Molly Whittington-Egan - The Stockbridge Baby Farmer. And Other Scottish Murder Stories

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

My special thanks to
Hilary Bailey
Glenn Chandler
Max Falconer
Dr Marc Hinchliffe
Carole Hopkins
John Linklater and
Richard Whittington-Egan

O ne October afternoon in the Stockbridge district of Edinburgh, a group of young boys were larking around in Cheyne Street. There was a longish parcel, dirty, scuffed, lying out in the open on a bare, so-called green, and when they kicked it open, hoping for a lucky find, such as a discarded pair of boots, the dead body of a baby unrolled in front of them.

Scared, the boys ran for a policeman, and came back with Constable Stewart, who timed the report at 1.30pm, Friday, October 26th, 1888. He saw that the body was badly decomposed, and bore it off straight away to the city mortuary, where, the following day, Dr Henry Littlejohn examined the small corpse, which presented a mummified appearance, and was tightly wrapped in an oilskin coat. It was male, weighed 11lb 4oz and was 29 inches in length, and the child had been about one to one and a half years old, in good previous health. A ligature an apron string, probably had been applied twice around the neck, drawn hard, so that it was embedded in the skin. The only possible explanation for its presence was wilful strangulation.

Meanwhile, James Banks, a plasterer, who lived in Cheyne Street, had become suspicious on hearing of the discovery of a dead baby only 20 yards from his home. That June, he had let a room to a couple calling themselves Mr and Mrs Macpherson. They were allotted a coal-closet, which they kept locked. In September, Mrs Macpherson had driven up in a cab, one day, with a baby. Isabella Banks, the plasterers daughter, had held it while Mrs Macpherson paid the cabman. She asked whose baby it was. It was a little girl, the lodger replied, and its mother would soon come for it. Then she threw it up in her arms in a fine gesture of benevolence and said, My bonnie wee bairn! That bairn was never seen alive again.

She told Mr Banks that she had got a child, and 25 to keep it, and had parted with it to a certain person for 18, leaving 7 for herself. We can be sure that, in the climate of the times, Banks would not have been surprised by the transaction, but rather by the speed of the transfer. Mrs Banks had been away from home during the month of September, and on her return, the family told her about the disappearing child. She asked Mrs Macpherson point-blank what had become of it and she said that she had put it away, and if a servant-girl came asking for her, she was to send her off, saying that she was in church.

Mrs Macpherson herself was pregnant, with the birth imminent. Mrs Banks noticed that there was a babys hat on the bed, and asked why she had bought it in advance which speaks volumes for the poor circumstances of these people, and the qualified expectation of a live, healthy birth. The story was that it was her nieces hat. She went away to have her baby and returned in due course without it. Once Mrs Banks asked her for the key of the coal-closet, and she refused, saying that she had dirty clothing in there. The Macphersons used a special chap (knock) when they let each other into the house.

James Banks, reflecting on these uncertain matters, decided to go to the police. Detective Clark, of Edinburgh City Police, heard his story and was very interested, although the little girl who had vanished was obviously not the boy found in the street. A very young female infant had been reported missing. Mrs Tomlinson, wife of Samuel Tomlinson, of 6 Wardrops Court, Lawnmarket, had told the police that her daughter, Alice Tomlinson, a domestic servant, had given birth on August 11th to an illegitimate baby, Violet Duncan Tomlinson, in the Edinburgh Maternity Hospital. Alice was in no position to care for an infant. She, the mother, had taken Violet in, but only temporarily, while advertising for someone to adopt her.

Among a number of applicants, a Mrs Burns, of Cheyne Street, had submitted the lowest tender. She had said that she wanted the baby for her sister, Mrs Macpherson, who was married to the Duke of Montroses piper, and would take the child to live in splendid country surroundings on the Dukes estate. This colourful fabrication was a clinching enticement, and Mrs Tomlinson had parted with Violet, aged one month, paying over a premium of 2 to Mrs Burns when she came to collect her. Since then, Mrs Tomlinson had gone several times to the house in Cheyne Street to see how her granddaughter was getting on, but had always been turned away and had begun to harbour doubts. Her daughter, Alice, had become ill, and was admitted to the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary.

Inspector Clark proceeded to Cheyne Street and cornered Mrs Macpherson alias Mrs Burns. He asked her what had become of Violet Tomlinson. She produced a pair of babys shoes and a vaccination certificate (immunisation against smallpox being then compulsory) and stated that she was with her sister, who was married to the Duke of Montroses piper. Unimpressed, the inspector searched the house and actually found the key of the coal-closet. The woman went to pieces, and begged him not to open the door. As he went forward to use the key, according to his supporting colleague, David Simpson, detective officer, she cried out, Get a cab! Take me to the police station. It is there. I did it!

The door was unlocked and revealed a chamber of horrors. The corpse of a baby girl, wrapped in a canvas cloth, was lying on the bottom shelf. This was, in fact, Violet Tomlinson. On the top shelf, there was a stain corresponding to the shape of a childs body, together with some pieces of cloth similar to that encasing the parcelled body found outside, and a canister which had contained chloride of lime. Contrary to still-held popular belief, lime does not aid decomposition, but rather retards it, and soft tissues are largely preserved. If water is added, to slake quicklime, some mummification will occur. Here, chlorinated lime was probably used for its disinfectant properties, to lessen smell. On this shelf, the body of Alexander Gunn had lain before being used as a football. He was one of twins, and his brief history will be told a little later.

A quantity of childrens clothing was also found in the house and the police officers were by now quite sure in their own minds that they had found the lair of a typical baby-farmer. The vile trade in unwanted babies, most often illegitimate, at a time when small value was placed on infant life, was not in itself illegal. The practice was called adoption but it was really fostering, and there was no legal force to the transaction. Generally, it was the activity of very impoverished people. Desperate mothers, or their agents, handed over their children to slatterns who cared for them with such negligence and omissions that death often supervened, or, as the money that came with them ran out, resorted to deliberate murder. The baby-farmers did not buy the children: it was the other way round. A child on weekly terms stood a better chance of survival than a baby taken with a lump sum. The deprivation of mothers milk and inadequate feeding with slops was often sufficient to ease the parting. If large numbers were taken in, the health problems multiplied.