Post by Joanna on Jan 9, 2015 23:50:53 GMT -5
The Dead Boy Under the Seat
Who strangled five-year-old, curly-haired Willie Starchfield (above) to death on a London train and then stuffed his tiny body under one of the seats? This tragic, sensationalized murder happened 101 years ago this week and it has never been solved.
On Thursday, January 8, 1914, an errand boy was sent to deliver a parcel. On his way back to work, he boarded a train at Mildmay Park station on the North London Railway. The lad entered a third class compartment and as the train approached Dalston station, he suddenly noticed a small hand protruding from beneath the seat. Frightened, the boy tried without success, to attract the attention of a porter. When the train arrived at Haggerston, he bolted from the station and out into the street. After recovering himself, he proceeded to the station master's office to report what he had seen. The train was stopped and searched. Beneath the seat in the compartment in which the lad had traveled, was the body of a five- or six-year-old boy with long golden curls. The face was suffused with blood, the lips bruised and marks on the neck suggested a cord of some sort had been used.
Chief Inspector William Gough was assigned to the case and initiated enquiries on the assumption the boy had been strangled. His opinion was soon confirmed by Doctor Spilsbury, who examined the body.
It did not take long to identify the child as the son of John and Agnes Starchfield. John Starchfield, described as a "rough" character, sold newspapers and in 1912, he had attained some celebrity status after he tackled an armed Armenian named Stephen Titus who entered the Horseshoe Hotel and shot a man and woman. Starchfield was separated from his wife. Willie, their little boy, lived with his mother and around 12:50 p.m. on the day of the murder, Mrs. Starchfield she sent her son on an errand. He never returned.
According to the medical evidence, the murder took place some time between 2 and 3 p.m. and the train had shuttled several times between Chalk Farm and Broad Street after the murder had been committed.
The inquest opened on January 15, 1914, and evidence was given by the guard on the train, the errand boy who discovered the body, and the porter who first searched the train. John Starchfield was asked to account for his movements on the day of the murder. He said he was in his bed in a lodging house and had not seen the boy for three weeks. The inquest was adjourned.
When the inquest was resumed a week later, two signalmen gave evidence relating to a piece of cord they had discovered on the line on the day of the murder. Doctor Spilsbury said it could have been responsible for the marks on the child's throat. A third signalman testified that when he was on duty at the St. Pancras Box as the 2.14 p.m. train from Chalk Farm passed, he saw a man in a compartment bending over what he thought was a young girl. This signalman examined the body of the murdered boy and said the recognized the face as the one he had seen, the long curls had misled him as to the gender. Another witness was the driver of a shunting engine at Camden Coal Yard. He stated that between 2.30 and 3 p.m., he had seen a man stooping over something in a compartment and that the man appeared to be tying up a parcel.
The most important witness was Clara Wood. She said she had seen a man leading a little boy by the hand on the afternoon of the murder and the boy was eating a piece of currant cake. The postmortem had disclosed 1½ ounces of partially digested food which contained currants. Mrs. Wood was asked if she could identify the man and she pointed to John Starchfield. “Me?” exclaimed Starchfield. “Yes,” the woman said. “It's a lie,” shouted Starchfield. The coroner adjourned the inquest at that stage, indicating further enquiries would be made in Starchfield’s interest.
When the inquest was resumed, witnesses from the lodging house gave evidence on behalf of Starchfield. A commercial traveler named John White described how he had seen a man and boy together at Camden Town Station. He identified Starchfield as the man. “It's a lie!” shouted Starchfield, “a damned lie!” One of the lodging house witnesses added: “It is too, he was in bed at the time.”
The coroner's jury returned a verdict of wilful murder against Starchfield and he was taken into custody and jailed at the Old Street Police Station.
While he was awaiting trial, one of the essential witnesses attempted to commit suicide and the prosecution suffered another setback when Mrs. Wood’s testimony collapsed under cross-examination. She created the impression she had seen a photograph of Starchfield in a newspaper before she identified him. She was confused about the hat he was wearing and when shown a photograph of the boy, she could not identify him as the boy she had seen.
The judge was critical of the coroner’s office after the coroner read for the jury, statements made to the police without formal depositions or questioning the witnesses. The judge declared: “I find that the depositions were not taken down at the time by the coroner, or at any rate they were not read over to the witnesses. Then, apparently, the coroner’s officer who took them round to be signed was permitted to allow the witnesses to correct them. That procedure seems to me to be an entire mockery and an abuse of the duties entrusted to any coroner.” He then instructed the jury to return a formal verdict of not guilty.
Starchfield died in the St. Pancras Infirmary in 1916. He always protested his innocence and claimed some friend of Stephen Titus killed his son in an act of revenge.
In a cruel twist, True Crime Library indicates, Willie was born with a heart problem "by which any sudden or violent shock was likely to kill him."
Sources: British Transport Police; Cheryl Eddy, io9, January 9, 2015; and True Crime Library.