The murder of Elizabeth Camp, 1897

[Chris]

The main thing I found interesting is that both Macnaghten and Anderson's accounts of the same story are similar in that they both seemed to be saying the murderer was known to police but not arrested or convicted. Macnaghten's account is somewhat different to Anderson's though, he seems to remember the details differently, eg. the day the moustache was bought. He also obviously mixes up two different suspects in his account too and finishes the tale with the suspect ending up in an asylum shortly after the murder.

It's certainly difficult to make sense of the details, but perhaps in general terms there's a useful lesson there about the need to treat police officers' memoirs with caution - especially when they are claiming to have moral certainty about the culprit of an unsolved crime...

[Debra A]

It's certainly difficult to make sense of the details, but perhaps in general terms there's a useful lesson there about the need to treat police officers' memoirs with caution - especially when they are claiming to have moral certainty about the culprit of an unsolved crime...

Definitely.

There's a detailed account of the questioning and identification of Marshall at the inquest in the The Standard of Wednesday, April 07, 1897

The two witnesses who identified Marshall as the man entering their Guilford barbers shop, looking for a false moustache, which they didn't sell (Marshall later admitted buying one in another shop) don't give the specific date, other than saying it was a Thursday in February.The murder date was Thursday 11th Feb.
At least two witnesses were taken by detectives to identify Marshall in Reading where he lived. One of these was a cabman who identified Marshall as being the man in the Alma, but subsequently changed his mind.
One witness mentions the fact that the suspicious man he saw in the Alma had a real moustache, not a fake.

This was Arthurs Marshall's own account of his movements on 11th Feb. The Guilford barber shop witnesses seemingly confirming his account of being in Guilford.

Trewman's Exeter Flying Post or Plymouth and Cornish Advertiser

"Arthur Marshall was called and explained his movements. he said he had never kept company with a woman in London. When he left home on Feb 11th his idea was to enlist. He went from Reading to Hurst and from Hurst to Wokingham. From Wokingham he went to Guilford. He got a sixpenny moustache there. He could give no reason for this. He walked to a wayside station and went to West Croydon, where he arrived between eight and nine. Shown a portrait of Miss Camp he said he had never seen her in his life. From West Croydon he went to New Cross and passed the night there. he had never ridden second class in his life."

[Debra A]

After reading several more accounts in 'The Standard' newspaper it looks like, factually at least, Anderson was spot on with his summary of the case against Marshall in his book Pseudo-criticism, or, The higher criticism and its counterfeit- 1904.
There was a very strong chain of circumstancial evidence against Marshall, he was identified to some extent by witnesses and the case could not proceed further because Marshall did have an alibi that placed him in Guilford about an hour before the murder was committed.

[Debra A]

...Guildford even.

[Chris]

I thought it might be interesting to try to identify the "eccentric barrister" who was suspected of having murdered Elizabeth Camp, according to Lionel Weatherly.

To recap, Weatherly said that about a year after the murder (which took place in February 1897) he was asked by a friend, a Bristol estate agent who was the honorary secretary of the dogs' home, to take as a patient a man to whom he had been appointed receiver. This was an eccentric barrister on the Western Circuit, who Weatherly did not believe had ever had a brief, but whose father was a judge and had written a book on torts. The patient asked if he could have two little dogs, which he had previously taken to the dogs' home. Weatherly said that he later found out that this took place at midday on the day of the murder, and that the patient had afterwards visited a friend, an old sergeant at Horfield, with whom he stayed the night before leaving for London. Weatherly mentioned that the patient had lived at Clapham. He remained in the asylum for "some few years," then recovered, was discharged and married, dying some years afterwards.

The estate agent who was the honorary secretary of Bristol Dogs' Home is easy to identify from online sources. Edward Thomas Parker was born at Crossley Farm in Winterbourne in 1855, established a firm of chartered surveyors in Broad Street in 1879, was the first secretary and treasurer of the Bristol Home for Lost and Starving Dogs, founded in Waterloo Street, St Philips in 1887, and died at Bristol in 1935. He remained honorary secretary of the dogs' home until at least 1900 [Bristol Mercury and Daily Post, 24 May 1900].

http://www.bristoldogsandcatshome.org.uk/dogs_and_cats_home/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/brizzlebornandbred/3281843334/

http://www.frenchaymuseumarchives.co.uk/Archives/Elliott/07_Older_Houses.rtf

As for the identity of the patient, strangely enough, at the date of the 1901 census, Weatherly's institution, Bailbrook Asylum, near Bath, housed not one but two patients who were barristers. They were identified only by their initials, and the details given are in the first and last entries shown below:



(1) F.T.S.

I could find no entry in the register of patients in Provincial licensed houses for 1880-1900 (MH 94/11) corresponding to the second patient. He may have been a voluntary patient; in the final column of the census return is written "Epileptic Tendency" rather than, as for nearly all the other patients, "Lunatic."

However, the Law List of 1903 lists only one barrister with the initials F.T.S. - a Frederick Thomas Saunders of Lincoln's Inn, who was called to the bar on 25 April 1877.

I wasn't able to find this man in either the 1901 census or the 1891 census, but in 1881 (as Fredrick T. Saunders) he was a boarder at Greenbridge Inn, Eglws Cumin [Eglwyscummin], Narberth (Pembrokeshire), described as a "Barrister (Not in Practice)". His age is given as 27, and his birthplace as Brompton, Middlesex, in agreement with the details in the 1901 census return for Bailbrook Asylum (Brompton being an area of Kensington).

In 1861 (as Fred Thomas Saunders, aged 7, b. London) he was in the household of his father, Thomas Bush Saunders, Barrister in Practice, at 31 Thurloe Square, Kensington. His birth on 6 May 1853 at Thurloe-square was announced in the Times of 9 May. (His father was the same Mr Saunders who conducted an unofficial inquiry into the Constance Kent case, which rapidly descended into farce.)

The death of Thomas Bush Saunders on 11 August 1894, at The Priory, Bradford, Wiltshire, was announced in the Times of 14 August. He was described as "M.A. Oxon, J. P. for the county of Wilts." In 1911 Frederick Thomas Saunders was living in the household of his sister, Emily Maria Collett, at The Priory, Bradford-on-Avon, and the death of Frederick T. Saunders, aged 61, was registered at Bradford-on-Avon in the first quarter of 1915.

Was Saunders the patient referred to in Weatherly's account? It appears not. He was not on the Western Circuit (according to either the 1903 Law List or Joseph Foster's "Men-at-the_Bar" (1885)), his father was only a J.P., not a judge, and doesn't appear to have written any books. There seems to be no connection with Bristol. And, whereas Weatherly said his patient was discharged, married and some years afterwards died, Saunders was still unmarried in 1911, four years before his death.

(2) C.A.P.

MH 94/11 does record the other barrister who was at Bailbrook Asylum in 1901. He was Charles A. Prideaux, and was admitted on 20 February 1899 and discharged on 9 July 1901 (not improved).

Charles Augustin Prideaux was born in 1855 in Marylebone, the son (later described as the only child) of Charles Grevile (or Greville) Prideaux and his wife Catharine Ann (nee Ruddock). Charles Prideaux senior had been born in Bristol and would in 1879 be appointed Recorder of Bristol and judge of the Bristol Tolzey and Pie Poudre Courts (Foster, p. 377).

In 1861 the younger Charles was living with his mother at 2 Titchfield Terrace, Marylebone. In 1871 he was at boarding school in Baker Street, Enfield. He was admitted a student of the Middle Temple on 23 January 1877 (Foster, p. 377) and a year later he was reported to have passed a satisfactory examination in Roman law only [The Law Times, 26 January 1878]. In December 1878 he (as Mr Augustin Prideaux) was one of those who entertained the tenth annual dinner of the Sylvan Debating Club, of which his father was president, with "an admirable selection of vocal pieces" [The Era, 15 Dec 1878]. On 26 January 1880 he was called to the bar (Foster, p. 377). In 1881 he was living with his parents at 31 Portland Terrace (Holland Lodge), Marylebone.

By 1885 he was a member of the Western Circuit, and his address was given as 31 Portland Terrace and 1 New Court, Temple (Foster, p. 377). But the only references I've found to him in the 1880s relate to literary, rather than forensic, activities. On 23 April 1885 he (as Augustin Prideaux) attended a "festival" of the Urban Club held in honour of Shakespeare's birthday at Anderton's Hotel, Fleet Street [The Era, 2 May 1885]. And in May 1888 Animal World published a long letter written by him, entitled 'Man and beast hereafter,' arguing that animals possess immortal souls. In this letter he described three men as his friends - the Rev. Vitruvius Partridge Wyatt [1846-1937], of St Saviour's in Bristol, Alexander Heriot Mackonochie [1825-1887, a prominent Anglo-Catholic priest] and John Templeton Lucas [1836-1880, an artist and writer]. Prideaux's letter was reprinted with his permission in 'Thoughts regarding the future state of animals' by the Rev. J. Frewen Moor (presumably in the first edition of 1893; the second edition, edited by Edith Carrington (1899) is available at Google Books - http://books.google.com/books?id=KHoTAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA63).

His mother died on 3 September 1890 [Times, 3 Sep 1900], and at the date of the 1891 census he was a visitor in the household of Bridget M. F. Corley at 351 Clapham Rd, Lambeth.

On 2 September 1891 he married Helen (sometimes called Helen Cardozo), daughter of the late Philip Vincent, surgeon, of Camborne, at Much Hadham, Hertfordshire [Royal Cornwall Gazette, 10 Sept 1891].

On 18 June 1892 his father died at Holland Lodge, Regent's Park [Times, 20 June 1892]. His estate was worth £9,685, but he left his son only £1,000 absolutely, with the residue after some other legacies left in trust for his benefit [Morning Post, 24 October 1892].

In 1898 his wife petitioned for divorce [National Archives, J 77/632/19302]. Her death was registered at Penzance in the second quarter of 1899, within months of his admission to Bailbrook Asylum; consequently Prideaux was stated to be a widower in the 1901 census return.

After his time in the asylum (20 February1899 -9 July 1901) he married, at Fulham, in the second quarter of 1902, Jessie Teresa Hay. He lived at 74 Stamford Brook Road, Hammersmith, between at least 1904 and 1919 [Post Office London County Suburbs Directories]. At the date of the 1911 census he was living there with his wife and her sister Elizabeth. There are some indications in the census return that his behavour at this time was still eccentric. The writing is almost illegible, but his place of birth appears to be given as Constantinople rather than Marylebone. He also appears to have acquired an additional middle name, Treverbyn (presumably to commemorate the marriage of Sir Roger de Prideaux and Elizabeth Treverbyn in the 14th century).

The death of his second wife Jessie was registered in the first quarter of 1928 at Hammersmith. The death of Charles A. Prideaux was registered in the first quarter of 1930 at Camberwell.

Clearly, Prideaux is a much better fit for the patient in Weatherly's account. He was a member of the Western Circuit whose father was a judge who had published a book (albeit not on torts but on the duties of churchwardens). His family was closely connected with Bristol. He had strong and eccentric opinions about animals. He married soon after being discharged from the asylum, and was dead by the time Weatherly published his story. We don't know where he was living at the time of the Camp murder (directories give his address as "1 Cloisters, Temple E.C.," but he surely lived elsewhere), but he was last recorded six years earlier - albeit only as a "visitor" - at 351 Clapham Road, close to the boundary between Clapham and Lambeth. There are some discrepancies - he was admitted to the asylum two years, not one year, after the murder, and remained there only two years - but they are relatively minor by comparison.

We can only guess at why Charles Augustin Prideaux was suspected by the police of being Elizabeth Camp's murderer, but at any rate Lionel Weatherly was convinced that his amateur detective work had succeeded in establishing a cast-iron alibi for him.

[Debra A]

Excellent work, Chris.
Thanks for posting the information.

[Chris]

One other point - evidently Weatherly assumed that Macnaghten, in his memoirs, was referring to his patient when he said that the suspect had been confined in a lunatic asylum. If he was, he must have confused two different suspects, as the earlier part of his description obviously relates to Arthur Marshall, the man with the false moustache. So it would be interesting to know whether Marshall was ever committed to an asylum.

From the information given in the newspaper reports of the inquest, it's not too hard to trace Marshall's family. Evidence was given by his sister Beatrice Marshall, who assisted her father in keeping a beer-house, the Turners' Arms, Coley Street, Reading, and his mother, Mrs Emma Marshall [The Standard, 7 April 1897]. Beatrice also testified that her father had a carpenter's workshop attached to his house [Trewman's Exeter Flying Post, 6 April 1897]. Kelly's Directory of Berkshire for 1899 shows Henry Marshall, beer retailer, at 8 Coley Street, Reading.

Given these details, the family can be found in the census returns, which show that Arthur Marshall was born in Sindlesham, in the parish of Hurst, Berkshire, his birth being registered at Wokingham in the first quarter of 1872.

Unfortunately his father died a couple of years after the murder (his death was registered in the first quarter of 1899), and at the date of the 1901 census his widowed mother was living with her daughter Agnes (a.k.a. Beatrice) - who had married Charles Keel the previous year - at 75 Mount Pleasant, St Giles, Reading.

I've been unable to find a match for Arthur Marshall in either the 1901 or the 1911 census, but I thought it might be worth posting these details in case anyone else had better luck.

(N.B. At the inquest it was stated that he had, two years previously, "worked on a sporting paper, and lived with his brother in Grosvenor-terrace, Walworth." In 1901 his brother George, a printer compositor, was living as a boarder at 52 Grosvenor Terrace, Newington, Southwark, but there was no sign of Arthur there.)

[Jonathan H]

I thank Debra putting me onto this story.

What I see is Anderson typically incoherent in his recollection, self-serving, and mean-spirited in blaming other cops -- and spoiling Macnaghten's slyness in correctly deducing a suspect's makeshift disguise.

I also see Mac fusing two suspects together, so that a respectable family will be safe; nobody will recognize their member in the mentally-challenged vagabond wandering around Blackheath.

It would take somebody with specific knowledge of the barrister suspect to recognize him, in this case Weatherly, just as it took a police officer with specific knowledge of Tumblety, eg. Littlechild, to see through 'Dr D' as partly 'Dr T'.

Actually Littlechild is as in-the-dark as Weatherly.

The latter thinks it is the same suspect, whereas Littlechild thinks this must be a pompous mishmash by Anderson.

A mad barrister suspect becomes a lumpen transient in Blackheath, after a murder, whilst a mad barrister from Blackheath becomes an unemployed doctor after his final atrocity (Sims, 1907) in Whitechapel.

[Debra A]

Thanks for the thoughts Jonathon,
I have to disagree with one point you made though.
IMHO, Comparing the account of Anderson in 'Pseudo-criticism, or, The higher criticism and its counterfeit- 1904' with the actual facts of the case as reported in the Standard (various dates) Anderson gives an accurate straightforward, no frills, summary of the circumstantial case against Marshall (without naming him), and the reason he could not be arrested or stand trial, rather than it being an 'incoherent recollection'.

While there is much criticism of the Railway Police by Anderson, this is also apparent to a lesser degree in Macnaghten's recollections, but Macnaghten seems to be attaching much less importance to this as a reason for the suspect not being caught sooner.

If Weatherley is right and the 'eccentric barrister' identified by Chris was the same man Macnaghten was 'fusing' with the suspect Marshall (for whatever reason), Macnaghten must have been aware of a suspect that Anderson either never knew of, or never considered as serious suspect? Yet Weatherley claims that the barrister was viewed by Scotland Yard as a such.

Chris, I have had a go looking for Arthur Marshall, using the information you provided, and drawn a complete blank too.

[Chris]

If Weatherley is right and the 'eccentric barrister' identified by Chris was the same man Macnaghten was 'fusing' with the suspect Marshall (for whatever reason), Macnaghten must have been aware of a suspect that Anderson either never knew of, or never considered as serious suspect? Yet Weatherley claims that the barrister was viewed by Scotland Yard as a such.

Yes, it's curious. And judging by the evidence given about Marshall, it wouldn't be that surprising if he had been committed to an asylum, so perhaps Macnaghten wasn't fusing/confusing two suspects at all.

On the other hand, the newspaper article by Cunliffe-Owen from late 1897 does give independent support to Weatherly's account of police suspicions against a barrister (and vice versa). It would be interesting to know where Cunliffe-Owen got his information, particularly in view of his reference in the same article to "the blue-blooded perpetrator of the Whitechapel murders" having died at Broadmoor.

Chris, I have had a go looking for Arthur Marshall, using the information you provided, and drawn a complete blank too.

Thanks for this. I got nowhere, even looking for "A. M." in case he was in an asylum which specified only initials in the census return. There were a few "A. M.s" close to the right age without any place of birth given, but of course that didn't leave much to go on, especially given Arthur Marshall's lack of an occupation.

[Chris]

I had a look at the divorce papers relating to the first marriage of Charles Augustin Prideaux (National Archives, J 77/632/19302).

The good thing is that they do definitely confirm that Prideaux was the patient Weatherly was referring to, because Edward Thomas Parker [the Bristol estate agent who was honorary secretary of the dogs' home] acts on his behalf and mentions that he has been appointed his receiver (by an order dated 25 April 1898).

Other than that there are no dramatic revelations. Helen Cardozo Prideaux petitions for divorce from her husband on 2 February 1898, on the grounds that he has "treated me with great unkindness and cruelty and has frequently used threats towards me and has struck and otherwise assaulted me ... on an occasion shortly after Whitsuntide 1897 at Gunnersbury in the County of Middlesex [he] threatened to shoot me ... on or about the 21st day of January 1897 at Gunnersbury ... [he] pointed a loaded Revolver at me ... on or about the 22nd July 1897 at Gunnersbury ... [he] violently squeezed me and thereby caused me great pain." As if that wasn't enough, the petition says he "has frequently committed adultery with Mary Lawrence and divers other women ... [and] on divers occasions in or about the month of July 1896 at 109 Livingstone Street Battersea ... [he] committed Adultery with the said Mary Lawrence."

The petition mentions that after their marriage she and her husband had lived at Stoneleigh Villas Keynsham near Bristol "and at divers other places" (presumably including Gunnersbury in West London, at the time of Elizabeth Camp's murder). But by 1898 she was living at 6 Alexandra Terrace, Penzance, Cornwall. Prideaux had been detained since 23 July 1897 at Wyke House, Isleworth, Middlesex, as a person of unsound mind.

In his answer to the petition, through Turner, Prideaux denies that his wife's allegations are true, but then adds "if he committed any of the acts of cruelty or adultery alleged in the said Petition he was of unsound mind at the time and suffering from permanent and lasting insanity and incapable of understanding the nature or consequence of such acts."

The cause was abated after the death of Helen Cardozo Prideaux on 30 March 1899.

If his wife's claims are accurate, Prideaux's violent behaviour may well have come to the attention of the police at around the time of Elizabeth Camp's murder, and it's interesting to note that both his home at Gunnersbury and the address in Battersea where he allegedly committed adultery would have been close to the railway line from Hounslow-Waterloo on which the murder took place.

One thing is clear, though. He could not have murdered Emma Matilda Johnson at Clewer near Windsor on 15 September 1897, as claimed in the newspaper report by "Ex-Attache." By that time he was already under detention in the asylum at Isleworth.

[m_w_r]

Hi Chris,

This is a fascinating thread. My computer's down at the moment and I'm clinging on to the virtual world on a borrowed machine, but when I'm up and running, I'll post a photo of the (former) Elephant and Castle at Vauxhall. I sometimes go past it on the bus on the way to work (it depends what bus I get). And while I'm not sure that it's precisely the same building that stood there in 1897, it's worth seeing. It's a Starbucks now, unfortunately.

Regards,

Mark

[Jonathan H]

Stewart was kind enough to put this up on the other site.

It is the Ur-text on Macnaghten's first reference as the retiring Commissioner, extremely oblique, to the un-named Druitt.

Having claimed, quite falsely, that he would never reveal anything about the fiend's identity [he was the source for Griffiths and Sims] Mac makes a passing reference to the Camp murder.

From the Daily Mail, June 2, 1913

SECRET OF SCOTLAND YARD

'END OF JACK THE RIPPER'

INTERESTING DISCLOSURE

"During the last ten years", remarked Sir Melville, "there have been few crimes for which no-one has been brought to justice though the Camp murder was one" ...

In the just posted press account, on the other thread about the insane, third medical student by ex-Attache from 1908 we see another Ripper/Camp conjunction which is very suggestive to me. at least.

The gist of the article is the muckraking claim, if it is one, that the better classes get the softer option of being incarcerated, even if they commit the most heinous of crimes [the opening is about the American tycoon and murderer Harry K Thaw who will make a cameo appearance in the Littlechild Letter].

We read:

'In fact it maybe mentioned that it was at Broadmoor that the blue-blooded perpetrator of the Whitechapel Murders is now admitted by the authorities to have breathed his last, and it is likewise to Broadmoor that was sent without trial the well-born and successful member of the bar whose homicidal mania led him to perpetrate two years ago a mysterious murder on a suburban London railroad and to kill in an equally unaccountable fashion a young woman last Summer at Windsor.'


Here are two sources which both mention the Ripper and the railroad murder almost in the same breath.

The second article's mention of the Ripper, as an insane toff now deceased, is obviously Druitt and Kosminski combined: the former was an English toff and dead, and the latter the resident of a madhouse -- though actually still alive.

It suggest 'ex-Attache' had a Scotland Yard source who was not in the loop, but neveRtheless had picked up scraps here and there, for example a juicy morsel that a mad barrister was suspected, at one time, in the Camp murder.

The reference to the railroad killer I think backs up my earlier post that Mac fused together a toff suspect-- a barrister like the Ripper -- and a proletarian nobody, in order to hide the former in the latter.

In his 1914 memoirs, Macnaghten will claim that the best and only suspect in the Camp case, False-Moustache Man, was the one who ended up in a madhouse -- and perhaps expiring there.

That there was, in fact, an English gentleman police suspect, as the tabloid is claiming -- correctly -- will be falsely denied by Macnaghten not by blatantly denying it head on, but by simply merging one suspect with another, but his essential identity is that of a transient nobody.

This is so subtly done that it was missed by a person who actually knew the barrister in question, who thought Mac was only writing about a single suspect.

I see his same method of discreet suspect fusion, and the protection of a fellow English gentleman -- or at least his family -- regarding the Whitechapel crimes.

Ironically, in the same memoir, Mac drops some of the self-serving fiction he in which he had cocooned Druitt and thus plays a pretty straight bat, so to speak.

I argue that, consciously or not, Macnaghten began merging Tumblety with Druitt for his literary cronies, eg. Drowned plus Doctor.

I wish to thank Debra again for alerting me to this case.

[Chris]

Here are two sources which both mention the Ripper and the railroad murder almost in the same breath.

And there are two more:
(1) Anderson's musings in the Daily Chronicle article of 1 September 1908 and
(2) the claims attributed to a "well-known Scotland Yard detective" in the Sunday Chronicle article of 15 October 1905.

[Stewart P Evans]

Miss S. C. Bright Letter

When I purchased the Littlechild letter from antiquarian bookdealer Eric Barton, the purchase included other letters sent to George R. Sims as a result of articles he had written.

On 6 September 1908 a Miss S. C. Bright of Gorleston on Sea wrote a seven-page letter to Sims concerning the Miss Camp murder and the identity of the unknown murderer. I reproduce that letter here as I thought that it might be of interest to readers of this thread.