A Fleeting Glimpse Through A Train Carriage Window
Did one of the witnesses see the murderer in the act of killing Willie Starchfield?
Dr Garrett and Bernard Spilsbury’s post-mortem evidence was followed by testimony from Richard Perks, who had examined the train compartment after Willie’s body had been removed.
‘I rode to Broad Street and made a very careful search and there was nothing. There was nothing in the way of crumbs found. The bottom panel of the door, where the window fits, was taken out and nothing was found. I looked particularly to see if there was a ticket in the compartment.’
Mr Perks provided a timetable of the trains working for the day which you can see in the image below. The markings in red show the train from the time Guard Pett took over the train and the direction it was travelling in corresponding to the time Willie’s body could have been hidden there and when he was found.
George Robert Jackson, signalman, came next. He was stationed at St Pancras signal box, situated between Maiden Lane Station and Camden Town Station. He was on duty from 7 a.m. until 3 p.m. on the 8th of January.
‘Between 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. I looked out of the open window of my box and saw a Chalk Farm train approaching me on the up line (towards Broad Street). In the fore part of the train, in a box compartment, I saw a man between 25 and 30 years of age, wearing a dark jacket or coat and bowler hat, dark moustache, leaning over the form of a boy or girl on the opposite seat. I was under the impression at the time that it was female. The man was facing the engine and I only got a cursory glance of him, side face. I cannot swear it was a boy the man was leaning over, only I have seen the body of Willie Starchfield at the mortuary and recognised the face as that of the boy I saw in the carriage.
The boy was in the corner seat nearer to me. His back was to the engine and his face inclined to the window. His head was moving backwards and forwards. The woodwork of the train prevented me seeing if the man had hold of the boy or not, but he was close to the seat where the boy was and was in a stopping position.’
Jackson watched until they were out of sight. He estimates the train would have travelled 100 yards in the time he could still see them, and the distance between himself and the train as 25 feet.
‘I could see that the child was quite young and had curly hair. There was no one else in the compartment but those two. I noticed no passengers in the adjacent compartment.’
Jackson was certain that the child he had seen was Willie.
Up next was John William Morcher, an engine driver stationed at Camden Loco Station. He’d spent the whole day shunting in Camden Coal Yard which adjoins Chalk Farm Station. Between 2.30 and 3 p.m. on the 8th he saw a North London train standing in the bay at Chalk Farm Station.
‘The bay is where the trains running only between Chalk Farm and Broad Street enter and start from. I saw a man in the fourth compartment, 3rd class, in the first or second coach from the engine, stooping over the seat facing Broad Street, as if he was tying up a parcel. I did not see his face, but I judged from his broad shoulders that he was a powerfully built man. He was dressed in a dark overcoat, but I cannot otherwise describe him, and cannot say whether he had a hat or not.’
The train had not been in the bay long and had not yet been turned for it’s run to Broad Street. Morcher said he saw the man twice as he passed.
‘The second time it seemed to me as if the man was strapping up a bag or parcel and I thought that perhaps he was a commercial traveller and had entered the train thinking it was one that ran through to Willesden, but finding that it went no further than Chalk Farm, had to hurriedly pack his parcel.’
Here, Edward Joseph Cook was recalled to confirm which carriage Willie had been discovered in. ‘It was the last compartment but one in the second passenger coach from the engine. There are five compartments in each carriage.’
Joseph Rogers, another signalman, stationed at the New Inn Yard signal box, between Shoreditch and Broad Street, told the court that he had picked up a cord on the track, on the left hand side coming from Broad Street. Another signalman had told him he had also noticed the cord, but had not touched it. The cord was shown to the jury, but as yet, I have no image of the cord to share here.
Did these railway workers see the same man? Did either of them see the murderer at work?
Given that Jackson’s sighting was of a man and child on the train travelling towards Broad Street, and Morcher saw a man on the train which had come from Broad street, they could only have been the same man if Morcher’s sighting occurred before Jackson’s. Furthermore, if the man Morcher saw had just got on the train, intending to go to Broad Street, he must have done so from the departing platform and waited in the carriage for the engine to be turned and attached to the other end of the carriages. This would put him at the back of the train and therefore in a different carriage to the one Willie was found in. Morcher’s man may have been doing the very thing that Morcher thought he was doing- tying up a parcel or bag before leaving the train.