The attack on Swedish housewife Mrs Meike Dalal on Thursday, September 7th 1961

[Dupplin Muir]

I'm rather skeptical about the idea that the crime was staged to frighten MG. The crucial question is: what was the benefit to Ewer in such a scenario? He paid a substantial amount of money, and ran the risk of a hefty prison sentence if his hired gun was arrested and decided to spill the beans. In return, what would he get if his plan succeeded? All that would happen is that MG would go back to playing 'Happy Families' with his wife.

My take on it is this:

Ewer lusts after JG and decides that MG has to go, especially since he's two-timing his wife. Ewer can then 'comfort' the grieving widow.
Ewer meets Alphon and France separately. Alphon agrees to carry out the killing. Of course, had Ewer known what Alphon was really like he'd have run a mile, but Alphon is a good actor and plays the part of a hardened killer. France agrees to go along with the plan for money, and puts JH forward as a suitable patsy because he has found out about JH and his daughter, so wants to give him a scare - though he doesn't want him dead.
France gives the gun to Ewer who passes it on to Alphon. Perhaps Ewer and Alphon carry out a reconnaissance of the places MG and VS frequent, which might explain sightings of someone resembling Alphon.
On the night of the murder, Ewer and Alphon follow MG's car. The first location is too busy for PA to carry out the attack, but MG and VS decide to move somewhere quieter. Ewer drops Alphon off and tells him to wait for a couple of hours so that Ewer can give himself an alibi.
Alphon is not a hardened killer, so he drives around until he finally plucks up the courage to shoot - and immediately blames the victim for it. Deciding that he might as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb (and to get rid of the witness) he rapes and shoots VS.
Alphon returns the gun to Ewer, who gives it back to France. France wraps it in a distinctive handkerchief belonging to JH and hides it in a place JH uses to dispose of unwanted swag.
Ewer and France then point the police towards JH: Ewer with his psychic powers, and France by telling the police about the bus seat.
When JH is convicted, France is shattered. He goes to see Ewer, who tells him to keep quiet or they will both hang. My feeling is that Ewer threatened France's family, and all that France knew was that Ewer had a hit-man at his disposal, so he took the threat seriously. Unable to live with what he'd done he then committed suicide.
Alphon then blackmails Ewer for large sums of money.

[moste]

And your point is?

Again, what purpose would the Frances have thought was served by taking the trouble to transport Hanratty's hanky to the bus? It was not shown to be his until the DNA from his mucous matched his remains, and the Frances had no reason in 1961 to believe it ever would.

Love,

Caz
X

Not shown to be his. However what they did have as you know in '61 was 'O' positive rhesus negative in the mucus, which France may well have known would have eliminated himself, and possibly others who did not share Hanratty's blood group. Incidentally ,I think as well as myself, I speak for others when I say the onslaught of petty quibbling, you seam to enjoy tempting Natalie into meaningless back and forth catty innuendos, is neither enjoyable, or helpful, to members of this wonderful forum, who are trying to concentrate on important issues. I mean we all like a bit of fun now and again, but it can become tiresome.

[Natalie Severn]

Hi Spitfire
Trying to put Alphon into the mix is problematic in my view. I'll give two reasons. First, as you say, planting the cartridges in the Vienna would have risked bringing Alphon into the frame. Secondly, I think the gunman was more accomplished than either Alphon or Hanratty - based upon the rapid two shots fired into poor Gregsten from the spurless 0.38 tank gun and the 'line' of bullets fired into Valerie Storie.

and is there anything to suggest that the perceived 'heat ' was so much that a distressed France needed to go to the police with the back seat of the bus story.

Thanks for this Ed .In this case the gunman may have learnt to shoot properly when doing national service. I suspect like Blue Moon states,he might have been a brother of Charlotte France who could be normally be trusted with a difficult situation but broke under pressure that night.They would have had to plan the whole thing from beginning to end including him adopting a false persona and wearing a mask over his face
When it came to the drive to Deadman's Hill.This of course was Gregsten's daily route to work as far as Watford /Abbot's Langley --after that the route meanders on until they reach the road sign flashing up with Deadman's Hill on it after which they were plunged into near total darkness.This is where I see Alphon's hand in it and wonder if this erstwhile scholarship boy at Mercer School,one of the oldest and most exclusive schools in London until it closed 1995 ,was actually employed to watch the couple and their haunts near Slough over the Summer months .Fogarty -Waul who lived in a caravan at Peck's farm off Marsh Lane gave a lift to a man in a shortie raincoat ,earlier in August ,when the man got out he headed towards the cornfield.The man looked very like Alphon and he saw the man again in late February 1962 tampering with his car and rang the police etc The man's appearance tallied with Alphon's.On August 22nd the day of the murder The Cobbs and their neighbour Frederick Newell also saw a man in Marsh Lane aged about 27 in a dark suit and white shirt with sallow skin brushed back slightly receding dark hair, dark eyes and a thin nose who had been seen three weeks previously in a dark jacket with a red pullover underneath and two weeks previously wandering round in a raincoat with a red garment underneath .These sound like sightings of a man staking out the lie of the land.

[moste]

I'm rather skeptical about the idea that the crime was staged to frighten MG. The crucial question is: what was the benefit to Ewer in such a scenario? He paid a substantial amount of money, and ran the risk of a hefty prison sentence if his hired gun was arrested and decided to spill the beans. In return, what would he get if his plan succeeded? All that would happen is that MG would go back to playing 'Happy Families' with his wife.

My take on it is this:

Ewer lusts after JG and decides that MG has to go, especially since he's two-timing his wife. Ewer can then 'comfort' the grieving widow.
Ewer meets Alphon and France separately. Alphon agrees to carry out the killing. Of course, had Ewer known what Alphon was really like he'd have run a mile, but Alphon is a good actor and plays the part of a hardened killer. France agrees to go along with the plan for money, and puts JH forward as a suitable patsy because he has found out about JH and his daughter, so wants to give him a scare - though he doesn't want him dead.
France gives the gun to Ewer who passes it on to Alphon. Perhaps Ewer and Alphon carry out a reconnaissance of the places MG and VS frequent, which might explain sightings of someone resembling Alphon.
On the night of the murder, Ewer and Alphon follow MG's car. The first location is too busy for PA to carry out the attack, but MG and VS decide to move somewhere quieter. Ewer drops Alphon off and tells him to wait for a couple of hours so that Ewer can give himself an alibi.
Alphon is not a hardened killer, so he drives around until he finally plucks up the courage to shoot - and immediately blames the victim for it. Deciding that he might as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb (and to get rid of the witness) he rapes and shoots VS.
Alphon returns the gun to Ewer, who gives it back to France. France wraps it in a distinctive handkerchief belonging to JH and hides it in a place JH uses to dispose of unwanted swag.
Ewer and France then point the police towards JH: Ewer with his psychic powers, and France by telling the police about the bus seat.
When JH is convicted, France is shattered. He goes to see Ewer, who tells him to keep quiet or they will both hang. My feeling is that Ewer threatened France's family, and all that France knew was that Ewer had a hit-man at his disposal, so he took the threat seriously. Unable to live with what he'd done he then committed suicide.
Alphon then blackmails Ewer for large sums of money.

Hi Dupplin, I can see that as feasible. I Don't go with the frightener angle either, they had been together for years for goodness sake! And anyway If this guy in the back of the car is only frightening Mike and Val, maybe smacking him about a bit, and, sticking the gun in their faces, insisting on them going their separate ways, 'or else'. Mike is going to say "Oh I know who's put you up to this nonsense. Then as soon as the scary man leaves he just simply phones the police,(or if he's too much of a mouse, Valerie would for sure.) No I'm sticking with preplanned murder.

[Natalie Severn]

I'm rather skeptical about the idea that the crime was staged to frighten MG. The crucial question is: what was the benefit to Ewer in such a scenario? He paid a substantial amount of money, and ran the risk of a hefty prison sentence if his hired gun was arrested and decided to spill the beans. In return, what would he get if his plan succeeded? All that would happen is that MG would go back to playing 'Happy Families' with his wife.

Yes I can see the reason for your reservation DM .But these were middle class Hampstead types with the sort of manners and mores of that time . I picture William Ewer slightly differently from yourself perhaps .Certainly Ewer adored Janet and probably her children too . But he also had a wife of his own -Janet's sister.And I sense that he lived by a certain code of honour -a bit sergeant major like and was deeply outraged by Gregsten's behaviour to Janet. It simply had to be put a stop to once and for all. Gregsten must return to his family and act like a proper husband and father instead of behaving like a complete cad and upsetting Janet like this. And I think he may not even have realised that he was actually falling for her himself- certainly Janet says she herself only slowly realised how much she was becoming attracted to him.
I don't see France either as having ever deliberately set Hanratty up to die.Hanratty might have fitted a kind of 'role play' model with his street wise argot and tall stories -some true-but thats all. However when it ended in rape and murder it became every man for himself and a scapegoat had to be found and if the cap fitted Hanratty then Hanratty would be the fall guy.
Yes,I too think Alphon was in there somewhere -employed to keep tabs on the couple in Slough for example which he fitted in with going to the dog races thumbing a lift over to the pub and so on .Finding out their movements. Sometimes going over to Taplow with Ewer in his car.
But... you may be right- .

[Sherlock Houses]

Incidentally ,I think as well as myself, I speak for others when I say the onslaught of petty quibbling, you seam to enjoy tempting Natalie into meaningless back and forth catty innuendos, is neither enjoyable, or helpful, to members of this wonderful forum, who are trying to concentrate on important issues. I mean we all like a bit of fun now and again, but it can become tiresome.

Nail on the head.

[Ed James]

Yes I can see the reason for your reservation DM .But these were middle class Hampstead types with the sort of manners and mores of that time . I picture William Ewer slightly differently from yourself perhaps .Certainly Ewer adored Janet and probably her children too . But he also had a wife of his own -Janet's sister.And I sense that he lived by a certain code of honour -a bit sergeant major like and was deeply outraged by Gregsten's behaviour to Janet. It simply had to be put a stop to once and for all. Gregsten must return to his family and act like a proper husband and father instead of behaving like a complete cad and upsetting Janet like this. .

None of us can be fully sure our favoured version of the events is true. However, I think an understanding of the character of each of the leading players (as best we can gauge it) is critical for an assessment of the motive, along with a questioning review of what is safely known to have happened during the abduction.

I largely share Nats' assessment of Ewer. I believe it quite possible that Ewer, self assured and convinced his world view was right, was outraged by his 36 year old brother- in- law carrying on with a 22 year old girl and jeopardising a lovely family.

Knowing the weak nature of Gregsten's character and Gregsten's own recognition of what he was doing was wrong (as Ewer evidenced to the police), Ewer would think that Gregsten could finally be brought to his senses. If the objective was to kill why not do it at Dorney Reach, why allow Gregsten to leave the car to get cigs etc and why spin it out for 5/6 hours.

Nats may be right about Alphon being involved in tracking the couple, but this might be difficult for someone who didn't have a vehicle. Given that Gregsten was quite open with his wife about the relationship, I expect the manipulative Ewer got some details of her husband's movements from Janet. After all Ewer prevailed upon Janet to visit Valerie in hospital (she's my friend) , ostensibly perhaps to throw the press and the public off the infidelity track ( and perhaps the police too!) . Doubtless Ewer was interested for his own reasons in what Valerie was saying and in how the police were progressing.

There are elements which to my mind don't sit so readily with the Ewer involvement line. For example, why was the gun dumped on a bus in the Ewer/France backyard even if it provided an opportunity to incriminate Hanratty. Unless as I have suggested before there was an aim to throw the scent away from the Redbridge /Wanstead area.

Atb

Ed

[Natalie Severn]

There are elements which to my mind don't sit so readily with the Ewer involvement line. For example, why was the gun dumped on a bus in the Ewer/France backyard even if it provided an opportunity to incriminate Hanratty. Unless as I have suggested before there was an aim to throw the scent away from the Redbridge /Wanstead area.

Atb

Ed

Thanks Ed for your carefully thought through words.
The 36A bus passed by the flat of Charles France and in my opinion there are other possibilities initially .Here is one of them.
The gun was found on 24th August in North West London [Hanratty sent his telegram that day from Liverpool ].
It may be the case that France had to get rid of the gun and ammunition from his flat quickly due to somebody climbing the stairs of the bus unexpectedly forcing him to have to quickly hide it under the seat and leave it there and get off the bus.
Don't forget more ammunition was found in Central London that week too....

[Dupplin Muir]

I think we'll have to agree to differ about Ewer! I don't see him as a fine,upstanding member of the middle-classes. I imagine he was acquainted with a fair few villains, and wasn't averse to a bit of 'receiving stolen property', so I find it difficult to imagine him taking the moral high-ground with respect to MG's affair.

[cobalt]

Dupplin Muir,

Do not underestimate the human capacity for hypocrisy.

Ewer strikes me as a man who would be much more at ease in the present day UK than he was in the changing scene of the early 1960s. He comes across as the worst type of Daily Mail reader, a man who could rail against immigration yet would be happy, in the modern age, to employ cheap immigrant labour in his shop or his home.
A man who could write letters to the paper about moral turpitude and teenage girls getting pregnant in order to get council housing ( in which he never lived) yet would have an affair with his sister-in-law.
A man who could denounce the intolerable tax burden placed on the small businessman, but roar support for megabuck military intervention overseas, all the while fiddling his own tax return.

Ewer would be in his element today! He was the coming man.

[Natalie Severn]

I sort of agree with both Dupplin and Cobalt here.Ewer was reputed to be interested in very far right organisations and so was Alphon who had literature from such an organisation in his case when he was first hauled in for questioning over the A6 murder on 27th August. It was due to their combined enthusiasm's for such extreme right wing organisations that caused Jean Justice to initially link the two men together . Alphon also claimed to have 'lived among the rich" which to my mind suggests he may have been attending far right meetings where there are many such rich members and so of course may William Ewer, though we have no proof of this as far as I know.
When I suggested William Ewer may have had old fashioned 'British' values about what married men were supposed to be doing and not doing, this did not preclude him having double standards for himself when it came to his own wife presumably,eventually anyway, but what he saw as outright caddishness by Michael Gregsten who already deeply in debt was now abandoning his wife and two young children to live in a Maidenhead flat ----which no doubt would have left Janet at the mercy of her sister and William Ewer for the very means to live.....where was she to find the rent if he left her deeply in debt ? She had no work and two children below school age.So Ewer's outrage or moral rectitude would have been about that scenario and the perhaps unspoken assumption by Janet that the Ewer's would have to help her out -which of course they did as we know.I agree that he was likely to have had all sorts of smalltime dealings with the Soho underworld a a dealer in antiques and paintings including its Art world-then inhabited by the likes of Lucian Freud and his soul mate Francis Bacon etc but in his personal life he appears to have adopted a rather more conservative household until Janet Gregsten and her children came to live with him----at which point ,like Bathsheba -'her beauty overthrew him' as Leonard Cohen wrote in his hit song Hallelujah!

[Spitfire]

It may be the case that France had to get rid of the gun and ammunition from his flat quickly due to somebody climbing the stairs of the bus unexpectedly forcing him to have to quickly hide it under the seat and leave it there and get off the bus.

Why should someone unexpectedly climbing bus stairs force Ewer to get rid of the gun from his flat?

It is a fact of double decker buses that passengers and the conductor have to climb stairs to get to the upper deck. There is nothing unexpected in this and many folk are not constrained by this to hide stuff from their living quarters by reason of it.

[Ed James]

Dupplin Muir,

Do not underestimate the human capacity for hypocrisy.

Cobalt I agree.


A couple of things on Ewer and France and police interviews.

We know from Woffinden that the police ( Acott?) interviewed Ewer on 11 September, but presumably apart from comments which Woffinden reveals about Gregsten's character and his 'shame ' about the continuing relationship, there was not much else of interest in the interviewing notes. Surely under modern policing, the police would have got to close family members more quickly. And today wouldn't they also have interviewed Ewer's wife/ Janet's half sister, Valerie separately.

I can't recall any direct quotes from in the books about France's interview, and presumably the absence of access to interview notes explains the speculation about how and the date that the police associated Ryan with Hanratty. Did France go voluntarily to Scotland Yard? And why the delay if he thought Hanratty was the perpetrator. In any case the police seemed to give France an easy time . Was the information that France gave so good that they did not probe him further? this would be surprising given the connection with the rehearsal club?

[Natalie Severn]

Why should someone unexpectedly climbing bus stairs force Ewer to get rid of the gun from his flat?

It is a fact of double decker buses that passengers and the conductor have to climb stairs to get to the upper deck. There is nothing unexpected in this and many folk are not constrained by this to hide stuff from their living quarters by reason of it.

I think my phrasing was clumsy .What I meant was that if France had had the gun returned to him by the gunman involved in the A6 murder he may have wanted to get rid of it almost immediately and taken both gun and ammunition out of his flat to be disposed of somewhere.However if he had to first take the 36 bus near his flat in Boundary Road by the time it got going to the busier bus stops towards the Harrow Road people might have been getting on ,climbing the stairs causing him to panic and hide the gun and ammunition under the back seat and eventually get off the bus as fast as he could,leaving the ammunition behind.So it could simply been expediency at a given moment .It need not have been done with an intention to frame Hanratty.Of course we have then to balance that with the fact that William Ewer appears to have had every intention of framing Hanratty when he raced round the Finchley Road following Hanratty from first the coffee shop then to the photographer's shop ,then to the Flower shop at which point Ewer telephoned Scotland Yard and the police arrived with Ewer introducing himself to them.The police went into the Flower shop and questioned Mrs Dorothy Morrell who told them the man sent roses to his mother,a Mrs Hanratty of12 Sycamore Grove,Kingsbury on September 1st.A report was sent to Scotland Yard but the murder squad had never heard of Jimmy Ryan ,the name the man gave to Mrs Morrell.
Bill Ewer continued looking for the man with staring eyes one day walking straight into the shop of a business associate -58 year old Mrs Louise Anderson who had an antique shop in Soho.He apparently did not know that Hanratty had been in the shop that very morning.
So very early on ,by August 31st,6 days after the murder and the day of the changed description of the gunman from dark eyes to light blue staring eyes,William Ewer believed James Hanratty to be the A6 killer and had told the police about him.That signifies a straightforward attempt by William Ewer to finger or frame Hanratty for the A6 murder to my mind whereas the gun on the bus is more open to question.

[Natalie Severn]

Ed see my post immediately above-no 809 -cheers N