Why Would Dew Know Kelly By Sight?

[Paddy]

JM, does it say anywhere that Ethel once lived in Dulwich c1960ish with one of her sons and his family? I may have met her if so...The family names fit.....

Pat...................

[jmenges]

She changed her last name to Harvey (after Crippen's middle name) shortly after the trial, married a Stanley Smith in 1915 and lived as Ethel Smith at 62 Buford Road, Croydon, from the late 1950's until her death in 1967 (at Dulwich Hospital). No sources I've seen has her moving in with a son in Dulwich, but I guess it's not impossible. The son who witnessed her death certificate gives 21 Owls Road, Wimborne, Dorset as his address.

JM

[Paddy]

Thanks JM, guess I will find out one day. If it was her she was a very nice old lady that helped me a great deal.....probably just coincidence though...


Pat.........................

[jmenges]

Her name was Ethel Smith I take it?

JM

[Paddy]

JM, well she was Ethel and lived with her son who was a Smith or her daughter his wife and their family.
But whether she was a Smith or not I dont know. He was one of two boys but I cant pin down the exact births. Would Ethel have given her name as Harvey on their births I wonder?
As this thread is not about this I had better stop now but thanks for your help.

Pat.............

[jmenges]

Admin can step in if they feel we're harming the topic so I'll respond here. Maybe the Crippen content can be moved...

If her maiden name is asked for on her children's birth certificate then it would probably say Ethel Clare Harvey. This name she used for less than 5 years. She went by Ethel Clare Smith her entire life after that and that is the name that appears on her death certificate. Supposedly she kept the secret of her true identity from her husband throughout their entire marriage. She lied on her marriage certificate stating her father was Walter William Harvey rather than Walter William Neave.

JM

[Mayerling]

I don't know how valid this point is, as it is of a kind of personal knowledge, but you're all welcome to it.

Cora was killed (presumably - there is some question about it) by the rare alkali poison hyoscine (I think that is how it is spelled).* Supposedly Hawley put it in her food on the night of the dinner with the Martinellis, in the hopes of passing off her death as a heart attack.

[*In his book "Crippen: The Mild Murderer", Tom Cullen pointed out that some of the neighbors at Hilldrop Crescent claimed they heard a woman screaming and then a gunshot late at night. In the course of the trial, there was a concentration on the poisoning evidence due to the rarity of hyoscine as a weapon in poison cases (unlike arsenic, strychnine, prussic acid, or even lead poisoning). Nothing further was heard about shooting anyone. Cullen thinks that Hawley might have given too much of the poison to Belle, and if so there was a reaction from her causing her distress and causing her to scream. Crippen had a revolver, and he may have shot Belle to silence her - but then had the new problem of a corpse with a bullet. This may explain the dismemberment. The fact that no head was ever found may be due to Hawley shooting Belle in her skull, and then, later having to dump her head - possibly on a cross Channel ferry to France.]

On one of the occasions that Jonathan Goodman was with me we were talking about the Crippen Case (Jon edited a volume for a series he did, called "The Crippen File".). He told me that there was a record at the British Museum that Ethel Le Neve had been reading a book about poisons prior to the events leading to the disappearance of Belle Crippen. So I think she did know more than came out, and may have been more active with Hawley from the start.

I tend to feel bad for both Hawley and Ethel, because the obvious solution today would have been Hawley and Belle divorcing and Ethel marrying Hawley (they apparently did love each other). But in 1910 that was not an easy road to follow at all. There was also a property division problem involved. That said, I have to admit that one thing about Crippen and his reputation always has bothered me: while admiring his efforts to save Ethel while he was doomed, he was not one of nature's noblemen. He was at best an herb doctor (Spilsbury put a question mark about his medical qualifications on the record of Crippen in his files), and had been involved in some dubious quack medicine matters for Munyan's (a prominent patent medicine company of that period) and had been involved in a really bad ear doctor sideline that was the subject of a newspaper expose. Under the circumstances, for all his friendly manner to most people, he could be ruthlessly dangerous in pursuit of a buck.

I also have found something disturbing that is sometimes noted by criminal historians, but has not been studied adequately (Jon wrote an essay about it in one of his books, but I feel a full study is warranted). The week Crippen and Le Neve fled London, there was another murder that happened. An over-the-hill actor named Weldon Atherstone (originally Anderson) was found shot to death in an empty Battersea flat that was underneath the apartment of his girl friend mistress. At the time she was entertaining another friend: Atherstone's oldest son. The young man went down stairs to find out what happened, and found a dying man. Supposedly in the darkness he did not recognize his father. People in the nearby streets claimed they saw the figure of a man jumping over a dividing wall into the street (the flat was on the other side of the wall). Presumably this was the killer, but nobody stopped him. The authorities, after an inquest, concluded that Atherstone had gone to the empty apartment to spy on his girlfriend and was surprised to find a burglar there who shot him. The case never was solved.

What came out later that was odd was that during a music hall artiste strike in 1909 Belle Crippen appeared as a scab performer on a bill with the same Weldon Atherstone! It was obvious that both performers, neither of whom were good or popular anymore, were willing to go against their fellow artistes on strike to get back on stage. Marie Lloyd, a popular entertainer of that period, when she heard that Belle was performing (and knew how dreadful Belle's acting and singing were) said, "Let her go on - it will make the public flee the theater in droves!" In any case it was "remarked upon as curious" at the time that two notorious murder victims actually briefly knew each other before they died violently.

Jeff

[Mayerling]

She changed her last name to Harvey (after Crippen's middle name) shortly after the trial, married a Stanley Smith in 1915 and lived as Ethel Smith at 62 Buford Road, Croydon, from the late 1950's until her death in 1967 (at Dulwich Hospital). No sources I've seen has her moving in with a son in Dulwich, but I guess it's not impossible. The son who witnessed her death certificate gives 21 Owls Road, Wimborne, Dorset as his address.

JM

Curious how Wimborne, Dorset attracts so many characters from different homicide cases.

Jeff

[GUT]

Curious how Wimborne, Dorset attracts so many characters from different homicide cases.

Jeff

Maybe there's something in the water

[Mayerling]

Maybe there's something in the water

Indeed, in one case it may have driven someone to test the water!

[Rosella]

Thankyou, Mayerling. Very interesting, but then the Crippen case is, isn't it? 'Supper with the Crippens' does mention the gunshot heard and that is certainly one explanation for the dismemberment.

Of course, the question of the couple's finances does come into it too, and would certainly have done so if Cora had agreed to a divorce. There was £600 on deposit in a bank but any withdrawals required six months notice. After Cora's death Crippen got ready money only by pawning Cora's jewellery. (His own bank account was overdrawn.)

The Atherstone murder was quite a weird one. In spite of a volatile relationship with his long-term (estranged) girlfriend, Atherstone seems to have been eaten up with jealousy, to the extent of suspecting his own son!

I believe his son didn't recognise him because the older man had a thick 'moustache' of blood covering his lip (and it was badly lighted on the fire escape.) I do think that a potential burglar was sniffing around and unfortunately for the actor, the two met in the dark.

[jmenges]

Of course, the question of the couple's finances does come into it too, and would certainly have done so if Cora had agreed to a divorce. There was £600 on deposit in a bank but any withdrawals required six months notice. After Cora's death Crippen got ready money only by pawning Cora's jewellery. (His own bank account was overdrawn.)

A year after Crippen's execution it was discovered that Ethel had forged slips on Cora's Post Office savings account and on 8 separate occasions over 2 months (April-July 1910) withdrew what would amount to £75,000 in today's money. The Director of Public Prosecutions consulted the Attorney General who decided not to extradite her back to the UK.

JM

[Rosella]

That's extraordinary, JM. Where would Cora have got large amounts of money from, though? She was very young when she and the doctor married and was certainly no heiress. There's enough to show that she wasn't exactly a leading light in the musical halls.

She had jewellery and furs, of course, but it was always said that, at least earlier in the marriage when Crippen was earning a regular income he was quite a generous husband. The Charing Cross bank, where the £600 was deposited, collapsed later in 1910, I believe.

[Callmebill]

Calm Crippen. Too calm.

Maybe Hawley Crippen wasn't the main bread winner. If Cora threatened to leave him then she would take not only his source of revenue, but her fortune. Hawley had a string of failed businesses -- and a set of false teeth.
Cora appeared on the stage. How much money she earned from that isn't known. She isn't easy to find in her role as performer. She seems to have worked under at least four monikers including Belle Elmore. By 1909 The Charing Cross bank held £323 solely in Belle Elmore's name, not Cora Crippen. The remainder, £600 in total, they held in a joint account from which either could withdraw interest.
It strikes me as odd that a man who insisted the money was his, as were her jewels etc, was careless in whose name the accounts were opened.
There's a busy man beneath that veneer of calmness he exuded.
I'm just not buying his innocence.