Serjeant Shee
Now, there is a letter to which I will call your attention, of the 19th November, 1855, from Palmer to Pratt—“Dear Sir,—You will place the £50 I have just paid you, and the £450 you will receive from Mr. Herring, together £500, and the £200 you received on Saturday,” that is, the £200 that Fisher paid to Pratt at the express request of Cook “towards payment of my mother’s acceptance for £2000, due 25th October, making paid to this day the sum of £1300.” Can you doubt when you take all that together—the dining together on the Friday—Cook writing that letter to Fisher, saying it was of the greatest importance to him as well as to Palmer that the £200 should be paid in order to pacify Pratt, can you doubt that on that day Cook was a most convenient friend to Palmer, and that he could not by any possibility do without him. But it does not end there. Cook died on the Wednesday morning early, the 21st; if we want to know what effect that death had on Palmer, and what interest he had in it, Palmer’s mouth being sealed, we must get it from Pratt. Nobody else that we know knows anything about it; Cook is gone. On the 22nd November, the day after the death—and I am sure you will make some allowance for a day having elapsed after the death of Cook before he wrote—Palmer writes thus to Pratt—“Ever since I saw you I have been fully engaged with Cook and not able to leave him.” Now, unless he murdered him, that is the truest sentence that ever was expressed. He watched the bedside of his friend; he was with him night and day; he attended him as a brother; he called his friends around him; he did all that the most affectionate solicitude could do for a friend that was ill, unless he was plotting his death—“And I am sorry to say after all he died this day, so that you had better write to Saunders; but mind, I must have ‘Polestar’ if it can be so arranged; and should any one call upon you to know what moneys Cook ever had from you do not answer the question.” Then he says, “I sat up two full nights with Cook.” That he sat up the whole of the night may not be true, but he was ready to be called if Cook should be ill; and Elizabeth Mills says after the first serious paroxysm, when she went to bed, she left Palmer in the arm-chair, sleeping by the man whom they say he intended to murder. No! murderers do not sleep by their victims in that way. What is the answer? I read it to you in order that you may see what ruin Cook’s death brought upon Palmer. The answer of Pratt is—and you will see how much it increased the difficulties of Palmer—“I have your note, and am greatly disappointed at the non-receipt of the money as promised, and at the vague assurance as to any money. I can understand that your being detained by the illness of your friend has been the cause of your not sending up the amount.” Attend to this paragraph—“The death of Mr. Cook will now compel you to look about as to the payment of the bill for £500, due the 2nd of December. I have written Saunders informing him of my claim, and requesting to know by return what claim he had for keep and training”; so that the very first effect of Cook’s death was, in Pratt’s opinion, who knew all about it, to saddle Palmer alone with the sum of £500. He says, “The death of Cook will now compel you to look about as to the payment of the bill for £500 on the 2nd of December.” We will investigate the transaction out of which that bill arose, and you will see, I venture to say, that I can satisfy you conclusively that the transaction out of which that bill arose was a transaction for Cook’s accommodation, for which Palmer had lent his name to accommodate Cook, and for which upon Cook’s death Palmer became primarily and alone responsible. It will be for you to judge, if I prove that to you, whether it suited Palmer at that moment to stand before the holder of that £500 bill—some client of Pratt’s—as the only man liable upon it, and whether there was the same chance, supposing it had been for his own accommodation, of putting it on, as they call it, after Cook’s death, as there might have been before. But let me be fair to the prosecution, and state to you now the view that the Attorney-General takes of that £500 transaction. As I told you, I mean to meet his case foot to foot, and to show, and I hope to show him, that there is nothing in it; that if he, as the law officer of the Crown, had had the option of taking up this case or not, he would not have taken it up; that the Crown never would have appeared upon it, but because the universal feeling of the country was such as to render it impossible that the case should not be tried after the verdict of wilful murder obtained on Dr. Taylor’s evidence; and because the Crown, having seen the absolute necessity of its being tried, felt that it would abandon the duty of protecting every one of the Queen’s subjects if it did not take care that a man with so much prejudice against him, that man leading the life that Palmer led, and disgraced by forgeries to a large amount, as it is said, and a gambler by profession, should not have a fair trial. There was no other way of securing a fair trial for this man, as the Attorney-General at once saw—there was no possibility of his being saved but by giving the counsel who defended him all the information that my friend had himself. We will see what his view is. My learned friend states it upon his instruction in this way. He is bound, as I told you in the beginning, in prosecuting this case to prosecute it strenuously; he is bound to put the facts together according to his instructions in such a way that, if they will and ought to establish guilt, it is brought home. Prosecutions must be conducted in that way, or the guilty would escape in nine cases out of ten. And therefore my friend, upon the view of the evidence—a comparatively superficial one—thinks that this is the theory upon which it appears probable that Palmer plotted the death of Mr. Cook. I will read to you from my friend’s speech, with reference to the £500 bill transaction; and, as I understand it, it is the greatest mistake that was ever committed, and would not stand for a moment but for the popular prejudice against Palmer. I think I can satisfy you that is so—“Pratt still declining to advance the money”—that is the £1000 which Palmer wanted him to advance—“Pratt proposed an assignment by Cook of two racehorses, one called ‘Polestar,’ which won the Shrewsbury race, and another called ‘Syrius.’ That assignment was afterwards executed by Mr. Cook in favour of Pratt, and Cook was entitled to the money raised on that security, which realised £375 in cash and a wine warrant.” They twist it in this way, that Palmer, having forged the endorsement of Cook, and being afraid of detection, put Mr. Cook out of the way. That is the view they take of that case. I think I can satisfy you it is impossible that that can be the correct view. It cannot, by any possibility, as it seems to me. It is for you to judge. We know exactly what took place; we had it from Pratt yesterday. What took place was this. Palmer applied for the loan of £1000; Pratt said, “I can’t let you have it.” Palmer said, “Will you discount a bill for £500?” Pratt said, “Not without security.” Palmer said, “What security will you take; it is for the accommodation of Mr. Cook? I have undertaken to get the enclosed bill cashed for Mr. Cook; you had a £200 bill of his.” He reminds him that he had been paid a £200 bill, and he says, “He is a very good and responsible man; will you do it, and I will put my name to the bill?” So that it was represented to Pratt as a transaction for the accommodation of Cook; and Pratt’s answer is, “If Mr. Cook chooses to give me his security I have no objection, but he must execute a bill of sale of his two racehorses, ‘Polestar’ and ‘Syrius,’ and he must execute a power of attorney, and signature to it must be attested by some solicitor in the country, so that I may be quite sure that it is really a valid security; and upon those terms, if you will get all that done, and Mr. Cook will submit to all that, I will give him £375 in money, £65 wine warrant, charging him £10 for expenses, and £50 for discount”—making up the sum of £500; that is what Pratt is willing to do. There is no doubt at all, you know, that Cook attached the highest value to “Polestar”; he was not going to execute a bill of sale with a power of attorney to enable the mortgagee or assignee to enforce it at once; he was not going to do that, and not get any money for doing it; he knew the value of “Polestar” and “Syrius”; “Polestar” was probably backed for the engagements on which he won the money at Shrewsbury. My friend says he never received that £375; it is in the last degree improbable that he never received that money; I put it to you as men of sense that he must have received it; do you think that he remained after executing the bill of sale on the 6th of September the whole time from that day to his death without writing to Pratt—“Why, you have the bill of sale of my two horses, and I have not got any money upon them”? Is it credible, can you believe Cook, who was as much in want of money as Palmer; do you think he would throw away his property in that way, and let Pratt obtain from him a bill of sale and get no money upon it? It is incredible; the only pretence for setting it up is this, it is a perfectly fatal one that will not stand before sensible men for a minute. Along with the cheque for £375 he sent £315 to Palmer for his own purposes; but my friend says Palmer, having got this cheque for £375 payable to order, fraudulently appropriated it to himself; forged the name of Cook upon the back of it, and kept Cook in ignorance of the transaction. Is it credible, that during three whole months Cook, who knew that he had executed a bill of sale of his two racehorses, and I will show you was in want of money, should have allowed it to remain so? Is it not much more probable that the signature of Cook was put on there with his full knowledge? It is not suggested that there was any attempt at imitating his handwriting. Is it not more probable that Cook, who wanted the ready money, and who would probably be put to inconvenience if he did not get the ready money, but only the means of getting it two days later—that Palmer should let him have the £315 cash which was sent up, and Palmer take the cheque? I will show you there is reason for believing that to be the case; I will put it to you, in the first place, whether it is probable he would be silent for three months. Palmer writes, “I will thank you to let me have the £315 by return of post if possible; if not, send it to me by Monday night’s post to the post office, Doncaster. I now return you Mr. Cook’s paper, and he wants the money on Saturday if he can have it; I have not promised it for Saturday, so please to enclose it with mine in cash in a registered letter, and he must pay for its being registered.” So that you see Palmer wanted it to be sent like his own, and Cook wanted it to be sent in cash. “Do not let it be later than Monday night’s post.” Pratt writes acknowledging the receipt of the document, saying he will send him his money to Doncaster, and endeavour to let Cook have his money at the same time. On the 10th of September Palmer writes to Pratt that he must send him for Mr. Cook £385 instead of £375 and the wine warrant, so that he can hand it to him with the £385. Accordingly, here is an intimation that Cook, who wanted the money on the very day, was inconvenienced by only getting a cheque on London which he could not immediately change, and therefore Palmer gave him the money and took the cheque. It is remarkable, when we look at the banking account of Palmer at Rugeley, the £375 is paid in by somebody to Palmer’s account, but the £315 is not paid into Palmer’s account at all; that is the only sum paid in on that day, so that I put it to you upon these facts, Pratt saying in a letter which accompanies the money, “I am obliged to send a cheque for Mr. Cook, for I have not received the money, which I shall do no doubt to-morrow”; so that not being able to send cash to the full amount he is obliged to do that which did not suit Cook; he sent him a cheque which he could not cash on the day he got it; he is obliged to send it to London unless he could find some friend down there, and that delays him for a whole day. I submit to you as the true version of the transaction that the bill was accepted for Cook’s accommodation; Cook gave as security for it the two horses, “Polestar” and “Syrius”; Cook never complained to Pratt during the rest of his life that he had not received the money upon it. It appears in the correspondence that Cook wanted the ready money, and that he wanted it on Saturday, and it would be probably inconvenient if he had got it a bit later than Monday; though Palmer would not promise to get it sooner than Tuesday. What says Palmer in his letter, which is not written for the purpose of this case, but written at the date of this transaction, that he, Palmer, would let Cook have the cash that was sent, and he himself take the cheque with Cook’s authority, and put Cook’s name on the back of it; and how else can you account for the silence of Cook, for the fact that the £375 is paid into the account of Palmer at Rugeley, and no trace of the other large sum of £315? That is well worthy your consideration. You cannot account by any reasonable mode for the fact that the security given for that £500 was Cook’s horses, and Cook remaining quiet about it for three months after he had executed a regular bill of sale, except the supposition that it was for Cook’s accommodation, and Cook got the best part of the money; and, if so, Palmer’s name being on the bill, what is the effect of Cook’s death? Gentlemen, what Pratt, who knew all about it, says is, “The death of Cook makes you liable for that sum of £500 due on the 2nd December.” I submit to you, on the second ground of motive, which my learned friend suggested, the case has altogether failed, and that it is perfectly clear that at the date of Cook’s death Pratt was of opinion that the death of Cook threw a further liability on Palmer of £500; he tells him so in that letter. How could it be his interest to kill him? We already find the difficulties which Cook’s death brings upon Palmer; the bill of £500, the danger of the loss of “Polestar,” which he wanted very much to have, and which Pratt would, of course, unless Palmer paid the £500, send to the hammer, and realise so shortly; we find that inquiries were at once apprehended on the part of Cook’s friends as to the money Pratt had paid to Palmer out of those two bill transactions, and the value which Mr. Cook had received for any endorsement which he had given.
Serjeant Shee
Just see another transaction of that date; it is not quite so clear, as it strikes me, but yet it makes it to my mind exceedingly improbable that Palmer should have desired the death of Cook. Exceedingly improbable! Mr. Wetherby told us to-day that though frequently stakes won at a race were sent up by the clerk of the course to the winner’s bankers within a week, it was not always so, and it would not be a matter of complaint if it was not. On the 20th of November, the day before Cook dies, and on which he was perfectly comfortable and happy, enjoying the society of his friend Mr. Jones, with whom he was on terms of the greatest intimacy, and to whom he could confide any troubles that he had, and who appears to be a gentleman in every way respectable and intelligent—on that day Cook was well, and Mr. Jones was with him, and there is no doubt that on that day, according to the evidence of Mr. Wetherby, he did sign and give this cheque for £350. If Palmer killed him that night, and by any chance the £350 should not have been sent up by Mr. Frail, so as to be there on the next morning, he (Mr. Wetherby) would not pay that cheque, and would never pay it after notice of Cook’s death, though the money should come up. He never did pay it. The end of that transaction was this, that Mr. Frail did not send it up, but made a claim upon Cook in respect of it. Cook’s executors disputed that, and Cook’s executors finally recovered the money, but they did not send it up to Mr. Wetherby. I do not put it as strong as the other case, because Palmer might think that the money would be there; but he also might think that it would not be there. It is not at all likely that, having got the cheque for £350 from Cook, he would run the risk of losing that money by destroying him in the night, Cook’s friends being there, and sure to institute an immediate inquiry into his affairs. Is that probable? I submit to you it is not. It is not likely that Palmer could have got a cheque for £350, or Cook should have given it to him, which should not be payable until the next day, when there might be no funds to meet it; and with that uncertainty, is it likely that Palmer should destroy Cook. That, therefore, is in the last degree improbable. It does not end there—what they have said on the other side is, you know, that he got this cheque fraudulently—he got possession of this money, and then, lest Cook should detect it, he destroyed him. It is not at all probable that that would answer his purpose. The moment the breath was out of Cook’s body his friends would surround the corpse. He might be perfectly certain that Mr. Jones would go to Mr. Stevens, that Stevens and Bradford, his brother-in-law, would be down, and that a post-mortem examination would take place, and instead of settling with Pratt as to this £500 bill and the £350 cheque, he would have to settle with hard men of business, men who cared nothing for him, looked upon him as a blackleg, and would care neither for his feeling, his interest, nor anything, but would let him go to ruin which way he liked, not stirring a finger to save him. Do you think that was probable? I submit to you not. It does not end there. We know from Herring that at that very time Herring held one bill for £500 on which Cook’s name was.
The Attorney-General—I do not think there is any proof of that.
Mr. Serjeant Shee—Whether it be so or not as to the £500, he had three £200 bills, one of which, I think, was drawn by Cook and accepted by Palmer, and the other two drawn by Palmer and accepted by Cook, or the other way.
The Attorney-General—You are quite right as to the £500.
Serjeant Shee
Mr. Serjeant Shee—And another bill of £500, which my friend stated and gave proof was not his mother’s signature. So that there was a bill for £500 not in her handwriting to which Cook was a party, for all of which Cook either in whole or in part, unless he rushed upon his own ruin, must provide; in respect of which, for the accommodation of Palmer or not, Palmer could go to Cook and say, “Now, Cook, it is true enough all these bills are for my accommodation, but what is the use of your making a fuss about that? If I cannot pay, you must, or your stud will be sold up; had you not better give your name to some more bills and make it easy?” If he put Cook to death that was gone. Again, in addition to the £500 bill, for which the bill of sale on “Syrius” and “Polestar” was given, the bill for £500 held by Herring was a forgery, according to their case, which there would be no excuse for not meeting; a £500 bill in the hands of a man who wants the money is not so easily put on; that £500 bill would very soon find its way to his mother. It would not have suited Palmer that his mother should know—his mother was a woman of large fortune, a respectable person I am told—she disliked his gambling propensities though she liked her son; neither did the excellent and most honourable man his brother, before me, who stands by him now, but who was estranged from him simply because he disapproved of his gambling, neither would he have given to him any countenance. If Palmer was pressed to pay that £500, and Cook was dead, there was nothing to save him from the exposure. Nothing! If you doubt what I say is the truth, look through the whole of the case—find me in any portion of this most voluminous evidence the slightest trace that there was a man in the world who would lend his name to Palmer to enable him to get money. Is not the fact that he forged, if he did forge, the name of his mother conclusive that he had no other resource? Is there the least trace of evidence that he had any other resource than the good nature, the easiness, perhaps the folly, of Cook, who could have renewed these bills for him—the three £200 bills and the £500—and put them on as they say? And was it not quite certain that if Cook, the acceptor of them, dropped, the claim would come upon Cook’s executors, and then the executors would ascertain all about it and sell him up? When you come to think of it, is it credible that the man under those circumstances should desire to bring not merely the creditors and executors of Cook—who might be supposed, though Mr. Stevens is not one of that class, to have some pity for Cook’s friend—but men of business, down upon him, who have no right to have any pity? A man dies, his affairs are put into the hands of solicitors; they have a plain duty to perform, they cannot be compassionate, they must be just; they must see the rights of their clients the executors established in due course of law, and compromise and arrangement with them is wholly out of the question. Can you find in any part of this case a single living person who was willing to have done for Palmer what Cook had been doing for him for two or three years? Does it appear that there was one? Does it appear that Cook was a close-fisted fellow, and did not care to do Palmer a turn? When Palmer needed the £200, which the harpy wanted from him, Cook at once wrote and said it is a matter of great importance to him as well as Palmer that this £200 should be paid; and he even risked the displeasure of Fisher in doing it. Then, again, Cook was in his senses perfectly on the Tuesday. He cannot have been very rich at that time. He gave him the cheque for £350. How is it possible to conceive that under those circumstances Palmer should have an interest in the death of Cook, and yet what is the theory of the Crown? That Palmer was convinced that he could settle his affairs as to Cook better with Mr. Stevens than he could with Cook himself—settle these word-of-honour transactions; these things, half of which would not bear inquiry in any way as reasonable business transactions, with a shrewd and probably a penurious man—deliberately thought that it would answer his purpose better to come in contact with his executor, Mr. Stevens, whom Mr. Jones might rush up to town and bring down with him. I submit to you with confidence, though what I say may be inconsistent with the views generally entertained by the public—the public, however, have never had an opportunity of looking at all these letters—but it seems to me as clear as anything can be, that it was the manifest interest of Palmer that Cook should live. But, in addition to its being his interest that he should live, was it safe for him that he should die? Palmer was a man who added to a shrewd knowledge of the world a knowledge of his profession, and, among other things, a knowledge of chemistry. Palmer knew perfectly well, and he had studied his profession sufficiently when he was a young man to know perfectly well, that, if strychnia was administered, it would in all probability throw the victim into horrible convulsions in a very short time, and in a way so striking as to be the talk of a small neighbourhood like Rugeley for a month or two, which would be time enough to alarm everybody, and to provoke inquiries into the circumstances of the death, which must certainly end, or in all probability end, if he was guilty, in his conviction. If that was so, was he so circumstanced at that time as to make it safe for him to run the risk of such suspicions? His brother, Walter Palmer, had died in the month of August, and his only hope, unless his mother forgave him or recognised those acceptances, his only hope of extrication from his difficulties was the getting the amount due by the Prince of Wales Insurance Company to him as the assignee of the policy on Walter Palmer’s life; that was his only chance. He had a chance that way, and it is plain that it was so good a chance, as I will show you presently, that he refused an offer of return of premium from the company; it does not appear what the amount was—and Pratt, who was his attorney, believed the chance to be so good that he had actually got the discounts of these large sums of money upon it, and had resolved, under the directions of Palmer, to put it in suit. It was really the only unpledged property he had, and how was he situated respecting it? It is plain from the letters which were put in yesterday, and it is further plain from a piece of evidence to which you will, I am sure, find it worth your while to pay great attention. We had Mr. Deane called yesterday, who is the attorney to the Prince of Wales insurance office; and for some time—though it had ceased just at that time—but for some time previously to this month of November, the insurance company, which, I believe, is not a very old insurance company, were annoyed at being called upon to pay so large a sum, and they determined to do all they could to resist it. They accordingly sent down Inspector Field to Stafford and his man Simpson to make inquiries, which he could not do without talking and insinuating suspicions and raising a cloud of doubt and conjecture about Palmer, and this had been going on for some considerable time. Now, observe the evidence of Deane, and you will see if it is not so. He says, “The name of my firm is Chubb, Deane & Chubb. I had been to Rugeley some time previously to the inquest. I know Field, the detective officer; we were solicitors to the Prince of Wales insurance office; it was in our employment that Field went to Rugeley; he was at Rugeley only a part of one day; he was at Stafford for three or four days altogether; he did not see the prisoner Palmer; this visit had been preceded by that of another officer named Simpson. Simpson went from Stafford to Rugeley with myself and Field; he told me he had seen Palmer; I think he went into Staffordshire in the first week in October.” Then my learned friend asked him what they went down for; he said that they went down to make inquiries as to the habits of life of Mr. Walter Palmer, of whose death the Prince of Wales insurance office had shortly before received notice; so that you see just before the death of Cook Palmer knew himself to be an object of suspicion, but he acted as if he thought it was the most unfounded and unwarrantable suspicion, putting the policy of insurance into the hands of an attorney to enforce payment of it, and the office meeting the claim by insinuations and inquiries which were of a nature to destroy his character and to bring around his head the suspicion of another murder.
Serjeant Shee