George Joseph Smith: Bridegroom Makes for Unusual Serial Killer

Last week, I told you about Annie Le, a Yale graduate student whose promising career was cut short by murder. This week, I have a classic crime from across the Atlantic. It’s the story of George Joseph Smith and the notorious “Brides in the Bath” case.

George Joseph Smith

Crime was an integral part of George Joseph Smith’s life from his early years. Born in London in 1872, he ended up in a reformatory at Gravesend by the age of 9. Later, he served time for theft and fraud. In 1896, he convinced a woman to steal from her employers, which earned him 12 months in prison.

George Joseph Smith in 1915 (Police Gazette, 1915)
George Joseph Smith in 1915 (Police Gazette, 1915)

Two years later, in 1896, he married Carolyn Beatrice Thornhill in Leicester. Despite many subsequent marriages, this was the only one that was legal. Soon after the wedding, the couple moved to London.

Carolyn worked as a maid for several employers, stealing from all of them at Smith’s behest. Eventually caught, she served 12 months and, upon her release, outed her husband. He went to prison for two years in January 1901.

Carolyn departed for Canada when Smith got out of prison. Unfazed, Smith married Florence Wilson in June 1908. A month later, he left her, but not before taking £30 (about $1,126 in 2023) from her savings account. He also sold the contents of their Camden Town residence in London.

George Joseph Smith during his murder trial
George Joseph Smith during his murder trial

Smith continued to marry and steal from women. Between 1908 and 1914, he contracted seven marriages, all of them bigamous. For a time, as with Florence Wilson, he stole what money they had and disappeared. But that was about to change.

George Joseph Smith Turns to Murder

In December 1910, Smith married Beatrice “Bessie” Mundy (using the name Henry Williams) in Weymouth, Dorset. The couple rented a house at 80 High Street. The house had no bathtub, so Smith rented one seven weeks later.

The new couple consulted a physician, Dr. Frank French, where Bessie complained of headaches. Smith told French a different story, that his wife suffered from epileptic seizures, even though she had no memory of them afterward.

The 'Brides in the Bath' murderer George Joseph Smith (1872 - 1915) standing in front of a painted backdrop with the first of his murder victims, Beatrice "Bessie" Mundy, (Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
The ‘Brides in the Bath’ murderer George Joseph Smith (1872 – 1915) standing in front of a painted backdrop with the first of his murder victims, Beatrice “Bessie” Mundy, (Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

On July 12, 1912, Smith called Dr. French to attend to his wife, saying she’d had another seizure. The doctor gave her some medicine and promised to check on her in the afternoon. However, Smith informed the doctor the next morning that Bessie had drowned in the bathtub during an epileptic seizure.

French found Bessie in the tub, her head underwater, her legs stretched straight, and her feet protruding from the water. With no visible trace of violence, he attributed her death to epilepsy. The inquest jury awarded “Williams” £2,579 13s 7d (almost $461,000 in 2023) as dictated by her will. She’d drawn up the will a mere five days before her death.

George Joseph Smith Arouses Suspicion

In January 1915, Division Detective Inspector Arthur Neil received a letter from one Joseph Crossley. Crossley owned a boarding house in Blackpool, Lancashire, and enclosed two newspaper clippings in his letter. One was from News of the World, dated Christmas 1914, which recounted the death of Margaret Elizabeth Lloyd (née Lofty). Mrs. Lloyd died at her home in Highgate; her husband and their landlady found her in the bathtub.

Margaret Elizabeth Lofty
Margaret Elizabeth Lofty

The second clipping, dated December 13, 1913, recounted the coroner’s inquest into the death of Alice Smith (née Burnham) in Blackpool. Her husband found her dead in the bathtub. In addition to her savings, Alice had a £500 ($78,487 in 2023) life insurance policy.

Alice Burnham (findagrave.com)
Alice Burnham (findagrave.com)

Crossley’s letter, dated January 3, expressed his and his wife’s suspicions over the striking similarity of the two deaths. He urged the police to investigate.

The Investigation Begins

DI Neil visited the house where Margaret Lloyd died. He found it difficult to believe a healthy adult woman had drowned in such a small tub. Investigating further, he found Margaret had made a will on December 18, 1914, three hours before she died.

Neil contrived to have the coroner, Dr. Bates, issue a favorable report to the insurance company. Expecting Lloyd/Smith to contact his lawyers, he had their offices watched. On February 1, a man matching Smith’s description appeared. After a few questions, the man admitted to the inspector that he was Lloyd and Smith. Neil promptly arrested him for bigamy.

By now, news of the “Brides in the Bath” case had begun to appear. On February 8, the police chief of Herne Bay, Kent, notified Neil of another death similar to Margaret’s and Alice’s. That was, of course, the death of Bessie Mundy.

The Solution

The question that needed an answer was, how did the two women drown? Neil asked the eminent Home Office pathologist Sir Bernard Spilsbury to find a solution.

Spilsbury began by exhuming Margaret Lloyd’s body and conducting a second autopsy. He confirmed drowning as the cause of death, although the evidence was not extensive. He then ruled out poisons or diseases.

Home Office pathologist Sir Bernard Spilsbury in his laboratory
Home Office pathologist Sir Bernard Spilsbury in his laboratory

Given the dimensions of the tub and the size of the women, Spilsbury concluded that they couldn’t have drowned during a seizure. The muscular activity during an episode would have pushed them out of the tub.

Spilsbury suspected someone had grabbed the women by the feet and pulled them underwater. The sudden influx of water into the nose and mouth might cause shock and unconsciousness.

Reconstruction of the Brides in the Bath murders in Madam Tussauds Chamber of Horrors, London
Reconstruction of the Brides in the Bath murders in Madam Tussauds Chamber of Horrors, London

To test this theory, DI Neil hired several experienced female divers similar in size and build to the victims. Try as he might, he could not force the women underwater without leaving signs of a struggle. Then without warning, he pulled the feet of one of the divers. Her head glided under the water before she knew what was happening. Neil pulled the diver from the tub when she failed to get out of the water. It took him and a doctor more than half an hour to revive her. It was a close call, but it confirmed Spilsbury’s theory.

Trial and Conviction

Smith’s trial for murder at London’s Old Baily on June 22, 1915. Under English law, prosecutors could only try him for Bessie Mundy’s death. However, prosecutors used the other two murders to establish the pattern of Smith’s crimes. Smith’s counsel, the noted barrister Sir Edward Marshall Hall, protested, but Mr. Justice Scrutton allowed it. Smith decided not to testify in his own defense.

Handwritten note by George Joseph Smith to his counsel, Edward Marshall Hall, indicating that he did not wish to give evidence in his own defense
Handwritten note by George Joseph Smith to his counsel, Edward Marshall Hall, indicating that he did not wish to give evidence in his own defense

It took the jury about 20 minutes to convict Smith, and Mr. Justice Scrutton sentenced him to death.

Epilogue

Marshall Hall appealed the verdict on grounds that Mr. Justice Scrutton improperly admitted evidence of a “system.” Lord Chief Justice Lord Reading dismissed the appeal.

Sir Edward Marshall Hall
Sir Edward Marshall Hall

George Joseph Smith went to the gallows at Maidstone Prison on August 13, 1915.

The Smith case is significant because it was the first instance of introducing past crimes to prove a system or pattern. Although some have criticized the technique, it is a feature of many modern criminal cases.

The “Brides in the Bath” case appears in several biographies of Spilsbury and anthologies of famous crimes. Among these are The Father of Forensics by Colin Evans and Robin O’Dell’s Landmarks in 20th Century Murder. George Joseph Smith: Brides in the Bath, a book in the True Crimes series, and Jane Robins’ The Magnificent Spilsbury and the Case of the Brides in the Bath also chronicle the case.

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John Lee: Amazing Killer, “The Man They Couldn’t Hang”

Last week, I covered the sad case of Gloria Pointer. Gloria was a 14-year-old Cleveland girl who was abducted and murdered on her way to school. This week, we look at the mysterious case of John Lee, a condemned prisoner who survived three execution attempts.

John Lee, Condemned Murderer

John Henry George Lee was born on August 15, 1864, in the English village of Abbotskerswell in the county of Devon. His early life was a mystery, although he was known to have served in the Royal Navy. He also had a reputation as a thief.

In 1884, Lee worked for a woman named Emma Keyse in Babbacombe Bay near the seaside town of Torquay. On November 15, Keyse was killed with a knife, and Lee was charged with murder.

John Henry George Lee
John Henry George Lee

Lee went on trial the following year. There was little evidence against him other than his prior record and an unexplained cut on his arm. However, he was the only male in the house at the time of the crime. Weak as the case was, and despite his claims of innocence, a jury convicted him of murder. His sentence was death by hanging.

They Can’t Hang John Lee

Lee’s execution date of February 23, 1885, arrived, and warders at HM Prison Exeter led him to the gallows. Everything was routine until the executioner, James Berry, pulled the lever to open the scaffold’s trapdoor. The trap failed to open. A puzzled Berry, who had tested the apparatus earlier, tried again, and again the trapdoor refused to open. Berry tried once more with the same result.

At this point, the medical officer refused to participate in further attempts to hang Lee.

The execution chamber of HM Prison Shrewsbury. The prison was decommissioned in 2013 and is now open to the public.
The execution chamber of HM Prison Shrewsbury. The prison was decommissioned in 2013 and is now open to the public.

Executioner Berry couldn’t explain why the trapdoor failed to open. He describes the incident in detail in his memoir, My Experiences as an Executioner, although he only mentions two attempts.

John Lee's would-be executioner, James Berry
John Lee’s would-be executioner, James Berry

The Home Office ordered an investigation into the malfunction. It revealed that the drawbar became misaligned when the gallows moved from the old infirmary to the coach house. As a result, the trapdoor hinges did not drop cleanly through.

Epilogue

Home Secretary Sir William Harcourt commuted Lee’s sentence to life in prison. After serving 22 years, the Home Office agreed to release him.

 John Lee shortly after he survived three attempts to hang him
John Lee shortly after he survived three attempts to hang him

After his release, Lee traded on his celebrity, lecturing on his life and becoming the subject of silent film. His whereabouts after 1916 are murky, but recent research concludes lived in the United States as “James Lee.”

John Henry George Lee died on August 15, 1945.

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Ruth Ellis: Sex, Love, Abuse, and Murder

In my last blog, I wrote about Della Sorensen, a Nebraska housewife who poisoned eight members of her own family. This week’s case takes us to London where, in 1955, Ruth Ellis shot and killed her racecar driver lover.

Ruth Ellis

Ruth Ellis was born Ruth Neilson on October 9, 1926 in Rhyl, Denbighshire, Wales. Her childhood was anything but idyllic. When Ruth was age two, her father, Arthur’s, brother died when his bicycle collided with a steam wagon. Soon afterward, Arthur became physically and sexually abusive toward his two daughters, Muriel and Ruth.

Ruth Ellis in a photo probably taken in the flat above The Little Club  (Hutton Archive)
Ruth Ellis in a photo probably taken in the flat above The Little Club (Hutton Archive)

In 1941 when Ruth was 15, she became friends with her brother’s girlfriend, Enda Turvey. Muriel later said that Edna introduced Ruth to “the fast life.” The two moved to London and lodged with Ruth’s father, who had moved there earlier. Arthur continued to abuse Ruth while at the same time carrying on an affair with Edna. It was a pitiful environment for a teenager to grow into a young woman.

Ruth Ellis
Ruth Ellis

By the end of the late 1940s, Ruth had engaged in nude modelling. Through those jobs, she became a nightclub hostess at the Court Club. The sexual abuse continued, as the manager of the club, Morris Conley, blackmailed his hostesses into sleeping with him. By the start of the new decade, Ruth was working full-time as an escort.

On November 5, 1950, Ruth married George Johnston Ellis, a divorced dentist and a regular at the Court Club. He was 41 and Ruth was 23. Ellis was an abusive, possessive alcoholic who convinced himself that his new wife was having an affair. When she gave birth to a daughter, Georgina, in 1951, Ellis refused to acknowledge paternity. The couple separated soon after and later divorced.

Ruth Ellis and David Blakely

Ruth Ellis became the manager of The Little Club in Knightsbridge in 1953. In that role, she had many admirers and was friends with more than a few celebrities. And it was at The Little Club that she met David Blakely, a hard-drinking playboy and racecar driver. Within a few weeks, he moved into Ruth’s flat above the nightclub, despite being engaged to another woman. Ruth became pregnant but terminated the pregnancy.

Racecar driver David Blakely
Racecar driver David Blakely

Ruth then began seeing Desmond Cussen, a former bomber pilot who was now an accountant and a director in his family’s tobacco business. She soon moved in with Cussen. However, she continued to see David Blakely. That relationship grew increasingly violent as both Ruth and Blakely continued to see other people. On New Year’s Day 1955, the couple agreed to marry. But then Ruth, pregnant again, suffered a miscarriage after Blakely punched her in the stomach.

David Blakely
David Blakely

The Murder of David Blakely

On Easter Sunday, April 10, 1955, Ruth took a taxi to the flat of friends where she thought Blakely might be. She arrived only to see his car drive off. Walking to a nearby pub, the Magdala, she saw Blakely’s car parked outside.

Ruth and David Blakely at The Little Club in 1955
Ruth and David Blakely at The Little Club in 1955

About 9:30 p.m., Blakely and his friend, Clive Gunnell, came out of the pub. As Blakely walked by, Ruth emerged from the doorway of the newsagent next door. When he reached for his car keys, she took a .38 caliber revolve out of her purse and fired. The first shot missed. As Blakely ran around to the other side of the car, a second shot caused him to collapse to the pavement. She then stood over him and fired three more bullets into the prostrate Blakely. The last one was so close it left power burns on his skin. She tried several times to fire the sixth bullet in the revolver’s chamber, finally succeeding in firing it into the ground. That shot ricocheted and injured a bystander who lost the use of her right thumb.

The Magdala Pub in 2008 (Steve Bowen/Wikipedia)
The Magdala Pub in 2008 (Steve Bowen/Wikipedia)

Ruth Ellis on Trial

Taken to the Hampstead police station, Ruth appeared calm and sober. At a magistrate’s court hearing on April 11, the court ordered her held on remand (i.e., without bail). Examinations by the Principal Medical Officer and two psychiatrists found no evidence of mental illness or insanity.

On June 20, 1955, Ruth appeared before Mr. Justice Havers in London’s Old Bailey. In court, she wore fashionable clothes and sported freshly bleached and styled hair. Her defense counsel, Aubrey Stevenson, expressed concern about her appearance but she declined to change it to be less striking.

Christmas Humphreys for the prosecution asked Ruth only one question. “When you fired the revolver at close range into the body of David Blakely, what did you intend to do?” She replied, “It’s obvious when I shot him I intended to kill him.” That answer guaranteed a guilty verdict and a sentence of death. It took the jury only 20 minutes to convict her.

The Execution

Ruth Ellis awaited execution at Holloway Prison. She told her mother she didn’t want a reprieve and refused to be part of the campaign. Her solicitor, John Bickford, did, however, send a seven-page letter to Home Secretary Gwilym Lloyd George. In it, he outlined grounds for a reprieve. Lloyd George (son of the World War I Prime Minister) denied the request.

Notice of the hanging of Ruth Ellis posted on the door of Holloway Prison on the day before the execution 1955 (Mirrorpix)
Notice of the hanging of Ruth Ellis posted on the door of Holloway Prison on the day before the execution 1955 (Mirrorpix)

The day before her scheduled hanging, Ruth revealed that Desmond Cussen had given her the murder gun. She also revealed that Cussen and not a taxi drove her to the murder scene. Lloyd George, however, saw this added information as further evidence of premeditation. He also said the injury to the bystander was a decisive point in his refusal to grant a reprieve.

While in prison awaiting her date with the hangman, Ruth wrote a letter to Blakely’s parents. In it she said, “I have always loved your son, and I shall die still loving him.”

The crowd gathered outside Holloway Prison at 9:00 a.m. on the morning of the execution (Mirropix)
The crowd gathered outside Holloway Prison at 9:00 a.m. on the morning of the execution (Mirropix)

Just before 9:00 a.m. on July 13, 1955, executioner Albert Pierrepoint and his assistant removed Ruth from her cell. They then took her to the death chamber where she was hanged. As was customary, she was buried in an unmarked grave inside the walls of Holloway Prison. In the early 1970s, the government exhumed the remains of executed women for reburial elsewhere. Ruth was reburied in the churchyard of St. Mary’s Church in Amersham, Buckinghamshire.

Epilogue

Ruth Ellis was the last woman to be hanged in Britain. Her case ignited widespread controversy, garnering exceptionally intense interest from the press and public. The public as a whole supported the death sentence, but the case was a significant factor in gathering support for the abolition of capital punishment. Britain ended capital punishment in 1964.

Today, Ruth would most likely be seen as a battered woman. It is improbable that she would be convicted of first-degree murder and virtually certain she would not have been executed.

For more information about Ruth Ellis and her controversial case, there are several books you can read. Before her own death from cancer in 2001, Ruth’s daughter, Georgina, wrote Ruth Ellis, My Mother. Her sister, Muriel, also wrote a book, Ruth Ellis: My Sister’s Secret Life. Both of these are older and may be harder to find. Two more recent books are A Fine Day for a Hanging by Carol Ann Lee, Robert Hancock’s The Last Woman Hanged, and Crime of Passion by Tracey James.

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Michael Stone: Hammer Killer Gets Lifetime in Prison

It’s been a while since I featured an English crime. So, this week, we leave murderous doctor Dirk Greineder behind in Massachusetts and travel across the pond to Kent, England. It was there in 1996 that a man wielding a hammer attacked Dr. Lin Russell and her two daughters. Michael Stone was the man convicted of killing Dr. Russell and one of the girls.

Michael Stone

Michael Stone, born in Royal Tunbridge Wells, Kent didn’t have the easiest childhood. For one thing, his paternity was uncertain. Stone’s birth certificate lists Ivor Goodban as his father. But later, he considered Peter Stone, another of his mother’s partners, to be his true father and took his name. However, neither man acknowledged Michael as their son.

Michael Stone after the failure of his 2011 appeal (Reuters)
Michael Stone after the failure of his 2011 appeal (Reuters)

From that shaky start, things got worse. Domestic violence was routine in his family home. But things were no better when he was placed in a care home, as he was abused there. At one point, he suffered beatings with a hammer. He also saw his mother’s former partner attack a man with a meat cleaver. By age nine, Michael started using drugs and committing crimes, and by twelve he had a police record.

Once he left the care system, Stone began using heroin and soon had a £1,500 a week addiction. Like many addicts, he financed his addiction by committing crimes. In the 1980s and 1990s, he served prison sentences for robbery, burglary, and assault. He carried weapons and sometimes attacked victims by squirting ammonia in their faces from a plastic lemon juice bottle. Police considered Stone a suspect in the 1976 murder of former special constable Francis Jegou. Stone was 16 at the time but was already an established and prolific offender.

The Russell Murders

On the summer day of July 9, 1996, Dr. Lin Russell, her two daughters, and their dog walked home from a swim party. Their path took them down a country lane in Chillenden, Kent. When they walked past a parked car, a man jumped out brandishing a claw hammer and demanded money. Told they didn’t have any money with them, the man tied them up and started hitting them with the hammer. Lin urged Josie, then nine, to run home and get help. But the attacker caught the girl, blindfolded her with strips from her swimming towel, and tied her to a tree. He then bludgeoned her until she passed out. After the fifteen-minute attack was over, the man drove off in his car.

The Russell family in happier times (Kent News Pictures)
The Russell family in happier times (Kent News Pictures)

Lin Russell, 45, was dead. So were six-year-old Megan and the family dog, Lucy. Miraculously, Josie survived. The damage to her skull required doctors to insert a metal plate, and they had to remove some of her brain tissue. Josie had to learn to speak all over again after the assault.

Josie (L) and Megan (R) Russell shortly before the murders (Tempest)
Josie (L) and Megan (R) Russell shortly before the murders (Tempest)

Michael Stone Arrested and Convicted

In July 1997, police received several tips after the television program Crimewatch aired an episode on the Russell murders. Those tips led to the arrest of Michael Stone, then 37. Stone couldn’t provide an alibi. He said he couldn’t remember where he was because he was taking so many drugs. Besides, he said, it was a long time ago.

Stone went on trial in 1998. Investigators had collected some items of physical evidence from the crime scene. These included bloody towels, a black shoelace, and a hammer. Given the scientific capabilities of the time, police were unable to link any of this evidence to Stone. There were also eyewitnesses who testified to seeing a man in the vicinity of the murders. But it was uncertain that the man the witnesses had seen was the attacker.

The main evidence against Michael Stone came from a man named Damien Daley. Daley was in jail at the same time as Stone. He testified that Stone confessed to the Russell murders during a conversation they had through a heating pipe. Two other prisoners, Mark Jennings and Barry Thompson, testified that Stone suggested his involvement in the murders to them.

The jury deliberated for nearly fifteen hours over two days before returning a guilty verdict. Mr. Justice Poole sentenced Stone to three life sentences with a tariff of 25 years. The tariff meant he would have to spend at least 25 years in prison before he could be considered for release.

The Michael Stone Trial Round Two

In February 2001, the Court of Appeals granted Stone a new trial. Within 24 hours of the first trial’s conclusion, Barry Thompson admitted he’d lied about Stone confessing to him. Later, it emerged that The Sun newspaper had paid Mark Jennings £5,000 and promised him a further £10,000. The court therefore deemed his evidence unreliable.

A second trial didn’t bring a different result, however. In less time than it took the first jury, the jury Stone’s second trial returned a guilty verdict. His sentence was the same: three life sentences with a tariff of 25 years. The judge opined that a whole-life order was appropriate, but 25 years was the maximum tariff he could legally impose.

Josie Russell survived Michael Stone's brutal hammer attack and is now a successful textile artist (PA)
Josie Russell survived Michael Stone’s brutal hammer attack and is now a successful textile artist (PA)

Epilogue

In 2013, criminologist David Wilson suggested serial killer Levi Bellfield as the possible perpetrator in the Russell murders. But Bellfield’s girlfriend at the time, Johanna Collings maintained that he was with her all day that July 9. Although he harbors doubts about Stone’s conviction, Wilson eventually concluded that Bellfield probably did not kill Lin and Megan Russell.

Levi Bellfield (PA)
Levi Bellfield (PA)

Michael Stone remains in prison and continues to maintain his innocence. All appeals of his second conviction to date have all failed.

Michael Stone (Stephen Hird/Reuters)
Michael Stone (Stephen Hird/Reuters)

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