THE DEEMING MURDERS

Waipa Post, Volume 49, Issue 3505, 14 August 1934, Page 2

THE DEEMING MURDERS

LONG LIST OF VICTIMS. A great sensation was caused in March, 1892, when the body of a woman was found buried under a hearth-stone embedded in cement in a house at Windsor, a suburb of Melbourne. The crime, which became known as “the Windsor Murder,” was traced to a man named Frederick Bayley Deeming, who < under the name of Barron Swanson, had fled to Southern Cross, Western Australia, where he was arrested and whence he was brought back to Melbourne. In the meantime inquiries instituted by the “Argus” through its London representative brought to light the fact that Deeming was believed to have also murdered his wife and four children at Rainhill, near Liverpool, in England. The bodies had been disposed of in a manner similar to that of his victim at Windsor’. These disclosures, Deeming’s cal- { lous and indifferent behaviour after his arrest, and the brutality of the crimes aroused popular feeling deeply. The murdered woman proved to be Emily Mather, with whom Deeming had gone though the form of marriage in England. He had become engaged, after the murder, to another woman, and at Southern Cross he had already provided the cement for the disposal of her body. Deeming’s trial, which lasted for five days, was begun in Melbourne before the late Mr. Justice Hodges at the end of April, 1892. The evidence left no possible doubt of his guilt. The only possible hope of procuring a verdict in his favour lay in a plea of insanity, which was not upheld, despite evidence by Dr. J. W. Springthorpe and the late Dr. J. Y. Fishbourne.

.Deeming was an extraordinarily glib liar, and Dr. Springthorpe had the greatest difficulty in arriving at the truth. The vanity of the prisoner was immeasurable, and he displayed an utter lack of remorse for his crimes. He pretended that when he changed his name he changed his identity. He admitted that Frederick Williams —the name he had used at Rainhill—had killed the woman and children there, also that Frederick Deeming had killed Emily Mather at Windsor. Neither of these crimes, he insisted, could be alleged against Barron Swainson, the name he had assumed in Western Australia, and he vigorously dissociated himself from the acts of Williams and Deeming. Dr. Springthorpe’s summing up of the life of Deeming, was that it had been “an extravaganza broken by lack of funds at intervals.”

The Crown kept the medical witnesses for the defence strictly to the terms of what is known as the McNaughton test, namely, whether at the time the crime was committed Deeming was aware of the nature and quality of his actions. This test was laid down by a committee of the House of Lords in 1843, a 3 determining guilt, and in 1891 it had been reaffirmed by the Victorian Full Court. Dr. Springthorpe could not conscientiously swear to the state of Deeming’s mind at the time he committed the crime, in order to overcome the McNaughton test. His persistence in maintaining his own conviction of insanity brought him into conflict with the Court, and Mr. Justice Hodges somewhat abruptly terminated his evidence. Deeming was convicted and sentenced to death on May 2. He was executed on May 23.