In 1838, Eliza Grimwood was murdered in a house of ill-fame at number 12 Wellington Terrace, Waterloo Road. Her throat was cut. Dickens wrote up the story in Three Detective Anecdotes as the tale of The Countess. Inspector Field of Dickens’s article On Duty with Inspector Field investigated, and the case demonstrates the painstaking search …
G is also for Greenacre
G is also for Greenacre: at the end of 1850, Dickens was sitting for his portrait with the artist William Boxhall. The picture was never finished. WP Frith said that Dickens told him: Well I sat a great deal, and the picture seemed to me to get worse – sometimes it was like Ben Caunt …
H is for Hardman
H is for Hardman From the Lancaster Guardian, Saturday 5th September 1857: The sentence of death passed upon Edward Hardman at the last Lancaster Assizes, for the wilful murder of his wife, by the administration of poison, was carried into effect at on Saturday… Edward Hardman was hanged at Lancaster gaol two weeks before Dickens …
H is also for Holiest
H is also for Holiest I couldn’t resist this one. If Edward Hardman lived up to his name, then consider the case of the Reverend Mr Holiest, Perpetual Curate of Frimley Grove. Holy, he might have been, but that did not stop his murderers for the poor reverend was murdered on the 27th September, 1850 …
I is for Isaac
The story of the murder of Isaac Jermy and his son, the shooting of his wife and a servant, by James Rush is worthy of Dickens and Wilkie Collins. It’s a story of disguise, forged deeds, secret rooms, a hidden closet, and even a shallow well under the floorboards where the forged papers were found. …
J is for Jarley.
Mrs Jarley is the touring waxworks proprietor in The Old Curiosity Shop. Her chamber of horrors include ‘the woman who poisoned fourteen families with pickled walnuts’ and ‘Jasper Packlemerton of atrocious memory, who courted and married fourteen wives and destroyed them all by tickling the soles of their feet.’ Dickens probably had Madame Tussaud in …
K is for Kent
Constance Kent was the half-sister of Francis Saville Kent aged four whose body was found in a disused privy at his home, Road Hill House, in Wiltshire in 1860. The child’s throat was cut. Inspector Whicher of Scotland Yard was sent for to investigate. His enquiries led to the arrest of sixteen year old Constance …
