On Tuesday 20 December, Crabtree appeared at the Town Hall charged with his father’s murder. After all the evidence had been heard Walter told the magistrate that he had been advised not to say anything. He pleaded not guilty, but the weight of evidence against him was too strong and he was committed for trial at the Leeds Assizes.
Halifax Town Hall, where Walter Crabtree reported that his father had been murdered.
Walter Crabtree appeared at the Leeds Assizes on Wednesday, 29 March 1871 and told the court that he was not guilty. The judge, Mr Baron Cleasby, listened carefully to the evidence from the prosecution team of Mr Shaw and Mr Thornber. Crabtree appeared calm throughout most of the proceedings, but once again broke down when his younger brother gave evidence. Samuel told the court from the witness box that he shared a bed with his father and had gone to bed early, and so had no idea what time his father had retired. He broke down and cried as he described waking up to find his father being beaten over the head by a man in the bedroom. When he identified his brother as the murderer, he once more began to cry and for a short while was unable to continue with his evidence. George then took the stand and described how he had retired early, only to be woken when he felt Walter stir. Previously, he had described being woken up by Samuel’s screams and rushing into his father’s bedroom, where he saw Walter and had heard Samuel’s accusation. Now he stated that as he awoke in the darkness he heard rustling, as if someone was getting dressed, and said, ‘What’s the matter?’ and Walter had replied, ‘I don’t know.’ He also stated that he had heard the noise of someone going downstairs at the same time, just after hearing the screams coming from his father’s bedroom. He told the court that he had heard Samuel saying, ‘Kate says it’s Walter, but it wasn’t Walter.’ The judge asked him, ‘Are you saying that Samuel kept saying that it was Walter; but it wasn’t?’ The witness replied, ‘Yes, my Lord.’
He explained how the door on Gills Court was usually kept closed and locked, but on the night of the murder so many people had been coming in and going out that he had jammed the door open. He also explained that the same door, when it was fully opened, covered the entrance into the cellar. He said that he had heard the outer door slam when Walter and the policeman had gone to fetch the surgeon. Cross-examined by Mr Waddy, for the prosecution, he confirmed that up until the day of the murder his father and Walter had always been on good terms. He stated that, ‘My father was a kind, good father to me and Walter. There was never a quarrel and I have never heard of my brother being on the liquor or misbehaving himself in any way.’
Kate Byrne told the court that she was startled awake by the sound of screaming and she immediately ran to the door of her master’s bedroom, where she met Walter before he went downstairs to open the door to PC Wilson, and that in his absence she had said to Samuel that someone in the house must have murdered his father, for no one else could have done it.
The surgeon, Dr Hodgson Wright, stated that the deceased was found lying on his back on the bed and that the pillow underneath him was saturated with blood. He stated that he saw several wounds at the back of his head, which might have been caused by an instrument such as the poker, and confirmed that these wounds were the cause of death.
For the prosecution, Mr Shaw stated that the defence of the prisoner was based on the allegation that someone else had entered the house that night; he pointed out that PC George Wilson saw no one leave the house. The door from Gills Court had been locked and bolted and Sergeant Potterton had searched the house from top to bottom and found no one hiding there. Mr Shaw pointed out that the actions of the prisoner after the murder did not point to his innocence. He requested the jury take no notice of the fact that the prisoner was related to the deceased, as it did not have any bearing on their deliberations, but to treat the case as if no such relationship existed.
Mr Waddy defended his client by simply stating that, ‘There was absolutely no evidence of any motive for the crime. Indeed, the prisoner had been an exemplary character and he had been on good, kind terms with his father.’ He reminded them of the contradictory statement made by the youngest son and excused his confused state to being woken in such a manner. George admitted waking and hearing his brother putting on his clothes, which suggested that Walter had also heard the screams of his little brother and was dressing to investigate the matter. Mr Waddy reiterated that George had heard footsteps going down the stairs at the same time he heard his brother dressing.
The witness box at Leeds assizes, where ten-year-old Samuel Crabtree gave evidence against his brother.
The defence suggested that a burglar had secreted himself in the cellar earlier in the day with the intention of stealing what he could when the household retired. George had admitted that the door to Gills Court had been left open earlier that evening. It could have been that the burglar heard PC Wilson pounding heavily on the door to Gills Court and returned to the cellar, making his escape when they were all in the upstairs bedroom. Upon conclusion, Mr Shaw stated that there was absolutely nothing linking Walter to this crime. At the end of his speech there was considerable applause in court but this was instantly suppressed by the judge. His Lordship then proceeded to sum up the evidence and he carefully laid the two theories set up by the prosecution and the defence before the jury and called attention to the complete lack of motive for the crime. The jury retired to consider their verdict at 7.35 p.m. and ten minutes later returned back into the court. The foreman announced that they had found the prisoner not guilty.
CASE ELEVEN 1872
SAVED BY A
THICK
OVERCOAT
* * *
Suspect: James Whitehead
Age: Fifty
Charge: Attempted Murder
Sentence: Penal Servitude
* * *
The firm of Messrs James Akroyd & Sons Ltd of Haley Hill had long been recognised in Halifax as a worsted spinner’s manufacturer, and was established by James Akroyd in 1840. As the business prospered, the family became so influential in the town that Colonel Edward Akroyd soon founded the local industrial village of Akroyden, built by architect George Gilbert Scott in 1859. This was a model village of gothic terraced houses that he built for the people he employed, and which was soon followed by another similar village built at Copley.
Akroyden, the industrial village built by Colonel E. Akroyd in 1859.
Akroyd Park, 1908.
Colonel Akroyd lived in a mansion known as Bankfield House (now Bankfield Museum), and on his death in 1887 he left it to the people of Halifax for a nominal cost of £6,000. The house and surrounding parkland became known as Akroyd Park, in memory of its benefactor, and is a popular location with the people of Halifax today.
The company of Akroyd & Sons Ltd employed about 4,000 employees in the different departments at their works on Haley Hill, and such was its esteem that the factory was visited by the future Edward VII after he had officially opened the Town Hall in Halifax in 1863. In 1872, the firm was flourishing and it was Colonel Akroyd who appointed his wife’s nephew, Mr John Edward Champney, as a partner in the company. Mr Champney played an active role in the firm, as well as being a local magistrate who lived at Northowram.
On Friday, 15 November 1872, Mr Champney left the house at Bankfield, where he usually had lunch with his aunt and uncle. As he was going through the gates of the works he saw James Whitehead on the opposite side of the road. Whitehead, aged fifty, had been employed as a supervisor at the Haley Hill mill for many years but had been dismissed for drunken behaviour the previous year. After being out of work for some time he had approached Mr Champney to ask for his job back and been re-instated as a loom weaver. However, it was not long before his reliability was again compromised when, on 24 October 1872, he refused to follow instructions and he was once more dismissed.
In November 1872, Mr Champney was on holiday with his family and the mill was being run by another manager, who found it necessary to dismiss another man working at the mill name
d John Gray – Whitehead’s brother-in-law. It had been announced that Gray was under investigation and as a result, and in order to escape the inquiries, Gray was allowed to hand in his notice. After his dismissal, Gray died, although no reason was given for his demise. Whatever the cause, Whitehead attached the blame for both his and his relative’s dismissal on Mr Champney and began to plot his revenge.
So when Mr Champney saw Whitehead on the afternoon of 15 November, he wished to avoid him and continued to walk down Haley Hill, not knowing that Whitehead was following him. Champney called in at the schoolroom attached to the works and when he emerged at 3.30 p.m. he saw Whitehead once again. Champney then went into the works’ weaving shed, where 700 people were employed, and continued to conduct business until 5 p.m. He spoke to one of the supervisors and told him that if Whitehead wanted some work to employ him again on one of the looms. When he came out of the works he walked towards Cross Hill. After walking for only a short distance he heard a shot behind him and felt a heavy blow behind his left shoulder blade. When he looked back he saw Whitehead about three yards away holding a pistol, and as he turned he felt another blow on his back. In anger, Champney turned and struck out at Whitehead, hitting him on the side of his head with his umbrella, the handle of which broke from the force of the blow. Fearing that Whitehead was once more going to shoot him, Champney quickly made his way back to the office of the works, where he saw Mr Stansfield and told him that he had been fired at. Mr Bramley, a surgeon, was sent for and, upon examining Champney, found two bullets – which had been fashioned out of a piece of iron from a weaving rod – trapped between his braces and his waistcoat. As he removed his outer coat and inner jacket the first bullet fell to the floor. The second bullet, which had just penetrated the skin, was removed by Mr Bramley, before he dressed Champney’s wounds. Whitehead was quickly arrested and taken to the Town Hall.
Bankfield House, now Bankfield Museum.
* * *
‘he heard a shot behind him’
* * *
A typical weaving mill in Halifax similar to the one owned by Messrs J. Akroyd & Sons on Haley Hill where James Whitehead had been employed.
The following day, Whitehead was brought into the Halifax Borough Court and charged with the shooting and attempted murder of Mr Champney. The prisoner was asked how he pleaded, to which he stated that he was not guilty. The Chief Constable, Mr Clarkson, outlined the case before the magistrate, who ordered that Whitehead was to be remanded until Tuesday 19 November.
While in court, Champney told of Whitehead’s dismissal, feeling the bullets on his back and how he had struck the prisoner over the head. Another witness, a man named Thomas Best, stated that Whitehead had been seen near the door of the weaving shed between 3 p.m. and 4 p.m., and that he had noticed that the prisoner seemed a bit worse for wear. He had spoken to Whitehead and asked him what he was up to, to which Whitehead replied he was there to kill Champney. Another witness, Thomas Parker, stated that he was coming home from the mill at 5.10 p.m. Just as he was passing the Coach and Horse Inn on Haley Hill he spotted Whitehead standing near to Mr Champney, just before the latter hit him over the head with his umbrella. Sergeant Turner took the stand next and described how he had arrested Whitehead. He could see that he had been drinking and after charging him, asked him if he fully understood what he was being charged with. Whitehead told him that he did and that it was alright.
The magistrates consulted with each other before summing up the case for the jury. They took only a short time for deliberation before Whitehead was found guilty and committed to take his trial at the next assizes.
On Friday, 6 December 1872, Whitehead was brought before the Leeds Assizes. He was undefended, and the prosecution was undertaken by Mr Waddy and Mr Wavell. Mr Waddy told the court that the prosecution had been promoted by the directors of the company of J. Akroyd & Son Ltd on a charge of attempted murder. He also told the jury that there could be no doubt about the premeditation of the action taken by the prisoner. Mr Waddy stated that when charged with the offence, Whitehead had again confirmed this statement in a cell at the Halifax police station. The home-made bullet was then produced for the court and it still had a portion of the cloth from the victim’s overcoat attached to it. Mr Waddy categorically stated that only the thickness of the overcoat had stopped the wounds from being more serious. The coat was shown to the court and both bullet holes were clearly visible. In his defence, Whitehead asked Mr Champney if he was certain that it had been himself who had fired the gun that evening, as it had been quite dark and that the street light had been behind him, but Mr Champney stated with absolute certainty that it was Whitehead who had fired the pistol.
Next to take the stand was Thomas Best, who, when asked if Whitehead had been sober when he spoke to him, told the court that Whitehead had been very drunk but seemed determined to carry out his intentions. He was then asked why he hadn’t alerted Mr Champney to the threat and he replied that he thought Whitehead was too drunk to carry it out. The other witness, Thomas Parker, also gave his account, stating that Whitehead had been waiting for Mr Champney. He had advised him to come back in the morning but Whitehead had just shaken his head.
Inspector John Helliwell Thompson of the Halifax police stated that a member of the Watch Committee, Mr Kershaw, had talked to Whitehead in his cell on the day after his arrest. He told Whitehead that he was sorry to see him there and asked why he had done it and he told him that, ‘He had sacked John Gray and he sacked me.’ The surgeon gave evidence regarding the wounds he had found on Mr Champney and said that had the bullets penetrated a quarter of an inch deeper the results would have been fatal. Whitehead was asked if he wished to ask any of the witnesses any questions, but he declined. The judge summed up for the jury, who returned a verdict of guilty. The judge then told the prisoner:
You appear to be a very desperate man and the only way of accounting for your actions was that you had been drinking. As such, I can only conclude that you had lost your reason and all that lifts a man to be something higher than a mere brute. Now you have reduced yourself to the condition of having shot at a fellow creature with the intent to kill him; and it was only providential circumstances that saved the intended victim’s life.
Offering no clemency or mercy to the prisoner, he ordered that he be sentenced to fifteen years penal servitude.
CASE TWELVE 1889
‘ACTING
LIKE JACK
THE RIPPER’
* * *
Suspect: Frederick Brett
Age: Forty-two
Charge: Murder
Sentence: Executed
* * *
In October 1889, the Jack the Ripper murders were still being widely talked about throughout England. There is little doubt that the story of the gruesome murders affected many people who read them. One was a man called Frederick Brett, from Halifax, who attributed the murder of his wife to the impact that Jack the Ripper had on him.
It seems that Frederick Brett, aged forty-two, and his wife Margaret, aged thirty-eight, had gone to Halifax in the latter part of July 1889 to work on the Halifax High Level Railway. The life of railway navvies and their wives were difficult, and many had to live in huts and sheds erected near to the place where they would be working. Brett was slightly luckier than some of his comrades because he had been in the Army Reserve Corp and had received a small pension. Within a matter of weeks he had given up the life of a navvy, due to allegations that his wife was too free with other men, and had obtained another position working at a brickyard at Elland. The couple had also managed to get lodgings at Gibbet Street, Halifax, in the home of Mr James Hindley.
Sunday, 20 October 1889, started as a normal day for Margaret and Frederick. Relations between the couple had steadily been getting worse, as Frederick’s increasing bouts of jealousy resulted in rows and arguments. According to their landlord, they had returned from the pub about 11.30 p.m. the night before and Brett had said to his wife, ‘Maggie, you seem
to treat me so lightly, if you don’t want me, say so and let me go at once.’ She told him to shut up and the next thing he heard was the couple going upstairs to bed.
Despite the fact that they had only been married a couple of years, Margaret and Frederick’s days started, all too frequently, with a row, resulting in the pair being incredibly sulky and barely speaking to one another over breakfast, and this Sunday was no different. However, by noon Brett had agreed to go to the pub to fetch a quart of beer for them to share with their lunch. After lunch he asked Margaret to go to the pub again for two more quarts of beer. At first she refused but, finally, to placate him she went, although when she returned she refused to drink any of it. By about 3 p.m., Brett had finished off all the beer and his wife decided to go out, but he wouldn’t let her go and in a temper he pushed her towards the bottom of the stairs, telling her to go to the bedroom and that he would follow her up. A few minutes later, the landlord heard screams and Margaret crying out. On reaching the bedroom, he found Margaret on the bed with blood pouring from a wound in her throat and Brett on top of her with an open pocket knife in his hand. Hindley recognised the knife as his own and pulled at Brett to try to get him off his wife. Brett stood up with the bloodstained knife in his hand and turned towards Hindley. The old man backed away, missed his footing and fell down the stairs. After making his way to the front door, Hindley raised the alarm before going to find a policeman.
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