Chapter 40

Other Murders and Foul Deeds

Various Dates

In addition to the crimes mentioned in the previous chapters of this book, other murders and foul deeds took place within the confines of Chelsea and Kensington. These stories are covered here in chronological order.

(1) Fanny Young, 1863

Fanny, who was not yet nineteen years of age, was in service to Arthur Buller and his family, in Kensington. She had worked for them for eight months and was highly regarded by the family.

As Fanny’s stay progressed, the family could not help but notice that Fanny appeared to be putting on a good deal of weight. More specifically, that weight seemed to be concentrated around the stomach region but, when questioned, she denied that she was pregnant.

One day in November, Fanny’s new weight suddenly vanished overnight. Suspicious of this, the family made a search of the house and, in a drawer in Fanny’s bedroom, the body of a child was discovered, wrapped in a napkin.

At both the subsequent magistrates’ court and the coroner’s court, Fanny was found guilty of murder. However, the Grand Jury overturned both verdicts and when Fanny appeared at the Old Bailey, before Mr Justice Blackburn, on 14 December, the charge had been reduced to one of concealing the birth of her illegitimate child. Originally she pleaded not guilty but her counsel, Mr Ribton, informed the judge that he was unable to argue against the charge. It was tantamount to the defence council saying that his client was guilty. After some discussion, Fanny changed her plea to guilty whereupon sentence was deferred until the next session of the court. Eventually, Fanny was to escape prison altogether, the State believing that she had already suffered enough.

(2) The murder of Mary Ann Walsh, 1881

Mary’s body was found in the front garden of 162 King’s Road, Chelsea on a Wednesday in mid-February, 1881. There were signs that she had been strangled.

A subsequent post-mortem examination by Dr Pearce of Markham Square showed that there were finger marks on Mary’s neck, and she had also been struck a number of times about the head and shoulders, but the direct cause of death was exposure. She had been attacked on a particularly cold night, rendered unconscious and left to die in the cold. It was, nevertheless, a case of murder.

The inquest was held at the Hope Tavern, in Arthur Street, Chelsea, before Dr Diplock. As expected, the verdict was ‘murder by person or persons unknown’.

(3) The murder of Ernest Castelein, 1945

Ernest Castelein was a native of Belgium and quite an accomplished artist. He had exhibited in his own country and now operated from a studio in Cromwell Road, Kensington.

On Wednesday, 25 July 1945, a nurse walking past the studio heard a deep groaning. She telephoned the police who broke into the building and found Ernest lying on the floor. He had been badly beaten and was rushed to hospital in Wimbledon. Ernest never recovered consciousness and died from his injuries on Monday, 30 July.

A thorough police investigation by Scotland Yard included speaking to all taxi-drivers, who may have picked up a fare early on the morning of 25 July. This led to a description of a tall man, who had been seen in the vicinity of Gloucester Road and Cromwell Road in the early hours of that Wednesday. Unfortunately, witnesses were unable to say whether or not the man had been a soldier or a civilian and, with so little to go on, the investigation soon ran out of steam. The attacker was never traced and the murder remains unsolved.

(4) The murder of Violet McGrath, 1954

On the morning of Sunday, 9 May 1954, the body of sixty-fouryear-old Violet McGrath was found in her flat in Onslow Square, Kensington. She had been battered and strangled to death, and a trail of blood led from behind the front door, implying that was where the attack had started. It also suggested that the killer may well have been known to Violet and that she had been attacked, as she was letting him out of the flat.

A neighbour told police that he had heard a dull thud coming from next door, at about noon, which narrowed down the time of the attack, but no witness could be found who had seen anyone leaving the house at that time, or shortly afterwards.

A possible motive for the crime was soon discovered. A couple of days before she had died, Violet had withdrawn a large amount of cash, and no trace of this was found inside her home, suggesting that robbery may have been the motive.

Despite the fact that when her body was found, Violet was lying next to a magazine containing an article on fingerprints, no trace of her killer was ever found.

(5) The murder of Countess Teresa Lubienska, 1957

Teresa Lubienska was a war heroine. She had been held in Ravensbruck concentration camp, where she tried her best to comfort her fellow prisoners. For that reason she was given the nickname the Angel of Ravensbruck.

On the night of 24 May 1957, Teresa went to a friend’s house in Ealing, for a meal. Leaving late at night, to return to her house in Cornwall Gardens, she was accompanied onto the underground by a Catholic priest, who had also been at the meal. The priest alighted at Earl’s Court. Teresa travelled on to Gloucester Road station, where she got off the train at 10.19pm. Minutes later, Teresa staggered into the lift, bleeding badly from five stab wounds in her chest. She was only able to shout, ‘Bandits! Bandits!’

Teresa died from her wounds in the ambulance taking her to hospital. Some sources have suggested that she was merely the victim of a mugging but that is unlikely as her handbag was found in the lift, and she still wore a valuable brooch on her lapel. Perhaps a better suggestion is that she was deliberately targeted, as she had been a vociferous opponent of the communist Polish government.

The investigation into Teresa’s death lasted for more than four years and thousands of statements were taken. None of it ever brought the police closer to arresting the culprit.

(6) Archibald Thompson Hall, 1977

Archibald Hall, who also used the alias Roy Fontaine, was a butler, with a lucrative sideline in theft. Hall’s routine was to take a position in a high-class household, usually forging his own references in order to obtain employment, and then steal what he could before moving on. He was also adept at forging signatures and often used that skill to take money from his employer’s bank accounts. This life of crime led to various prison sentences but, upon his release, Hall would always return to his criminal ways.

In November 1977, Hall obtained a position as butler to a retired Labour member of parliament, Walter Scott-Elliott and his wife, Dorothy, at their flat at 22 Richmond Court, Sloane Street, Kensington. The Scott-Elliott’s were an extremely rich family with houses in France and Italy. Their London home was crammed with valuable antiques and collectibles and Hall decided that they were perfect targets. Walter was, by this time, rather senile and his wife was suffering from acute arthritis.

In order to steal as much as possible, Hall decided he needed some assistance. He contacted an old ex-girlfriend, Mary Coggle and she, in turn, suggested a friend of hers, a petty crook named Michael Kitto. The three decided to work together to steal as much as possible from the Scott-Elliotts.

In December 1977, Dorothy Scott-Elliott spent some time in hospital. This was the perfect time to rob the flat and, on 8 December, Hall invited Kitto into the flat to determine what they would take. As Kitto was being taken on his conducted tour, he and Hall walked into Dorothy Scott-Elliott’s bedroom. Unfortunately for them, she had been released early from hospital, and demanded to know what they were doing in her room. Hall silenced her by smothering her with a pillow.

Walter Scott-Elliott was in his own bedroom and shouted out, asking what the commotion was. Hall went into his room, told him that his wife had been having a nightmare, but was now fine. Walter accepted this and went back to sleep.

Dorothy’s body had to be disposed of, but Walter couldn’t be left in the house by himself. The solution was to engage the services of Mary Coggle, who dressed up as Dorothy and wore a wig and the dead woman’s fur coat. Dorothy’s body was then placed into the boot of the family car and Hall then drove it up to Scotland. Walter was drugged and didn’t even realise that the woman sitting in the car next to him was not in fact his wife.

Near Loch Earn, Dorothy’s body was thrown into a stream. Hall then drove Walter to a hideout in Cumbria, before he and Kitto returned to Sloane Street, and ransacked the flat. They then returned to Cumbria, collected Walter, took him back to Scotland and strangled him. When he did not die immediately, Hall battered him to death using a spade. His body was then buried in a shallow grave.

Hall’s problems were still not over, however. Mary Coggle had taken a liking to Dorothy’s fur coats and insisted on keeping them for herself. Hall and Kitto wished to sell them. The solution was obvious. Mary was smothered to death with a plastic bag and her body thrown into a stream.

Still the murders were not at an end. Over Christmas, Hall and Kitto stayed with Hall’s brother, Donald. After enjoying his hospitality, Hall killed his brother mainly because, as he was to say later, he had never really liked him.

Once again, the plan was to dispose of Donald Hall’s body in Scotland. On the way north, Hall and Kitto stayed at a hotel in North Berwick, where they changed the number plates on their car, just in case any potential witnesses should spot them driving north. Unfortunately, on the way to dispose of the body, Hall and Kitto were stopped at a routine police checkpoint, where it was revealed that the number plates did not match the make of car.

Arrested, Hall made a full confession to the police, also admitting an earlier murder where he had killed an associate and buried his body in the bed of a stream in Scotland. In all, he was now admitting to five murders, two in Scotland, two in Cumbria and one in Kensington. Tried in Edinburgh, both Hall and Kitto were sentenced to life imprisonment.