moreover
husband and wife were very happy together, in spite of the
disparity of their ages, for Louisa was only in her early thinies,
hal'ing married young at the instigation ol her mother.
About the middle of this year a new hoarder arrived, a wool
washer named Michael Peter Collins. \\'hen he took up residence
with the Andrews they were not to know that he would turn out
to be the cuckoo in their pleasant nest. But it was not long before
Charles A ndrews found his wife's affections cooling towards him,
and soon he realized that she and the new lod,:er were falling
in love with one another, a not altogether s u rpri."ing circumstance,
since he was a slimly built, good-looking young man, not yet
thinv.
A,idrews had several arguments with his wife over her growing
auraoion to Collins. These in time became verv heated, so that
the d1ildren, who had always been used LO pe,,ce in the home,
were troubled and upset.
Towards Christmas Andrews decided an end must be put to
the whole affair, and he ordered Collins lo leave the house.
Louisa was furions, anti a terrible quarrel ensued, which ended
in her going to the Botany Police Station for assistance. There
she was interviewed by Const-able Jeffs who knew Andrews well.
''You must do something about my husband," she complained,
"He's lighting and rowing with the boarders, and they'll all leave
unless he's stopped."
Constable Jeffs promised to look into the matter, and that
evening he wandered over to Popplc's Paddock, but all was quiet
in the house. He knocked at the door, but received no answer.
When Arthur, the eldest son of the familv, heard about Collins
being put out, he asked his father, "What a.:e you doing that for?"
To which the man replied, "Oh, I don ' t want to tell you what
it is for. I don't want him to live in this house."
But Collins <lid not stay away. Whenevu he thought her
husband would be out of the house, he went over to see Louisa.
Once their meeting was interrupted by Andrews arriving un,
expectedly. The occasion was especially embarrassing for Mrs.
Laws. a neighbour who had dropped in for a chat with Louisa,
at the precise moment her husband returned.
Andrews was incensed, and in the angry scene that followed
he told his ex-boarder that he had brought nothing but trouble on
100 FAMOFS DETECTIVE STORIF.S
him and his family, and that he was to clear out and stay out.
A few days before Christmas, Charles Andrews became sick for
the first time in his life. It was a strange illness which gave him
a general feeling of being unwell, and yet was not severe enough
to confine him to his bed. He conti nued to work on and off,
occasionally staying home when he felt worse. Food disagreed
with him, and he had diftiruhy in keeping anything in his stomach.
Christmas came and went. with still no change in Andrews'
health. Louisa and the children were worried, and the children
especially did all they could to help in the house and make things
easier for their parents. Although only nine years old, little May
Andrews found there were many jobs she could do to relieve
her mother, and leave her free to attend her father when he had
a bad turn. · One day when she was dusting a shelf in the kitchen
ahe found a fascinating little box which she had never seen
before, On it was a pinure of some rats painted in colour. She
spelt out the words written on the cover, carefully, and found it
contained samething called "Rough on Rats." She looked inside
and saw a bluish powder, of whic· h some had already been used.
Fascinated. she took it to her mother to ask what it was for. She
did. not see the box again.
Charles Andrews became steadily worse in health, and finally
he had to give up work and go to bed. It was now late .January,
of 1887. On Thursday, the :!7th of this month, one of the board
ers, George Oshorne, railed on Dr. Thomas Martin, and asked
him if he would come out and see his landlord, as he was very
ill. The doctor arrived in the evening some time after eight, and
examined the patient. Andrews rnmplained to him of severe
pains in the stomach, constant ,·orniting and diarrhoea. �lanin
prescribed a m ixt11re for him to take, and gave his wife instruc
tions as to the kind of food he should be given.
On Saturday, George Osborne again went to the doctor, and
told him Andrews was no better and was still vomiting. Dr.
Martin gave him a new mixture which he said would fix him u p
all right, but i t did not have the desired effect, and the patient still
continued in hi! unfort11na1e condition.
On Monday, 1\lrs. Andrews called on a neighbour, Mrs. Farrer,
and asked her i[ she would be good enough to send her husband
William over to their house when he returned from work, a&
the sick man wa nted him to witness his will.
William Farrer duly arrived and found his friend lying on the
MURDER IN SECRET 101
sofa in the front room.

Louis:, said, "Andrews wants you to witness his will," and her
husband 1'>ainfully drew himsel{ off the sofa, and aslc.ed Farrer
if he would do so in the presence of a boarder, John Stephens,
who was already in the room.
They both signed, and then Andrews. lying on the sofa, read
them tht: contents of the document, which wa., dr:,wn up in
farnur of his wife.
The will was legally worded, and Farrer. trying Lo cheer the
siclc. man, laughed and said, "You didn't write that yourself, old
chap."
"No," replied Louisa. "I got a man in the lnsmance Company
to do it for him."
The next day Dr. Martin called again. and found his patient
in a very weak state. All the symptoms had increased in intensity.
,vhile he was examining him, he could not help noticing the
indifferent attitude of the wife, and thought to himseH, "1 should
not be surprised if she hasn't got her eye on a second husband."
His suspicion was confirmed when he found she had been giving
the im·alid certain things which he had forbidden. among which
was beer. Nevertheless he considered his condition fairly satis
factorv. and told Louisa there was no cause for alarm.
On \Vednesday morning a friend, Charle, Sayers, called on An
drews. He found him in a low, depressed state. He had only
heard of the illness a few days previously. and was most upset at
seeing his strong, healthy friend so lethargic and siclc.. He was
still lying on the sofa, and told Sayers all about the dreadful pain
he was suffering, and how the continual vomiting was sapping his
strength. Savers tried to brighten him up, h\' assuring him he
would soon be up and around again.
But Sayers was wrong. In the early afternoon Andrews died.
Louis:, despatched her elder daughter to fetch Mrs. Laws as a
witness to the death. As soon as the neighbour arri,·ed Louisa
informed her she was catching the next tram, into town to let
the Insurance people le.now, and then she was going on to the
Savings Bank. She was as good as her word, and went.
Dr. Martin was informed o[ the death that e,·ening and gave
a certificate indicating that the cause of death wa; gastritis.
Two days later a local groom and coachman called with a coffin
and placed all that remained of Charles Andrews in it. Louisa
gave him the name, age and date to be engraved on the lid, and
lOZ FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
he took the body away. And as the corpse left the house, so
Michael Peter Collins moved in to take the place left vacant.
A week later, he and Louisa held a party and dance in an empty
house in the Terrace. Sounds of laughter and revelry could be
heard all over the neighbourhood, much lo the disgust of Con
stable Jeffs. One of the guests asked what the party was for, and
Collins i nformed her that it was their wedding celebration, al
though the ceremony was probably not performed until a few
weeks later. It was a case, as Hamlet said of his mother, where
'The funeral baked meats
Did coldly furnish forth the marriage tables."
At the time of his marriage Collins was extremely poor, for he
was out of work. In fact his was not a stable character, and he
worked only intermittently, being always one of the first to be
put off when business was slack. However, Louisa drew out the
ten -pounds that her late husband had had in the Savings Bank,
and they Jived on that until she was able to collect the two
hundred pounds insurance money for his life, early in April. Then
both of them stocked themselves up with new clothes, and Collins
became the prone! possessor of a watch and chain, and went
off for a trip to Melbourne, his home town. On his return they
took another house, away from Botany, and Louisa bought a
quantity of new furniture for it. Once more they took in boarders.
Towards the encl of 1887 a baby was born, a very delicate child.
Louisa, too, was becoming very worried, for her husband was
consistently out of work and her little stock of money was running
low, in spite of her efforts to conserve it. Collins now managed
to obtain two or three clays work a week at Botany with Thomas
Geddes, the fell-monger, who had employed him on and off during
recent years. They moved back to Botany in February of 1 888.
At that time they were entirely clear of debt, and Louisa had
twenty-five pounds left in gold.
Almost immediately Collins was given the sack, and once more
the family had to depend on what was to be earned from keeping
lodgers. Fortunately the two eldest children were now supporting
themselves.
Collins was unemployed for eight weeks. One Saturday morn
ing during this period he went to his wife, and said, "Louisa, will
you give me a pound? 1"11 lint! a way of making money. I know
a gambling home in George Street.·
--------------------------�
"No, !I.lick, of course not, you 1'.now what a horror I have of

gambling," she re p lied.
"Don"t be silly; he urged. "I promise I won"t lose it."
So Louisa gave in, and he went off confidently with the pound.
That night at half past eleven when she was lying wakeful in
her bed, he returned. He was very happy, and gleefully dropped
four pounds ten on the covers.
"That's better than hard work, my dear," he chuckled.
Louisa, too, was delighted.
"Do you know," he said, as he undressed. "If I'd had twenty
pounds to-night I'd have fetched you home a hundred just as easily
:ts I done that. \Viii you give me twenty pounds next Saturday?"
Louisa shook her head. "I don't know," she demurred. "It's a
great risk." But nevertheless she gave in to him.
The following Saturday night Louisa lay anxiously in bed
awaiting his return. He came on the last tram, and she heard
him enter the house.
He was silent when he came into the room, and she asked,
�Mick, is that you?"
He did not answer, but struck a match and lit the candle. She
could see by the tragic look on his face that something was wrong.
He sat on the side of the bt>d, and moaned, "Louisa, I've lost
a l l the monev."
Then he Liurst into tears, and so did Louisa.
"Here I am out of work, and lost all the monev," he cried. "\Viii
you ever forgive me:'"
He was so sh�ckingly upset that Louisa freely did so, even
trying to cheer him a little.
As he got into bed he said, "\\'hat will I do to get work?
There is no work in Botany."
That night he lay sleeplessly tossing and turning.
The next morning he would eat no breakfast, but took only a
cup of tea. He mumb.led over and O\"er again, "I wonder where
I could go for work?"
He sat for a while considering the problem, then exclaimed, "I
think I'll go up the Illawarra line. Give me a pound, Louisa. I£
I'm lucky I'll be away a week.."
She gave him the pound and he set off.
To Louisa's surprise he came back that night, absolutely over
come with shame.
"\Vhatever's the matter?" she enquired.
"Don't ask me. I have ruined myself and you, too.N

"Tell me what has happened," she persisted.
"Very well," he replied slowly. "I went six miles further than
the station I'd bought the ticket for-you know I don't know
that line--and there the guard saw the ticket and the distance it
was for. The guard got hold of me and pulled me out of the
carriage onto the platform, and struck me and fetched me back to
Sydney. At Sydney the guard said, "I'll let you off if you give me
three pounds ten.' I says, 'If you wait till I p awn my watch, I'll
give you the money.' He said he would, so I did so, and then came
home."
He appeared thoroughly heart-broken and gave way to a torrent
of tears. "Louisa," he sobbed, "I wish you had someone else besides
me, I have dragged you down to ruin.''
Whether she believed his story or not, Louisa nevertheless
forgave him, and a few days later he was fortunate enough to
obtain work with Geddes again at thirty-six shillings a week.
But trouble seemed to dog the couple. On the 18th April, 1888,
the baby, John, became ill. It did not appear anything serious
just an upset stomach. In their poor circumstances they did not
think it necessary to call a doctor. About ten o'clock at night on
the 19th, the baby woke up crying. Collins rose from his bed,
lit the lamp, and picked up the child. While he walked up and
down with John in his arms he crooned soothing words to him,
and soon he was quiet. After a while he began to laugh at the ,
light of the lamp. His mother then took him, and fed him,
before putting him down to sleep again. At twenty past eleven
the baby wakened again, screaming in terrible pain. They did all
they could to soothe him, but to no avail. John Collins died
twenty minutes before midnight.
Dr. Martin was sent for, and arrived a few hours later. H e
questioned the parents a s t o whether the baby had been given
anything which might have upset him, . but Louisa said all he
had had was a teaspoonful of castor oil about noon on the day
he died. In the circumstances, as he had not been attending the
child, the doctor could not give a death certificate, and instructed
the Collins to inform the police of the matter, and told them
that he himself would send a memo to the Coroner. This he did,
and the Coroner wrote on the report:
"As there are no ground for supposing this child died from any
but natural causes, an inquest may be dispensed with. N
John's death resulted in further financial strain for Louisa.

Even though she borrowed £ 1 .2.6 from a friend to help with the
funeral expenses, the baby had nevertheless to be buried in the
paupers' section at the Rookwood Cemetery. The same man who
had attended at the death of her first husband brought the coffin
and removed the tiny corpse. There was also a bill of a guinea
to be paid to the doctor.
Collins was broken-hearted. He returned to his work, but
miserably complained to his wife, "It's no use of me to work, mv
wages will never pay back debts, and redeem the watch." He had
been inordinately proud of that watch, his wife's wedding present
to him.
Louisa did her best to comfort him.
Perhaps it was not surprising, but also excusable, that about a
month after her baby's death, Louisa started to drink. Collins was
unjustifiably annoyed about it, as he, himself, was almost a tee
totaller. He told her it would have to stop. This subject was the
only one on which they had arguments, for despite their difficult
position, they lived happily together. As their various boarders
stated, they were extraordinarily fond of one ano�her.
V.'hen her husband was out of the house, Lomsa would send
little May, now nearly eleven years old, to fetch liquor for her.
Once when she gave her the money for some beer and brandy
she said, "l\foney's no use while your stepfather's in the house.
Perhaps when he dies we'll get some more money."
That same night when Collins came home from work, Louisa
was drinking alternately the beer and brandy, and !\fay, now the
eldest child at home, heard him speak very crossly to her mother
about her failing.
About the middle of June Collins became ill. He complained
of pain in the stomach, and of his food upsetting him. He con
tinued to work for a while, but often had to knock off for a hour
or two, when he felt too sick to go on. Finally he gave in alto
gether one Sunday, and sent a message over to the stables where
he was due to pick up a load of green sheepskins to take to Glebe
Island, to say he would be unable to work.
About this time, May, who was helping in the house, discovered
a packet of "Rough on Rats" on a shelf in the kitchen, under an
inverted basin. She was older now, and knew what the powder
was for.
She could not think why her mother should have bought it, aa
there were no rats in the house in Pop ple's Terrace where they
nQ_w Jived. When she questioned Louisa, however, the box was
removed, ,and she did not see it again.
Now that Collins was really ill, Louisa did all in her power to
persuade him to see a doctor. In spite of his protests that they
could not afford it, she told him he was more precious to her than
anything else, and he certainly must have treatment. At last he
g-.ive in rather ungraciously, and together they visited a Dr. l\far
shall, on the 28th June.
Collins complained of a cold which had been hanging about
him for a few weeks, and said he had a slight cough, and that
nothing would lie on his stomach. The doctor could detect no
signs of disease in his heart or lungs, his pulse was slow and
normal, and there was no sign of fever. He told the patient there
'i.·as no cause for alarm, that he was just suffering from "mallaise."
When they returned home, Louisa made her husband take a
dose of the medicine the doctor had given him. He took a spoon-
ful of it. ,
"This will do me no good," he grumbled. "It's just throwing
good money away."
He lay on the bed and moaned awhile, and then exclaimed,
"The bailiffs will be in the house, there's nothing surer."
Every time he heard a knock at the door that week, he turned
pale as death, and when Louisa came to tell him who the caller
wa s. he would say, "Oh hell, I thought that was the bailiff."
At this time they were several months behind with their rent.
On the 2nd of July, the Monday after Collins' visit to Dr..
Marshall, Louisa called on him again, and asked him to go out
to Popple's Terrace as her husband was still very sick. He saw
him with Louisa in the room. His condition had changed only
slightly. He was in bed, but not undressed. He complained of
vomiting and diarrhoea, and the doctor told him it was simply a
case of "engastroduodenal catarrh," which must have sounded very
frightening to the patient in spite of the doctor's adverb "simply."
The next afternoon Constable Jeffs was walking along Popple',
Terrace when he saw Louisa outside her house.
"How's your husband, Mrs. Collins?" he asked. "I hear he's ill.•
�He's very bad," she replied gloomily.
Collins, hearing Jeffs voice outside, called out and asked him
to come in. The policeman entered and found him lying on the
bed.
MURDER IN SECRET JOT
"Well, and how are you feeling now?" he enquired.

"Oh, I'm all right," replied the sick man. ''I'll be up and about
in a day or two. It's just this damned stomach of mine, I can"t
keep anything down."
On Wednesday the doctor called again, and the following day
Louisa went to his rooms to see him, and told him she was most
distressed about her husband. He suggested it might be best 10
send him to hospital, for he felr extremely sorry for the wom;in,
who nursed her husband with such tenderness, and was so un
necessarily concerned about his condition. But she would not
bear of it.
Back at Popple"s Terrace, Louisa continued ministering to the
needs of Collins. She would allow no one else to do any thing for
him. and insisted in preparing all his [ood herself and being con
stantly at his bedside. She had special condensed milk for him,
and none of the rest of the family were allowed to have anv of
this delicacy.
Collins as a patient had one foible, although he was in bed he
insisted on wearing his best trousers all the time. Louisa de
m urred at this somewhat, but then agreed if that was what he
wanted she was quite content.
On Friday, 6th July, a friend of Collins named Arthur Hamil,
from Bunnerong, called. He told the patient that a sure cure for
him was a mixture of beer and egg. He didn't know how to do i t
himself, but he'd "get his old woman 10 fi x it for him." When h e
returned with the remedy, Louisa informed h i m that she had
gi,·en her husband egg and beer, but it had done no good.
It was not until Saturday, the 7th July, that Dr. Marshall be
gan to ha,·e suspicions regarding his patient's illness. He could
see no reason why he should not recover more quickly, and there
fore was aswnished when his stepson, Arthur, Louisa's eldest child,
called in the afternoon and told him that his mother had sent
for him as Collins was dying.
He contacted Dr. Martin, who described the death of Louisa's
firn husband, Charles Andrews, lo him. _ They decided to go to
gether to see Collins. They arrived about 'ten at night, and found
the patient in a state of collapse, with a hardly perceptible pulse,
and complaining of constriction in his throat. He agreed with
Lou isa .that the man was dying.
Leaving Popple's Terrace, the two doctors called at the Police
108 FAIIIOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
Station, and informed Senior Constable Sherwood of their sus

picions.
Sherwood took Constable Jeffs, and together they went to
Popple's Terrace, at about eleven o'clock on the same night.
The Senior Constable asked Collins how he was.
"I've only got a cold," the man replied. ''I'll be all right in a
few days." I
"Have you taken anything to make you vomit?" asked Sherwood.
N
" o :•
Louisa put in, "I know what he has taken. It was I who gave
him his medicine."
While they were still there a Mrs. Partington dropped in to
see how her friend's husband was getting on. After the policemen
had gone, Collins asked for a drink.
"I think he should have some brandy," suggested the visitor.
Louisa went out and brought back a glass of milk, into which
she poured a little of the spirit. She put it to his lips and he took
a few sips. Then she replaced it on a box by the bedside.
The following day, Sunday the 8th, Senior Constable Sherwood
called again, and found Collins in a very low state, with Louisa
sitting on the side of his bed holding his hand and saying, "Poor
Micki Poor Micki"
About noon the two doctors paid another visit and found their
patient almost pulseless, although his temperature was normal.
After lunch Mrs. Partington and another friend dropped in, and
discovered Louisa and two of the children in the sick man's room.
sorrowfully watching him. She saw there was a glass of milk on
the box at the bedside, but suggested to Louisa that as Collins•
lips appeared so dry, it might be better if she brought a little
brandy and water, and they could moisten his lips with it. Louisa
brought the brandy in a cup, and diluted it from a dipper of
water. Mrs. Partington dipped a quill in the cup, and gently
wiped it over his lips. A few minutes later he died.
Louisa broke into uncontrollable sobbing. "I must get awav,•
she moaned. 'Tm going to the beach or the brickworks. I don't
want to live any more."
She tore herself from Mrs. Partington's grasp and made a datll
for the door, where she ran straight into Constable Jelh.
"How is your husband?" he enquired.
"He's dead," she replied dully.
He walked back into the bedroom with her, and saw Collins
lying on the bed. Louisa told him he had died a quarter of an
hour before and she had sent her daughter for the doctor. Sher
wood arrived at that moment, and the two policemen left together
to report the matter.
At the tram stop Jeffs met Arthur Andrews returning from town.
He said he had seen the doctor and told him of his stepfather's
death, but he had refused to give him a death certificate, and had
said further he would have to report the matter to the police.
Jeffs informed Sherwood of the doctor's decision and then re
t111 ned to the Collins' house.
Once there he began a systematic search. He found the small
teacup with a brownish fluid in it, which Louisa said was brandy
and water, and the tumbler three quarters full of white liquid
which she said was milk. · when he went to pick it up to take it
away with him, she jumped from her chair and seized his arm,
"That is nothing," she shouted.
He explained that he must take everything, and told her to sit
down while he went on with his work. He realized that during
the hour he had been absent she had been drinking heavily, and
was verv much under the influence of what she had taken.
He st�rted examining bottles and jars.
"There is no medicine here," she exclaimed excitedly. "Dr.
Marshall has taken i t all away."
He picked up a small square bottle, pa�tly empty with directions
on the label. "l thought the doctor had taken all the medicine
awav," he said.
Louisa got up and made for the door, but Jeffs had already been
warned by Mrs. Partington that she ttiought the woman intended
to do something to herself, so he barred her egress.
"Where are you going?" he asked.
"I want to go down to the beach for a walk, or to the brick
yards."
"What for?"
"I won't live after to-morrow. I'm tired of life.N
Jeffstried to soothe her. "Come now, Mrs. Collins," he urged.
"you must sit down and rest. If you won't stop inside I shall have
to take you down to the police station."
Arthur came into the room to see if there was anything he
could do. Jeffs asked him to try and quieten his mother.
She turned to her son and said, "l won't live after to-morrow.w
\
"What are �·011 talking about?" enquired Ar1hur. "Wha t's to

become of the children?"
"I don't care what becomes of them," she retorted bitterly. For
a moment she was silent, then "Fetch me your stepfather's clothes,"
she commanded.
The boy brought them, and she began searching through the
pockets. She took out the watch and chain which Collins had
finally been able to redeem, and throwing the clothes on the
floor, made another dash for the outer door, only to be checked
once more.
The next morning Louisa was more normal, and went into
town to see Dr. :\farshall. She told h i m the police had said they·
would meet her there between n i ne and ten to discuss the death
certificate, and asked why he would not give it to her. He replied
that he could not as he was not fully satisfied as to the cause of
her husband's death, and that he had reported the matter to the
Coroner, who was now the one who would have to give a certifi
cate for burial. She staggered away from him as though drunk,
and he suggested she should go home, as the police were obviously
not coming.
When she got off the tram at Botany she met Senior Constable
Sherwood to whom she remarked, "Isn't i t strange that the doctor
won't give me a certificate?"
The inquest opened on the following Tuesday, the 10th July,
at the South Sydney Morgue before the City Coroner, Mr. J. P.
Shiel!.
Louisa, in a statement read to the court, outl ined the facts of
her married l i fe, and her husband's i llness. She pointed out that
the doctor had said he was s�ffering from a bad cold with gastritis,
and that his life was not i nsured.
Dr. :lfarshall and Dr. Frederick Mil ford, who had conducted the
post-mortem with him. _ gave evi�ence concerning the illness of
Collins and the condltlon o[ !us body. 1 hey announced that
various organs and the contents of the stomach had been sent to
Mr. Hamlet the Government Analyst. Dr. !\J i l ford said the cause
of death was periton itis brought on by some noxious drug, nr
possibly from a nalllral cause.
The inquest was adjourned until �fr. Hamlet could report on
the result of his analvsis.
On Thursdav the · 1 2th. Mr. Hamlet reported he had found
almost three grains of arsenic in the stoma<:h of the dead man, and
other traces of it in the various organs. The coroner gave the

necessary authority to arrest Louisa, and Constable Sherwood was
instructed to carry out the duty.
He went to the house at Popple's Terrace, and informed Louisa
that he had to arrest her on suspicion of murder. Again she was
greatly under the inftuence of drink, and slumped into the chair,
when she realized the significance of what ·he was saying to her.
"Am I coming back again?" she asked.
Then, when he did not answer she covered her face with her
hands and moaned, "I !mow I'm not coming back again."
The arrest was kept a great secret. Even as late as Friday night
the Police Department told the press they knew nothing of it.
On Friday, too, the City Coroner gave Ins ector Hyam the
requisite warrants for exumation of the bodies orCharles Andrews
and the baby John Collins.
The inquest into these two deaths began the next day, but little
could be done beyond ordinary routine statement of facts and
circumstances until an analysis o( the organ5 of the bodies had
been made.
On the 17th July, the inquest into the death of Collins was
resumed, and the fact that the glass allegedly containing milk had
traces of arsenic, was brought to light. The inquest was not
cpmpleted, however, until the 26th as an illness of the coroner's
prevented it going forward.
By this latter date, Louisa had a story all ready to support the
theory that Collins had committed suicide. She told
the court a depressing tale of all the hardships they
had . endured, and then went on to say: "A month
ago last Monday I was brushing his overcoat and found in one of
the pockets a package of white paper; there was no writing on it.
I opened it and there was a large tablespoon of white stuff like
salts, but much finer. It had a bright, sparkling appearance. It
had no smell, but I put my tongue to it, and it made my tongue
hot and my mouth water, and I could not help spitting all the
dav. When he came home between seven and eight o'cfock that
night I says. 'Mick, what little package is that in your coat pocket?'
He said, 'Have you been at my pockets?' Then I told him how I
saw it and he says teasing me, 'I'll search your pockets after tea
and see what's in it.'
"Then he went on, 'I'm damned i[ I know what's the name of it,
a man at Waterloo gave it IO me to take in a little water for a
lump I have in my groin,' from which I knew he suffered. I be

lieved him and we went 10 bed. I says, 'Will you take some of
that to-night then?' He said, 'No, not to-night, it's too cold.'
: "Next morning he got up at 4 o'clock as usual, lit tne candle
and dressed himself, he put on his hat and looked at me in bed;
put his hand up Lo the coat I spoke of before, and Look this pack
·age out, and put it in his trousers pocket that he was wearing. I
says, 'Will you take some of that now?' He says, 'No, I'll lake it
over at the stables.'
"He came home at 7 o'clock to his breakfast; he pushed the
meat aside that he was always fond of, and said he wanted some
sops. I gave him a clean basin and he made some sops himself.
He went to the yard and commenced retching dreadful, the first
time I have ever seen him retch. I says, 'Whatever's the maller
with you? Did you take some of that medicine?' H_e said, 'No,
I didn't.'
"When he came home Lo supper he ate very little, and went
into the room to go to bed. He had been there a few minutes
when he called out 'L01vsa, fecch me the small glass.' I savs, 'Will
a cup do?' He said, 'No, fetch me the glass.' I got half a dipper
of water and the glass._ and went into 1he bedroom. I was surprised
to see him siuing on the side of the bed with his new trousers on.
I says, 'Are you going oufr' He says, 'No, you won't mind me
sleeping in these trousers.' I say. s , 'No, if you are comfortable, I'm
satisfied. Whatever do you want this glass for?' He says, ' I want to
rinse my mouth out, that's all.' I believed him, and went to bed.
"He woke me in the middle of the night, retching dreadful. I
says, 'There is something strange the matter with you.' He said,
'It's only the cold l have.'
"He used LO cough very much. It still got worse and worse, and
he kept working up till Sunday dinner time. From the time I saw
the powder till the time he was laid up, was one week."
She then went on to describe the visits of the doctors and the
attentions she had given the sick man.
She finished by saying, "There is two unfortunate things I done
during his illness, and that was Lo take over that glass he had
used so long without once washing it out, and Lo put his trousers
in water that was taken off him after his death. His l i fe was not
insured; he was in no lodge or society whatever; he has left me
penniless and in debt."
The coroner in his summing up pointed out to the jury (for
coroner's juries were in force at the time), that the fact that Collins
had died from arsenical poison was an established fact. The point
for them to decide was whether the deceased had committed
· suicide as suggested by his widow, or whether she had murdered
him. In consideration of the former theory they would need to
consider carefully if it were likely that a man suiciding would sub
mit himself to such prolongecl suffering. It was usual in such
cases to take a large dose of poison at one go. Further he had
been too weak the last two days to administer anything to him
self.
The jury returned a verdict of guilty against Louisa and she
was committed for trial at the next Quarter Sessions.
The inquest into the deaths o[ Andrews and the baby was re
sumed on the 3rd August.
The Government Analyst, Mr. Hamlet, reported the traces of
arsenic in the body of the former. But as the coffin had been
found practically submerged in water, he said, this would tend to
its d issolution. There was no arsenic in the body of the baby,
though this did not necessarily prove he had not died from arseni
cal poison, he said, as cases were on record where deceased people,
known to have taken arsenic, were found in a very short time to
have no trace of i t in their remains.
Mr. M. F. Rainsford, accountant of the ,rucual Life Association,
gave evidence that Andrews had been insured from the 15th
March, 1877, and that the full amount of his insurance had been
paid to his widow on the 7th April, 1887, when the Company had
been notified that the monev had been willed to her.
Louisa interrupted the proceedings here by saying, "The will is
now at the office of Mr. Dowling as good as ever I should think.
It was made out by my husband, and showed that he was a sensible
and sober man."
At the end of the proceedings Louisa refused to give evidence
or make a statement.
The jury found her guilty of the murder of Andrews, but that
tl1e child died of natural causes. She was committed for trial.
Louisa Collins' trial for the murder of her second husband
commenced on the 6th August, 1888, before Judge Foster. The
evidence brought forward was mainly that which had been given
at the inquest. The child, May, was railed to tell how she had
found the rat poison, and Mr. Hamlet informed the court that
'Rough on Rats" contained 96-97 per cent. of arsenic.
11' FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
A Mrs. Ellen Price, who laid out the body, a peared to give
evidence that she felt nothing in he pockets or the deceased'&
trousers when she removed them. She was certain there was no
packet nor box there, from which he could daily have be1:n taking
the arsenic which killed him.
Mr. Lusk, who was appearing for the accused, addressed the
jury at length in her favour, stressing her continued kindness, the
peculiarity of her husband"s behaviour, and her lack of motive.
Mr. Coffey, Crown Presecutor, pointed out the absurdity of the
suicide suggestion in view of its protracted performance.
Judge Foster, in his summing up, added the point that nothing
had been said by the accused about the alleged powder in her
husband"s possession until af\er her arrest.
The jury retired, but returned after three hours to say there
was no likelihood of their ever reaching a verdict. The next
morning they were dismissed and a new trial was ordered.
The second trial for the murder of Collins began on the 5th
November before J udge Windeyer. The only new. matter which
came up in this trial was as to whether Collins might not have
been poisoned accidentally. It appeared that some farmers were .
in the habit of treating sheepskins with arsenic before they were
sent to the fellmongers, and it was suggested that the deceased
might have hurt a finger, and put it into his mouth, thus intro
ducing the poison into his system. Or, on the other hand, that it
might have entered the hotly through a sore which he had on his
leg at the time of his death.
In answer to this Dr. Marshall stated that a quantity of arsenic
as great as three grains could not inadvertantly have been intro
duced into the system either through inhalation, or through the
tissues. A juryman jumped to his feet and alleged he knew of a
man who died from work with arsenic. The judge interrupted
him by an instrunion that such a statement should be made on
oath so that all the relevant facts could be elicited by cross
examination.
At the completion of the trial the new jury retired, only 10
return with the information that they were unable to agree on a
verdict. They, loo, were dismissed and a new trial ordered.
In the meantime the Crown decided it might be better to press
the other charge, and on the 19th November, Louisa was arraigned
for the murder of her first husband, Charles Andrews. Again the
case was a mere going over of the facts which came out at the
inquest.
As in the Collins' case it was suggested that the arsenic may have
entered the body accidentally, as Andrews, too, worked with green
sheepskins. Alexander Geddes who had employed him for many
years 'was brought forward by the Crown as a witness. He stated
that during the nineteen years he had been in the business, he had
never known of any serious results to health through working
with arsenic, although some of his employees had suffered from
leg and hand sores.
At the conclusion of the trial the jury again failed to agree.
Louisa's fourth trial on a charge of murder began on the 5th
December before the Chief .Justice of New South Wales, Sir
Frederick Darley. This time she was before the court again charged
with the murder of Michael Peter Collins. Thomas Geddes, fell
monger, added to his previous evidence that he had investigated
the matter and found that no arsenic was used in the particular
work in which Collins was employed.
For a fourth time a jury retired to consider whether Louisa had
committed murder or not. This time they returned with a verdict
of guilty.
She rose from her seat in the dock when the finding had been.
announced, and, throwing back her head said in reply to the usual
question as to whether she had anything to say, that there was
nothing. The Chief Justice sentenced her to death.
It might have been thought that this would have been the last
heard of Louisa Collins, but such was not the case. On the 1 9th
December, just as a special committee for the discussion of the
estimates for supply was about to get down to business in the
Legislative Assembly, one of the members, a Mr. Melville, called
their attention to the fact that this woman had faced three juries
who failed to agree on her guilt, before she was finally sentenced.
Naturally the Honourable Member was immediately informed
he was out of order.
"All right," he said, "I will put myself in order by moving that ·
the salary of the Minister of Justice, £1 ,500, be reduced by £500.
I am not urging the possible innocence of the woman, but the .
number of , years since New South Wales has been disgraced by
the execution of a woman."
Another member interposed, "And this is Centennial year, tool"
Asked Sir Henry Parkes, "How could such a motion in the

Committe of Supply, have any good effect on the [ate of this un
happy woman?"
A heated 9iscussion followed, in which feeling was pretty evenly
divided. On the one side were those who enlarged on the horror
o( her crime, on the other those who were against capital punish
ment at all, and especially when resorted to in the case 0£ a
woman.
"New South Wales. is on the eve 0£ committing a national mur
der," one member shouted.
Sir Henry Parkes insisted that he believed the w9men in the
Colony, if asked, would vote for the hanging of Mrs. Collins.
After this sta�ement he managed to steer the discussion back to
more regular channels.
The Sydney Morning Herald on the next day, in a leading
article, was scathing in its comments on the discussion. "I( any
thing were wanted to show," the writer said, "how thoroughly the
Assembly is ruled by caprice, it would be found in the proceedings
last night. The business before the House was the consideration
of the Estimates, but nearly the whole of the sitting was taken up
bl a debate on the case of Lousia Collins who is under se9tence
o death for the murder of her husband.", In discussing the case
itself, he added, "Women have special opportunities of exercising
the propensity for murder in a secret, stealthy way."
For the next fortnight or so letters to the editor began to pour
into the "Herald" on both sides of the q uestion. Strangely enough
it seemed that the idea of a woman bemg executed was the chief
reason for those who rushed into print in her favour, doing so.
The sentiment was voiced well by the writer who said, "As to
the policy of deliberately puttin$" any woman to a death o[ open
shame and violence in a Christian land, I am firmly persuaded
that ,uch a horrid spectacle is essentially brutal and demoralising."
And then. naive!\·, "Men are different from women."
Against this plea for the broadest fnterpretation of chivalry,
rose a host of others in protest.
"Women who commit such enormitv as this unsex themselves
as far as any chivalric feeling or senti,nent is concerned."
"WIiy not a woman as well as a man reap the results of her
own acts? "
"1 say such a creature is a disgrace to the very name of woman.�
"A murderess is death at the very fountain where one would
go look for life, and hence more dangerous than the murderer."
Others urged mercy for the sake of Christian charity alone,
These were mainly the adherents of an anti-capital punishment
policy, and wanted any murderers to be imprisoned for life to
give them a chance to repent of their evil doing, and thus find
mercy in Heaven. "Is not mercy and forgiveness to the sinful the
very rock and foundation of Christianity?" asked one; while others
quoted numerous Biblical passages to justify their stand.
The Bible, however, was just as freely quoted to prove that
Louisa should be done to death.
There is an echo of present day thinking in the letter of one
man who wrote, "It seems to me strange that people must commit
the most [earful crimes before they can enlist the sympathy of a
certain class of their fellows. A rational man or woman, one
would think, would reserve all their sympathy for the poor
victim who has, probably, been murdered with a refinement of
uuelty."
An interesting development occurred on the 24th December,
when, before the Chief Justice, Sir Frederick Darley, Mr. J ustice
Windeyer and Mr. .Jusiice Foster, Mr. Rogers, Q.C., and \fr.
Lusk who had defended Louisa, moved for a writ of error in the
Supreme Court to quash her conviction.
There were dual grounds for this move: firstly it was alleged
that evidence about the death of Louisa's first husbaud, Andrews,
should not have been allowed in her trial for the murder of
Collins, and secondly, that an irregularity took place when one
of the jurymen received an unopened telegram during the case.
The Chief Justice said that as he had presided at the trial, he
had discussed beforehand how much of the evidence regarding
Andrews was admissahle. It had been agreed that the fact he
died from arsenical poison could be allowed, but not the implied
motive for his death, that his widow had benefitted financially
by
j��ge vVindeyer supported him in this view. "Where a number
of persons have died of poisoning," he said, "you can not shut out
from consideration the fact that they all died in the same way,
as showing that it was not a mere matter of chance."
Regarding the second objection, the Chief Justice had no recol
lection of a telegram being brought into Court. But he said it
had already heen 1 ruled that a juryman should not be deprived
118 . FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
of receiving information entirely irrelevant to the case, such as a

message about the illness of a child.
Both the Crown Prosecutor and Mr. Lµsk, however, were
certain that a Court official had brought in a telegram and..
ruinded it to a juryman without it first being inspectod by th�
Judge, and that the man had murmured something about it being
all right, to the attendant. An earlier case was quoted where a
juryman had been handed a report of the trial, and the prisoner's
objection to the final verdict had been upheld on account of this.
It was decided to make enquiries regarding this mysterious,
and suspicious, telegram from the Telegraph Office. A copy was
obtained, which was addressed:
H Mr. W. H. Hill, Juryman, Central Criminal Court, Darling•
burst. To be opened by his Honor, Sir Frederick Darley,
Chief Justice."
The message inside contained the few words, "In the event of
further detention, anything you require," and was si gned by
David Hill.
The Chi ef Justice ruled it was a trivial message, and of no
bearing on the case. He added that it should have been brought
to him first, but could have in no way influenced the jurymall
c:oncerned in his consideration of the case.
As if to give the lie to Sir Henry Parkes who had stated, if
asked to vote, women generally w-0uld be in favour of the execu
tion of Louisa Collins, a petition was drawn up for presentation
to the Governor, from the female inhabitants of Sydney.
In it they stated, "It is abhorrent to every feeling of humanir
and a shock to the sentiments in this nineteenth century, both
here, and in other English-speaking communities, that a woman
should suffer death at the hands of a hangman, and at the hands
of one of the opposite sex, so long as imprisonment can be substi
tuted." They pointed out that three, realll four, trials for the
same offence, was contrary to the practice o the mother country;
that lh;e �vide!'ce was only circumstantial; that three juries of
tlurty-s1x intelligent men had been unable to reach a verdict; that
innocent people had at times been executed; that recently mere,
bad been extended to two murdresses at West Maitland; and that
no woman had been executed in New South Wales for twenty
eight years.
Other petitions went ahead, too. A Public Meeting was called
II,' politicians in the Town Hall. Amongst all the old arguments
already used were two rather interesting statements. One was,

"Louisa Collins, like many other women, is not morally respon
sible for her actions," and the other, "A woman is not allowed to
take part in the making of laws, nor is she allowed rights as a
property holder, yet she is placed on equality with man in the
question of retribution." And this !alter was not a view put
forward by a militant feminist emancipationist, but by a man, a
member of parliament.
From the 3rd January, 1889, until the day set down for the
execution, one deputation after another waited on the Governor,
Lord Carrington, with petitions for the commutation of Louisa's
death sentence to one of life imprisonment.
Louisa herself petitioned, saying she was still a young woman
who had borne seven children; her mother petitioned; two of
her children, one of whom was May, whose evidence had been
so damning to her mother, waited on Lord Carrington, begging
h i m to use his royal prerogative of mercy. Others petitioned on
the grounds of the woman's insanity; others because she muse be
innocenl, as no untutored woman could know enough about
drugs to have been able to measure out che infinicisimal quantities
of arsenic required for slow poisoning. Some even tried to prove
thac bismuth, a medicifl'e ordered by the doctor, was at times
known to be imp).lre and contain arsenic.
To them all Lord Carrington had the one answer. He could
see no reason in the circumstances strong enough for him to set
aside the decisions of the Chief .Justice and che Executive Council.
Speaking to the delegacion of men who came as a resulc of the
:'ublic :\Ieeting, he said that if he had known what a terrible
duty was going to be placed on him, he would nev�r have accepted
the position of Governor, muc!1 as he desired to serve his Queen.
So on the morning of the 8th .January,_ just before nine o'clock,
Louisa was to be found Ill che condemned cell at Darlinghurst,
closeted wich the Chaplain of the prison. She had spent her last
hour in prayer, and he was 1ww reading the burial service over
her.
She walked quietly and calmly to the scaffold, not needing the
support of che two wardresses who accompanied her. They them
selves were in tears, and appeared more 10 require comfort than
she.
The Chaplain finished the service on che scalford, and she
muuered audibly, "Amen."
lZt P'AM.OUS DETECTIVE STORIES
The actual hanging was bungled, for the machinery had not
been properly checked before hand, and a mallet was needed to
hammer out the bolt, before the handle could be released. The
•Herald" had a bitter leader in its columns. the next morning
about such inexcusable neglect.
"She was a woman of great courage," the Chaplain commented
when it was all over. She waa also the first woman to be executed
at Darlinghurst Gaol.
THE TRAGEDY AT VILLA MADEIRA
By CHRIS B. LESANDS
Much mystery surrounded the strange attack on

Mr. Rattenbury. When the police came Mrs.
Rattenbury was drunk, and could do little to help
them.
WHEN family physician Dr. O'Donnell arrived at "Villa Ma-

deira," the ultra-modern home of Mr. and Mrs. Rattenbury,
at Manor Park Road. in England's Bournemouth, around about
midnight on Sunday, :\lard, '.24, 1935, he saw an unusual sight.
Fifteen minutes previously he had answered his telephone in
answer to a call from :\l iss Irene Rigg, companion-help to :\frs.
Rattenbury, who frantically pleaded "For God's sake, doctor, come
round to Villa l\fadeira. Something dreadful has happened."
Shown into the house by :M iss Rigg, he found Mrs. Rattenbury
staggering around very drunk, and Mr. Rattenbury unconscious
with blood flowing from his head. Before he had time to enquire
what had happened, M rs. Rattenbury said, "Look at h im-look at
the blood-someone has finished him." After Dr. O'Donnell had
temporarily stopped the ble�ding. fie telephoned for Mr. Rooke, a
well-1..nown surgeon, who arrived shortly after, but finding it iw-
111
possible to examine the patient as Mrs. Rattenbury in her drunken

excitement kept getting in his way, Mr. Rooke sent for an ambul
ance and had the patient removed to a nursing home nearby. After
Mr. Rattenbury's head had been shaved in the operating theatre,
Mr. Rooke and Dr. O'Donnell saw three serious wounds on the
head that could not have been self-inflicted and as a result Dr.
O'Donnell did what he was bound to do and that was to com·
municate with the police.
Mr. Rooke 91'>erated on Mr. Rattenbury, and after the operation
was over, Dr,'O'Doimell returned to Villa Madeira between �.30
and 4 a.m. If he considered that the sight that met his gaze on
his first visit was unusual, he was to see a strange sight on his
second visit, for he found Mrs. Rattenbury running about the
house fo an intoxicated condition, four or five policemen in the
house, some of whom she was trying to kiss, the radio-gramophone
p laying and the house a blaze of lights. He gave Mrs. R�ttenbury
half a grain of morphia and put her to bed. During the time the
Doctor was absent, Mrs. Rattenbury had kept on telling the
policemen that she had killed her husband. The next morning
she repeated her assertions and was taken to the Bournemouth
Police Station and charged with doing grievous bodily harm with
intent to murder. When she was charged Mrs. Rattenbury said,
''That is right-I did it deliberately, and would do it again."
Three days later Mr. Rattenbury died. whereupon Mrs. Ratten
bury was charged with the murder o( her husband
• and removed
to Holloway gaol.
Up to this point it seemed a simple case of a dome8tic brawl
which had ended fatally for one, but detectives in their probing
unco\'ered a remarkable story of domestic infidelity which set all
England by the ears in the amazing'trial which followed.
Before Mrs. Rattenbury was taken to Bournemouth Police
Station and charged with doing grievous bodily harm with intent
to murder her husband, she made a statement to Inspector Carter,
head of the Hampshire Constabularv at Bournemouth, which gave
them a lead. It read, "About 9 p.m. on March 24, I was playing
cards with my husband when he dared me to kill him as he
\\'anted to die. I picked up a mallet and he then said, 'You have
not the guts to do it.' I then hit him with the mallet. I hid the
mallet outside. I would have shot him if I had had a gun."
When the mallet was found hidden bel\jnd a box in the trellis
work outside the front door, and pieces of Resh and hair were
THE TRAGEDY AT VILLA MADEIRA 123
found adhering to it, it looked as if 'Mrs. Rattenbury's statement

was true, but the slemhs were not satisfied that she was telling
the truih and they closeh• questioned Miss Irene Riggs and 19-
year-old chauffeur-handyman George Stoner about the happenings
in the Rattenbury household.
Neither could give them much information which would throw
any light on the tragedy, :\fiss Riggs because the afternoon of
March 24 was her haH-day off, and she only returned to the
house just after the finding of Mr. Rattenbury's body, and Stoner
because he had retired to his room early in the evening and
did not know what :\fr. and :\frs. Rattenbury were doing. '.\:ever
theless they got him to make a statement, which they considered
might throw some light on the murder.
This read: '·George Percy Stoner states: I am a chauffeur
handyman employed by :\Ir. Rattenbury of 5 Manor Road, Bourne
molllh. l retired to mv bedroom about 8 p.m. on Sundav, March
24, 1935, leaving :\fr. �nd Mrs. Rattenbury in the drawing room.
About 1 0.30 p.m. I was roused by Mrs. Rattenbury shouting to me
to come down. I came down into the drawing-room and saw
Mr. Rattenbury sitting in the armchair with blood running
from his head. :\frs. Rattenbury was crying and screaming and
said to me 'Help me to get Mr. Rattenbury into bed. he has
been hurt.' I then took the car and went to Dr. O'Donnell's
house. He had left before I got there.
"When I returned I cleaned the blood from the floor on the
instructions of !\frs. Rattenbury. Mrs. Rattenbury was sober and
as far as I le.now, she had not been drinking. When I went to bed.
she was in a normal condition. I have never seen a mallet on
the premises. Until I was aroused, I heard no sounds of a quarrel
or noise of any kind. Since September, 1 934, I have been employ
ed by llfr. and Mrs. Rattenbury. They have been on the best of
terms. I said to her, 'How did this hapl'en?' She said, 'I don't
know.' Mr. Rattenbury was dressed in !us normal clothes whilst
Mrs. Rattenbury was dressed in pyjamas and her feet were bare.M
Dr. O'Donnell was punled over the case, for he le.new that
Mrs. Rattenbury had a horror of cruelty, and would not hurt
anyone, let alone strike her husband over the head with a mallet,
11<> he called at Villa :\fadeira to see Miss Riggs.
She opened the door and it occurred to him that it was curious
that she did, for on every other occasion the handyman Stoner had
epened it and let him in. Dr. O'Donnell ilSked -where Stoner w;u.
'
l.
1%4 FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES
and Miss Riggs told him that he had gone to Holloway gaol to
.
visit Mrs. Rattenbury. He then told Miss Riggs that if she knew
' anvthing she could tell the police, it was her duty to do so.
He asked Miss Riggs whether she thought Mrs. Rattenbury
had murdered her husband, and she replied, "I know she did
not do it." He asked her how she knew and she replied that
Stoner bad confessed it to her. He had told her that there would
be no fingerprints on the mallet as he had worn gloves. Dr.
O'Donnell rang up Bournemouth Police Station, and said that
Miss Riggs wished to make a statement, and that the handyman
chauffeur Stoner had confessed the murder to her. Dr. O'Donnell
told the police that Stoner had left for Holloway gaol to see
Mrs. Rattenbury, and that no time should be lost in taking Miss
Riggs' sta�ment. A little later the police arrived and Miss Riggs
told them what she knew.
That evening Inspector Carter went to Bournemouth Railway
Station and awaited the arrival of the train from London. When
Stoner stepped out of the train, the police inspector arrested him,
charged him with murder, and took him to the Bournemouth
Police Station.
At the inquest into the death of Mr. Francis Mawson Ratten
bury, the coroner·� jur_y returned a verdict that George Percy
Stoner and Alma Victoria Rattenbury murdered Mrs. Rattenbury's
husband and they were committed to stand trial at the May
sessions at Central Criminal Court in London.
The trial opened on Monday, May 27, 1 935, and continued for
four davs. It was heard within the Central Criminal Court at
Old Bailey, London, before Mr. Justice Humpreys and a jury.
Counsel for the Crown being Mr. R. P. Croom-Johnson, K.U.
Mrs. Rattenbury being defended by Mr, T. J. O'Connor, K.C.,
whilst Mr. J. D.. Casswell appeared for George Percy Stoner.
Before the trial began Mr. Casswell submitted that his client
Stoner should be tried separately from Mrs. Rattenbury, but
the Judge ruled against him and the two accused were charged
jointlv "with the murder of Francis Mawson Rattenburv, on
Marr!; 28, 1935."
After they bad both pleaded "Not Guilty," Mr. Croom-Johnson
in opening his speech for the Crown said, "May it please your
Lordship and members of the j ury, the charge against the accused
is that they murdered Mr. Francis Mawson Rattenbury, a retired
architect, by an attack made upon him on March 24, at his home
in Bournemouth. The accused Stoner was employed at that house

as a handyman-chauffeur. Both Mr. and Mrs. Rattenburv had
been previously married. About 1928 Mr: Rattenbury, who had
been worl:.ing in Canada, retired and came to live in Bourne
mouth. In September, 1934, Stoner was taken into Mr. Ratten
bury's employ. On March 24, the people living at the Villa Ma
deira were Mr. and Mrs. Rattenbury, Miss Jrene Riggs, who was
employed as a companion-help to Mrs. Rauenbury, Stoner, and
six-year-old John, the son of Mr. and Mrs. Rauenbury. On March
18 the sum of £250 was paid into Mrs. Rauenbury's account from
Mr. Rattenbury's account, and the next day Mrs. Rattenbury and
Stoner came to London, and stayed in adjoining bedrooms in a
hotel at Kensington passing as brother and sister. They went
shopping apd Mrs. Rattenbury purchased a l�e number of
articles for Stoner, including pyjamas, underclothing, suit of
clothes, and boots, and a gold watch.
'"It is the submission of the prosecution in this case that the
relationship between Mrs. Rauenbury and Stoner had ceased to be
that of the wife of the employer and the man employed, but
had become an adulterous intercourse. On their gomg back to
the Villa Madeira where 68-year-old Mr. Rattenbury resided, the
situation was likely to be one of some difficulty, and the prose
etnion submits that Mr. Rattenbury stood in the way of their
indulgences in this guilty passion.
"Coming to March 24, you will hear from the evidence that the
injuries to Mr. Rattenbury were inflicted with a mallet which
was borrowed on that evening. Miss Riggs, the companion-help,
had gone out of the house that afternoon about four o'clock and
did not return until ten-fifteen in the evening. and it is submitted
that somewhere between those times the crime was committed. A
few minutes after Miss Riggs returned from her afternoon off,
she went to her bedroom, and she saw Stoner leaning over the
banisters looking down into the hall. He said he was looking
to see that all the lights were out. Later when going to the
kitchen, Miss Riggs, in passing the drawing room door, heard
the sound of heavy breathing. The prosecution suggests that was
the heavy breathing of a man who had suffered the injuries which
caused his death.
"After Miss Riggs had gone to bed, she heard somebody going
downstairs; it was Mrs. Rattenbnry, became immediately after
wards she was heard calling, 'Jrene, Jrene!' Miss Riggs heard her
126 FAMOL'.S DETECTIVE STORIES
cries, and she went downstairs. She found Mrs. Rattenuury in

the drawing-room dressed in her pyjamas. Mr. Rauenbury wa•
sitting in an armchair, and l'vliss Riggs noticed at once that he
had what appeared to be a black eye.
"On the instructions of Mrs. Rattenbury, she telephoned for
Dr. O'Donnell, and a little while afterwards Mrs. Rattenbury
called Stoner down. He went off in the car with a view to (etching
the doctor more q uickly. When Dr. O'Donnell arrived a good
deal had already been done to remove traces of blood. There
were three wounds on l\Ir. Rattenbury's head and these three
wounds had been caused by a heavy instrument. I suggest that
the instrument was a heavy mallet which Stoner had borrowed
from his grandparents by saying that he wanted to drive some
pegs in the garden. The mallet when found by a policeman
had human hairs adhering to it and also a piece of skin.
"After Mr. Rattenlrnry had been removed to a nursing home and
the police arrived :\frs. Rattenbury told police whilst she con
sumed nip after nip of whisky, 'I was playing cards with my
husband until nine o'clock. I then went to my bedroom. At
about JO.�O I heard a yell and came downstairs into the drawing
room. I saw my husband si uing in the armchair and sent for
Dr. O'Donnell.' Stoner was not arrested until March 28, and
meanwhile llfrs. Ranenlrnry was in Holloway gaol.
"On March 27 she wrote to Stoner from Holloway saying. 'I
must see you, darling. Please write to me. This is the third letter
I have written. Hope you receive this. I hardly know how lo write
now. Let me know how "Ra11." (meaning her husband) is getting
on. No more now. God bless you. Please ask Irene to give you
a few bobbing t,ins for my hair. I think they will be allowed.'
"On March LS, after Stoner had been arrested, he said to the
arresting police offic·er, 'Do you know Mrs. Rattenbury had no
thing to do with this affair?' The police officer cautioned him and
he then said 'When I did the job I believe he was asleep. I hit
him and then went upstairs and told Mrs. Rattenbury. She
nished down then. You see I watched through the french windows
and saw her kiss him good-night and then leave the room. [
waited, and crept in through the french window which was un
locked. Still it ain't much use saying anything. I don't suppose
they will let her out yet.'
"Ladies and gentlemen of the jury it looks as though Stoner,
having borrowed a mallet, which undoubtedly was the instrument
THE TRAGEDY AT VILLA MADEIRA 12'1
used to inflict the head injuries, brought it to the house, and it

is the contention of the prosecution that one or other of the
accused delivered a blow or blows at the head of Mr. Rattenbury,
with one common object and one common design, set out to get
rid of Mr. Rattenbury, who, as I suggested earlier, stood in their
way. That, members of the jury, is the contention o( the prose
cution in this case."
After the police, Dr. O'Donnell, Mr. Rooke and Miss Irene
Riggs gave evidence for the prosecution, and several witnesses
gave evidence for the defence Mrs. Rattenbury entered the
witness box to be examined by her counsel, i\Ir. T. J. O'Connoc,
K.C. .
She told the court that she was born in Canada, that her age
was 37 and that she had married her husband who was about 60
years of age seven years prior to them leaving Canada and coming
to England. Since the birth o( her son John she and her late
hus_band had not lived togeth �r as _husbancf and wife. On Septem
ber 25, 1 934, she had advertised m the local newspaper: "Daily
willing lad 1-1-18, for housework. Scout-trained preferred," and
this advertisement was answered by the youth called George Percy
Stoner. Since he was of an age to drive a car, and his previous
employment had been , in a garage, he was engaged as chaulfeur
handyman. Two months later she "(ell in love" with Stoner and
became his mistress. Her husband had told her to lead her own
life and she had taken him at his word. Before her trip to
London she told her husband that she had to have an operation
and he provided her with the money. She and Stoner stayed at a
hotel in London in rooms quite close to one another, and were
in fact living as man and wife.
On their return to Villa Madeira, as her husband seemed down
in the dumps, she suggested that they go to Bridport for a week
end and her husband agreeing she made the necessary arrange
ments, but finding that they could not get away fgr the week-end,
it was arranged that they would leave on Monday, March 25, but
Stoner on hearing of these arrangemems threatened to kill her
if she went to Bridport with her husband.
On the night of the tragedy she played cards with Mr. Ratten
bury, then went to bed. Shortly after Stoner came into her bed
room and got into bed with her. He then told her that she
'WOUid not be going to Bridport with her husband on th� follow•
ing day as he had hit him with a mallet. She jumped out of bed,
rushed down to the drawing-room and [ound her husband slumped
over an armchair with blood streaming from his head. She re
membered calling for Irene and Stoner and helping to get her
injured husband to bed, but after that her mind was a blank.
She remembered pouring herseH out a drink of whisky because
she felt sick but nothing else.
Cross-examined by Mr. Croom-Johnson for the Crown, she
admitted that there was only one person alive who could check
her story of what went on in the house from the time Miss Riggs
went out for her afternoon off and the time she came back, and
that person was Stoner.
"Are you telling the jury," he asked, "that [rom the time
practically that you were sick and poured yourself out a glass of
whisky your memory does not serve }·ou at all?"
"I can, yes, a few things. I remember like an awful nightmare."
"You remember, as I gather, placing a wet towel round Mr.
Rattenbury's head?'"
"'Yes, and I remember rubbing his hands, and they were so
cold. "
"Do you remember the police officers coming?"
"Absolutely not."
"l\frs. Rattenbury, did you your,eH murder your husl>andi"
"Oh, -no."
uDid you take any part whatever in planning it?"
..No."
"Did you know a thing about it till Stoner spoke to you in
your bed?"
"I would have prevented it if I had known half-a quarter of
a minute before, naturally."
Cross-examined by Mr. Casswell, for the accused Stoner, Mrs.
Rattenbury must have wondered what was coming, but he told
her, "'Mrs. Rattenbury, I want you to, .\&lldermt1�. [rom the start
that I am not suggesting that you had anyhing whatever to do
with what happened on March 24, or that you ever incited Stoner,
or knew that he was going to do it. \Vhat I want to ask you a
little about is the time when he first came- to stay at the Villa
Madeira.
"I suppose you told him that you and your husband were not
living as man and wife?"
"It was obvious to anyone living there; they would know it."
''You were looking for sympathy from someone, were you not?"'
"No, I certainly was not."
"Your association with Stoner was just_ an infatuation, was it
nott'''
"I think it was more than that.H
''You fell in love with him?"
"Absolutely."
"Now tell me when you first came to the conclusion that be
was takin� drugs?"
"He told me that he got queer feelings in the head but not as
if he were taking drugs."
"Did you ever see what he was taking?"
''No, he never would let me, and I could not force his confid
ence; he would not tell me."
"Dr. O'Donnell told you that he thought Stoner was· taking
cocajne?"
"Yes."
"When Stoner told you that he had hit your husband on the
head with a mallet, and you went downstairs and found your
husband had been hit on the head, had you any doubt that
what Stoner said was true?"
"I did think it was true."
This astute line of cross-examination was to pave the way for
the defence of the accused Stoner, for his cminsel said, ''Now that
is the defence which is put forward on behalf of the accused
Stoner. On his behalf you ha_ve now heard the evidence of Mrs.
Rattenbury, and on his behalf I accept and endorse the whole
of her explanation of the facts leading up to i\farch 24, and what
happened that day. I put it to you that he was under the
influence of drugs at the time, that he did not know what he was
doing was wrong, in which case a correct verdict would be guilty
but insane. That is all I wish to say."
Mr. Justice Humphrey's summing up was fair to both accused,
and the jury retired to consider their verdict.
They were out for j ust under an hour, bringing in a verdict of
not guilty in the case-of Mrs. Rattenbury, but guilty with a strorig
recommendation to mercy in the case of Stoner.
Three days after the trial Mrs. Rattenbury was removed to a
nursing home for rest and treatment. About 2.30 p.m. she went
out, saying that she would be back by 9 p.m.. but at 8.30 p.m. her
body was found floating in a tributary of the River Avon, with
several stab wounds in the chest. Near a bank of the river her
handbag was found and in it were some old letters, on the back
of which she had written, "1 want to make it clear that no one is
responsible for what action I may take regarding my life. I had
qmte made up my mind at Hollowav to finish things should Stoner
be found guilty, and that it would only be a matter of time and
opportunity. Every night and minute is only prolonging the
appalling agony of my mind. H I only thought i t would help
Stoner I would stay on, but it ha, been pointed out to me all too
vividly, I cannot help him. That is my death sentence. . . . .
Eight o'clock. After so much walking, I have got here. Oh, to
see the swans and spring flowers and just smell them. It is
beautiful here. Thank God for peace at last."
Three weeks later Stoner's appeal against the death sentence
was dismissed, but he was reprieved and the sentence of death
wmmuted Lo penal servitude for li(e.
No. 67 BRIDE FOR SALE, l)y G. Vardy.
No. 68 THE DOLLS OF DEATH, by Max
Afford.
No. 69 .WAGES OF DESIRE, by Jean Devanny.
No. 70 THANKS FOR THE MEMORY, by
Stewart Howard,
No. V1 OLD MAN. MURRAY, by Will Lawson.
No. 72 EXCUSE FOR SCANDAL, by W. S.
Howard.
f:g: i! :fJGNl8l�� s�mfs�R 0rd'
f:g: Jg Walfor
�: � p\f>
.d.
O
�Tr 1t� �� •
MU o
J
No. 77 �ON MY INTRU ION, by J. B.
No. 78 SUSPICION, by M. N. Mlnchln.
No. 79 FAMOUS DETEOTIVE STORIE • ew
Series. No. 2.
0
�� g� Walford.
� 11>�8t�8s:V· ��anlt
No. 82 NO TRAIN ON TUE DAY, by J. B.
Blair.
=:�
No. 83 FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES. New
Series. No. 3.
No. 84 THERE IS STILL TOMORROW, by
FJ,"ank Walford.
:g; gg Ji.J.f: Ti�i,Tu
Howard.
ED �
�·J'l, wb �"': !1'.
80
No. 87 �1: AND THE WOLVES, by

No. 88 FAMOUS DETECTIVE STORIES. New
Serles. No. 4.
.,...,-;:,,_,__ �
......, �
. -.,�
/.
TH E R E IS _ N OfH I N G . �
LI K E A MA GP/£ TO MAKE TH E
H O U RS FLY /
MAGPIE SERIES
A § E LE C T E D §TORY
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famous

A MAGPIE -SELECTED STORY

FRANK JOHNSON PTV. LTD.

THE DOCTOR TALKED TOO MUCH 5

Contributions dealing with true stories

He might have got away with his crime if he

DOCTORS, popularly, are suppbsed to be strong silent men,

has no peer in the criminal annals as a horrible murderer. Others

though there is scant evidence that she ac111ally was, nevertheless

10n. The family comprised Mr. Robert James Edmondson, his

gone away for a week's holiday. He then got Mrs. An<lerson to

decorate the doctor's home on the l\fonday. Holmes denied the

demanded that he start work immediately on re . papering and

Cardenholme Llnn which ran through the thickly wooded ravine.

· He held up his bandaged hand and added, "What could I have

telling her of Mrs. Ruxton's infidelity-a letter which, incidentally,

son's disappearance and death was admitted by the trial judge,

Figuring largely in the list of solved crimes are

"Thompson and Jameson were both charged with assault, rob­

The Mystery of No. 29 Wolverton St.

It had been declared by a noted British criminolo­

THERE is a decided possibility that had Mr. and Mrs. Johnston

pool, and although they knew .the names of their immediate

The "Wallace Murder" (as it came to be known) says noted

The next evening Wallace returned from work at about six

murder, was quickly on the scene. He considered that Wallace was

Nevertheless I suggest it will carry you almost irresistibly to the

"Does it occur to you now it was anything like his voice?"

A Professor of Forensic Medicine in the Liverpool University and

"He may be sane now."

would have estimated death as being from three to four hours

devoted husband, presented insuperable problems. In fifty-two

Her beauty was the magnet that drew him to . . .

MOST murders which take p�ce in this sophisticated age are

As the orchestra played "The Beautiful Lady in Blue" and

to the States, and that her escort was 34-year-old Al Dahlberg,

two newspapers reported the occurrence thus: "An American ship's

planned to marry. I was in the process of moving for a divorce

Cross-examined by Mr. Jenkins (for the accused) sht admitted

After hearing the death sentence the youthful Tuma-who no

THE LONG CHANCE

Luck pla:rs a part in many enterprises. The

Shrinking returns provided him with a reason for suggesting a

gentleman must have been a gardener at one time, I'd say," he

"Throw that damn thing away," called Horweg, in a temper.

preferred to be in New Guinea, being chased by cannibals.

It was a private little engagement that had to do

reputation for reartessness, and for thoroughness. No better man,

were returning from the agricultural settlement at the latter place

"Well, Martin," he said genially, "and how are you?"

Immediately after he had assumed office Price reorganised the

tell Mr. Honey he is to be sent over to the office. I'll be there

being then in a sitting posture, I could rest the irons on the

THE WOMBAT'S BURROW AFFAIR

Like Buck Roxton, whose story is told earlier in

TH E wombat is one of Australia's most imeresting marsupials.

bush inn, being allotted his bug-ridden bed by Mrs. Robinson

"About what happened around this place a couple o[ years

seemed to worry about anything. They didn't care a hoot when

"He is a dangerous man," said Wilson. "I would have spoken

In its early days, Sydney was peopled by the

THE story of a certain Tawell, Sydney's first apothecary. is so

The dread ·of transportation and all that it implied held no

When Corporal Bastable's horse was slain he

"Thompson and Jameson were both charged with assault, rob

It had been declared by a noted British criminolo

Station, and informed Senior Constable Sherwood of their sus

lump I have in my groin,' from which I knew he suffered. I be