CHAPTER XXI
THE LAMBETH POISON MYSTERIES
Towards the close of the year 1891 and the early part of 1892, public interest was excited by the mysterious deaths of several young women of the "unfortunate" class residing in the neighbourhood of Lambeth. The first case was that of a girl named Matilda Clover, who lived in Lambeth Road. On the night of October 20, 1891, she spent the evening at a music-hall in company with a man, who returned with her to her lodgings about nine o'clock. Shortly afterwards she was seen to go out alone, and she purchased some bottled beer, which she carried to her rooms. After a little time the man left the house.
At three o'clock in the morning the inmates of the house were aroused by the screams of a woman, and on the landlady entering Matilda Clover's room, she found the unfortunate girl lying across the bed in the greatest agony. Medical aid was sent for, and the assistant of a neighbouring doctor saw the girl, and judged she was suffering from the effects of drink. He prescribed a sedative mixture, but the girl got worse, and, after a further convulsion, died on the following morning. The medical man whose assistant had seen her the previous night, gave a certificate that death was due to delirium tremens and syncope, and Matilda Clover was buried at Tooting.
A few weeks afterwards a woman called Ellen Donworth, who resided in Duke Street, Westminster Bridge Road, is stated to have received a letter, in consequence of which she went out between six and seven in the evening. About eight o'clock she was found in Waterloo Road in great agony, and died while she was being conveyed to St. Thomas's Hospital. Before her death she made a statement, that a man with a dark beard and wearing a high hat had given her "two drops of white stuff" to drink. In this case a post-mortem examination was made and on analysis both strychnine and morphine were found in the stomach, proving that the woman had been poisoned.
These cases had almost been forgotten, when, some six months afterwards, attention was again aroused by the mysterious deaths of two girls named Alice Marsh and Emma Shrivell, who lodged in Stamford Street. On the evening of April 11, 1892, a man, who one of the girls in her dying testimony called "Fred," and who she described as a doctor, called to see them, and together they partook of tea. The man stayed till 2 a.m., and during the evening gave them both "three long pills."
Half an hour after the man left the house, both girls were found in a dying condition. While they were being removed to the hospital Alice Marsh died in the cab, and Emma Shrivell lived for only six hours afterwards. The result of an analysis of the stomach and organs revealed the fact that death in each case had been caused by strychnine.
There was absolutely no evidence beyond the vague description of the man for the police to work upon, and this case, like the others, with which at first it was not connected, seemed likely to remain among the unsolved mysteries; when by the following curious chain of circumstances, the perpetrator of these cold-blooded crimes was at last brought to justice.
Some time after the deaths of the two girls Marsh and Shrivell, a Dr. Harper, of Barnstaple, received a letter, in which the writer stated, that he had indisputable evidence that the doctor's son, who had recently qualified as a medical practitioner in London, had poisoned two girls—Marsh and Shrivell—and that he, the writer, required £1,500 to suppress it. Dr. Harper placed this letter in the hands of the police, with the result, that on June 3, 1892, a man named Thomas Neill, or Neill Cream, was arrested on the charge of sending a threatening letter. He was brought up at Bow Street on this charge for several days, when it transpired that in the preceding November a well-known London physician had also received a letter, in which the writer declared that he had evidence to show that the physician had poisoned a Miss Clover with strychnine, which evidence he could purchase for £2,500, and so save himself from ruin.
Neill Cream was remanded, and in the meanwhile the body of Matilda Clover was exhumed, and the contents of the stomach sent to Dr. Stevenson, one of the Government analysts, for examination. He discovered the presence of strychnine, and came to the conclusion that some one had administered a fatal dose to her.