Millers Court - the demolition picture

[Chava]

When were the houses built?

From what I can gather, the first houses went up in the early 1670s. The street was than called 'Datchett Street' after the Datchett family who owned the land that was sub-divided. It was originally a footpath along the open land. Datchett St was 400' long and 24' wide. By 1694, we have 13 householders paying rates, but there are no street numbers at that time. I'm assuming the rest of the houses were built at some point within the first years of the eighteenth century. I did find a graphic of a row of houses along the north side of White's Row that went up at the same time using similar builders and methods.

Here it is

The plainer houses in the middle might have been something like #26 Dorset St in form, although #26 and #27 have a distinctive alleyway running between them. It's narrow and I can't explain its function. If there was a coach-house behind each of those houses, then maybe you'd bring the horse down through there. But what about the coach? Or wagon? Or whatever? You wouldn't get that down there so easily!

Edited to add that numerous complaints were logged against the builders who were working that area at that time. Bad mortar, bad bricks, bad everything! So even the original 'nice' houses were probably in very shoddy shape within a few years.

[Sam Flynn]

#26 and #27 have a distinctive alleyway running between them. It's narrow and I can't explain its function. If there was a coach-house behind each of those houses, then maybe you'd bring the horse down through there.

The "Miller's Court" alley was only some 3 feet wide, Chava - you'd have struggled to get a rocking-horse down there unless you tucked your elbows in! One presumes that whatever costermongers' barrows McCarthy kept in the shed would have been "garaged" via the front door.

[Chava]

The "Miller's Court" alley was only some 3 feet wide, Chava - you'd have struggled to get a rocking-horse down there unless you tucked your elbows in! One presumes that whatever costermongers' barrows McCarthy kept in the shed would have been "garaged" via the front door.

Yeah, Gareth. That's what I think. But it's too narrow to be any kind of passageway for delivery. I'll bet it was created when they built Millers Court. They may have removed a section from each of the two houses--say a foot and a half from each--to create a passageway into the court. They couldn't make it wider without taking even more room from the front downstairs room on either side. And if the frontage was really 16', as my research suggests, then those rooms would have been extremely narrow already!

[Stephen Thomas]

I"ve been doing a little bit of research. I can't find a floor plan for any of the Dorset St houses, but I have found some information about the builders of those houses. I thought they had been built by silk weavers for themselves and their families but I was wrong. They probably were built with silk weavers in mind, but the houses in Dorset St and White's Row seem to have been thrown up by speculative builders--ie cowboys--and were badly-built from the start. A number of builders were done for using bad morter etc. Also, these were small houses with 16' frontages. I can't find any mention of basements, although some of the nicer houses in the area did have 'semi-basements' which I guess were used for storage. So the place where Kelly lived must at some point have been used to cook food. I'm pretty sure that the door she used as her front door would have been the houses egress into the garden originally.

Yep, Chava, that's the way it was. Your research is good.

[Suzi]

Hi all-
Chava-
Having read Fiona's description of the wonderful gardens et al -which were transformed at some point- into 'the court ' your dimensions are accurate I reckon- 10' across from door front to door front at tops would make sense..Dammit no chance of Mr Diemschutz (NOT that he did!!!) getting his horse-rocking or not- down there then- in a month of Sundays.!!! (Just an image that was mildly amusing!)


In fact Mary herself- may have had to get a sidle on to make it through that alley into the court- if she was as stout as portrayed! in THAT pic!!!!! (Her hum)
"Come with me -behind me- and you'll be- er Ouch- Comfortable" hehe
Suz x

Perhaps Mrs P heard a cry of 'Oooh Move Over!'

[Chava]

Here's a question--very possibly a stupid one.

I've seen the diagrams and plans of Millers Court. I've seen the contemporary pictures and photos of #26 Dorset St. It's clear from the barn-door that replaces the front window that barrows etc are stored in the downstairs area of #26, and Kelly seemed to have had the only rental room on that floor.

There doesn't seem to be any way to get in or out of Millers Court except via the passageway from Dorset St. I'm not seeing any little lanes leading out from the court itself. That passageway was, by all accounts, 3' wide. So how did anyone get furniture in or out? Even supposing those cribs were let furnished, that furniture had to be brought in somehow. Iron bedsteads would collapse and could be brought in. Small wooden chairs could be brought in. But I doubt you'd get a table down there. As Sam Flynn pointed out upthread, unless you were very trim indeed, you'd have to sidle down sideways to get in yourself! Furniture could not have been fetched through #26 because the door into the main ground floor from Kelly's room had been boarded-up.

It's not that this adds to our understanding of the case. Unless there was another way to get in and out of the court, say through the hallway at #27. 29 Hanbury St was open all night. I wonder if that was the case there as well.

[Stephen Thomas]

That passageway was, by all accounts, 3' wide. So how did anyone get furniture in or out?

Hi Chava

I wouldn't say that's particularly narrow. It's just the regular width of a staircase and very few pieces of furniture would be too big to get through. A table, for instance, is about 30 inches high.

[Chava]

Hi Chava

I wouldn't say that's particularly narrow. It's just the regular width of a staircase and very few pieces of furniture would be too big to get through. A table, for instance, is about 30 inches high.

Hi Stephen,

You're right. On reflection, most things will go through a front door, which is certainly not particularly wide.

[caz]

Hi All,

Yes I know, I’m late to the party again, but I’d just like to say that I’m with Sam and Stephen here over the more probable location of Prater’s room.

Any ambiguities in Prater’s testimony would have been ripe for misinterpretation and it was arguably paraphrased for maximum significance and drama. If Diddles hadn’t woken her, by touch alone, there is nothing to suggest she would not have slept soundly through and woken naturally, and remained another anonymous tenant with no story to tell, just like the couple reported to have been in the room directly above Mary.

From the words directly attributed to Prater, she was saying she would definitely have heard any singing or commotion coming from Mary’s room as she made her way upstairs to bed, at about 1.30 am. But I don’t think she was suggesting that noise made by Mary or ‘guests’ ordinarily woke her once she was in her own room and fast asleep and would therefore have been heard by her on this occasion. That looks like a misinterpretation to me. By her own admission she had drunk enough to send her off into a sound sleep and I don’t suppose it was for the first time. So in order to hear a faint “Oh murder” coming from the direction of the court, it appears that she needed to be awake at the time - enter Diddles to do the necessary.

It would have been more dramatic - but less believable - had they reported that Prater had clearly heard the victim’s last words, uttered in the room directly beneath, where the killer then proceeded undisturbed to do his worst butchery yet, while the poor woman immediately overhead shivered alone in her bed with fright. But no drama at all if this witness went to bed as drunk as a skunk in an upstairs room at the front of the house, and was therefore not close enough to the one at the back on the ground floor for anything short of a piercing scream to have penetrated her sleep.

But we have a plausible compromise here - a witness who was arguably near enough to the action (wherever Prater’s bloomin’ room was) to have heard any appreciable or unusual nocturnal noises made in No.13 room, Miller’s Court, had she stayed awake and alert, plus the ability to guess whether a faintly audible human voice was coming from the front of the house, ie a Dorset St direction, or the back, ie from somewhere within the court.

A problem I have with No.20 being directly above No.13 is that Prater need not have admitted that the cry was “faint”, or came “as if from the court”. She could have said she recognised the voice (after all, she had spoken with Mary earlier) and that it clearly came from the room below, which the victim had occupied. And who could have doubted it? But she didn’t and not even the papers interpreted it that way. But then, she could hardly have claimed that it sounded like someone was being slaughtered in her bed, because a woman who puts furniture up against the door is not going to go straight back to sleep again after that, drunk or not, for fear that she might be next. And although Prater, or the papers, may have made the most of her proximity to the crime scene, she was stuck with No.20, and if that was above the “shed” there was no use in trying to claim otherwise.

If the room above No.13 was indeed occupied by two people who heard not the faintest sound, Prater could hardly have said she heard Mary’s words distinctly, coming from the room below her. But she could have got away with her claim of being woken by the cat in time to hear a faint cry “as if from the court”, where such cries were common, and it would certainly have made more sense if she considered No.13 to be part of the court at the rear, and No.20 as more a part of the house. In fact it makes little sense to say that the cry seemed to come from the court, if her own room was as much in the court as Mary’s. Why not “as if from below” if she was now supposing it to have been Mary’s last gasp?

So did Prater hear this faint cry - which could be everything or nothing - or might she have imagined it after learning that someone else had made such a claim? Let’s not forget that her reaction to the cat waking her was to go back to sleep, apparently unconcerned by any noises coming from any direction. She’d have needed an explanation for that when later claiming to have heard the dead woman’s last words and nothing more. The only sensible conclusion, in my humble opinion, is not to use Prater’s testimony to favour one theory over another concerning why or where Mary may have uttered them, or her killer’s ability to keep the noise below suspicious level.

Love,

Caz
X

[Stephen Thomas]

I’d just like to say that I’m with Sam and Stephen here over the more probable location of Prater’s room.

Hi Caz

I can't speak for my friend Sam (or my friend Fisherman) here but

Prater is reported to have said that her room was #20 which she said was on the first floor (2nd floor US) of #26, that is overlooking Dorset Street and above 'the shed' which we know fronted onto Dorset Street. This is relatively recent internet generated information (and big up to Sam for spotting it) which I reckon should supercede previously accepted 'knowledge'.

Stephen

[WARSPITE]

At the link below you will find the pic of the demolition of Dorset/Duval Street in 1928

http://photos.casebook.org/displayimage.php?album=6&pos=13

This includes the back of Millers Court as seen below:


To get my bearing on this I have marked three features;
Red - the chimney incorporated into the tall wall that rose beside Millers Court
Blue - the window of Elizabeth Prater's room
Magenta - the window in the floor above Prater's room
I have also used the same colours in the sketch of the back of Millers Court to correspond
I found this useful and others may also
Chris

This threads too complicated for me to follow,but Im posting the demo pictures again for everyone to enjoy.This is an excellent find,who discovered them?

[George Hutchinson]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't it Jake at the Guildhall Library?

PHILIP

[halomanuk]

I had never seen these photo's before,didn't even know they existed - brilliant stuff !!

Do we know who took the photo's ?
Was is the company demolishing the site ?

[greg]

The photo was taken by S.R. Geiger. I tried to find out more about him at the time but apart from a few sports photos attributed to him there was very little else.

[halomanuk]

Thanks for that Greg and welcome to the forums...