THE MYSTERY OF THE CARPET BAG

Evening Post, Volume CXVIII, Issue 60, 8 September 1934, Page 25

THE MYSTERY OF THE CARPET BAG

It' is the' proud boast of the police who are investigating' the trunk murder mystery in England thatso far no trunk murderer has Perhaps, therefore,.it is apity,,says-the "News-Chronicle," that the workmen who are at present demolishing Waterloo Bridge cannot also efface the record of the unsolved mystery of a largo carpet bag—the nineteenth century equiva-. lent of the modern suitcase—containing human remains which was fouiid on the bridge in 1857.' A comparison of the two crimes is illuminating both from the point of view of the technique of the murderers and of the methods of crime detection used by the police of 77 years ago and today.

Here' are the facts of tho forgotten murder: —At 5.30 a.m. on October 10, 1857, two youths in a rowing boat found the carpet bag on the abutment' of the third pier from the. Middlesex end of Waterloo Bridge. The bag was practically full of sawn-up bones of a man .between forty and fifty years, from which almost all the flesh had been removed. As in tho Brighton murder, both the head and hands wore missing. Medical evidence showed that the victim had been stabbed before death. Henry Etheridge, the toll collector on the bridge, said he remembered that shortly.before midnight a woman wearing a black mantle and speaking with a gruff voice passed through tho toll with tho bag. Ho remembered her particularly because sho dragged the bag through the turnstile, causing it 'to revolve two' quarters instead of one,, and so causing the loss of a halfpenny on the register. After waxing wrathful with tho woman the. toll collector dragged tho bag out of the turnstile for her., - A long length'of rope attached to the bag led to the conclusion that ' the woman had lowered the bag over the bridge with the intention of letting it into the water without a splash, but that, unknown to her, it-had lodged 'on one of the buttresses. Superintendent Dunkin, of Bow Street, the.Scotland Yard.of that day, 1 took charge of the murder hunt with great energy. The following day; the-

News," whkh devoted a solid column and a :hal£ of small.type to the crime, announced: ?'The whole o'£ the.machinery of the Police Force, throughout the country has already been-put into action..... Immediately on the discovery of the bones, information giving a description ,of the bag a'nd its contents was sent to every division. In loss than three hours ' the printed 'lnformations' wore: in the hands of the'whole of the Metropolitan Police." A detailed description of the carpet bag was issued to the newspapers oh the second day of the hunt. Handicapped by not being ablo to publish half-tone photographs of clothfound in the carpet bag,.the nine-; teehth century police hung the garments up on a line in the yard at Bow Street, and' invited public identification. One morning between 6000 and 7000 people were present at the inspection, and the crowds of mprbid sightseers became so great that 'the exhibition had to be closed.

As today, the police came to the conclusion that the body must have been carted to its disposal in a vehicle, and a search was made for any cab which had carried a carpet bag. Again the nineteenth century police published descriptions of missing people. As today, too,' the names of many people were published as possible victims, only for them to come forward the following day to protest their indignation. ; • Some' of the more sensational newspapers suggested that the remains had be.en placed on the bridge by medical students as a hoax "to hdrrify the British, lieges"—an allegation which was volubly denied by the "Medical Times" and "Lancet." When nobody came forward to.identify the >' remains, the suggestion was made—as it is, being made today—that the victim was a foreigner. ' But the interest in trunk murders last century was not as sustained.as today, for while columns were devoted to the mystery for the first few days, all reference to it had disappeared within a fortnight, and a horrified British public was Teading instead the latest pf-the-Indian. Mutiny^