CHAPTER 6

Murder in Shoreditch? 1923

She was a good woman and did not deserve it.

In August 1923, Edith Emms, a 37-year-old waitress, was facing a life-changing dilemma. She wondered whether she should return to her estranged husband. She explained this to Thomas Allan, a regular at Gillman’s cafe on Lamb Conduit Street, in which she worked. ‘I have heard from my husband Jack, he’s coming home. I don’t know what I am going to do, whether to go back with him or not.’

Although the couple had a son, John, aged 17 who was an invalid, resident in Folkestone, she was not necessarily better off living with her husband. John Emms was born in about 1882 and his stated occupation was as a driver. They had married in 1905 and separated seven years later. Shortly afterwards, he went to Australia in order to better himself. Yet he fell into crime there and was sent to prison in Melbourne for burglary in 1914. Four years later he was in jail again, this time for four years, for theft and for receiving stolen goods. He was released in 1922 and returned to his mother’s house in Bethnal Green in the summer of the following year. When he was in Australia, he had corresponded with his wife, but they had ceased to communicate with each other in 1920.

Yet he now seemed a more attractive proposition. He had at least £400 with him, very possibly made by illegal means. Furthermore, he knew how to turn on the charm when he had to. He appeared to Edith to be a different man and he promised to treat her differently. They would buy a business together and start anew. Edith was also given a neck chain and jewellery. The two began to live together; perhaps a fatal decision.

They opened a small restaurant/coffee house at Hackney Road in Shoreditch on 28 September 1923, having paid £250 for it. Elizabeth Hitch, a 28-year-old kitchen maid, was employed at £1 per week. They also had two paying lodgers, both single men. These were Arthur Casseltine, a 27-year-old music hall attendant at the Poplar Hippodrome, and Arthur Fowler, a 30-year-old tailor’s assistant who worked in Hackney Road. Between them, they paid 35s a week in rent.