Facing the porter's lodge stands the Governor's house, with a little bit of garden stretched before it; but the grass seems to know that it is prison grass and therefore denied all such luxuries as manure or prepared soil. The beds grow no flowers worthy of notice, and are rich only in flints. A pathway leads thence to the debtors' airing court, a sizeable gravelled square surrounded by white painted wooden railings; and next to this rises the prison bake-house from which proceeds a hum of machinery and a grinding noise. The power that turns the mill stones is that of a tread-wheel, worked by thirty-two felons, in prison-grey, trudging for an hour at a time up the endless stairs which turn away beneath their feet. Prison officers armed with cudgels discourage the rebellious or the laggardly from a neglect of their task. The result is both a sensation of health produced by wholesome exercise, which many of the felons are taking for the first time in their disorderly lives, and a large quantity of flour-not perhaps of the highest quality, yet passed as fit for human consumption. Through the bake-house windows may be seen great stacks of bread, baked into slabs three inches thick, which are then sawn into yard lengths and piled together in orderly fashion, like planks of rare timber at a cabinet-maker's shop. Square loaves, such as free men eat, are suspect as serving to conceal such forbidden objects as bottles of spirits, rope-ladders, and weapons of destruction, smuggled in with the grain.
When Dr Palmer reached the Gaol, he still felt ill; and, immediately donning nightcap and nightshirt, went to bed again. Major Fulford, the Governor, took advantage of this removal of his clothes to remove them even farther, fearing that poison might be concealed in them. He ordered another suit to be made for Dr Palmer, not of prison-grey, since he was not yet a convict, but of a sober broadcloth. However, he declined to wear these new clothes, insisting that the Governor had no right to force them on him, and that they were badly cut. His wilfulness convinced the prison officers that poison must surely lurk in the seams or corners of coat, waistcoat or trousers; two or three grains of prussic acid or strychnine would, of course, suffice to end his life. When, a fortnight later, his own clothes were at last returned, every garment had been searched with a fine comb and beaten hard to dislodge any powder. All the seams had also been opened; the buttons examined lest one of them should serve as a miniature poison-box; the heels unfastened from his boots, lest these too should serve as receptacles for poison, and put back after careful scrutiny.
Much as Dr Palmer hated sleeping alone, almost more he hated being cut off from the racing news; but the Governor had strong views on the subject of horse-racing and gambling and let him read no newspaper which contained any talk of 'form' and 'odds'. In his despondency, Dr Palmer determined on self-destruction. No easy means offered, however, since he might use neither knife nor fork for his meals, ate off a tin plate and drank from a tin mug. He therefore resolved on starvation, simply sipping a little water from time to time, and lying motionless in bed, his face turned towards the wall. The Governor, on his usual morning visit, became alarmed by this behaviour, and tried to argue him into eating. Dr Palmer replied courteously that he was not hungry, and wanted nothing. Since, by the seventh day of this obstinate abstention from food, his prisoner had lost a stone of weight and seemed in danger of making good his resolve, the Governor had a savoury bowl of soup prepared, and sent for a spoon and a stomach pump.
He told Dr Palmer that, according to the prison doctor, his pulse was regular, his looks those of a healthy man, and there seemed no reason why he should not partake of this succulent soup.
'It's only that I have no appetite for coarse food,' Dr Palmer murmured faintly.
'Then, Sir,' cried the Governor, 'you shall choose between this spoon and that other instrument! I don't care a fig (let me be frank) whether you live or die, except in so far as my own appointment is concerned. But if I pander to your desire for self-extinction, my superiors will punish me severely; which I do not intend to happen. You have five minutes to decide whether you will drain your bowl, or oblige me to take compulsory measures. In the latter case, I shall summon a force of officers, of whom I have fifty at my orders, wedge open your jaws, drop the tube of this pump down the gullet, and pretty soon soup will be warming your stomach. It is by no means the pleasantest way of eating, but what other recourse have I?'
Dr Palmer said: 'I had not considered, Sir, that my loss of appetite might endanger your appointment here. And though I don't welcome your poor opinion of me-which I find unbecoming when I'm not yet pronounced guilty, and won't be, neither-nevertheless, if you insist, I'll consent to drink the damned beverage with your greasy spoon.'
He gave no further trouble in this respect, beyond asking one day that meals might be sent to him from his own kitchen. The Governor refused, for fear poison might be conveyed in the dishes, but told him that he was at liberty to order what victuals he pleased, within reason, for cooking in the debtors' kitchen. 'Ah, but it's not the same,' sighed Dr Palmer. 'Your prison cooks murder good food.'
'I trust at least that they do not poison it,' tardy retorted the Governor.
***
Meanwhile, numerous bills fell due which Dr Palmer could not, and old Mrs Palmer would not, meet. One morning Mr Wright, a solicitor from Birmingham, arrived at Dr Palmer's house and demanded admittance in virtue of a bill of sale to the amount of £10,400 given by Palmer some six months before for his horses, furniture, and all other movable property.
Mr Bergen, the Rural Superintendent of Police, who was charged with safeguarding the papers, drugs, and other contents of the house, refused to admit Mr Wright; however, one of Mr Wright's men presently gained an entry by breaking a pane of glass in the scullery window and unlatching it. Once inside the house, the Law protected Mr Wright, and arrangements were soon made for selling off the Doctor's effects by public auction.
We gather from Mrs Bennett, a next-door neighbour whose husband is a shoemaker, that if it had been Prince Albert's own sale there couldn't have been more folks about. They flocked in from Birmingham and all around, coming only to gaze, not to buy. The sale, according to the catalogue, should have occupied three days, but was got over in ten hours.
'The business was altogether too hurried,' Mrs Bennett told us. 'If the things had been brought out into the open air they would have fetched more; but the auctioneer didn't allow the bidders' time. It was along of the crowds that tramped through the house and prevented dealers from examining the articles at leisure. Nobody could see what was what, and the auctioneer wanted to get done quickly; even so, a mort of small things got stolen as souvenirs. The books, most of them new and up to date, were almost given away. And the furniture was beautiful!'
Mr Fawcus, a cabinet-maker, who stood waiting for Mr Bennett to finish cobbling a pair of boots, agreed with Mrs Bennett. 'Yes, Sir, the furniture was very good indeed, and not merely the pieces that I made at his orders according to Sheraton's models. I know he paid forty guineas for a sideboard-that's large money-and sixteen for a chiffonier. He had excellent taste in furniture.'
Mrs Bennett fetches us the catalogue: Contents of drawing-room: one fine-toned semi-grand pianoforte in rosewood by a celebrated London maker. 'Poor Mrs Palmer used to accompany herself on that, while singing Thomas Moore's Irish Songs,' Mrs Bennett said. 'She had a sweet voice. But the pianoforte went for a song-no joke intended.'
Rosewood couch with spring seat, squab and pillow in blue damask, and six elegant rosewood chairs in suite. 'My work,' said Mr Fawcus. 'Bought at the sale by Mr Bergen, the Rural Superintendent of Police, whose daughter took a fancy to them. He'd have bidden up to the original price, he would, but there was no competition-there isn't likely to be when Mr Bergen bids-so he got them cheap, and afterwards told me: "Fawcus, these people here, they don't know good stuff when they see it." He's a very knowing gentleman.'
Handsome mahogany book case, six foot by nine foot long, with plate glass and sliding shelves. 'That went at a better price to the Hon. Mr Curzon's steward.' Pair of handsome chimney glasses. 'Those were in the same lot,' remarked Mr Fawcus, 'big as chimney pots, and real cut crystal.'
Contents of best bedroom: handsome German bedstead with panelled foot-board, carved cornice and fringe, and figured damask hangings. 'Ah,' said Mrs Bennett, 'that's where poor Mrs Palmer bore her unfortunate children, and where she died, and where the Doctor was lying when arrested.'
'It's a good deal too heavy and fanciful for my taste,' confessed Mr Fawcus, 'but then I'm English, you see. It was old Mrs Palmer's wedding gift to the Doctor, and she bought it back. I think she wished to show that she hasn't lost faith in her son, despite all the ugly rumours.'
'Which I don't believe, neither,' cried Mrs Bennett, 'whatever the Coroner may say, and the judge, and the jury, and Captain Hatton, and Mr Bergen and all! It made my ears burn to hear some of the comments, dropped by those ill-mannered Birmingham folks as they roamed the house. They'd whisper: "That's where the wicked devil used to sleep with his mistresses." And when they came to the surgery, the remarks they passed about the bottles there was perfectly sinful!'
Contents of dining-room: eight fine Elizabethan carved oak chairs with seats upholstered in purple plush velvet. Also two valuable oil paintings: 'Charles Marlow, the Jockey, with Nettle' and 'Goldfinder, Winner of the Queen's Plate at Shrewsbury.' Twenty-five shillings a chair, just imagine!' exclaimed Mr Fawcus, 'originally purchased by the Doctor for four guineas, and a bargain at that! And the pictures went for five shillings, the frames alone being worth a guinea.'
'All that I bought,' said Mrs Bennett, 'was a nice deal box containing fishing tackle and pills. The Police didn't seem to mind the pills being sold and, of course, I burned them in the grate to keep them out of the children's clutches. "A box of fishing tackle is a funny place to put pills in," the auctioneer told us. But the tackle was a bargain at a shilling. My husband enjoys his bit of fishing of a Sunday afternoon, and the box was handy for garden tools.'
'The only fair prices were paid for the Doctor's cellar,' chimed in Mr Fawcus. 'He had 222 gallons of home-brewed ale, according to the catalogue, 67 dozen of port, and 43 gallons of spirit. A very fine cellar for so abstemious a man. It never occurred to the innkeepers who bid for them that every bottle might contain rank poison; they were a deal less suspicious than the officers at Stafford Gaol.'
***
We strolled round to the back of the house, where the garden stretches-half an acre of land 'in very good fettle,' as Mr Fawcus called it. The low hedge dividing the courtyard from the garden has been carefully clipped, and the small garden in front of the house, with a little pile of imitation rock to spruce it up, is thoroughly well tended. Though we noticed at least six beds of leeks and spring onions, a patch about the size of his drawing-room carpet was all the space Dr Palmer devoted to flowers. The beds, cut out of the turf in curious shapes, such as stars and lozenges, contained only a few pinks and wall flowers.
We came across a well-built stable and coach-house with a pear-tree trained against the brick wall facing the noon sun, and a horseshoe nailed to the door. The large tank is of slate and clean rainwater flows into it for horses' drinking-soft water improves their health. In one corner, next a pig sty, a manure tank is sunk, into which the slush of the stable and piggery formerly drained; there being a pump to raise the liquid as it was required for the cultivation of vegetables. All these improvements to the property had been added by Dr Palmer.
Following the kitchen-garden path, where clothes poles and the cord along them formed a kind of telegraph, we found a fine rhubarb bed, behind which grew forty gooseberry and currant bushes, all neatly pruned. And beyond these, we suddenly came on a gentleman in check coat and trousers sitting on an upturned oyster barrel. He rose and addressed us in a hoarse Manchester accent, pressing upon us a tradesman's card which we reproduce here:
For a Fortnight
Photographic Portraits
C. ALLEN
Respectfully informs the Ladies, Gentry & Inhabitants of Rugeley and elsewhere that he can produce
A Very Superior Photographic Portrait
in gilt and other frames
FROM ONE SHILLING TO ONE GUINEA
and invites their patronage at the rear of
PREMISES LATELY OCCUPIED BY W. PALMER
Specimens may be seen at Mr James's, Bookseller
Commencing at 10 o'clock Mornings until 6 in the Evening. Rugeley, June 2nd, 1856
We thanked Mr Allen, but informed him that another day would suit us better. 'Oh, that's all right, bless you, Sir,' he said, 'I don't want for custom. The number of fashionably dressed folks who journey over here from the surrounding districts for a sight of Dr Palmer's house, barred and empty as it is, still astounds me. It's early yet for the rush, which don't commence much before noon. I do very well indeed from them, and take their portraits standing against the stable door, with one hand on the pear-tree to steady 'em. Yes, Sir, 'tis a superb place for my trade.'
***
Dr Palmer's creditors had all gathered together like a flock of vultures, and on January 21st, 1856, his brood-mares, horses in training and yearlings came up for auction. We were present to witness that interesting occasion.
At Hyde Park Corner, close to where carriages and horsemen enter the park, and where the mob stands roaring and screaming to see Her Majesty the Queen drive by in her landau-not far, in fact, from Decimus Burton's Arch topped by that formidable equestrian statue of the late Field-Marshal the Duke of Wellington, you will find Tattersall's Ring, the sanctum sanctorum of Turfites. It is a haunt as familiar to the young Yorkshire tyke as to the finest swell in London: a name as suggestive of good faith, honour, prompt payments, splendid horseflesh and noble company as it is of swindling, robbery, non ests, defaulting, levanting, screws and blackguards.
There's a sporting air about 'The Corner', from the red-jacketed touts who hang around its entrance to the shrewd cast of the auctioneer's countenance. We went down the yard, already filling at the news that Palmer's nags would come under the hammer, and hundreds who had no intention whatever of bidding, were assembled there through curiosity. Here they stood: gentle and simple, young and elderly, peers of the Realm, gentry, tradesmen and legs. That lanky old man with the fine aristocratic face, and neck swathed in the thick white choker, is a clergyman, and as thorough a sportsman as ever stepped; nor are his sermons any the worse for that. The dirty little man in the brown coat is a Viscount, exceedingly rich but so mean that he is said to go through the refuse bins outside his former club, from which he has been ejected, searching avidly for remnants of lobster and crayfish, which he grudges to buy for himself. Yonder goes the 'Leviathan' of the Ring, Bill Davies, tall and thin, dressed entirely in black, with a blue speckled handkerchief about his throat. He started life as a carpenter, and his word is now good for fifty thousand pounds; beside him walks young Frank Swindell, another commission agent, wearing a bunch of early violets in his buttonhole. Both of them have made an odd discovery, that, in the long run, straight dealing pays even in the betting ring. Since they scorn 'daylight robbery', which is to encourage betters to lay money on dead'uns-horses that will never run-engineers of dirty work no longer trouble to approach them.
Tattersall's stables are the acme of neatness and cleanliness. Here to the right is the Subscription Room, into which we might not go; instead we visited a public house mainly frequented by little grooms and jockeys, and listened to their gossip. 'The Rugeley Poisonings' were all the talk, and feeling ran high, the sporting fraternity being about equally divided between pro's and con's. Some swore that Billy Palmer was a bold sportsman, a good loser, and a generous friend; others that he was Ananias, Cain and Judas Iscariot rolled into one.
'He's lower than an animal, and worth a deal less,' cries a ferret-faced stable-boy to young Ashmole the jockey, 'and I'll undertake to prove it-at even money in half-sovereigns!'
'Done,' young Ashmole answers, 'let the landlord hold the stakes and be umpire.'
'Well,' says Ferret Face, 'Palmer was denied entrance to Tattersall's, now wasn't he? And a horse is an animal, isn't it? Well, there's seventeen of his horses admitted today where he wasn't, and a couple of 'em will sell for well over five hundred guineas, and none for lower than fifty. Well, what's Palmer worth? There's bills for fifteen thousand pounds out against him, and ten thousand of 'em won't be met. And as for his life, I wouldn't back his chances to live the year out, not at a hundred to one.'
Young Ashmole, defeated by this crude logic, which satisfied the landlord and raised loud cheers at the bar, paid up sulkily; but, having done so, he soused Ferret Face with a mug of beer full in his grinning phiz.
Bidding at the auction was spirited, and high prices were realized. Prince Albert's name has already appeared in our account of the other auction, if only as a metaphor; here we heard it used in a direct and practical manner. For Major Grove, Her Majesty's Commissioner from the Royal Paddocks, bought Trickstress, an eight-year-old mare, for 230 guineas on Prince Albert's behalf. Strange to relate, though the Major appeared anxious to secure Nettle, a decidedly superior animal, in the end he let her go to Mr F. L. Popham for 430 guineas. (Nettle, it will be recalled, was favourite for the Oaks last year, and her tumble over the chains sealed Dr Palmer's financial doom.) The Chicken went for 800 guineas to Mr Harlock, who has since changed her name to 'Vengeance'. In the aggregate, the sale amounted to £3906, which included the high price of 590 guineas for a three-year-old filly, by Melbourne out of Seaweed, which fell to Mr Sargent.
***
While Dr Palmer was attempting suicide by starvation, the bodies of his wife and brother were exhumed, and coroner's inquests held on them. In the first case, Annie Palmer's, the gaseous exudations of the corpse had, since the fifteen months of burial, escaped through the fibre of the oaken coffin and left the corpse comparatively dry. Dr Monckton made the post-mortem examination, and again the organs were sent to Professor Taylor, who reported antimony in the stomach, liver and kidneys and judged that death was due to this antimony administered in the form of tartar emetic, and to no other cause. The jury found Dr Palmer guilty of wilful murder.
Exceptionally distressing was the post-mortem done on Walter Palmer's body. He had been buried in a lead coffin and, the wooden shell being removed, a hole was bored through the lid. At once a most noxious effluvia permeated the entire Talbot Inn. Fifteen of the persons present, including seven of the jury, were seized with nausea, and some of them remained seriously indisposed for the next two or three days. The lid being opened, the corpse wore a terrible aspect, being a mass of corruption, dropsy and gangrene. Professor Taylor inclined to think that death was caused by prussic acid, though he could find no trace of the poison in the organs sent him for analysis; and though Dr Day, who had signed the death certificate, testified that he had not smelt the tell-tale fumes of prussic acid on the dying man's breath., but only those of brandy! Dr Day stood firmly by his original opinion that death was due to apoplexy, consequent on excessive drinking. Since Drs Monckton, Harland, Campbell, Hughes and Waddell supported Dr Day, Professor Taylor felt it wise not to press his view.
Nevertheless, when the case came before the Coroner, the jury, instigated by Mr Hawkins, the chemist, who had been chaffed a good deal for having supplied Dr Palmer with enough poison to destroy the whole parish, brought in yet another verdict of wilful murder. Walter's widow, Mrs Agnes Palmer, had attended the Court, but so broken by grief that the Coroner led her to a private room where he took her evidence in the presence of the Foreman and the Clerk. Among others who appeared were George Palmer, the solicitor, who told the Court: 'Mr Hawkins feels rancour towards my brother, and will, I am sure, find him guilty of murder whatever the evidence. At my brother's sale, Mr Hawkins bought a medical book to use against him when he comes to be tried on the equally false charge of poisoning his friend, the late Mr Cook.'
Pratt, the moneylender, was also called, because he held Walter Palmer's life-insurance policy as collateral security for Dr Palmer's debts to him, and because he had approached the insurance companies on the Doctor's behalf; which led him to be suspected of complicity in the supposed murder. The Coroner and jury asked him searching questions; denounced his rate of interest-sixty per cent a year-as usurious; and treated him so roughly that at last he screamed in falsetto, tears of rage streaming down his plump face: 'How can you ask such questions of a family man with three young children and a dear wife, who will probably be ruined by this affair? I lost over four thousand pounds through Palmer!'
The Court burst into loud laughter.
This, however, was not yet the end of the matter, for George Palmer appealed. The case was duly carried before the Grand Jury at Stafford Assizes, who threw out the bill against Dr Palmer for wilful murder of his brother Walter, finding the evidence insufficient.
Now, if it is asked why Professor Taylor had been so ready to name prussic acid as the cause of death, the answer is clear. A detective, employed by Mr Stevens to make inquiries at Wolverhampton, discovered that on the Monday before Walter's death, while the race meeting was in progress there, the Doctor had visited a chemist's shop and bought a quantity of prussic acid and jalap from the assistant. Mr Stevens acquainted Professor Taylor with this news, and the evidence which the assistant gave at the inquest, supporting Professor Taylor's seemingly unaided diagnosis, prompted the verdict of wilful murder. But George Palmer prudently took the precaution of checking the Poison Book and found no entry, on the date concerned, referring to prussic acid. He then threatened to indict the assistant for perjury-a crime which carries the statutory punishment of transportation-if he would not publicly withdraw his statement. This the young man hastened to do, though transportation has, of course, been suspended since 1846, when the authorities of Van Diemen's Land, overwhelmed by a horde of idle and depraved convicts, far outnumbering the free settlers, begged the Government to send no more. The probability is that the assistant had made Dr Palmer a present of the prussic acid, just as Newton did; and that the Doctor intended to use it on other owners' horses-for it can at least be said that he always ran his own to win.
***
While held in Stafford Gaol, Dr Palmer was only once allowed outside the building. On January 21st, policemen escorted him to Westminster where he appeared as a witness at a trial in which Padwick, the moneylender, was plaintiff, and old Mrs Palmer defendant. (This, it will be recalled, was the day artfully chosen by the managers of Tattersall's to put the 'all-yellow' horses under the hammer; the coincidence excited high bidding.) Padwick was trying to recover a two-thousand-pound loan, in the form of a bill which apparently bore old Mrs Palmer's acceptance. She denied the handwriting, and was supported in this by three of her children: Mr George Palmer, the Revd John Palmer, and Miss Sarah Palmer. The dramatic appearance of Dr Palmer, who had presented the bill to Padwick, caused quite a stir. The door of the judge's private room was thrown open and he entered, cool and collected, in the custody of a large and muscular police officer. From the witness box he leisurely surveyed the crowded audience, to some of whom he gave a familiar nod, before fixing his attention on a person located between him and the learned counsel who conducted Mrs Palmer's case. This was a young red-haired woman, believed to have been the same Jane Widnall, or Smirke, lately returned a widow from Australia, who had first seduced him from the narrow path of virtue. She afterwards applied for a seat at the murder trial, but the demand being too great, failed of her expectation.
Dr Palmer was then sworn and answered the following questions in a low, yet firm and distinct voice, without betraying the least hesitation or nervousness.
MR EDWIN JAMES (handing him the bill of exchange): Is the signature 'William Palmer' as the drawer of this bill in your handwriting?
DR PALMER: Yes.
MR JAMES: And you applied to Padwick to advance you money on it?
DR PALMER: I did.
MR JAMES: Who wrote Mrs Sarah Palmer's acceptance on it?
DR PALMER: Ann Palmer.
MR JAMES: Who is she?
DR PALMER: She is now dead.
MR JAMES: Do you mean your wife?
DR PALMER: Yes.
MR JAMES: Did you see her write it?
DR PALMER: Yes.
A shudder went through the audience. That a man should accuse his dead wife of a crime which he had himself forced upon her seemed a heartless proceeding; yet, she being dead and past caring, his chief concern was to preserve his mother's esteem. She had assured Jeremiah Smith that 'my Billy would never seek to rob me,' nor was she disappointed; his honest confession of fraud now saved her two thousand pounds, for Mr Padwick's Counsel saw no course open to him but retirement from the case. The jury found in favour of old Mrs Palmer, and the prisoner was hurried back to Euston Square Station.
It is an ironical circumstance that Mr Padwick, half an hour earlier, had purchased two of the Doctor's horses: a bay yearling colt, by Touchstone out of the Duchess of Kent, at 230 guineas; and a brown yearling filly, by Touchstone out of Maid o' Lyme, at 250 guineas. He swore that had he known how the verdict would go, he'd never have 'bought hoof or hair of that twister's blood-stock.'
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