THEY ALMOST ESCAPED

Auckland Star, Volume LXVIII, Issue 270, 13 November 1937, Page 3 (Supplement)

THEY ALMOST ESCAPED

rE rather stout man wearing a mornine dress suit walked leisurely into the post office at Margate. Pulling a telegraph form from a slot, he wrote on it „ n address in the city, and then this cryptic message. "Extremely muddy water down here."

The clerk who accepted the completed form perused it and jflancrd sharply at the sender as if wondering how anyone could pass such „ reflection upon the amenities of Margate. Anyway it was October and it denied l»"' i" 'he season to be worrying nbout tin- -t; f the sea. Perhaps the meson gv had some other interpretation. [fiilf «n hour later the telegram reached a city ..Hire. It was handed to jlr, William Charles (roek-r, the <ity pnlicitor, wlioxe eyes assumed a shrewd expression ns I hey read the message. Taking «■ folder from a drawer of his. desk, ho read once more a letter it contnined.

The communication was from the office of a Mml'mlc solicitor who was acting cm behalf of a Mr. Sidney Harry ]'\>X. Hliclh I In- letter notified the dentil of Mr*. Fox, from suffoontioti and i*h<■<■!<. after an outbreak of tiro in her room at, the Ffotel Motropole, Margate, and formally entered a claim C n behalf of Mr. Sidney Fox for payment in riwpe.-t of insurance policies covering Hindi an eventuality and aniountina to £3000.

Then from Mi" folder Mr. Crocker took a memorandum. It showed in a few columns of liirnrcs that from May I of that y enr (H'-I'i until the day of his mother's death, Mr.•Sidney Fox had taken out a <lnily insurance policy in respect of her life on no fewer than 107 dnyi out of a possible total of 176.

This in itself might seem a strange proceeding, though insurance companies have to deal with many eccentric customers. The document assumed a deeper significance when one read the comments of one of the officials who ]in<l issued ono of these policies to Mr. Fox.

Tho client, he wrote, hnd been Tery anxious for a correct definition of the accidental death clause. If, for instance, his mother were drowned in a bath, would that bo nn accident within the meaning of the policy? And what was the position if she were poisoned by food nerved in a restaurant?

A grim smile, passed the lips of Mr. Crocker. Tho step of sending that ex-Scotland Yard man to Margate appeared to have been justified. Ho had probably unearthed something interesting.

The "something interesting" was found s few days later, sufficient to warrant Chief Inspector Hambrook of Scotland Yui:l al«o making the journey to Margate. Until this moment the circumstances of the death had appeared straightforward. Sixty-three-year-old Mrs. Fox and her son Sidney had arrived at the Motropolo Hotel nearly three weeks previously, explaining that they had just returned from a visit to the graves of two members of their family who were killed in the war.

Seven evenings later a fire had occurred in the bedroom of Mrs. Fox. Apparently the old lady had been reading an evening paper in front of a lighted gas fire. It was presumed that the paper had caught alight as she was reading, or that she had dozed for a low moments and the paper had fallen to the floor and caught fire.

Son Had Gone To

Grafs For Help

Tho fire had been discovered by her •on, who, finding tho volume of smoke impenetrable, had run downstairs for Jiclp. Fellow-guests had come to his •»«i«tanec. One had crawled in on his liftnds and knees and, locating the old l'"ly, had carried her out. Others had ■damped out the flainee around the chair '» which she had been sitting. Another liiul tinned out the gas fire. Artificial respiration was tried, but ,l( » "park of life appeared. Mrs. Fox had obviously died from suffocation. An Inquest had been held the following day, and the coroner, returning a verdict of accidental death, had ex (tressed his aynipathy with tho distressed son.

Five tiny* inter Mrs. Fox had been Wlwl in the little Norfolk village of ••rent l'Vimsluini. wliere «hc had spent most of he,- married life. It was 10 «»y» al'tor the funeral that Chief wspector Ha ml.rook went to Margate, currying the detail* of those peculiar "imirnneo transactions. The local chief l '"ii«tnl)|e lukl already had misgivings ,llH »"t the dentil of .\'lrs. Vox. He had received a visit from a local woman who mill read t ], ( , |~.j„„.t „f t |, p inquest. This woman '.mil previously let rooms til Mrs, Fox ,mh| her son and she could not understand whv, although they had b «en unable to pay her bill, they had »«curod accommodation at an hotel like l "« Metrupole. She knew Mr. Fox could not bo telling the truth when he spoke 01 all the money he had lost in the fire. There was another tiling the manager of thi Metropolc could not understand. « was trne JiU account had not been paid, but there was something more din'luieting. His wife had tried to comfort *<« while efforts were being made to '"vivo hie mother.

She had been stroking his thick bushy "air in her effort* to allay his distress. jj°nie time later she smelt smoke upon »w hand*. She wondered how his hair could have become «o full of smoke if ■J", statement wa« true that he had not "•«» in the room.

CLUES THAT Betrayed MURDERERS

NO. I.

The significance of the two statements was sufficient for the chief constable. At his request the manager of the hotel took out a warrant charging Fox with obtaining food and accommodation on take pretences, an offence thev now knew he had committed elsewhere. At least, thought the chief constable, he would be able to put bis hands upon Mr. Fox if there were foundation for the*e suspicions. So an officer went to Norwich where Fox had been pressing for payment of his insurance claim*, and brought him back'to Margate. Fox was already in custody when Hambrook arrived at the seaside resort. After hearing the chief constable's story tho Ytwd man began his investigation. He soon came up against his first big obstacle. Tho room at the hotel had been cleaned out and refurnished. All the debris from the fire had been sent away to tho Corporation rubbieh heap. It was essential to the investigation that the detective should see the charred newspaper* which, according to the other guests, had surrounded the chair in which the old lady had died. Among them hrnd been a French newspaper, though what interest this eould have been to a woman wlio had never been able to apeak a -word of any foreign language the detective could not understand.

It* presence would not appear so remarkable if someone had collected a number of papers for the purpose of deliberately setting fire to them.

The Tefuse was traced to a dump which was to form the foundation of a new promenade road between Margate and Westgate. Tons of other rubbish h«d already been deposited there, and there wae no indication in what spot the debri* from Mrs. Fox's room lay buried.

Hambrook obtained permission to use the services of a email army of council workmen. For days they toiled, sifting the refuse. Finally the tedious tank reached a dramatic climax.

First some of the dead woman's garments were unearthed. A few more hours' search in the same «pot brought the newspapers to light. Everything they recovered the detectives replaced in Mns. Fox's room until it began once more to resemble the scene on the night of the fatal fire. The armchair in which Mrs. Fox had died was placed in it« former position. Then the detectives began experiments. These tests proved definitely that the fire must have originated from underneath the armchair. It wm the floor boards beneath the chair which were scorched, and not those in the apace between the chair and the fireplace, a space which would have been the centre of the bla«e had it been due to any accidental cause.

Hambrook conducted another experiment. He lit a fire in a room with similar dimensions to Mrs. Fox's room. With other officers he stood in the room breathing in the emoke in the manner of a person asV.ep. Then, going outside, hi tntci to clear his throat, but for some time hr found some difficulty, so coated were his breathing organs with soot from the fire. Now, if Mrs. Fox had been breathing at the time of the fire in her room, her air passages must clearly show similar effects. Only a post-mortem examination could determine this poiuc. and Hambrook decided to apply for an exhumation of the body. This was granted, and early one November morning the detective and Sir Bernard Spilsbury, the Home Office pathologist, travelled to Great Fransham. . The coffin was lifted f>o;n its resting place and carried.to vhe village schoolroom. The children had been givin a special half-holiday. The process of the post-mortem was only in its preliminary stages when Hambrook received from the pathologist definite confirmation of his tht.vy. Mrs. Fox had not breathed during the fire. Her throat and lun?s wnre free from soot or any other effect or smoke. Nor could the presence of ca-bon aunoxide be detected in the blood. How had she met her death?

There was a bruise on the larynx and another on the tongue, suggesting that B l, e had died from strangulation "What became of the old lady s false teeth?" asked Sir Bernard. Here was a point everyone had overlooked. No teeth had been found, although, as Sir Bernard then pointed out, Mrs Fox must have bad some in her head at the time, for as «he died ehe had bitten her tongue. Those teeth had to be found. Hambrook hastened back to Margate. There, after many inquiries, he >ound a maid who said she had found the teeth in a I basin while clearing up after the fire. She had put them away In a ctu.lrard ami was able to produce them slra.ght away.

The girl was positive th".D the teeth had been in the basin immediately after the fire.

'J his clinched JTambrook's case. How, he asked himself, could a woman walk across the room and put the teeth in the basin when it was proved that she had been wearing them at the moment of deoth?

Fox bad already provided an alibi for the bruises. A few davs before the fire lie had told the hotel staff of a eham light he had had with his mother. "We often have a sham fight when she is ht, he had told them, thinking, no doubt, that this would counter any suspicions the bruises might create if they were found after her death.

Hjs trial produced a great medical r.. in wl,ich some ° f th<? m <*<t skilled medical men in the country gave their interpretation of those bruises. For a while nr. one could tell which way the case would go. Then came a vital passage—a few questions and answers which were to convince the jury of the guilt of the man in the dock.

.Shortly after he had entered the witness box a thunderstorm broke over vhe Court. The questions of the AttorneyGeneral and the answers of Fox were punctuated by peals of thunder and flashes of lightning.

Fox did not lose his head. Calmly he told the story leading up to the outbreak of the fire in Mrs. Fox's room.

Then came some deadly questions from the Attorney-General.

"Did you realise," he asked Fox, "when you opened the communicating door, that the atmosphere of the room was such as would probably suffocate anybody inside?"

"Tf I had stayed in three or four minutes I should have been suffocated," Fox replied.

"So that you must have been greatly apprehensive for your mother!" was the next question. "I was," was the reply. "Fox, you closed the door?"

"It is quite possible I did."

"Can you explain to me why it was that you the door instead of flinging it wide open?" was the swift question the Attorney-General fired.

For a second Fox bit his lip. In that moment he must have realised the trap into which he had fallen.

"My explanation for that now," he said slowly, "is that the smoke should not spread into the hotel."

No words uttered by a man on trial for his life could have acknowledged guilt more adequately than that reply of Sidney Fox.