THE HUMAN TRAGEDY.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LI, Issue 202, 15 August 1908, Page 3

THE HUMAN TRAGEDY.

A MURDERER'S WOOLNU. (By U. R. Sims, in Answers.) As the clock struck ten on the night of Friday, September, Urn, m the jear 11)00, two young lovers, who were standing outside a private house in Buyswater, bade eacn other farewell. The end had come to the pleasant evening that the young parlourmaid had been spending with ner alliauced husband. "Cood-night, Alice!" said the youuman, kissing his sweetheart. " TeU your brothers 1 will go on the river with them on Sunday." On Saturday morning the youmr i,a". ournuud went to the telephone in'tor mistress's house.

- »!L , e Wi,s son 'y< but "«-• could not take her brothers out, as promised He • S* wou d , Sl * her early in the week She repbed that, as he could not be h C VWi ' for her out. B.tthey„u U g mai , 0 , 011e . a who represented that he made a Vood airoigh ihe Exchange and Mart' his fiancees company. At twelve o'clock on he Sunday, September ltith, he turnid up at her mother's house, lie did »»t tell her that he had, in Ids"' hT« ♦ ? Wltl ' her ' lttl Varmoutl. bv h if?? .V' a,n m tlle ,uorni "8. ur th.u i had the previous atternoon, taken where'* a " d « irl t0 Varniouth had taken lodgings i„ one of tlll , roWl _ the following Thursday-September -Oth-the engaged couple met again, ana ogam at parting the young man had bad news for his sweetheart. The grandfather was very ill indeed, and the atf-c-Lionate grandson had promised to spend bunday with biin at (iraveseml. Buj again love triumphed over kinship and the young parlourmaid, walkinwith some friends on .Suudav, Septem" ber 23rd, ill Hyde Park, was'astonished to meet her lover there i

He explained his unexpected appearance. When he got to his grandfathers House there were so many relatives round the invalid that he felt he was m the way. At the very time that Herbert Bennett was making this explanation the news of a tragedy had spread like wildfire through Yarmouth. The dawn of day had revealed a terrible secret of the night. The dead body of a young woman had been found on a secluded part of the beach. Hound ber neck was a tightlyticd mohair bootlace. The woman had been identified as a Mrs. Hood, who had left her lodgings m one of the rows the previous evening and had not returned. The young man who greeted his swe2theart so affectionately that Sunday afternoon had not been to Gravesend. He had, in his eagerness to be with the pretty parlourmaid during her hours of liberty, left Yarmouth by the first tram, , and, arriving at Liverpool Street at eleven-thirty, had hurried across London . to Hyde Park, in the hope of nicethg her.

He liad travelled to Yarmouth the previous afternoon by the five o'clock train.

Mrs. Hood had been seen by her landlady's daughter apparently waiting for someone outside the Town Hall at nine o'clock.

At about eleven o'clock that night two young people sitting on the Yarmouth beach heard the voice of a woman cry, "Mercy—mercy!"

Shortly before midnight, a young man in a light-grey suit arrived at the Crown and Anchor Hotel very much out ot breath, and said he had lost the last train and wanted a bed. Before he went to bed he ordered breakfast to be ready for him at seven in the morning. At 7.20 on Sunday morning the first train to London steamed out of Yarmouth Station. Among the passengers was a young man in a light-grey suit. When' Herbert Bennett met Alice Meadows that Sunday afternoon, he was wearing a light-grey suit. l'roni the afternoon of Sunday, Se|>-> teniber 23rd, the wooing of the" young dealer in second-hand violins sped apace. On the following day his sweetheart wrote to him at his address at Woolwich—he' was employed at the Arsenalhoping that he got home safely on the Sunday. She received a loving letter in reply: "My own darling Alice,—l arrived home quite safe, but not at all happy. I shall be glad indeed, my darling, when you do not have to leave me at all, for I feel (mite miserable now that 1 have to wait so long to see you. Hoping lo see you on Thursday, when I shall have lots of news.—With fondest love and kisses, your most loving and affectionate Herbert." Of the sincerity of the young man's love for the girl who looked upon li;H'self as his atiianccd wife, and wore his engagement-ring, there was no doubt. He had always been generous to his sweetheart; now he became more so. He gave her jewellery and- dresses and a sealskin jacket; the dresses and jacket, he said, had beijri given to him by a cousin, who had gone to South Africa. The jewellery, the dresses, and the

jacket had, as a matter of fact, been the property of his wife. She had left then at the house she had been renting—Xo. 1. Glencoe Villas, Be.xley Heath. Whjn site went to Yarmouth she took only a few things with her. The young husband's conduct in giving' away the clothes and jewellery his wife had left behind her when she went for a short stay to Yarmouth told atrong'iy against him when he came to be tried for his life. It argued knowledge on his part that there was no possibility of her return to claim her property. Herbert Bennett had not been living at Glencoe Villas with his wife. He hdd lodgings at Woolwich, but after Sunday, September 23rd, he was frequently at Glencoe Villas. He told the neighbours who saw him removing things that his wife had gone to Yorkshire for her health, and he was sending her some clothes. lie sent them to Alice Meadows. After sending his dead wife's things to lu's sweetheart, he asked her to marry him before Christmas, instead of in the following June, as had been arranged. The engaged couple went to look at several houses. They liked one they saw at Charlton, and Bennett took it, and ]»aid the deposit. The course of true love was running smoothlv enough. The pretty parlourmaid had left her situation, and was

looking forward to a happy union with a young mail of means. This young man, who, at seventeen, hail made his first experiment in matrimony, and found it a failure, was, at twenty-one, ahout to make a second venture, and this time he was evidently confident of

happiness. The Yarmouth murder was still being () widely discussed. As far as the public knew, no clue had been found to the ~ real identity of Mrs. Hood. So one had ,j come forward to claim the body. No one. in spite of the efforts of the polive, had thrown anv light on the mystery. The liabv girl left behind by Mrs. r Hood when'she. went out to be murdered } had been taken charge of by the land- '^ a 'it the end of October the coroner's J jury returned a verdict that a woman unknown had ca murdered by a man ] unknown. , , On November 4th. at a little tea-party at Stepney, one of Alice Meadows brothers brought up the subject »• t»f *•"•- mouth Weh mystery, lie said it wa curious that no clue had been obtained as to the. identity of the murdered wonn \lice turned to her affianced hi «- X, ami asked him what bethought about it- He «'"' tl,at t1,,% t,, !! ,f? and then the family con"Nation turned on the approaching m iV mvsterv was. however, on the eve TlZwt Bennett was arrested. On November 7th the girl who was to lnieb i IMl li ( ,._tbe laundry-nv.nU •>■'■ ' vevtised. the washing mark had ■ _ H ry people who had -', Bon . L n l!0v . n( ,,t. bvniL' -Jf ™<" n( ' \ t . lim .,i that The liolce had also a-<e'" m i J.ostmark on a .letter ■ <■> . V,\,.Nlood the morning bef.^™>, ■ .lerwasWonhvielv T «.. o r _ ; tl,e Hico Pnwe«Wm o >. .^ i t ■ rl li s wife and eh"". •as,?**.-*'

near relative. That letter is iu my possession, anil 1 will give it word fur word: "H.M. l'risou, Norwich. November 10th, 11100. Dear ,-1 expect by now that yon have heard of what 1 have been accused of; but 1 hope Vou do not believe it, for 1 know of : i. I have never let yon know any of ny troubles, as you know, since I was married to Alary. 1 have not lived with her for a long time, and the last 1 saw of her was oil .September 15th, when s'ic told me she was going to leave me for good. .She got £32 out of me on that

date, on the ground that she would give

I me away over that Westgate affair if J did not give it her. .She had been keeping company with a William Hood, and it is my belief that she went to Yarmouth with him on the I.sth, and spent, her time there with him. Relieve •»"• I know nothing of it, and if they give me fair play, 1 will prove myself not guilty; but 1 have not had the chance to speak (i word in mv defence yet, and when I do 1 shall have to tell the truth from tlie beginning of mv married lifi>, and I trust that (iod 'will help n'.e through—Your loving, affectionate, bit miserable. Herbert."

In this letter the young husband confesses that he knew' that his wife was staying at Yarmouth in the name of Hood. Yet, though the murder of a " .Mrs. Hood " at Yarmouth was known to him, and even discussed in his pre- 1 seuce. he told til? people at Bexlcv, who knew bis wife as Mrs. Dennett, that Mrs. Bennett was iu Yorkshire. j

I was present at the. Old Bailev tlu.--ing tho whole of the trial of Herbert Bennett, and watched him closely. Except once, during the final speech of Mr. C. F. tiill, the counsel for the Crown, 1 never saw hiin show any outward sign of anxiety or agitation. Once, when the Court laughed at a witness's odd reply, be laughed, too.

[ When " Mrs. Hood'' went out on t'lfl . fatal night she was wearing a long, goid chain of a peculiar pattern. At the end 1 of it was a gold watch. A peculiar ci: cumstance about tho watch was that the Yarmouth landlady's daughter had once ,' seen the baby, Ruby Bennett, put it ! into its mouth and bite it, leaving the I indentation of its little teeth upon the case. When, after bis arrest, the detectives searched Bennett's room at Woolwich, they found, among other things, a long, gold watch-clmin, and at the end of it a gold watch, on which there were th-j marks that might have been made by a little child. Mrs. Bennett had been photographed with the gold chain round her neck by a beach photographer two days before the murder. The'chain that was round the neck of the woman when she was murdered was found in the possession of her husband, who had told the neighbours that lus wife had gone to Yorkshire for her health. The youth who, in the dock of the Old Bailcv, was calm, self-possessed, and apparently light-hearted, had crowded into his twenty-one years a wide and varied experience of life. The sou of a cement-worker, lie left school early, to be a newspaper-boy. Then he was apprenticed to the grocery trade, and, as grocer's assistant, had learnt to tie up parcels with a peculiar knot, which, at the trial, was called •'the grocer's knot." The knot in the mohair bootlace that strangled Herbert Bennett's wife was described in TOUit by experts as " the grocer's knot." At seventeen he met, and married, . the daughter of a butcher at Northncet, and in the first year of the marriage the ( babv Ruby was born. ( He had a grocer's shop at Westgate- , ou-lSea. There he had a fire, and re- ( ceived a large cheque from the insur- ] -ante company. After receiving the in-1 J surance money, he went on a mysterious r voyage with his wife to Cape Town. ; They stayed in South Africa only four davs. After his return he was.employed at' Woolwich Arsenal, and while so employed he went to Ireland with his sweetheart for a fortnight's holiday After their return he led a double life. His wife lived at one place, and he at; ( another. When they were together sne j. had been heard to say that he had bet-; 1 ter be careful how he treated her, as s she could get him fifteen, years. She t herself, wlur she went to Yarmouth t took onlv a small parcel, her baby, and , the key of No. 1, (ilencoe Villas. And <: she wc'iif into lodgings in Yarmouth m t a false name. c It was in Julv, 1000. the year of the ,: murder, that Herbert Bennett met Alice f Meadows, a voung parlourmaid, m svr-, "vice at Bayswater. In August he be-. came, engaged to her; in September he t murdered his wife. In October lie took the house in which they were to live f when Alice Meadows became Mrs. Ben- s nett On November 4th the family of his fiancee discussed the Yarmouth nuir- j dcr in his presence. On the lith he was ] arrested. .... . c On March 2nd. 1001, the Lord (lm I Justice of England sentenced him .o ( death, ami on March 21st he was ex.cited at Norwich Onol, his last being, " No confession." j 1

There was a mystery about the l'*"nett case that lias never been unraveled. Having mv own theory with regard to tlie young man who, while working.a •• Woolwich Arsenal for a wage ol Unity shilling a week, could afford to trave. about°the country, stay at hotels and spend money lavishly, 1 took more than ordinary interest in the crime and in the criminal. ... He was spending money on Aliei. Meadows: he had to find the money tor the private house at Glencoe Villas and for his wife's expend. He had lodgings of his own, .and lived well. He was a forger, a swindler, he ha. I committed arson, and received the insurance money; but he found it wonli his while to work for 30s a week at Woolwich Arsenal, while he was spcivv in" £s—and sometimes .till— «■ IUVK upon himself, his wife, and his swect"rhe victim, by her extraordinary conduet, had played into her murderers lumds. She did not, even on the lata! ni"ht, tell her Yarmouth landlady that she was "oing to* meet her husband. .

That was the mystery of the tragedy. The pathos of the tragedy is to be sought elsewhere. On the last day of the trial 1 sat fo a time in sorrowful eonipany. llerbcit Bennett had told Alice Meadows tuu his grandfather was dead, and lie had been to the funeral. On the day that •lie knew that her affianced hushand « ti die on the gallows, Alice Meadovs and the old grandfather sat side by s'de With the heartbroken girl, ant doin<' her best to comfort her, was the mother, who had been looking fonvaid to her daughters happy marriage to a voting man of ample mcans-a young man who had given her every proof ol the intensity of his love and devotion. _ The >'i'eat tragedy of this young man s evil life began on the day that for Ue lirst time he knew honest love. His marriage at seventeen had been opposed by his parents, lie had never shown much affection lor the pool ■ man after the marriage had taken place The couple led a cat-and-dog life, and were always threatening each other The wife knew something that won.d „!v,. her husband fifteen years. What hold had he over her that induced hcv, at the time thev were living a i.ut, amit,l not too friendly, to quit her home hurriedly taking oniv a small parcel, i key. and her baby into lodgings at W,*nitlri And why did she go to these lod«in<»s under a false nanus? With Mice Meadows the whole situa,ioll was changed for this young man wnos( . life had hitherto been utterly disreputable. She gave him aflection, and she placed the most implicit .i ; ■ in Uini-a trust that he never abu> d.| She took him to her home, and lie , people made him one of the tam.lv cue'.. There mav have been moments whe i the lad. who was a past-master in crime before he had come to mans estate, or„T in hj« .iream of a fair future, th . tl.p Watt »I»>*™ of «>c B«How* lm.l fallen across the path of ove that .- .1 and his betrothed were lightly tieading . | hand-in-hand.