An Illustrated History of Old Sutton in St.Helens
Part 24 (of 34) - Notorious and Curious Sutton Crimes
a) Murder & Suicide On A Train | b) Irish Terrorism in Suttonc) Midnight Coup In Lancashire | d) 'Indecent Behaviour' In A Churchyard
e) Two Candidates For The Ragged School | f) Trouble at Rolling Mill
g) The Raid on the Sutton 'Tossers' | h) The Drunken Hearse Driver
i) The Shooting of a Bold Poacher | j) The Great Railway Robbery
Header image: Bobby and locals posing for the camera in Junction Lane c.1900
a) Murder and Suicide on a Train
'Murder and Suicide' was the headline in The Times' edition of September 23rd, 1871, which was followed on the 25th and 30th of that month with lengthy reports of the witness statements that were made at the coroner's inquest. The reports revealed how 33-year-old unemployed surveyor, Robert Wanless of Sutton, had shot his wife Ann in the temple whilst the pair were travelling on the Liverpool train. After killing his wife in cold blood, he then put the revolver into his mouth and pulled the trigger.
Porter Patrick Tracy told the coroner's inquest that when the train stopped at Kirkby station he opened the carriage door because he was going to "put his missus" on the train. His attention was also directed to powder smoke which he could see through the window and upon entering the compartment discovered the couple lying motionless on the floor. He thought Wanless was asleep so he decided to give him "a blow on his back, and I told him to rouse up". After realising that they were both dead, Liverpool was telegraphed and the police and a doctor met the train at Exchange Station in Tithebarn Street (closed 1977).
The coroner's jury decided that Robert Wanless had shot his wife and himself while in a state of "unsound mind, caused by jealousy, family difficulties, and blighted propects". The jury also called for a "means of communication" in every train after Thomas Young reported that he wasn't able to contact the guard after hearing the shots. Witnesses also testified that Wanless was a drunken brute, obsessed with the notion that his wife was seeing another man. Three children were orphaned by his actions.
b) Irish Terrorism in Sutton
On November 16th, 1868 William Gladstone (1809 – 1898) was just days away from beginning the first of his four spells as British prime minister and ended his parliamentary election campaign at the Volunteer Hall in St.Helens. Prophetically he warned a crowd of about 2,000 people that "dangerous discontent" existed in Ireland. Fifteen years later, during Gladstone's second period as prime minister, Sutton became embroiled in a nationwide terrorism scare which The Times newspaper reported as a "very grave" Fenian plot. It seems that the police in Liverpool had received intelligence that explosives were being sent over from Ireland. So on March 20th, 1883 they arrested Denis Deasy, an Irish man who had disembarked from a steamer from Cork with a "package of nitro-glycerine in his possession, and with the constituent parts of one or more infernal machines".
On March 31 and then April 7th, Flannigan and Deasy were brought before Liverpool magistrate Mr. Raffles to face charges of possessing "certain dangerous explosive substances."
Earlier in the year a gasometer in Glasgow had been blown up and there'd also been an explosion outside an office of the Times in London, so there was considerable tension. The Times published an article on April 7th under the heading 'The Discoveries of Explosives' which rather intemperately blamed the "dynamite plot" on the "scum of the London Irish at the bidding of American emissaries". The article explained that "the conspirators have taken lodgings in quiet places". Sutton in 1883 was at its industrial peak and not exactly "quiet", but still not bad cover for a sleeper member of a terrorist cell!
The Times report of the first day of the trial from 8/8/1883
Patrick Flanagan, Denis Deasy, Timothy Fetherstone, Henry Dalton and Daniel O'Herlihy were charged with levying "war against Her Majesty" and on August 10th 1883 after a three day trial were found guilty and sentenced to penal servitude for life.
c) 'Midnight Coup in Lancashire'
They also raided Pilkington's stores at Ravenhead and attempted without success to break into the explosive stores of the Greengate Brick & Tile Company in Thatto Heath. Lea Green railway guard Gus Jenkinson was on his way home from work when he disturbed the raiders and was held at gunpoint for an hour until they fled empty handed after failing to penetrate the store's iron doors.
Just what the purpose of the raids was, we shall probably never know, as the British Army were in the process of evacuating from Ireland as a result of the Anglo-Irish Treaty. By June 1922 armed confrontations were taking place between those in favour and those against the terms of the agreement with the British, namely the exclusion of Northern Ireland from the newly-created Irish Free State. Soon Ireland would be plunged into civil war, so perhaps the explosives went across the Irish Sea to be used in the deadly internecine conflict that led to the loss of so many lives.
d) 'Indecent Behaviour' in a Churchyard
Newspapers reported that Vallancey was fined £2 by magistrates for brawling and was also alleged to have threatened a man called Joseph Wright with a revolver, saying "I'll shoot you, I'll shoot you". The Times in their three reports ( pub.19/8/1896, 19/1/1897, 29/4/1897) added that the cleric had also torn flowers from the grave and then had "danced on it".
An unrepentant Rev. Vallancey unsuccessfully appealed against his court conviction. One of the grounds for the appeal was that if a clergyman was convicted of such conduct, his parishioners might be deprived of his clerical services. The appellant judge Justice Wright quipped that in this particular case "they would also be deprived of his revolver" !
A year after the original incident, Vallancey was brought before a church Consistory Court to face the ecclesiastical music. The presiding Chancellor criticised the cleric for continuing to deny the allegations and suspended him from ministering for eighteen months. He was also banned from residing within twenty miles of the parish and probably went to Devizes in Wiltshire where his wife died in 1898. However, the man who the North Otago Times (13/3/1897) of Dunedin, New Zealand said was responsible for a "peculiarly atrocious brutality" did return to live at St.Mary's Vicarage in Rosliston and died in 1906.
In 1888 he and niece Agnes Vallancey and fellow nephew Capt. T. E. Vallancey were chief mourners at Henry's funeral which was also attended by Sutton dignitaries Eleanor Hughes of Sherdley Hall and William Blinkhorn JP. The St.Helens Reporter of 28th September, 1888 described the service as being of "quiet and apprehensive character". This description probably did not apply to HEFV himself who had a reputation as an indomitable figure in Sutton.
e) Two Candidates for the Ragged School or the Gallows
Compassion and understanding could be at a premium in St.Helens police courts during the early Victorian years. For example, it was a criminal offence to be a 'lunatic' or attempt suicide and offenders could be dealt with quite sternly. In a St.Helens Newspaper article entitled 'A Lunatics Electric Shock' of October 3rd, 1899 it was described how a man named John Isaac Duxbery of Nook Lane, Sutton had been brought up before magistrates Leach and Sharples on a charge of being a 'lunatic at large'. They also reported how police doctor Dr. Edward Casey, of Junction Lane, had a prescription to ameliorate his condition:
Dr. Casey said the man had delusions of a dangerous character. He had been drinking and a few days in the workhouse would do him good - The Clerk: "What are you afraid of?" - Duxbery: "Electric shocks" - The Clerk: "Where are they?" - Duxbery: "I feel them all over me." Prisoner was committed to the workhouse for 14 days. 
In February 1856 two Sutton brothers John and Robert Parry, aged twelve and ten respectively, were convicted of stealing potatoes from a Mr. Baxter. The St.Helens Intelligencer of 1st March reported that:
The elder brother is a shrewd, cunning, active boy, and an old offender, well-known to the police, has been convicted four times for theiving (sic), and very well acquainted with Kirkdale; for the above offence he is to be imprisoned and whipped. The other boy was returned to his father. 
Around 8 o'clock one Saturday evening in February 1896 when shopkeeper Mrs. Reid of Worsley Brow was in her kitchen, little Cathy Carroll seized the moment. The 12-year-old nipped into the Sutton Oak grocer's shop and helped herself to a whole jar of sweets on the counter, valued at 5 shillings and a tanner. For twenty-four hours the little girl must have been in heaven! Catherine disposed of some of the evidence on the railway line but probably shared her ill-gotten gains with her pals and her six brothers and sisters. The word was soon out and it wasn't too difficult for the Sutton bobbies to discover who the culprit was and on the Sunday night they came calling at her Assam Street home.
In court her mother Mary, told the bench that she was a good girl who hadn't done anything like this before and so she was dealt with leniently under the First Offender's Act and bound over. The act had the phrase 'conditionally released upon probation of good conduct' enshrined within it and is seen as the precursor to the creation of the probation service in 1907, when the Probation of Offenders Act hit the statute books. Incidentally the 'open all hours' grocers was owned by 29-year-old George Reid who bought it off his brother-in-law James Leigh, who had run it at 14 Worsley Brow for some time. It hadn't always been a successful enterprise, however, as in 1883 previous owner Edwin Challinor had been forced to place the grocer's business into liquidation.
f) Trouble at Rolling Mill
The Rolling Mill in Watery Lane at Sutton Moss was built by William Keates (c.1800 - 1888) in 1860. Keates and his partner Samuel Newton, also owned the large copper smelting works in Sutton Oak, which employed 100 men and traded as the British and Foreign Copper Co. In 1876, the Rolling Mill factory that shaped metal for industry, was the scene of an attempted murder of a Sutton policeman by a desperate naval deserter who'd taken employment there.
Achilles was the third vessel that took the name of the Greek hero and after its second major re-armament the ship served at Liverpool as a guardship for a couple of years. The broadside ironclad frigate possessed twenty guns and was the only British warship ever to have four masts. It's said that the greatest area of canvas ever shown by any nation's warship was spread upon its masts. Impressive she must have looked to Rainhill-born Arthur Corke when the young sailor first boarded her. Perhaps he had visions of sailing the seven seas on Achilles and acting as a guardship at Liverpool somewhat dissolutioned him.
Sergeant Bee received information of the deserter's presence at the works but was clearly not expecting any trouble as he turned up on Tuesday 10th without any back-up. The sergeant arrived at the factory's office around noon and Corke was sent for. Upon seeing the police officer he took a bottle out of his pocket and drank from it. According to the St.Helens Newspaper's report (31/10/1876) Corke then said to Bee:
I've done you now, for I've poisoned myself, and you won't have to take me far 
Arthur Corke was charged with desertion and of wounding with intent to murder and was sent to HM Chatham in Kent where he served a lengthy sentence. He seems to have returned to Liverpool as in May 1897 he was sentenced to 5 years for forging a will in the city. Sergeant John Bee seems to have taken early retirement from the force as a result of his injury and within five years is recorded as running a grocer's in Preston.
The Rolling Mill was closed in December, 1895 and during the twentieth century, the Widnes copper firm of Thomas Bolton & Son took over the works. There was also a Sutton tavern in Ditch Hillock (later Watery Lane) that took the works' name. The story of the deserter sailor who tried to murder a local bobby, was probably told quite a few times there over a jar or two!
g) The Raid on the Sutton "Tossers"
The summer of 1916 is remembered for the start of the Battle of the Somme, one of the bloodiest ever military operations. The St.Helens newspapers were full of reports of the Great War, with many pictures of casualties and captured men. Never had the St.Helens Newspaper and Reporter used so much photography in their papers, albeit posed studio pictures. They proudly profiled the "patriotic" St.Helens families who had as many as half-a-dozen members, including fathers and sons, fighting at the front.However, for the Sutton bobbies who weren't called up, it was business as usual. They continued their own law enforcement war, rigidly enforcing all statutes and making no concessions for the hostilities in France and the worries of the combatants' families and friends back in England.
The gambling laws were similarly enforced by the St.Helens police with great rigour, even the simple pursuit of pitch and toss. Although played with different variations, it usually involved two coins being tossed with one member of the group or 'school' choosing 'heads' and another 'tails'. There was a winner if the coins both come down heads or tails, otherwise stakes were 'rolled over' to the next toss.
He observed the "gang", as they were referred to in court, for over two hours tossing coins and playing handball. Around 4.40pm Frederick's ice cream cart drove up and all the men bought ice cream. Sgt. Bate seized the moment and with his quarry distracted, he moved in with his constables and raided the unsuspecting group. In court all but two were convicted and they were each fined thirty shillings or fourteen days in prison.
Pitch and toss was the most common form of coin gaming, and was especially popular with Sutton mining communities, where it had been played since the 18th century. The pursuit rapidly declined from the 1950s, with the onset of television and the spread of other forms of entertainment.
h) The Drunken Hearse Driver in Sutton
These days with breathalysers and blood tests, it's not too difficult to evidence a heavy alcohol consumption. In days past, proving drunkenness was often one man's word against another with defendants in court regularly claiming that they'd only supped a glass or two. There had to be corroborative evidence from witnesses, especially police officers or a previous history of drunkenness before magistrates were minded to convict. After all drinking was endemic during the latter parts of the 19th century.
PC Carter must have rubbed his eyes with disbelief when he saw Ridgway's horse-driven hearse coming along Warrington Road with no apparent driver. Had he been working too hard and seeing things! However, he managed to bring the carriage to a halt and discovered Ridgway fast asleep. He could have waken him quietly, perhaps by gently shaking him. Instead he chose to bellow at him as old-style coppers tended to do and the hearse-driver almost jumped out of his skin! As the St.Helens Newspaper reported:
He stopped the horse, and found defendant on top of the hearse asleep. He shouted to him, and defendant jumped up and nearly fell from the hearse. He was quite drunk. 
In court Ridgway said he had been "a long way in Cheshire" and at Sankey on the way back had only had one glass of beer. He also claimed not to have been asleep at all and that the police had suddenly turned a lamp on him and then jumped upon his hearse. He said he wouldn't go home because he was angry with the way he'd been treated.
However, as several police officers provided similar testimonies and as the cab proprietor had previously been fined for being "asleep on a conveyance", J.P.s T. Pilkington and R. Pennington Jnr. convicted him with a fine of 10 shillings plus costs. A lot of trouble for the police for just a ten bob fine. Just whether he had a customer in his hearse is not, unfortunately, revealed in the St.Helens Newspaper's account, although we can presume not. Otherwise I would have felt compelled to style this article 'Dead Drunk in Sutton'!
i) The Shooting of a Bold Poacher
During the nineteenth century, the Sutton and Bold district was much more agricultural than it is now and so there were more rural crimes than today. With so many open fields, it wasn't too difficult to get away with nicking from farmer's fields, although the bobbies on their beats would keep their eyes open for offenders. Suspicious bulges on the persons of shifty-looking characters exiting fields would attract close attention from the Sutton boys in blue and you didn't have to steal much to find yourself in court.
Illustration above from The Graphic newspaper, published on January 23rd, 1875
On October 24th 1899, Thomas Seddon was brought up before Alderman Sinclair on the Police Court bench charged with stealing 9d of cabbages. The police had caught him taking them from a field on John Price's farm near to St.Nicholas's church in New Street. 76-year-old magistrate Arthur Sinclair knew the area very well as he lived in Waterdale, just down the road from farmer Price and he gave Seddon a fine of five shillings or seven days in prison.
Illustration entitled 'Catching A Poacher' from The Graphic newspaper pub. October 17th, 1874
Poaching was also fairly common in the nineteenth century, especially in Bold, and mainly concerned the unlawful slaughter of pheasants and hares. Most landlords were very protective of game on their land and insisted that they alone held the sporting rights to kill them. Until the passing of the Ground Game Act of 1880, tenant farmers didn't even have the right to kill pests that were damaging their crops. When Henry Bold Hoghton declared in March 1844 that his tenants would be able to shoot hares and rabbits and do what they wanted with them, it attracted some favourable publicity in newspapers.
Hoghton was somewhat forward-thinking for his time. The Leeds Mercury (May 25, 1844) said he was "a truly Honourable Gentleman" when he issued a statement that his tenantry were free to vote for whoever they chose in the forthcoming general election. This couldn't be taken for granted and Ellen Hughes was said to have instructed her Sherdley tenants during 1844 to vote for the Tory candidate.
After killing a hen pheasant around half-past midnight, they bumped into Henry Hoghton's gamekeepers, led by Mr. Taylor who with gun raised ordered them to stay put. However, the trio of poachers after briefly obeying, turned on their heels and ran. So Taylor unleashed his dog on them and Holden fired at the animal, badly wounding it. In retaliation the gamekeeper opened fire on the fleeing men, bringing Thomas Boydell to the ground. He was shot in the thigh and arm and was easily captured by the gamekeepers. Although his pals made a clean getaway, Boydell gave their names and addresses to the Warrington police, who picked them up next morning. Being shot was considered sufficient punishment for Boydell who gave evidence on behalf of the prosecution at Timperley and Holden's court hearing and the pair received three months imprisonment in Kirkdale jail in Liverpool.
The magistrates cautioned Taylor, the gamekeeper, against "firing at parties he might detect in the act of poaching in future". Although Taylor claimed he fired at a distance of some 60 yards after having his dog shot, the J.P.'s said "that was not justification for his shooting at a fellow-creature". He was warned that he would have been prosecuted for manslaughter if Boyden had been killed, although there were no charges for wounding. Of course, confrontations between armed poachers and gamekeepers at the dead of night were inevitable and there were numerous incidents nationwide during the 19th century, that led to a number of deaths on both sides.
i) The St.Helens Great Railway Robbery
However, as far back as 1865, Sutton had its own Great Railway Robbery, as the newspapers dubbed it. Unlike the film production that was based on Butch Cassidy's 'Hole in the Wall' gang who in 1900 stole $5,000 from a train and the 1960s robbery in which £2.6 million was taken, Sutton's version was much more modest. In fact the ill-gotten gains from a train at St.Helens Junction amounted to just 30 pairs of ladies boots and 34 flannel shirts! Oh, and some 'trusses' of corduroy too.
Despite this, the coverage in the St.Helens and Liverpool press was extensive and was spread over a period of weeks. A report on the committal hearing for the six suspects that was held at St.Helens Town Hall, almost filled a full page of the St.Helens Newspaper's July 11th edition and a week earlier they'd reported that:
The robberies which have for so long a time baffled the skill of the detectives of the London and North Western Railway Company, as well as that of our local police officers, seem at length in a fair way of being unravelled.
A number of railway employees were singled out as being likely candidates and six were arrested and their houses searched. Driver James Seddon was 'nicked' at St.Helens Junction and others who were taken into custody included shunting porters and firemen, one of whom seems to have been Seddon's own son James Jnr. who was arrested on an engine.
There were a number of court hearings in St.Helens which descended into near-chaos. An error had meant that three of the accused, who'd been granted bail, were kept locked up for a fortnight. Defence solicitor Pemberton objected strongly to this and also protested against the magistrates, who were due to adjudicate in the committal hearings. It proved quite difficult to find a J.P. who didn't have a financial interest in the London and North Western Railway Company and one magistrate was forced to stand down. Then an objection was raised by Pemberton against William Pilkington Jnr. conducting the hearing.
Pilkington admitted that he was "connected with one who had a large amount invested in the concern". He added that the only other magistrate available to consider the case had the largest investment of all the J.P.s in the train company. So Edward Johnson, law clerk to the Commissioners was summoned and he gave his legal judgement that Pilkington could adjudicate after all.
Within a fractious atmosphere, Alfred Lee, the station master at St.Helens Junction, gave evidence that on May 30th, 1865, wagon 10803 had been kept in a Junction siding overnight. This was normal practice for goods trains that had been delayed and it presented easy pickings for the accused, who were serving the 11pm to 6am night shift.
There were a number of separate charges that each man faced and some pleaded guilty and had named others. After being committed to trial at Kirkdale in Liverpool, five railway staff from St.Helens Junction were found guilty and sentenced to between 1 and 2 year's imprisonment.
Despite engine driver Henry Hesketh being cleared of one charge and the jury recommending mercy after convicting him on a second, he was still given an 18 months sentence. A message was clearly being sent out by the judiciary, of whom many members owned shares in the railways, that they would no longer tolerate this level of theft from the trains.
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