Charles Peace, or The Adventures of a Notorious Burglar

by Anonymous

The unfortunate victim was an aged woman, seventy-two years of age, who acted as confidential housekeeper to Mr. and Mrs. Small, farmers of that place.

On the morning in question the house was left in charge of the poor old lady whilst her master and mistress went to attend divine service in the parish church of Chingford. On their return the deceased, whose name was Mary White, was found weltering in her blood. A man named Geydon was suspected. A reward of £200 was offered by Government for his apprehension; but from that day up to the present period no clue to the commission of the murder has ever been discovered.

The celebrated Waterloo-bridge mystery, which caused such a stir in the metropolis, cannot be readily forgotten. On the 9th of October, 1857, a carpet bag was found upon one of the stone ledges of an abutment of Waterloo-bridge. It contained portions of the mutilated remains of a person, evidently murdered and deposited thereon, together with a portion of wearing apparel saturated with gore.

The toll-keeper at the bridge said he remembered seeing a person, dressed as a woman, come up from the Strand side on the previous night, about half-past eleven. She had a carpet bag with her—​to the best of his belief the bag in question was the one she had, as he particularly noticed a large flower in the centre of the pattern. The remains were examined, the clothes were hung up in Bow-street station, where thousands of persons inspected them; but, notwithstanding, this, like the other crimes, has remained a mystery.

On the morning of the 9th of April, 1863, a very atrocious and mysterious murder was discovered in a house of evil repute, No. 4, George-street, Bloomsbury, St. Giles’s, one of the very worst parts of the metropolis.

The unfortunate girl in this instance was a shirtmaker, named Emma Jackson, who resided usually with her father, mother, and brother, at No. 10, Berwick-street.

The unhappy girl used to maintain herself as long as she could solely by her needle; but when this failed her, through shortness of work, she occasionally stayed out at night to eke out a livelihood by prostitution.

The inquest, which was holden at the “Oporto Stores,” Broad-street, Bloomsbury, before Dr. Lankester, coroner, showed that the deceased went as early as seven in the morning, on the day in question, to the brothel, at No. 4, George-street, with a man, and on asking for a bedroom, were at once shown to one by the young servant in charge, which they then took possession of.

As she did not come down in the course of the day, the parties belonging to the house went upstairs, and on going to her room were horrified to find her lying across the bed with her throat cut.

Dr. Weekes was the first witness called. He stated that he had made an examination of the body of the deceased, and in addition to finding her throat cut discovered that both her arms and legs were smeared with blood. There were also stains of blood on both thighs. On the left buttock was a mark of the grasp of two fingers. In the neck there were four punctured wounds, two in the front and two behind. There was a considerable effusion of blood on the membrane of the vertebrae, particularly to the right of the spine. There was a very clean cut three-quarters of an inch long. He thought deceased must have been asleep when the first cut was inflicted. The cause of death, he believed, was partly owing to suffocation, and partly owing to loss of blood, as blood had been diffused in considerable quantities both from wounds in the internal jugular, and the veins in part of the trachea. After the second wound he believed that the deceased was dragged into the position in which she was found. In answer to a question by a juror he said he thought the deceased had no power to make any noise after the first wound. In answer to the coroner he said he believed that when he first saw the deceased she had been dead from nine to twelve hours. His belief was that the wounds had been inflicted with a common pocket-knife. In his belief he was decidedly of opinion that the deceased did not receive the wounds in the position in which she was found, but that she was placed in that position by her murderer. She could have had no power of calling out after the wind-pipe had been separated.