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Murder in Miniature: Reconstructing the Crime Scene in the English Courtroom

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Crime and the Construction of Forensic Objectivity from 1850

Part of the book series: Palgrave Histories of Policing, Punishment and Justice ((PHPPJ))

Abstract

Exploring the little-known medium of the English crime scene miniature, this chapter removes the roof of the ‘bungalow of death’ and invites us to peer inside. Tiny scale models of murder scenes, like that of the Crumbles bungalow where Patrick Mahon killed Emily Kaye in 1924, appeared in nineteenth- and twentieth-century courtrooms more frequently than the historical record suggests. The result is that these little likenesses have been overlooked in the literature on crime and forensics in the past, underestimating the significance of spatialized understandings of evidence and visual representations of crime scenes in court. This chapter explores the larger methodological implications of murder miniatures for sources about crime and trials in the past, illustrating the effects of investigating crime scenes at scale.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Daily Mirror, 17 July 1924, p. 8.

  2. 2.

    Grateful thanks to Dr Katherine Watson for this observation.

  3. 3.

    For a summary of this literature and an excellent history of crime scene photography see A. Bell, ‘Crime scene photography in England, 1895–1960’, Journal of British Studies, 2018, 57: 53–78; also A. Neale, Photographing Crime Scenes in Twentieth-Century London: Microhistories of Domestic Murder, London: Bloomsbury, 2020.

  4. 4.

    East Sussex Record Office (ESRO): SPA 2/37: Sussex Police Authority: ‘Papers for criminal conviction: R v Patrick Herbert Mahon’, 1924; Daily Mirror.

  5. 5.

    Historic England Archive, BB012367&8: ‘Lewes Crown Court Interior’ by Sid Barker, 1988, https://archive.historicengland.org.uk/SingleResult/Print.aspx?id=3656443, 15 December 2018; ESRO: SPA 2/37/39-40: Press photographs of Mahon in the dock, 1924.

  6. 6.

    E. Wallace (ed.), The Trial of Patrick Mahon (Famous Trials Series), London: Geoffrey Bles, 1924, p. 27.

  7. 7.

    The National Archives (TNA): DPP 1/78: Director of Public Prosecutions Case Papers, MAHON, P.H., Murder, 1924, Index of Exhibits.

  8. 8.

    Taunton Courier, 23 July 1924, p. 1.

  9. 9.

    T. Hitchcock, R. Shoemaker, C. Emsley, S. Howard, J. McLaughlin, et al., The Old Bailey Proceedings Online, 1674–1913, www.oldbaileyonline.org, version 8.0, March 2018: Trial of Elizabeth Canning (t17540424-60), 1754, 30 October 2018.

  10. 10.

    Ibid., examples include Trials of William Williams (t18070408-90), 1807; Mary Harrison, (t18131027-27), 1813; James Haley (t18241202-1), 1824; Charles Thomas White (t18261026-54), 1826.

  11. 11.

    Ibid., Trials of Elizabeth Ross alias Cook and Edward Cook (t18320105-22), 1832; Benjamin Cole (t18510915-1818), 1851; William Palmer (t18560514-490), 1856; Sarah Jane Wiggins (t18591128-35a), 1859; John Wiggins (t18670923-884), 1867.

  12. 12.

    Ibid., Trial of Francois Courvoisier (t18400615-1629), 1840.

  13. 13.

    For examples trials of Patrick Mahon at Lewes, reported Pall Mall Gazette, 1 February 1901, p. 8; William Podmore, Southampton, Daily Mail, 3 March 1930, p. 10; Sidney Fox, Lewes, Midland Daily Telegraph, 17 March 1930, p. 1; John Loughnan, Manchester, Northern Daily Mail, 21 November 1933, p. 8; James Camb, Southampton, Coventry Evening Telegraph, 17 November 1947, p. 1.

  14. 14.

    Old Bailey Online, Trials of Elizabeth Gibbons (t18841215-126), 1884; Harry John Surtees (t18830730-737), 1883; Adelaide Bartlett and George Dyson (t18860405-466), 1886; Daniel Stewart Gorrie (t18900519-444), 1890; Patrick Duffy and Thomas Rushton (t18910406-355), 1891; Marie Herman (t18940528-509), 1894.

  15. 15.

    The Police Journal, 1928–2018, for examples A.J. Quirke, ‘The evidence of the camera’, 1933, 6: 72–83; W.J. Hutchinson, ‘Plans and photographs’, 1937, 10: 42–51; J. O’Brien, ‘Simple photography for policemen’, 1936, 9: 63–71, 173–182, 331–342, 468–472.

  16. 16.

    S. Stewart, On Longing: Narratives of the Miniature, the Gigantic, the Souvenir, the Collection, Durham: Duke University Press, 1993, pp. 54–65.

  17. 17.

    Pall Mall Gazette, 1 February 1901, p. 8.

  18. 18.

    Science Museum Group, ‘Model railway carriage, 3rd class smoking compartment. Ref. 1999–7037’, Science Museum Group Collection Online, https://collection.sciencemuseum.org.uk/objects/co489466, Accessed 15 December 2018; City of London Police Museum Blog, ‘The Houndsditch Murders and the Siege of Sidney Street’, https://cityoflondonpolicemuseum.wordpress.com/2018/06/11/the-houndsditch-murders-and-the-siege-of-sidney-street/, accessed 7 October 2019.

  19. 19.

    M. Byers and V.M. Johnson (eds.), The CSI Effect: Television, Crime, and Governance, Plymouth: Lexington, 2009.

  20. 20.

    J. Keily and J. Hoffbrand, The Crime Museum Uncovered: Inside Scotland Yard’s Special Collection, I.B. Tauris and Museum of London, 2015, pp. 76–77.

  21. 21.

    TNA: ASSI 36/37/6: Assize Court Deposition Files, P Mahon, Murder, 1924: List of Exhibits; MEPO 3/1605: Metropolitan Police Papers and Correspondence, Murder of Emily Beilby Kaye, 1924: Report, Chief Inspector Percy Savage to Superintendent J.H. Ashley, 6 May and 13 June 1924. See also discussion of cauldron DPP 1/78: MAHON, 1924: Trial transcript [Savage cross-examined by Mr. Cassels for defence], pp. 19–20.

  22. 22.

    ESRO: SPA 2/37/2-41: Mahon, 1924—archived thanks to a Scotland Yard Detective’s personal collecting and letters to his mum. See also A. Sutton-Vane, ‘Murder cases, trunks and the entanglement of ethics: The preservation and display of crime scene material’, in A. Adam (ed.), Crime and the Construction of Forensic Objectivity from 1850, Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, 2020, pp. 279–301.

  23. 23.

    I. Burney and N. Pemberton, Murder and the Making of English CSI, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 2016, p. 63.

  24. 24.

    K. Biber, In Crime’s Archive: The Cultural Afterlife of Evidence, Abingdon: Routledge, 2018, pp. 39–61.

  25. 25.

    S. D’Cruze, ‘“The Damned Place was Haunted”: The Gothic, middlebrow culture and inter-war ‘Notable Trials”, Literature and History, 2006, 15: 37–58.

  26. 26.

    Ibid., p. 39; C. Emsley, T. Hitchcock and R. Shoemaker, ‘The value of the proceedings as a historical source’, Old Bailey Online, https://www.oldbaileyonline.org/static/Value.jsp, Accessed 16 January 2019; K.D. Watson, ‘Love, vengeance and vitriol: An Edwardian true crime drama’, in A. Kilday and D. Nash (eds.), Law, Crime and Deviance Since 1700: Micro-studies in the History of Crime, London: Bloomsbury, 2017, pp. 107–123.

  27. 27.

    Watson, ‘Love, vengeance and vitriol’, pp. 114–118.

  28. 28.

    This is a criticism Biber has levelled at twenty-first-century legal treatment of photographs, see Biber, In Crime’s Archive, pp. 13–38, esp. p. 15.

  29. 29.

    K. Fink (Dir.), CSI: Crime Scene Investigation (TV), Season 6, esp. Built to Kill Parts 1 & 2, 2006.

  30. 30.

    W.J. Turkel, ‘The crime scene, the evidential fetish, and the usable past’ in Byers and Johnson, CSI Effect, pp. 133–146.

  31. 31.

    S. Marks (Dir.), Of Dolls and Murder (documentary film), 2012.

  32. 32.

    Biber, In Crime’s Archive, pp. 39–61; C.M. Botz, The Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death, New York: Monacelli Press, 2004.

  33. 33.

    Byers and Johnson, CSI Effect.

  34. 34.

    P. Savage, Savage of Scotland Yard: The Thrilling Autobiography of Ex-Superintendent of the C.I.D., London: Hutchinson & Co., 1934, pp. 165–186.

  35. 35.

    Ibid.

  36. 36.

    TNA: DPP 2/78: ‘Director of Public Prosecutions Case Papers: MAHON, P’, Exhibit 75: Statement of Mahon (2 May 1924), Exhibit 78: Further statement of Mahon (3 May 1924), Exhibit 79: Further statement of Mahon (5 May 1924), Exhibit 80: Additions to Statement Exhibit 79 (5 May 1924).

  37. 37.

    Ibid.; Savage, Savage of Scotland Yard, 168; TNA: DPP 1/78: Trial transcript [Detective Sergeant Thomas Frew cross-examined by Cassels], p. 27. Comparing these documents shows something of how interviews were conducted and statements made, that police had different understanding of ‘verbatim’ than might be supposed, and that their own questions were not recorded.

  38. 38.

    DPP 1/78: Police report, Savage to Ashley, 6 May and 13 June 1924, p. 18.

  39. 39.

    Ibid.; Trial transcript [PC Shelah], pp. 3–4.

  40. 40.

    Ibid.; Memo to counsel 2 July 1924; Statement of PC Shelah, 30 June 1924.

  41. 41.

    L. Seal, Capital Punishment in Twentieth-Century Britain: Audience, Justice, Memory, London: Routledge, 2014, pp. 24–26.

  42. 42.

    DPP 1/78: Police report.

  43. 43.

    Ibid.; Trial transcript, [Mahon, examined and cross-examined], pp. 145–244; [Judge’s summing up], pp. 248–272. Mahon claimed he bought the chef’s knife to cut meat, unaware of a carving knife amongst the bungalow inventory when he rented it, he bought the meat saw to change a lock on a wooden door.

  44. 44.

    Ibid. Some exhibits were introduced to identify Kaye as the deceased, including her possessions, hotel registers and statements of staff who recognized her from photographs in life, statements by her sister and friends about her gentle personality and plans to marry, receipts and account statements showing purchase of foreign currency and withdrawal of promissory banknotes Mahon spent in false names.

  45. 45.

    DPP 1/78: Trial transcript [Shelah], pp. 3–6; Trial of Patrick Mahon, p. 34.

  46. 46.

    DPP 1/78: Transcript [Shelah], pp. 2–4. Note that this closed questioning and short answer is typical of police courts and trial courts. At the former, questions and answers were written into prose to form depositions which were then treated as verbatim at the latter, though they were not. Similarly, Old Bailey Proceedings and published Great and Famous Trials can be compared to transcripts to show that questions were largely edited out, forming inaccurate accounts of courtroom exchanges.

  47. 47.

    Ibid., p. 4.

  48. 48.

    Biber, In Crime’s Archive, pp. 13–38, esp. 15.

  49. 49.

    DPP 1/78: Transcript [Savage], p. 122, emphasis and parentheses as original.

  50. 50.

    Ibid. [Webster], p. 111; [Spilsbury], p. 119.

  51. 51.

    Ibid. [Mahon], pp. 221–222.

  52. 52.

    Ibid., pp. 238–239.

  53. 53.

    DPP 1/78: Transcript [Judge’s summing up], pp. 248–273.

Archives

East Sussex Record Office at the Keep, Falmer:

UK National Archives, Kew:

  • ASSI: Assize Court Deposition Files, CRIM: Central Criminal Court Deposition Files, DPP: Director of Public Prosecutions Case Papers, MEPO: Metropolitan Police Papers and Correspondence

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Newspapers

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  1. University of Sussex, Brighton, UK

    Alexa Neale

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  1. Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield, UK

    Alison Adam

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Neale, A. (2020). Murder in Miniature: Reconstructing the Crime Scene in the English Courtroom. In: Adam, A. (eds) Crime and the Construction of Forensic Objectivity from 1850. Palgrave Histories of Policing, Punishment and Justice. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-28837-2_3

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