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William Palmer | |
|---|---|
 William Palmer (drawing by Joseph Simpson, 1912) | |
| Born | (1824-08-06)6 August 1824 |
| Died | 14 June 1856(1856-06-14) (aged 31) Stafford Prison, England[1] |
| Cause of death | Execution by hanging |
| Occupation | Doctor |
| Spouse | Ann Palmer (m.1847–d.1854)[1] |
| Children | 5 + numerous illegitimates |
| Conviction | Murder |
| Criminal penalty | Death |
William Palmer (6 August 1824 – 14 June 1856), also known as theRugeley Poisoner or thePrince of Poisoners, was an English doctor andmurderer. Palmer was convicted for the 1855 murder of his friend John Cook, whom he had poisoned withstrychnine. He was also suspected of poisoning several other people including his brother and his mother-in-law, as well as four of his children. Palmer made large sums of money from the deaths of his wife and brother after collecting onlife insurance, and bydefrauding his wealthy mother.
Palmer washanged in public the year following his conviction.Charles Dickens called Palmer "the greatestvillain that ever stood in theOld Bailey".[2]
William Palmer was born inRugeley,Staffordshire, the sixth of eight children of Joseph and Sarah Palmer. His father worked as asawyer and died when William was aged 12, leaving Sarah with a legacy of £70,000.[1]
At age 17, Palmer worked as an apprentice at aLiverpool chemist, but was dismissed after three months following allegations of theft.[1] He studied medicine inLondon and qualified as aphysician in August 1846.[1] After returning to Staffordshire later that year, Palmer met plumber and glazier George Abley at the Lamb and Flagpublic house inLittle Haywood, and challenged him to a drinking contest.[1] Abley accepted, and an hour later was carried home, where he died in bed later that evening; nothing was ever proved, but locals noted that Palmer had an interest in Abley's attractive wife.[1]
Palmer returned to Rugeley to practise as a doctor and, in St. Nicholas Church,Abbots Bromley, married Ann Thornton (born 1827; also known as Brookes as her mother was the mistress of a Colonel Brookes) on 7 October 1847.[3][4][5] His mother-in-law, also called Ann Thornton, had inherited a fortune of £8,000 after Colonel Brookes committedsuicide in 1834. The elder Thornton died on 18 January 1849, two weeks after coming to stay with Palmer; she was known to have lent him money. An elderly Dr. Bamford recorded a verdict ofapoplexy. Palmer was disappointed with the inheritance he and his wife gained from the death, having expected it to be much greater.[1]
Palmer became interested inhorse racing and borrowed money from Leonard Bladen, a man he met at the races.[1] Bladen lent him £600, but died at Palmer's house on 10 May 1850.[1] Palmer's wife was surprised to find that Bladen died with little money on him despite having recently won a large sum at the races; his betting books were also missing, so there was no evidence of his having lent Palmer any money.[1] Bladen'sdeath certificate listed Palmer as "present at the death" and stated thecause of death as "injury of the hip joint, 5 or 6 months;abscess in the pelvis".[1]
Palmer's first son, William Brookes Palmer, was born towards the end of 1848[6] andchristened in January 1849.[7] He outlived his father, dying on 29 April 1926.[8] The Palmers had four more children, all of whom died in infancy. The cause of death for each child was listed as "convulsions":[1]
Asinfant mortality was not uncommon at the time, these deaths were not initially seen as suspicious, though after Palmer's conviction in 1856 there was speculation that he had administered poison to the children to avoid the expense of more mouths to feed.[1] By 1854 he was heavily in debt and resorting toforging his mother's signature to pay off creditors.[1] Palmer took outlife insurance on his wife with the Prince of Wales Insurance Company, and paid out a premium of £750 for a policy of £13,000.[1] Her death followed on 29 September 1854, at twenty-seven years old.[1] She was believed to have died ofcholera, as acholera pandemic was affecting theUnited Kingdom (causing 23,000 deaths across the country[9]) at the time.[1]
Still heavily in debt, with two creditors (to whom he owed £12,500 and £10,400[10]) threatening to speak to his mother and thereby expose hisfraud, Palmer attempted to take out life insurance on his brother Walter for the sum of £84,000.[1] Unable to find a company willing to insure him for such a sum, he instead returned to the Prince of Wales Insurance Company, paying out a premium of £780 for a policy of £14,000.[1] Walter, analcoholic, soon became reliant on his brother, who readily plied him with several bottles of gin and brandy a day; he died on 16 August 1855.[1][8] However, the insurance company refused to pay out Walter's policy and instead dispatched inspectors Simpson and Field to investigate. The pair found that Palmer had also been attempting to take out £10,000 worth of insurance on the life of George Bate, a farmer who was briefly under his employment.[1] They discovered that Bate was either misinformed or lying about the details of his insurance policy, and informed Palmer that the company would recommended a further inquiry into Walter's death.[1]
At about this time, Palmer was involved in an affair with his housemaid, Eliza Tharme.[11] On 26 or 27 June 1855, Tharme gave birth to Palmer's illegitimate son Alfred, thus increasing the doctor's financial burdens. With his life and debts spiralling out of control, Palmer planned the murder of his erstwhile friend John Cook.[1]
John Parsons Cook, a sickly young man with an inherited fortune of £12,000, was a friend of Palmer.[1] In November 1855, the pair attended theShrewsbury Handicap Stakes and bet on various horses between 13 and 15 November. Cook won £3,000 by betting on "Polestar";[1] Palmer lost heavily by betting instead on "the Chicken." Cook and Palmer had a celebration party at the Raven, a local drinking establishment.[1] Already on 14 November, Cook was complaining that his gin had burnt his throat; Palmer responded by making a scene in which he attempted to convince bemused onlookers that there was nothing untoward in Cook's glass.[1] Afterwards Cook fell violently ill and told two friends, George Herring and Ishmael Fisher, that, "I believe that damn Palmer has been dosing me."[1] On 15 November, Palmer and Cook returned to Rugeley, at which point Cook booked a room at the Talbot Arms.[citation needed]
Earlier on 14 November, Palmer had received a letter from a creditor named Pratt, who threatened to visit his mother and ask for his money if Palmer himself would not pay his debt soon.[1] The following day he bet heavily on a horse and lost.[1] Having seemingly recovered from his illness, Cook met with Palmer for a drink on 17 November and soon found himself sick once again.[1] At this point Palmer assumed responsibility for Cook; Cook'ssolicitor, Jeremiah Smith, sent over a bottle of gin, which Palmer had in his possession before he sent it.[1] Chambermaid Elizabeth Mills took a sip of the gin and subsequently fell ill; Cook was given the rest of the gin, and his vomiting became worse than ever.[1] The next day, Palmer began collecting bets on behalf of Cook, bringing home £1,200.[1] He then purchased three grains ofstrychnine from the surgery of Dr. Salt and put the grains into two pills, which he then administered to Cook.[1] On 21 November, not long after Palmer administered twoammonia pills, Cook died in agony at about 1:00 am, screaming that he was suffocating.[1]
On 23 November, William Stevens, Cook's stepfather, arrived to represent the family.[1] Palmer informed him the deceased had lost his betting books, which he further claimed were of no use as all bets were cancelled once the gambler had died; he also told Stevens that Cook had £4,000 in outstanding bills.[1] Stevens requested aninquest, which was granted.[1] Meanwhile, Palmer obtained adeath certificate from 80-year-old Dr. Bamford, which listed the cause of death as "apoplexy."[1]
Apost-mortem examination of Cook's body took place at the Talbot Arms on 26 November, carried out by medical student Charles Devonshire and assistant Charles Newton, and overseen by Dr. Harland and numerous other onlookers.[1] Newton was drunk, and Palmer himself interfered with the examination, bumping into Newton and taking the stomach contents off in a jar for "safekeeping."[1] The jars were sent off toAlfred Swaine Taylor, who complained that such poor quality samples were of no use to him, and a second post-mortem took place on 29 November.[1]Postmaster Samuel Cheshire intercepted letters addressed to thecoroner on behalf of Palmer; Cheshire was laterprosecuted for interfering with the mail and imprisoned for two years.[1] Palmer also wrote to the coroner himself, requesting that the verdict of death be given asnatural causes, enclosing in his letter a £10 note.[1]
Taylor found no evidence of poison, but still stated that it was his belief that Cook had been poisoned.[1] The jury at the inquest delivered their verdict on 15 December, stating that the "Deceased died of poison wilfully administered to him by William Palmer"; at the time, this verdict could be legally handed down at an inquest.[1]
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Palmer was arrested on the charge of murder and forgery, and was detained atStafford Gaol; he threatened to go onhunger strike, but backed down when thegovernor informed him that this would lead to his beingforce fed.[1]
AnAct of Parliament (theCentral Criminal Court Act 1856) was passed to allow Palmer's trial to be held at theOld Bailey in London, as it was felt that a fairjury could not be found in Staffordshire, where detailed accounts of the case had been printed by local newspapers.[1] However, an alternative hypothesis is that Palmer was a popular figure in Rugeley and would not have been found guilty by a Staffordshire jury: the implication being that the trial location was moved for political reasons so as to secure a guilty verdict.Lord Chief Justice Campbell, the senior judge at Palmer's trial, suggested in his autobiography that, had Palmer been tried atStaffordAssizes, he would have been found not guilty.[12] TheHome Secretary also ordered that the bodies of Ann and Walter Palmer be exhumed and re-examined; Walter was too badlydecomposed, though Dr. Taylor foundantimony in all the organs in Ann's body.[1]
Palmer'sdefence was led by MrSerjeantWilliam Shee.[13] Their case suffered adverse comment from the judge because Shee had, against all rules and conventions of professional conduct, told the jury that he personally believed Palmer to be innocent.[14] The prosecution team ofAlexander Cockburn andJohn Walter Huddleston possessed fine forensic minds and proved forceful advocates, especially in demolishing the testimony of defence witness Jeremiah Smith, who had insisted that he had no knowledge of Palmer's taking out life insurance on his brother, despite Smith's signature being on the form.[1] Palmer expressed his admiration for Cockburn'scross-examination after the verdict through the racing metaphor, "It was the riding that did it."[15]
Circumstantial evidence came to light:
Palmer's financial situation was also explained, with Pratt telling the court he lent money to the accused at 60%interest, and bank manager Mr Stawbridge confirming that Palmer's bank balance had stood at £9 on 3 November 1855.[1]
The cause of Cook's death was hotly disputed, with each side bringing out medical witnesses. Few witnesses actually had any experience in human cases of strychnine poisoning, and their testimony would have been considered weak by 21st-century standards.[1]
The prosecution had the last word, and an image was painted of Palmer as a man desperately in need of money in order to avoiddebtors' prison, who murdered his friend for his money and who had covered his tracks by sabotaging the post-mortem.[1] The jury deliberated for just over an hour before returning a verdict of guilty.[1] Lord Campbellsentenced Palmer to death, to no reaction from Palmer.[1]
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Approximately 30,000 people were at Stafford Gaol on 14 June 1856 to see Palmer'spublic hanging by executionerGeorge Smith.[16] As he stepped onto thegallows, Palmer is said to have looked at the trapdoor and exclaimed, "Are you sure it's safe?"[17]
The prison governor asked Palmer to confess his guilt before the end, which resulted in the following exchange of words:[1]
Palmer was buried beside the prison chapel in a grave filled withquicklime. After he was hanged his mother is said to have commented: "They have hanged my saintly Billy."[18] Shortly after the execution, a newspaper reported:
Some scholars believe that the evidence should not have been enough to convict Palmer, and that the summing up of the judge was prejudicial.[20] On 20 May 1946, the StaffordshireSentinel published a final piece of evidence not included in the trial, found by Mrs E. Smith, widow of the former coroner for South West London; it was a prescription foropium written in Palmer's handwriting, on the reverse of which was a chemist's bill for 10d worth of strychnine and opium.[1]
A waxeffigy of Palmer was displayed in theChamber of Horrors at Madame Tussaud's waxwork museum from 1857 until 1979.[21]
In theSherlock Holmes short story "The Adventure of the Speckled Band" (1892) referring to the villain who is a doctor, Holmes tells Watson that when a doctor goes bad he is "the first of criminals," then mentions Palmer andEdward William Pritchard as examples.[22]
The incident involving Palmer at the autopsy of Cook is glancingly referred to inDorothy L. Sayers's 1928 murder mystery novelThe Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club.[23]
William Palmer was portrayed by actorJay Novello on theCBS radio seriesCrime Classics in the 7 October 1953 episode entitled "The Hangman and William Palmer, Who Won?"[24]
Robert Graves's final historical novel,They Hanged My Saintly Billy (1957), defends Palmer, offering Graves's trademark "reconstruction of a damaged or maligned reputation" (p. xxv).[25]
The filmThe Life and Crimes of William Palmer was released in 1998, withKeith Allen playing the part of Palmer.[26]
{{cite book}}:External link in|via=However another version is that he was very popular and would not have been found guilty had he been tried locally. Lord Justice Campbell who was the senior judge at Palmer's trial suggested in his autobiography that, had Palmer been tried at Stafford Assizes, he would have been found not guilty. This contradicts the stories in the press that the trial was switched to London because in Staffordshire people were so biased against Palmer that he would have automatically been found guilty.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: publisher location (link)
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