AFTER THE VERDICT

Waipa Post, Volume XXIV, Issue 1615, 7 March 1925, Page 2

AFTER THE VERDICT

LATER DAYS OF CRIMINALS,

After the drama of important criminal trials there is reaction for those who have taken leading parts, whether as accused or witnesses. Many witnesses acquire a liking for the “limelight,” and they are disappointed when little notice is taken of them at ■a later time. It is not unusual to find them visiting Che law courts, either in the hope of attracting attention, or as connoisseurs of other trials. Some convicted persons who are fortunate enough to escape with a gaol sentence also seek notoriety, when liberty allows them ito do so. These facts, familiar to those whose occupation takes them to the courts, come to mind l again in reading one of the sections in Mr Charles Kingston’s new volume, “A Gallery of Rogues.” Several of the chapters of this interesting and varied book are grouped under the title, “What Happened After the Verdict.” One of the cases, which has a certain amount of Australian interest, is that of Madeleine Smith, the girl who was charged in Edinburgh with having poisoned a Frenchman, Emile L’Angelier, her former lover. Two years after their first meeting, when she was 21 years of age, Madeleine was in the dock on this charge. She had written passionate letters to L’Angelier, who proved to be a blackmailer. He had threatened to make the letters public if she jilted him, as she wished to do. His death followed. In the nine days’ trial, Madeleine Smith was the coolest person in the Court. Mr Kingston suggests that though she had undoubtedly suffered under L’Angelier’s threats by comparison a trial for murder was less disturbing. She smiled as the letters were read, and she told the prison matron that her cell would be perfect if it contained a piano. Invited to say whether Miss Smith had put poison in L’Angelier’s cocoa, the jury gave the Scottish verdict, “Not proven,” and Madeleine stepped gracefully from the dock, murmuring with a radiant expression, “Well, they won’t catch me with arsenic again.” While she was waiting for the carriage in which she was to be driven with her wealthy father to his country house, she invited one of her counsel to call and see her. “Thank you, Miss Smith,” he said, “but please don’t forget I never touch cocoa.” Madeleine’s parents had done all that was possible to help her in the trial, but they and her other relatives were ashamed of her, and would not receive visitors in her presence. She then insisted on an allowance, and went from one boardinghouse to another. Madeleine married an eccentric man, Dr. Hora, who feared discovery in Great Britain of the identity of his wife. It was this that caused them to go to Perth, Western Australia. There Dr. H’ora practised for a time, and, though Mr Kingston does not mention the fact, he was a candidate for election to Parliament. Dr. Hora died in Australia, and a few years later Madeleine was in London as the wife of a merchant whom she had met on board ship. At their Sunday parties there were many artistic and theatrical visitors. One evening some of these unwittingly began a conversation on crime, which veered round to the Madeleine Smith case. Among the guests was George du Maurier, who wrote “Trilby,’ and drew for Punch the series on “Things One Would Rather Have Expressed Differently.” Speaking of the fair poisoner, he loudly declared —“She ought to have been hanged. Her beauty should not have saved her from the scaffold.” Du Maurier received a severe shock when a fellow-guest afterwards asked him whether he knew the maiden name of their charming hostess. The parties fell off, and Madeleine turned to music for consolation. Thirty-four years after her acquittal she died in London, in 1891. Much mistaken sympathy has been wasted on John Lee, “the man they could not hang.” Mr Kingston says that he was coarse, illiterate and ruffianly. Lee was footman and handyman to Miss Keyse, of Babbacombe, When he murdered her and tried to conceal his crime by setting fire to the room in which the body lay. The case was proved up to the hilt. Lee was refused a reprieve, and was led to the scaffold in Exeter Prison, but a week of rain had stiffened the drop, and it would not work. Lee was kept in gaol for nearly a quarter of a century. Mr Kingston says that he was sly and Uriah Heep-like except when there was comment on the refusal of successive Home Secretaries to release him a't the expiration of the regulation 15 years. He then showed murderous hatred. Lee received a considerable sum far his “reminiscences,” and lived extravagantly while the money lasted. Then he became a barman in an East End public house, and told sensational stories of his experiences to gaping audiences in the bar. When interest dwindled in recent years he begged even from the poorest. A nurse whom he had married soon after his release applied to the Lambeth Board of Guardians for relief for herself and their three children. “It was then stated,” says

Mr Kingston, “that Lee had eloped to Australia with a barmaid. From all accounts his Australian adventure did not prove a success, and when he died he was buried in a pauper’s grave and there was no one to mourn him.”

One of the strangest cases mentioned is that of Dr. Minors, a highly valued contributor to the great Oxford Dictionary. The editor of the dictionary, Sir James Murray, decided, to call on him at the address given, Crowthorne. This proved to be an accommodation address for prisoner patients at the Broadmoor Criminal Lunatic Asylum. Some years before Dr. Minors had suffered from “persecution mania,” and had shot a brewer’s drayman dead under the impression that he was in the pay of enemies. Dr. Minors had a soothing influence on the more violent prisoners, and, as Dr. Murray had found, he was exceptionally gifted in word lore. Mr Kingston remarks that. Eugene Aram, Edward Rulloff (an American murderer), and other notorious criminals have been noted for their passion for exploring the meaning of words. The statement is rather alarming to innocent students with the same taste.