‘Perfect husband’ was multiple murderer

Press, 14 November 1984, Page 14

‘Perfect husband’ was multiple murderer

He was the lonely spinster’s dream. But to contemporary journalists, he was “supercad,” the multiple bigamist, the man who lived off women. George Joseph Smith seduced them, relieved them of their savings if they had any - and, on three occasions, killed them. The story of Smith — the “Brides in the Bath” murderer — is told in a “Lady killers” episode called “My Perfect Husband,” on Two at 10 o’clock tonight At the Old Bailey in June, 1915, Smith stood trial for the murder of one woman, Bessie Mundy, a shy woman who was not without money. From the start the prosecution introduced evidence

on the deaths of two other “brides.” Prosecuting counsel, Archibald Bodkin, detailed how in each case Smith went through a bigamous forin of marriage after the briefest .possible courtship. “In each case, husband and wife take furnished lodgings together, first making an inquiry about the availability of a bath,” he said. ‘Tn each case the ‘bride’ is subsequently found drowned in this bath. In each case the prisoner is the sole beneficiary under the will of the deceased.” The evidence about Bessie Mundy’s death by itself would probably have been insufficient to overturn the coroner’s inquest verdict of

accidental death. Then Mr Bodkin turned to the fate of Miss Alice Burnham, Smith’s wife of 1913 ... As each bath in turn was brought into the courtroom and Smith’s outbursts from the dock grew louder and wilder, the case against him became ever stroriger. However, in the Old Bailey itself, there were still women who looked on him as their ideal man and perfect husband. Kenneth Haigh plays Smith, Michael Byrne is his defence counsel, Edward Marshall Hall, and Stephen Murray plays Bodkin. Joan Hickson is the witness, Miss Carrie Rapley, and Jill Dixon is the faithful Edith Pegler.