Kate Summerscale - The Wicked Boy: The Mystery of a Victorian Child Murderer

E arly in the morning of Monday 8 July 1895, Robert and Nathaniel Coombes dressed themselves, collected the familys rent book from a room downstairs, and went out to the back yard. It was just after 6 a.m. and already bright and warm.

Robert was thirteen and Nattie twelve. Their father had gone to sea on Friday, as chief steward on a steamship bound for New York, leaving the brothers and their mother, Emily, at home together. They lived in a small, new, yellow-brick terraced house at 35 Cave Road, Plaistow, a poor but respectable working-class district in West Ham, the biggest borough in the docklands of East London.

In an attempt to attract the attention of their neighbour in number 37, Robert picked up a handful of stones and threw them at the roof of the washhouse next door.

At 6.15 a.m. James Robertson heard the stones clattering on the washhouse roof and came out. Mr Robertson saw the two Coombes boys in their yard: Robert, dark-haired, with blue eyes, thick eyebrows and sun-tanned skin, and the paler, smaller Nattie. He knew them as sharp-witted lads. Robert produced a gold sovereign, worth twenty shillings (or 1), and asked Mr Robertson if he could change it for them. Mr Robertson said that he had no silver but offered to change the coin for two half-sovereigns. He fetched the two gold coins from his house. Robert then asked him if he would pay the rent on 35 Cave Road on their behalf as no one would be at home when the landlady called by later that morning. Mr Robertson agreed, and Robert gave him back one of the half-sovereigns along with the familys rent book. Robert explained that he and Nattie were going to watch the cricket at Lords, in north London. Mr Robertson asked if their Ma was going with them.

No, said Robert. We had a telegram late last night from Liverpool and she is going there. Weve had a rich uncle die in Africa, and Auntie wants to see Ma. Emily Coombes sometimes travelled to the north-west of England to visit her well-to-do older sister and her mother.

Mr Robertson asked whether she had gone already.

No, said Robert. She is going directly. She has had a faint. (Or She has had a fit when asked to recall the conversation, Mr Robertson could not be sure.)

How long ago was that? enquired Mr Robertson.

Robert pulled a gold watch from his pocket and consulted it. About an hour and a half ago, he said.

Mr Robertson asked who was with their Ma. Robert jerked his thumb behind him, in the direction of the house. Mrs...

Mrs England? suggested Mr Robertson. Amelia England was the Coombes familys neighbour on the other side, and a close friend of Emily Coombes.

No, said Robert. He did not explain further but added: Perhaps Ma will see Mrs Robertson before she goes.

The boys set out for Lords.

Robert and Nattie were among more than 12,000 people to travel to St Johns Wood that Monday to watch the Gentlemen v Players match, the fixture of the season at the most famous cricket ground in England. The streets near Lords were lined with lawns and villas, and on the day of a big match they were packed with people, the men in top hats, bowlers, flat caps or straw boaters, the few women in dresses with bell skirts and high necks, their hats perched on pinned-up hair and their parasols tilted at the sun. A handful of police constables in domed helmets and flared jackets moved among the crowd.

The great draw that day was the legendary cricketer W. G. Grace, who, at forty-six, was enjoying an astonishing renaissance. He had just become the first player ever to score a thousand runs in the opening month of a season and was, according to the