To John’s surprise, Isabella immediately engaged the constable in conversation, volunteering that she and Grace had been wondering what had become of a child who had been in her care until the previous day. Her quick nervous intervention made John uncomfortable, while Grace sat stiff and silent on the other side of the hearth.
In response to the constable’s further information that the child had been found drowned, Isabella remarked that she and Grace had just been wondering what kind of breakfast the child had had. At this comment, John looked at her sharply.
For his part, P.C. Sutcliffe found such a reaction to the news that one’s charge, so recently relinquished, had been found drowned very strange, but he did not betray his feelings. And his continuing calm seemed to help keep Isabella at her ease.
Isabella needed little prodding to provide a detailed statement of their movements with the child the previous day, which the policeman took down in his fine hand. As he conscientiously recorded with his own spelling and punctuation:
Isabella Gardiner of Meanly Farm in the township of Newton Late of no 3 Victoria Street Dalton, in Furness, states that she has nursed the Deceased Thomas Dockery for the last 4 months and came to Meanly Farm about a week since for the purpose of waiting of her sister, Mrs Isherwood, and brought the child with her to Meanley and on Saturday night the 16th Instant about 11 p.m. she gave over the Deceased to Its Mother Elizabeth Dockery while in the street opposite the Black Bull Inn Slaidburn. The mother then said that she was going to Bolton-by-Bowland the Child was then in good health and on Saturday the 16th Inst. about 11 p.m. Isabella Gardener by arrangement saw the Deceased Childs Mother, Elizabeth Dockery, on the Street near Black Bull Inn Slaidburn and there gave the child over to Its Mother. The Child then being in good health the Mother told Isabella Gardener that she would go to Bolton-by-Bowland. Discription of Elizabeth Dockery Age 26 years Dark Hair, rather tall and slender build Dressed in a Navy blue dress, a black cloth Jacket, a white straw Hat trimmed with blue Ribbon and fare worne Elastic side boots. Accompanied by a man who (crossed out) John Stables supposed to be her Husband. Discription about 5 ft 2 in.
A copy of Isabella’s original statement, in P.C. Sutcliffe’s own hand, located in 2005 by Cathryn and David Higham of Slaidburn.
High, Stiff build Complexion Fresh Dressed in Shaby dark Coat and Trousers, soft billerock Hat, White Tie around his neck and strong boots. Supposed to have been residing a Rimminton near Gisburn She had received a Letter address from Rimmington asking her to beet her with the Child at Clitheroe on the Saturday they went to Clitheroe at 12 noon but did not see them till when Elizabeth Dockery asked her to take the Child and meet her at Slaidburn and she brought the child to Slaidburn and give it over to Elizabeth Dockery and demanded soin … Money but she said that the man John Stables had said that If she was not off He would do for both her and the Child, she then went home with her sister.
P.C. Sutcliffe carefully folded up Isabella’s statement and wrote on the outside, “Statement of Isabella Gardener.” He then asked Grace and Isabella to come with him to identify the child who had been found drowned. Grace almost swooned at the prospect, and seemed weak and encumbered by her condition, and before she or Isabella could even answer, John replied firmly that he could identify the child who had been in his home.
As John was making himself ready to leave with the constable, Grace found her voice and said that she wished that they had taken the child to the workhouse.
“Happen it is as well as it is,” was Isabella’s quick reply.
Later, P.C. Sutcliffe regretted that he had not recorded those comments as well.
A Break in the Case
Meanwhile, in Canberra, Australia, the partial story of the child murder continued to tantalize me. I returned frequently to the Slaidburn website in the hope that more information would appear. For some reason the simple act of leaving a query in the site guestbook never occurred to me. Looking back, I think I was in awe and amazement at what Penny had been able to discover and it didn’t occur to me that more could be discovered by comparatively simple means.
Then I had what a detective-novel writer would call “a break.”
In late October, while I was wandering about the Slaidburn site trying to glean more information, I saw a message on the notice board that made me think that I might at least find out more about my great-grandmother Jane and her family, the Bleazards. I sent off a tentative email to a woman called Elaine, who appeared to have Bleazard antecedents, asking her if she knew anything about a Jane Bleazard, who appeared to have died young.
Next thing I knew, I had the names of Jane’s parents, the date of her christening, and the dates of the births of some of her brothers and sisters. Exhilarated by my easy success at gaining so much information from a stranger, I emailed my thanks and included this request:
I have one further favour to ask of you in regard to genealogy. If you look on the Slaidburn site, you will see that my grandmother’s stepmother was accused of murdering her child. What it doesn’t say is whether she was convicted or what happened. There is some suggestion that the Leeds assizes might have the info, but they do not seem to be on the net.
If you are near Slaidburn could you call the librarian who did the work, or even email me the library’s phone number?
Maybe she was deported to Australia. Wouldn’t that be a strange coincidence.
Regards Sheelagh
In response to my note, Elaine Buckley, an Internet-based fairy godmother, sent this message to David and Cathryn Higham in Slaidburn:
Sorry to bother you two but you might be able to help with this query from an Aussie. If you can’t I will try Chris Spencer. Email me either way.
Thanks Elaine
And so began the twenty-first-century reinvestigation of the nineteenth-century Slaidburn alleged child murder.
The Slaidburn Connection
David Higham sent his response to Elaine’s query early the next morning, October 30.
Subject: From the Slaidburn Website — Re the Child Murder
Dear Elaine and Sheelagh,
Thank you so much for forwarding such an interesting email. We never expected to have anyone contact us about the child murder.
The librarian at Clitheroe, Mrs. Sue Holden, has given us various newspaper cuttings which we have turned into pages on the site.
Sue does not have any further information on the source of the newspaper report or of the verdict. She suggested that the records may be in Leeds or possibly Wakefield.
We will have to make further enquiries and make a visit to Leeds so it may be some time, still it is an excuse for a shopping trip.
This matter has now gone to the top of our “to do” list.
As soon as we can tell you anything we will be in touch.
My own excited response was quickly sent. I tried to include some relevant background for the Highams without overwhelming them.
… I just read David’s email and I am excited at the prospect of learning more…. I can tell you that my grandmother, who appears in the child murder write up as Margaret Isherwood, age 9, used to say that the family lost everything defending her step mother in a case involving child suffocation. We all had the impression that it was like a cot death or a careless accident, so my sister Penny, who is presently living in Wellington, New Zealand, couldn’t believe it when she found the child murder site and when we both read actual testimony of our grandmother and the comment about our great grandfather bursting into tears when his new wife, now accused of murder, entered the courtroom.…
Sheelagh
In the meantime, I had determined that transportation to Australia for British criminals had been discontinued by 1885, so the slightly romantic notion that I might find traces of Grace and Isabella in Australia had to be abandoned.
Meanwhile, though, the Highams immediately demon-strated the sensitivity and thoughtfulness I have since come to know as characteristic of them. Their next email reflected their con
cern that the interesting story they had selected for the Slaidburn website might have a negative impact on the descendants of those involved.
Subject: More from Slaidburn
Thank you for the family details. We hope that the report on the site has not been too upsetting for your family. Your email has really brought it home to us that the case involved “real people.” We find it quite upsetting.
David always saw the case more as an indictment of the Poor Law provisions of that time than an indictment of the individual. How different things might have been had she received the signature of the Overseer of the Poor at Slaidburn and that the child had received entry into the workhouse at Clitheroe.
We will try to send a friend to the Public Record Office in London where we have found that the records of the criminal trials for the period should be kept.
Fingers crossed that the records are intact and that we can find details of the case.
David and Cathryn Higham
David and Cathryn, thorough researchers both, were also on top of the criminal trial lead.
Subject: A little more from Slaidburn
Dear Sheelagh
We have checked with my friend in London this morning. She has a day off a week on Thursday and was wondering what to do, so she will now be visiting the Public Record Office at Kew….
If we manage to find out anything else in the meantime we will let you know.
David and Cathryn
Within a day we had more information. As I came to understand over time, David and Cathryn are bright, well-educated, and curious, and this was a mystery that they, too, bless them, were keen to solve.
Considerable Commotion
Slaidburn was in terrible turmoil. Jane’s brothers, who had been quietly supportive of John finding a new wife, were shocked and upset. John Bleazard rued the day he had agreed to be a witness at John’s wedding to Grace. His sister, Margaret, felt heartbroken that she had not been able to look after Jane’s wee ones as she had done for their own sister Isabella, and that they had fallen into the hands of such a woman.
The Isherwoods were shocked and alarmed. Their centuries-old position as law-abiding people seemed to have been undermined by the actions of those two women — and outsiders at that.
Mary Rushton, living over at Chapel Croft, was deeply dismayed at the role her family seemed to have played in the tragedy. How she wished that her husband Thomas had needed to take the trap to town himself on Saturday. Then Grace and Isabella could never have made their disastrous trip to Clitheroe and things would be different today.
The Barghs had found little Thomas’s body and summoned the police on Sunday. By Tuesday, the first day of the inquest, the reporter from Preston described the district as being in “considerable commotion.”
In the carefully devised rotation of sites for legal proceedings, it was the turn of the Black Bull Tavern to host this inquest. Hark to Bounty, just across the road, had been the venue for such hearings for centuries, but in recent times the publican at the Black Bull had successfully argued for his fair share of the business.
Mr. Robinson, the coroner, had reacted quickly, calling together a jury of John Isherwood’s peers, farmers and tradesmen from the area whom John had known all his life. In their work as stonemasons, John and his father Matthew had built or repaired homes or outbuildings for all of them.
Maggie was nervous and frightened by what she had been told would happen at the inquest. The policeman and her father had told her just to answer the questions slowly and honestly, but she was worried that Grace and Isabella would get angry with her. She had never had to answer questions in front of grown-ups before. Yes, she was bright and confident, but this was scary business.
Grace and Isabella weren’t even at the hearing at the Black Bull that day. Maggie wondered where the policeman had taken them. By listening, she learned that the coroner, Mr. Robinson, was going to meet with people again on Thursday. Maybe she would see her mother and Aunt Isabella then.
That night at Hark to Bounty there was talk of little else. And across the road, the Black Bull regulars vigorously rehearsed the day’s testimony with various embellishments of their own.
Poor Thomas, unwanted toddler, was buried on Thursday and all concerned hoped that they would attract little attention. Only John, Matthew and Margaret, P.C. Sutcliffe, and the Rector Halliday were there to see Thomas Gardner’s tiny coffin into the ground. Passersby looking into the churchyard could see John’s bowed head and shoulders, his normally strong, straight figure bent into a posture of despair. Matt and Maggie, joined by little James Rushton, stood by with childish solemnity, holding wilting posies of spring flowers for Thomas’s grave.
Back at Meanley after the funeral, Margaret had taken Matthew out in the yard and made him swear an oath to never repeat what she was about to tell him. Once he had sworn his solemn oath and spit on the ground for good measure, she stood on tiptoe and whispered in his ear: “I saw it. I saw the dead baby when they came back from Clitheroe. It was all white and its arms and legs were hanging down.”
Matthew drew back horrified, the image too much for his young imagination. “Don’t you go telling that to anyone else,” he said. “That’s evil.”
Maggie was a little disappointed in her brother’s reaction. She had hoped he might press her for more details.
When the adjourned inquest reopened on Thursday afternoon at the Black Bull Inn, the two sisters were brought as prisoners from where they were being held in Bolton-by-Bowland. The neighbourhood was by now in a rare state of excitement, exacerbated by gossip and the funeral of the poor child. Sides were being taken and old secrets relating to inconvenient children were being whispered by a compassionate few.
Quite a crowd had gathered in the street outside the Black Bull to hear the inquest’s findings. Those seeking drama were not disappointed — the jury returned a verdict of wilful murder against both prisoners and they were committed for trial at the Leeds Assizes.
Present Day — Updates from Slaidburn
All the background that I really had on Cathryn and David Higham was that Elaine Buckley liked them and found them very helpful, and of course, the fact that they had been so wonderfully responsive to me. They also seemed to be well-grounded in Slaidburn, especially since it was clear that the website was the product of their hard work. Hardly the thorough introduction most would prefer. Nevertheless, our joint pursuit of the outcome of the child murder charges, ably assisted by Penny, did cause us to coalesce into quite a hardworking and cohesive team.
Subject: Update from Slaidburn
Dear Sheelagh
An interesting and productive day.
We revisited the Clitheroe librarian Mrs. Sue Holden today, principally to tell her your fascinating news and to thank her. She then showed us the fragile and tattered Victorian scrapbook where the original newspaper articles, which she had partially photocopied, came from. Turning the page, we realised that there was also an account of the Magisterial Court committal proceedings at Bolton-by-Bowland relating to the case. So more typing for the website! The articles came from the Preston Guardian and indeed confirm that the resulting trial was scheduled for the Summer Sessions of the Leeds Assize Circuit Court in July. Unfortunately no further reports of the trial in the scrapbook. In the immortal words of Homer Simpson … Doh!
We then contacted the Public Records at Kew in London as this is where all records of Assize trials are kept. A most helpful gentleman is seeking to find the correct bundle (literally bundles of papers tied with ribbon) in which the records for that Circuit are kept, in preparation for the visit by our friend a week on Thursday. He did warn us that some records, eg. 1874, are missing but reminded us that the Leeds newspapers of the time would almost certainly have reported the facts of the case. We also found that the “alleged murderess” could not have been transported to Australia as this only occurred between 1787 and 1868.
We then contacted Leeds City Library who confirmed that they ho
ld copies of several Leeds newspapers of the time and have them on microfiche.
So all in all we should be able to get to the bottom of the case for you in the near future.
We will email you when we have typed the Magistrates report on to the website, assuming that you have no objections. We meant to ask you whether you would prefer that we removed the page from the site as we now see it as being about “real people” and would not seek to distress or offend in any way. Do let us know.
David and Cathryn
As I read David and Cathryn’s email, I couldn’t help thinking that it should be used as a teaching aid in a course for investigative journalism or archival research. Their ability and enthusiasm thrilled and reassured me. So did their dedication to detail … and their sensitivity.
With the story gathering momentum, the Highams and I were keeping Penny and Elaine Buckley posted so that they could marvel with us at their Internet discoveries.
Subject: Updated website
Dear Margaret Sheelagh, Penny and Elaine,
The typing of the magisterial proceedings is now complete and up on the website. You will also find that I have changed one of the photographs after re-reading the inquest evidence. I took some pictures from Langcliffe Cross bridge earlier in the year (foot and mouth disease restrictions have prevented me actually going into the field) and realized that the stream flows across a flat rock shelf before a pool approximately 30 yards below the bridge, which is more likely to be the “pavement” as was mentioned in the inquest evidence than I previously thought.
I am also trying to find an old photograph of Meanley Farm for you. It was a 17th Century building with a long row of “weaver’s windows” (for extra light) across the upper storey facade. As with many farmsteads in the area it was pretty much as it would have been at the time of the incident …
The Slaidburn Angel Page 7