DR. CRIPPEN'S FAREWELL

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 225, 28 January 1911, Page 10

DR. CRIPPEN'S FAREWELL

A REMARKABLE MESSAGE. Lloyd's News received just before hit execution the following message from Dr. Crippen, through Miss Le Neve, with the request that it should be published:— Pentonville Prison. This is my farewell letter to the world. After many days of anxious expectation that my innocence might be proved, after enduring the agony of a long trial and the suspense of an appeal, and after the final endeavor of my friends to obtain a reprieve, I see that at last my doom is sealed and that in this life I have no more hope. With all the courage I have I face another world and another Judge—from Whom I am sure of justice greater than that of this world and of mercy greater than that of men. I have no dread of death, no fear of the hereafter, only the dread and the agony that one whom I love best may suffer when I have gone. Death, I say, has no terror for me, and I fear not at all the passing from this life. lam powerless now, and bow to the inevitable. But in this letter of farewell I desire to make a last appeal to the world not to think the worst of me, and to believe words now written from the condemned cell. I beg them to remember that I have been condemned on inconclusive evidence, and chieily by evidence of expert witnesses who were contradicted by other experts upon the most vital point of the case—the scar found upon the remains in Hilldrop Crescent. Upon the identification of the remains as being those of Belle Elmore the whole case for the prosecution depended. Yet, as I sat at the Old Bailey listening to the long arguments of the counsel for the Crown, to the witnesses brought against me, and to the summing up of the judge, I knew that they were wrong, and that this lawful error was based upon false proofs. In spite of my fate there is one working for me now in collecting fresh evidence, and it is still possible that after my death the real truth may be revealed. Face to facie with God, in Whose presence my soul shall soon stand for final judgment, I still' maintain that I was wrongly convicted, and my belief that facts will yet be forthcoming to prove my innocence. I solemnly state that I knew nothing ox the remains discovered at Hildrop Crescent until I was told of their discovery by my solicitor, Mr. Arthur Newton, on the next day after my arrival at Bowstreet. My conviction was obtained on purely circumstantial evidence, and I am positive that if I had had at my disposal a sum equal to that spent by the Crown on the prosecution the important points of that evidence would have been rebutted so decidedly that a conviction would have been impossible. I possess no legal training or knowledge, but I shall venture to analyse some points which are, to my mind, of the greatest importance. First of all—the hair that was found with the remains. It was admitted that Belle Elmore bleached her hair, but all agreed that she was most fastidious as to her personal appearance. It is impossible to believe then that she would permit any such portion of her hair to remain unbleached as would show to the public that it had been bleached. Yet the lengths of hair found were dark brown throughout, with only light color towards the end. What a farce was the supposed identification of the hair! Were the strands of hair mixed with other colored strands of hair and shown to the witnesses? No; they were brought along before the witnesses, who were told this hair was found at 30, Hilldrop Crescent, and asked: "Can you identify this as Belle Elmore's hair?" Of course, they said "Yes," except one, who was just enough to say, "No; this is not Belle's hair. There are only a few short bits which may resemble her hair."

As a matter of fact, Belle Elmore's eyes and hair was black. She was a Russion Pole by immediate descent, belonging to a race who notoriously have black eyes and hair—not brown. Those who saw her sister in court will recall how very dark she was. Now as to another point. Why did I go away?

No doubt it was a foolish move. But put yourself in my place—suddenly confronted by an inspector from Scotland Yard, threatened with arrest if the missing woman's whereabouts were not shortly revealed, and told by him that the newspapers would be ringing with the details in a short time. What did this mean to me?— Separation from the one I loved most in the world, and the laying bare to vulgar interpretation of our sacred relations, which I did not feel justified in doing at the time. Was it so very wrong, then, that my immediate thought was to take my loved one away where we could begin a new life together, free from unjust criticism, as we believed?

But all goes back to the identification of the remains. There are several other points easily deprived of value as evidence. Tor instance, the bits of pyjama jacket found with the remains. Can anyone imagine that a man desirous of hiding a crime would leave such a piece of evidence? Is their presence not to be decidedly regarded as proof that they were placed there for a purpose. I am confident that if I could have commanded unlimited funds, like the Crown, to have brought medical witnesses from the States, and. further, corroborative medical witnesses in London, the result would have been entirely different. As it is, I must leave my innocence to be proved by the hand of God, Who, I am sure, will assist the great efforts to bring furthor evidence forward of the one who loves me so well, and whom I love beyond all. There are many other points in the evidence against me which could have been rebutted, but they are all minor things, of no account in comparison with the alleged identification of the remains found in the cellar. That was the central mystery of the case. It still remains a mystery. My condemnation, therefore, was a judicial error, created chiefly by the mountains of prejudice built up in the public mind by the sensational story of my flight and capture. The mind of a British jury was poisoned against me because I had loved so deeply a woman not legally my wife, and because my unhappy domestic life with Belle Elmore. I have been called many »ruel names, and perhaps the world thinks of me as a monster of cruelty. From the depths of my heart T can say that I have never been a cruel man. and that my whole life has been devoted to hard work and kindness to my fellow men and women. T have not been one of those who live a careless ne'er-do-well existence, pandering to their own selfishness, and regardless of duty or human affection. The records of my life show that from the outset. T have lived soberly and industriously as a professional man. From the time when I finished my sciiool days at St. Jose, in California, and entered the Homoeopathic College at Michigan University I was devoted to science. I never knew an idle hour, and when I took my M.D. degree at Cleveland, Ohio, at twenty-one years of age, I was absorbed in the work of the hospitals and in the lectures on various branches of medi-

cine, being particularly interested in nervous cases, which I studied at the Hospital for Paralysis, and in eye disease, which I studied also at the Ophthalmic Hospital. When I married my first wife, Miss Charlotto Bell, and practised as an eye and ear specialist in Salt Lake City, there was no young professional man more keen or more industrious than myself, and my domestic life for the six years of this wedded life, was that of a good citizen. When my first wife died I moved to Brooklyn, and there I met Belle Elmore. The story of her strtnge way of life and of my marriage to her is well known. When after some time of separation we lived together in London—first at South Crescent, Tottenham Court road, and afterwards at Hilldrop Crescent—l was still engaged for the greater part of the day in those medical pursuits, which left me but little leisure. About my unhappy relations with Belle Elmore I will say nothing. We drifted apart in sympathy; she had her own friends and pleasures, and I was a rather lonely man, and rather miserable. Then I obtained the affection and sympathy of Miss Ethel Le Neve. I confess that according to the moral laws of Church and State we were guilty, and I do not defend our position in that respect. But what I do say is that this love was not of a debased and degraded character. It was—if I may say so to people who will not, perhaps, understand or believe—a good love. She comforted me in my melancholy condition. Her loyalty and courage and self-sacrifice'were of a hicrh character. Whatever sin there was—and we broke the law—it was my sin, not hers.

In my farewell letter to the world, written as I face eternity, I say that Ethel Le Neve has loved me as few women love men, and that her innocence of any crime, save that of yielding to the dictates of the heart, is absolute. To her I pay this last tribute. It is of her that my last thoughts have been. My last prayer will be that Gdd may protect her and keep her safe from harm, and allow her to join me in eternity. Surely such love as hers for me will be rewarded. However vile I am, whatever faults I may have committed, surely a woman whose'love has been beyond all womanly loyalty, who, though I am scorned by men, holds true to her love and is faithful to the last, has a virtue of love which may not be denounced by men who have not been so happy as I have been, and by women whose hearts are not big enough for such devotion. Remember that she has faced the agonies and torture of being charged with' murder, of enduring a long imprisonment, of facing a terrible prosecution before her acquittal. Yet she still loves me for all that, unwillingly, I have madt her bear. Is that not a wonderful woman's love? Facing my Maker, very close to the hour of my death, I give" my testimony to the absolute innocence of Ethel Le Neve. She put her trust in me, and what I asked her to do she did, never doubting. When I asked her to fly with me because of the scandal that would follow the discovery of Belle Elmore's disappearance she believed the words I spoke, and said she would go with me whatever discomforts might follow. j When I suggested the boy's disguise she adopted it with a girlish sense of amusement over which there was no shadow of guilt. Poor child! Why should she feel j guilty? She had been overwhelmed with | surprise to hear that Belle Elmore was still alive. But she had forgotten my first and only deception—the story of the cablegrams announcing Belle Elmore's ueath. Her only idea now was that we were getting away to a new world and a new life, away From prying eyes and scandalising tongues. She was willing to venture all for that—and she trusted me. I believe she has told in full detail the story of her adventures in boy's clothes, and although I have not been permitted to read a line of her narrative, I know that every word is true, for she has the heart of truth. I feel sure, also, that she has said no unkind word about me. I make this defence and this acknowledgment—that the love of Ethel Le Neve has been the best thing in my life—my only happiness—and that in return for that great gift T have been inspired with a greater kindness towards my fellowbeings, and with a greater desire to do good. We were as man and wife together, with an absolute communion of spirit. Perhaps God will pardon us because we

were like two children in the great unkind world, who clung to one another and gave each other courage. In Rotterdam and Brussels, and during the voyage across the Atlantic on the Montrose, Ethel had no suspicion of the tragedy that awaited her. Always she was hopeful of the future, and full' of expectation of the adventures to come. Then, as a bolt from the blue, came the arrival of Inspector Dew, with the appalling charges made against us both, followed by our dreadful separation. The world knows what happened afterwards, but what it does not know is the agony we both suffered, the frightful torture of two hearts beating one for another, yet divided by the most cruel barriers. From that time to now I have suffered | more than a human being may bear. It was a horrible thing to be in ignorance I of her health, her welfare, her whereabouts, and to be powerless to protect her by word or deed against the possible

unkindness of people, harsh with a woman upon whom false suspicion has fastened its claws. For myself. T was ready to hear everythins with as much calmness and courage as I could command. Yet I was buoyed up sometimes with wild hopes, more cruel than the most dreadful resignation. Tt seemed to me certain that the Court of Appeal would reverse the judgment. Yet it upheld the verdict. After the failure of that appeal I was crushed and overwhelmed. Hope went from me completely, and my heart was broken. It was not that my own life was forfeit, but I had dreamed dreams that I might regain my liberty to build up a now home in a new land with the woman without whom life to me was worthless. Oh! the bitterness of the thought that T must leave her alone to those who can never love her and protect her as T would have done! I bad been looking forward to a happy life—to years together in a little paradise of our own. And now I have to face the creat separation of death. In these last hours of mine T beg to thank the governor of my prison for his immense kindness in allowing me to receive so manv letters and so many visits from the woman who has shared my hopes and given me her pity. These visits and letters have been, indeed, mr deep consolation in these last days of my life. Her letters have been "brave and beautiful. They have proved to me how immeasurabde in its loyalty a woman's love may bo to a man broken and condemned. Durinrr these last days I have sat with my eyes fastened upon a hook, so that my warders may have imagined me to be reading. But the words have swum before my eyes, and I have been thinking all the time of the last letter and the letter to come, of the last visit, and the hope of the next, from the woman who is so dear to me.

I have been thinking by day and by night of what little thing I might do, while life is still mine, to, protect her interests, and to ensure, as far as may be, her future welfare. I am thankful that she has found good friends to help her and guard her, 1 at least for a time, from people only too willing to take advantage of her helplessness, and I am still more thankful that she. has steeled her heart, with ! splendid courage, to endure the tragedy f of these black days. | I myself have endeavored to be equally courageous, yet there have been times during her visits to me when an agony of intense longing has taken possession of me, when my very soul has cried out to clasp her hand and speak those things which are sacred between a man and woman who have loved. Alas! We have been divided by the iron discipline of prison rules, and warders have been the witnesses of our grief. Why do I tell these things to the world? Not to gain anything for myself —not even compassion. But because I desire the world to have pity on a woman who, however weak she may have seemed in their eyes, has been loyal in the midst of misery, and to the very end of tragedy, and whose love had been selfsacrificing and strong. Tnese are my last words. I belong no more to the world. In the silence of my cell I pray that God may pity all the weak hearts, all the poor children of life, and His poor! servant HAWLEY HARVEY CRIPPEN.