The Baby Farmers

by Annie Cossins

  Just after Clarice finished giving her evidence, one of the jurymen complained to the Coroner that Makin ‘had been in conversation with a spectator all day’. When Constable Joyce escorted the man from the courtroom, Mr Williamson objected, telling Joyce he had ‘no right to turn that man out’. In the alarming scene to follow, John Makin let slip the mask behind which he hid his emotions, becoming enraged and accusing the juryman of telling lies:

  Don’t tell lies. You look after the evidence and never mind me. You have been continually throwing it up at me. Remember I have not been found guilty yet although some of you have found me guilty.

  You attend to the evidence, that’s what you are paid for.11

  The Coroner then ordered John:

  Will you be kind enough not to address the jury. Please sit down.

  When the court adjourned for lunch, John complained to the Coroner:

  He said the jury were condemning him unfairly, and they had continually been passing insulting remarks at adjournments, which were quite unjustifiable. He . . . did not hear the stranger speak to him, and the juryman . . . was very smart in drawing the coroner’s attention to it. ‘Why, the —— jurymen are sleeping half their time,’ said Makin, ‘instead of attending to the evidence’.

  Constable Joyce then gave Makin a piece of his mind:

  Joyce: You know, Makin, you have no right to speak to anybody in court.

  Makin: I'll speak to whom I like.

  Joyce: No, you won't.

  Makin (enraged): You won't stop me.

  Joyce: Yes, I will.

  Makin: Then you will have to cut my tongue out.

  When it was announced that lunch was ready, Blanche and Florence refused to leave the court and, in tears, complained that Clarice had been telling a lot of lies ‘and she should have been in their place’. Sarah tried to reassure them, ‘Come on, my children . . . they can’t hang your mother; they can only put her in gaol’. With a hint of triumph, Makin had the final say, ‘That’s where it pinches them. They can’t say we murdered them’.

  Before they left the courtroom, Constable Joyce brought in one of the afternoon’s witnesses, who recognised Sarah straight away. Sarah replied, ‘Well, I’m blowed. I never saw the woman in my life’ while Blanche observed, ‘Oh, I suppose they will bring Paddy the blackfellow next to see if he knows you’. Not only was the morning’s evidence against them, the afternoon seemed to be promising more of the same.

  The smelly bedrooms and Sarah’s spying skills

  Things did not improve for the Makins after lunch when three more women gave damaging evidence. The first two, Miss Wells of 111 George Street and Mrs Fitzpatrick of 107 George Street, testified that they had seen three babies when the Makins lived at number 109 and frequently heard babies crying.12

  The new resident of 109 George Street, Mrs Ralph, told the court she had noticed a very unpleasant smell from the first night she spent in the house. It was worse in the bedrooms and so bad that her family could not sleep ‘on close nights’. Her family eventually got used to the smell but were relieved that it disappeared once the bodies had been unearthed by the police. Constables Joyce and Brown had also examined the floorboards throughout the house but decided that none had been removed. Joyce even climbed through the manhole in the ceiling of the back bedroom but ‘emerged covered with cobwebs [and] with empty hands’.

  Mrs Ralph then revealed that Sarah Makin had called at her house on a Sunday night about eight weeks earlier, during the very first inquests but before the police had dug up the backyard. On the doorstep, Sarah asked about the previous tenants and wanted to know whether ‘the floor of her house had been taken up by the [Redfern] police’. When Mrs Ralph replied no, Sarah sympathised in relation to the inconvenience of having the police around and revealed that the previous tenants ‘were great friends of hers and nice people’. Mrs Ralph retorted that they could not be that nice since they left ‘without paying the landlord his rent’. Sarah then inquired whether or not the Redfern police had found a baby in the backyard and left, rather pleased, when she was told they had not.

  The verdict

  Mary Stacey and Clara Risby had given evidence in the second George Street inquest in the hope they would find out what had happened to their babies. Despite their evidence, it was unclear who the mother of Baby B was. Clara’s baby girl would have been nearly six weeks old, if, when the Makins moved to George Street, she was still alive. This age fits within Dr Milford’s estimated age range of two to ten weeks for Baby B. But it is equally likely the Makins disposed of Clara’s baby while they were in East Street and before their sudden move to George Street. John Makin had told Clara that his wife was ‘out with the child’ the last time Clara visited East Street, his usual excuse when a baby had met its end.

  We know from Clarice Makin’s evidence, however, that Mary Stacey’s child had lived with the Makins in George Street and was not one of the six babies taken to Burren Street, making it highly likely that Baby B was Mary’s baby. Despite this evidence, the Coroner was unconvinced.

  During his summing up to the jury, the Coroner told the jurymen that although the case was ‘one of very strong suspicion’, with no cause of death and no identifying features on Baby B, ‘it was impossible for them to bring in any other verdict but an open one’. The jury retired. After an hour they returned to inform the Coroner they disagreed with him. The Coroner was not happy. Three jurors were holding out for a guilty finding against the Makins. The foreman asked if it were absolutely necessary to prove identification. If not, it would be much easier to incriminate the Makins. The Coroner instructed them it was essential to identify Baby B. He would give them another fifteen minutes. When they returned, the jury had fallen into line by deciding there was insufficient evidence ‘to determine how, when, where, or by what means the infant came by its death’, despite the gravest suspicion against all of the Makins. There would be no answers for either Mary or Clara as a result of this inquest.

  John Makin’s prediction, that ‘they can’t say we murdered them’, was right. This time. But John had forgotten that just after they disappeared from George Street, two mothers in particular were keen to find out what had happened to their babies. It was perhaps inevitable that one of them would, unknowingly, orchestrate the downfall of Australia’s most notorious baby farmers.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  The day Miss Amber Murray visited the Makins

  20–21 December 1892

  The inquest into the death of Baby D opened on 20 December 1892.1 The Coroner, the jury and the packed public gallery were in for another nail-biting journey into the gloomy underworld of baby farming.

  This inquest commenced after the jury had decided not to deliver a verdict in relation to the death of Baby C until they had heard the evidence concerning the death of Baby D. This decision was made in order to see if either Baby C or Baby D could be the child of the star witness for the day—Miss Amber Murray.

  After the discovery of the George Street babies, Amber had made her way to Newtown police station from her home in Paddington. She gave Constable Joyce the letter she had received on 24 June in response to her advertisement in The Evening News, the day that Miss Stacey had advertised in the same newspaper:

  WANTED, kindly, motherly person, to adopt fair baby boy, 3 weeks, small premium. A. L., Oxford-street P.O.

  The long, sympathetic letter had been signed by a woman calling herself E. Hill, who knew how to reassure a concerned mother:

  In reply to your advertisement in EVENING NEWS to-day for a kind person to adopt baby boy 3 weeks old, small premium, having no small children, only three grown daughters, I have great pleasure in applying to you for it. I will give it a mother’s love, and attention—in fact all that a mother can give to it—if it was her own. I will take it for—say £2 10s—or £3, just to get it a small outfit. . . . It is our intention of going to live in the suburbs, where we will keep a cow, so you will have no fear for your baby, as it will get plenty of o
uting and fresh air from the girls, as we are very fond of children. I may also tell you we are comfortable, and have an income. If this should suit you you can call on me on Saturday (to-morrow) evening or any time through the day. I can explain more to you if you can, if possible, call on Saturday as we may be out of town early on Monday morning. If you give us the child you can see it every week . . .

  I remain, yours faithfully,

  E. Hill, 109 George-street, Redfern, near post office, tram to George-street.

  You need not fear about your baby, as you will find it will be taken as much care of or more so than yourself would care for it.

  Amber had given birth to a strong, healthy son on 30 May 1892 at the home of Mrs Patrick, a midwife in Brisbane Street, Paddington. Like all the other unmarried mothers who had testified, she was a domestic servant who was vulnerable to unwanted pregnancies and perhaps the sexual attentions of gentlemen staying at the Royal Hotel in Glenmore Road, Paddington where she lived-in. One newspaper described her as ‘a young barmaid’.

  The day after her advertisement, Amber received three replies, although the reassuring letter from E. Hill saw her take the tram to George Street the next evening at about eight o’clock. Amber said she was taken into the house by Daisy and met Mr and Mrs Hill in the front room. The Hills began their usual tale with a few extra embellishments. Mrs Hill was keen to bring up Amber’s baby because she had lost a child who was two years old and wanted another boy to take his place, even though her two-year-old son, Tommy, was probably in the house.

  Mr Hill concentrated on the money side of things. Like a good salesman, John had some winning arguments, since Amber agreed she did not mind paying £3 ‘as long as he took care of the child’. John assured her that he would ‘bring it up as one of [our] own’ and give it a good education. On cue, Sarah told her she had nothing to fear. Then came the Makins’ code, the meaning of which was unknown to an adopting mother. John announced the family would very soon be moving to a much healthier place to live, in Hurstville. She was reassured when John promised she could visit her child once a week and Sarah chimed in, ‘Oh yes you can. I am a mother myself and I know what a mother’s love is’.

  When Amber visited Newtown police station, she also gave Constable Joyce the agreement for her son’s adoption, dated 27 June. Amber said she had got it from ‘a gentleman friend’, George Anderson, who ‘travels on boats’. Possibly Mr Anderson, a sailor, had previous experience in dealing with the inconvenience of an illegitimate child, since the agreement was ‘drawn up in exaggerated legal phraseology’. Extremely precise in its terms, it reads like a standard form contract of the type we have today for commercial transactions and provides more evidence that the sale of children in the colony had developed its own market with its very own standard legal approach to adoption. The adopter agreed to adopt ‘the child’ for a premium of £3, while Amber agreed not to interfere with the child without the consent of the adopter. If she did she was liable to pay a penalty of £500 Sterling. The agreement was signed by Amber and John Hill. On the day he was adopted, Horace was three weeks old.

  Before Amber left George Street, the Hills said they would call at the home of her midwife to pick up her baby. Between 6.30 and 7 p.m. on 27 June, John arrived with his daughter Florence. John was full of praise as Florence took the baby in her arms, saying, ‘It’s just the kind of child we want’. For some reason Amber did not have the £3 premium but promised that ‘as she had to go out’ she would deliver both the money and the child at 8 p.m., her words suggesting she had to collect the premium from someone. Perhaps her mysterious friend George had agreed to pay the fee and had not turned up. But John was in a hurry, insisting that he take the child there and then, perhaps afraid that Amber would change her mind. John told her not to be later than eight o’clock as he had some friends coming.

  When Amber arrived, she sensed the Makins were keen to get rid of her. They had been watching for her arrival since, as Amber walked past number 109 by mistake, John called out to her. As he showed her into the front room he explained, ‘I have not long to spare’ because he was expecting friends, and ‘you might meet someone here you would not care to meet’. In reality, the Makins were expecting a visit from another mother, someone the Makins themselves would not want Amber to meet.

  Amber was asked by a juryman what the inside of the house at 109 George Street was like. She replied it was clean and comfortable but ‘poorly furnished’ although Mr Hill had told her he would be buying ‘fresh furniture’ with a fortune he had just inherited.

  Sarah brought Amber’s son into the front room and handed him to Clarice, who fed him from a bottle while Florence and Blanche looked on. In fact, ‘[t]hey all seemed confused, and appeared anxious that [Amber] should go away quickly’. But she was not put off so easily. Unusually for the unmarried mothers they dealt with, Amber was unwilling to hand over the £3 premium until the legal agreement was signed. When she ‘laid the agreement on the table’, John said, ‘What’s this? I don’t understand it’. Amber told him to read it. John replied, ‘I have no time to waste any longer’ and sent Florence outside to watch for the friends he was expecting.

  But the Makins were in a corner. John signed the agreement in the name of John Leslie, perhaps betraying his subconscious thoughts about the arrival of the mother to whom he was known as Mr Leslie. In the complicated life of the Makins, 27 June was the day they also adopted Agnes Todd’s baby. As soon as John realised he had signed the wrong name, he wrote his other alias, ‘Hill’, over the word ‘Leslie’. Amber signed the agreement as the parent and filled in some of the blank sections. John knew enough about the requirements of a legally binding contract to say that ‘he would call for the agreement, put stamps on it, and sign it properly, as he had signed it before the blanks were filled in’.

  Satisfied, Amber paid her £3 and gave Sarah some clothes for her baby son. John agreed to register the birth of her child and to give him a name while Sarah announced, ‘I have thought of a pretty name for your child. We will call it Horace Amber Murray as it is so near your own name’. When she kissed her son goodbye, Amber did not know it would be the last time she would see him. John reassured her he would visit on Saturday or Tuesday next when he planned to come in to town to buy a cow and would give Amber the family’s new address. Sarah crooned, ‘You have nothing to fear. You have given your child into good hands’.

  In the witness box, Amber identified the long white gown and the shirt that Baby D had been wearing when he was dug up. She recognised the gown because she had made it herself, while the shirt had been given to her by Mrs Patrick, her midwife. She also identified four other long gowns she had given to Sarah Makin on 27 June, telling the court that all the garments had been made by her ‘and she could identify’ her own sewing, including one item with one sleeve ‘shorter than the other’. Constable Joyce had recovered this clothing from a pawnshop in Waterloo where Daisy Makin had pawned it in the name of Mrs Wilson for 13 shillings.

  After her baby was adopted, the next time Amber saw John was on Thursday 30 June, the day after the Makins had moved into Burren Street. He called at 58 Brisbane Street, the home of Amber’s midwife, to announce that his family had moved to Hurstville. When Amber asked how her child was, John replied, ‘Oh, quite well . . . but it’s not your child now’. John promised to visit with the child on Saturday. Mrs Patrick suggested that she and Amber could visit them instead but John excused his family as being so upset by the move they would not be settled for six weeks.

  Mrs Patrick was the next witness called to give evidence. She recognised the babies’ clothing Amber had given the Makins, including a shirt she had made as a gift. Mrs Patrick then described the meeting between Amber and John on 30 June.

  But why did John not just disappear quietly from Amber Murray’s life after his move to Burren Street? It seems he was creating a bit of a charade, although the next stage of his performance would contain an unexpected change in the script. A lot of convincing
improvisation would be required.

  John had announced he had only come to sign the agreement. When Amber said she had given the papers back to her gentleman friend, he replied, ‘Oh, they are no use to you, my girl or to me either. The chap simply gave them to you so that you and the child would have no more claim on him’. Amber agreed with this astute assessment of her situation but she replied that her child ‘is not going to be slighted for all that’.

  John informed Amber that her baby was not well. He began by asking whether her son had had a rash before the Makins adopted him. Amber admitted he had suffered from thrush but was quite recovered by the time she handed him over. John then dropped his bombshell: ‘a rash came out on its face’ which made him think the child was suffering from ‘some disease from either the father or mother’. Mrs Patrick and Amber were quite shocked since John was referring to syphilis. Mrs Patrick hotly denied this could be the case, describing the baby ‘as clean at birth as a child could be’ when he was born. Amber offered to take her son to a doctor herself but John demurred: ‘My wife is a midwife and had fifteen children of her own . . . She knows all about children’. Unfortunately for John, Mrs Patrick was a bothersome woman with her own views. She put John on notice:

  I don’t hold with people adopting children, it is only a money making game and fancy for £3. I would not take the best child to adopt for £300. Had [my] husband been home from sea he would not have allowed it.

  John hung his head and confided his own little boy had died and he merely wanted Amber’s child to replace him and ‘keep his daughters in at night’. But his contrition did not convince Mrs Patrick, who recognised a shyster when she saw one. As John left, she said if anything happened to the child she would report it to the Coroner if Amber did not. She offered to take the baby back if his circumstances changed and asked for his address. But he refused to give it, saying he had forgotten. Although John promised to call every week to let Mrs Patrick see the child, a week later Mrs Patrick saw him in Oxford Street posting three letters ‘but he would not face her’.