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THE MURDER OF MRS HOGG, 1890

Women rarely commit murder. Those who have done so have generally been poor, illiterate, aggressive if not volatile, mentally unstable, and poison is their usual method of bringing death. More than half (thirty-seven) of the women hanged for murder (sixty-eight) between 1843 and 1956 were poisoners. The murders women commit are mostly domestic ones – of a child, husband or lover, and occur when the murderess can no longer endure the anguish of a relationship or a situation. Children have often been murdered by women in a kind of misdirection of their anguish – as a substitute for the husband or lover, or for the suicide of the murderess herself. A very few women have murdered for gain, to improve their economic or social conditions. Some murder out of spite. Associated causes of murder where women have been concerned are sexual frustration, nymphomania, lesbianism, post-natal depression, the menopause, alcoholism and feeble-mindedness. In the case of Mrs Pearcey, sexual jealousy has been mooted as the mainspring of the murders she committed. They are more likely to have arisen from circumstances similar to those described in Congreve’s famous sentence: ‘Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned, nor hell a fury like a woman scorned.’

Mrs Pearcey was not, in fact, married. Her real and maiden name was Mary Eleanor Wheeler. But when she went to live with a man called Pearcey, she assumed the name and title of his wife, retaining both when, for reasons unknown, he left her. Male reporters later portrayed her as being tall and powerful, with striking almost masculine features, a full figure and fine eyes.

A woman correspondent of the Pall Mall Budget described her as being ‘a woman of about five feet six, neither slight nor stout. There is nothing of the murderess in her appearance; in fact, she is a mild, harmless-looking woman. Her colouring is delicate and her hands are small and shapely. But she has not a single good feature in her face. Her eyes are dark and bright … Her mouth is large and badly formed, and her chin is weak and retreating.’

Eleanor Pearcey’s emotional instability and depressing loneliness – her nearest relatives were an aged mother and an older sister – seem to have led her into a series of affairs, further solaced by drink. In 1890, at the age of twenty-four, she was on her way to being a full-time courtesan. The three rooms she occupied on the ground floor of 2 Priory Street, Kentish Town, were paid for by an admirer, Mr Crichton of Gravesend in Kent, who called on her once a week. The rooms were small but attractively furnished. On the left of the entrance hall of the house was her front parlour, in which there was an upright piano; folding doors opened on to a bedroom overlooking the yard at the rear. There was a tiny kitchen.

Another admirer was a furniture remover, Frank Samuel Hogg. Him she apparently loved; she used to put a light in her window to let him know when she was free. A feckless, sentimental and selfish man, who had known Eleanor Pearcey for some time, he was vain enough, it appears, to imagine that all women who looked on him loved him, and was pleased to be proved right. One conquest, however, turned out to be a careless triumph in more ways than one. She became pregnant, and such was the weight of her family’s opinion, backed up by several large brothers, that Frank Hogg was persuaded to marry her. The marriage was not happy, and when his wife, Phoebe, a large, plain woman, duly produced a baby girl, also called Phoebe, this apparently so lowered her bearded husband’s self-esteem and increased his self-pity that he used to speak of suicide to his young bosom-friend, Eleanor Pearcey. He would weep in her arms and bemoan his wretched state, adding his frustrations to hers. As an alternative to suicide he talked of emigration. Both were anathema to Mrs Pearcey.

Although she had known Phoebe Hogg before her marriage to Frank Hogg and had been friends with his sister Clara – the actual relationship between the three women appears to have been quite complex – Mrs Pearcey seems to have become increasingly jealous of Mrs Hogg and full of hate. Apparently Eleanor Pearcey felt that Frank was essential to her happiness and that the realisation of his happiness must be her prime aim. She wished to be his wife, to have him all to herself.

In her letters she besought him not to kill himself, to go on living for her sake if not for his. In one, she wrote:

You ask me if I was cross with you for coming only such a little while. If you knew how lonely I am you wouldn’t ask. I would be more than happy if I could see you for the same time each day, dear. You know I have a lot of time to spare and I cannot help thinking. I think and think until I get so dizzy that I don’t know what to do with myself. If it wasn’t for our love, dear, I don’t know what I should really do, and I am always afraid you will take that away, and then I should quite give up in despair, for that is the only thing I care for on earth. I cannot live without it now. I have no right to it, but you gave it to me, and I can’t give it up.

It must have seemed that her emotional dilemma could only be resolved by the destruction of Phoebe Hogg, and all Mrs Pearcey’s passionate envy and frustration focused on the other, older woman, who had the benefit of Frank’s company every night and every day.

Frank and Phoebe Hogg lived with his sister Clara and his mother in rooms at 141 Prince of Wales Road, Kentish Town. On Thursday, 23 October 1890 Mrs Hogg (now aged thirty-one) received a note from Mrs Pearcey inviting her to 2 Priory Street for tea. She showed the note to her sister. It said: ‘Dearest, come round this afternoon and bring our little darling. Don’t fail.’ But Mrs Hogg was for some reason unable to go there that day. Her sister later told the police that Mrs Pearcey had once invited Phoebe to go with her to Southend and look over an empty house.

The next day, Friday the 24th, Eleanor Pearcey gave a small boy a penny to deliver a second note, and this time, without telling anyone where she was going, Phoebe Hogg left her house about 3.30 pm and set out, pushing her daughter in a bassinette or pram down Kentish Town Road and into Royal College Street towards the drab little road (now Ivor Street) where Mrs Pearcey lived. Mrs Hogg pulled the pram up the steps and parked it in the narrow entrance hall. Carrying the child, she then followed the younger, smaller woman either into the front parlour or into the pokey kitchen at the end of the hall.

It was in the kitchen that Phoebe Hogg was slaughtered, despatched with a poker and more than one knife. Her skull was fractured and her throat so severely cut that her head was almost severed from her body. It seems that Mrs Hogg was not easy to kill, that she struggled and fought for her life: the arms of both women were bruised. Two window panes were broken and the kitchen’s walls and ceiling were spattered with blood. Mrs Pearcey’s neighbours heard what they called ‘banging and hammering’ at about four o’clock. Another neighbour said she heard a child screaming – or what sounded like a child. But like most good neighbours they hesitated to intrude, readily assuming in a noisy neighbourhood, where cries and fights were not unknown, that the rumpus was in some way connected with workmen repairing a pub on the corner.

Afterwards, Mrs Pearcey probably washed her hands and the weapons, took off and washed her top-skirt, tried to scrub out the bloodstains on a rug, on the curtains and on an apron. At some point she heaved the body of the murdered woman into the pram, in which the little girl, whether alive or dead, also lay. She covered them both with an antimacassar. About six o’clock Mr and Mrs Butler, who lived in the second floor flat at the top of the stairs, returned separately to 2 Priory Street. Both knocked against the bassinette parked in the darkened hallway: Mrs Pearcey heard them and called out to each of them to take care.

Some time after this, when it was quite dark, she put on her bonnet and went out, bumping the pram down the few steps at the front door on to the pavement and, turning right, wheeled her dreadful load away from the house into Chalk Farm Road, then up Adelaide Road and into Eton Avenue. Pushing the weighty pram before her, she sought some deserted place in the gas-lit streets where she might unburden herself, unobserved, of the pram and what it contained. The body of Mrs Hogg was deposited by a partly built house in Crossfield Road, near Swiss Cottage. The child was dumped on some waste land in Finchley Road.

By now the child was dead, having suffocated, it is said, in the pram – no signs of violence were found on her. On the other hand, the little girl may have been suffocated in the house, perhaps by a cushion. The child is unlikely to have remained silent while her mother was murdered, or when both were put in the pram.

As if in a daze, as if tied to the now empty pram, Eleanor Pearcey walked on for over a mile through the quieter, richer streets around Abbey Road, finally abandoning the pram in Hamilton Terrace, between Maida Vale and St John’s Wood. She then began the long walk home through the shadowed streets. In all, she walked about 6 miles that night.

Evidently the horror of her deeds was too much for her. She was seen about 8 pm by a friend – possibly before she started out on her terrible errand – standing on a pavement near her home, staring vacantly about her, her face drawn and pale, her clothes much disordered and her hat askew. The friend, who had at first failed to recognise her, assumed that Mrs Pearcey was drunk and passed on without a word.

Eleanor Pearcey seems not to have returned to her home until late at night. For at about 10 pm, Frank Hogg called on her. He had a latch-key and let himself in. No one answered his calls. Apart from a lamp in the bedroom, Mrs Pearcey’s rooms were in darkness, he said later. He peered, he said, into the front parlour, saw nothing untoward and withdrew. But he left a note saying ‘Twenty-past ten. Cannot stay.’

Frank Hogg later alleged that he was unaware that his wife and Mrs Pearcey were on friendly terms. It seems that after calling at the house in Priory Street on his way home from work about ten o’clock, he walked on to Prince of Wales Road, where his wife’s absence had apparently caused no alarm. It was assumed in the Hogg household that Phoebe had gone to visit her sick father in Rickmansworth. Nonetheless, Frank Hogg sat up until 2 am awaiting her return.

On Saturday morning he left home soon after six o’clock and went to work – he was employed in the furniture-moving business by his brother. He came home for breakfast about 8 am. About the same time the Hoggs’ landlady, Mrs Styles, who had heard rumours of a murder in Hampstead, said to Clara Hogg: ‘Have you heard of this dreadful murder?’ ‘What do you mean?’ asked Clara, adding ‘Tell me all about it. My sister-in-law has not been home all night. You gave me quite a turn. We have been enquiring in all directions and can’t find a trace of her.’ Clara went out to buy a morning paper and read that the body of a woman, brutally murdered, had been found by a police constable in Hampstead on Friday night. She talked to her brother and he set off for Rickmansworth to see if his wife was there. She decided to visit Mrs Pearcey.

Eleanor Pearcey was at home, and the two women conversed in the front parlour. Clara Hogg asked Mrs Pearcey if she had seen or heard of Phoebe. Mrs Pearcey said ‘No.’ Clara rephrased the question and Mrs Pearcey then replied: ‘Well, as you press me, I will tell you. Phoebe wished me particularly not to say anything, and that is why I said “No.” She did come round at five o’clock. She asked me to mind the baby for a little while, and I refused. She also asked me to lend her some money. I could not lend her any, as I only had 1s 1 ½d in my purse.’ Phoebe, said Mrs Pearcey, then left the house. Clara Hogg was puzzled: she thought it most unlikely that her sister-in-law, who had a horror of being in debt, would ask for a loan, even a small one. However, she made no comment, only remarking that she intended to visit the Hampstead police and to ask to see the body of the woman who had been murdered the night before, in case it was Phoebe. She asked Mrs Pearcey to accompany her, for moral support.

For some reason, Mrs Pearcey agreed – she could, after all, have invented some excuse. But her part in the murder of Mrs Hogg had probably been blotted out of her mind. DI Thomas Bannister took the two women from the police station to the Hampstead mortuary, where they were both shown the body of Mrs Hogg. The baby’s body was not found until the morning of the following day.

Eleanor Pearcey said she was unable to recognise the unwashed, bloody mask of the woman on the mortuary table. ‘That’s not her,’ she said. ‘It’s not her. It’s not her! Let’s go away!’ She became hysterical. Clara said: ‘That’s her clothing.’ But she could not identify the features.

DI Bannister took the two women out of the room and said to Clara: ‘Surely if she is a relative and you have been living together, you can form a reliable opinion as to whether it is the person or not.’ Both women were brought back to look at the body. Clara was still doubtful, and when she attempted to touch the corpse’s clothing, Mrs Pearcey cried out: ‘Oh, don’t touch her!’ and tried to pull Clara away. ‘Don’t drag me!’ scolded Clara. A doctor in attendance at the mortuary was then asked by Bannister to wash the face of the corpse. When this was done, Clara said: ‘Oh, that’s her. Don’t drag me!’ she added again.

Detective Murray then took both women to see the bassinette, which Clara Hogg identified. Sergeant Beard was sent to accompany the women back to 141 Prince of Wales Road, where Frank Hogg and Mrs Styles were questioned. He was searched and in a pocket his key to 2 Priory Street was found. All three women and the unhappy husband were then asked to come to Hampstead police station for further questioning, and Mrs Pearcey was detained there. DI Bannister, mystified and made suspicious by her excessive and odd reaction in the mortuary, asked if one or two of his men could inspect her apartments. She agreed and said: ‘I would like to go with them.’

About 3 pm she returned to Priory Street with Sergeants Nursey and Parsons. They examined her rooms. One of the sergeants then went out to send a telegram to DI Bannister. The other sergeant stayed and engaged Mrs Pearcey in conversation in the front parlour, where she played the piano and sang. She also talked about her ‘poor dear dead Phoebe’, whom she loved so much, and about the ‘dear baby, who was just beginning to prattle, oh, so prettily’.

On receiving the telegram, DI Bannister went straight to 2 Priory Street. He spoke to Mrs Pearcey, questioned her as well as her neighbours and searched her rooms with one of his sergeants; she appeared to him to be distraught and her speech was somewhat incoherent. In the bloodstained kitchen he found two carving-knives, their handles similarly stained. A recently washed apron and skirt were also discovered, as well as a stained rug, smelling strongly of paraffin as if an attempt had been made to clean it. The curtains were missing – they and a bloody tablecloth were found in an outhouse. In the fender of the kitchen grate was a long, heavy poker with a ring handle: it was smeared with matted hair and blood.

Bannister took the knives and the poker into the parlour, where Mrs Pearcey was now whistling and affecting indifference. Asked what she had been doing with the poker, she responded: ‘Killing mice, killing mice!’

She could offer no sensible explanation for the bloodstained rooms. Bannister said to her: ‘Mrs Pearcey, I am going to arrest you for the murder of Mrs Hogg last night, also on suspicion of murdering the child, Phoebe Hogg.’ Mrs Pearcey jumped up and said: ‘You can arrest me if you like. I’m quite willing to go with you. But I think you have made a mistake.’ He took her to Kentish Town police station. On the way she commented: ‘I wouldn’t do such a thing. I wouldn’t hurt anyone.’

In the police station, she was charged and searched. When she removed her gloves, her hands were seen to have cuts on them. She wore two rings: one of brass, the other a broad gold wedding ring, which was later proved to have been removed from Phoebe Hogg’s fingers. The search also revealed that Eleanor Pearcey’s underclothes, unchanged for twenty-four hours, were saturated with blood. They were removed and she was supplied with workhouse garments.

Mrs Pearcey appeared at the Marylebone police court on 27 October charged with the murder of Mrs Hogg. She was sent for trial at the Central Criminal Court in the Old Bailey and appeared there, before Mr Justice Denman, on 1 December 1890. Mr Forrest Fulton and Mr CF Gill led for the Crown and the accused was defended by Mr Arthur Hutton. Still wearing her workhouse clothes, Mrs Pearcey gave no evidence and remained stonily impassive throughout the trial, seemingly indifferent to everything. The trial ended on its fourth day, when she was found guilty and sentenced to death.

Eleanor Pearcey was hanged at Newgate Prison on Tuesday 23 December 1890, on a bitterly cold and foggy morning. A crowd of about 300 people gathered outside the prison gates. A reporter in the Pall Mall Budget wrote:

The bell of St Sepulchre’s church commenced tolling at a quarter to eight, the tones ringing out sharply on the morning air. It had no effect upon the crowd, many of whom were women, and obscene and ribald jokes could be heard among every group, the females especially being fiercely denunciatory of the convict’s conduct … At one minute before eight o’clock a yell from the crowd proclaimed the fact that the black flag was hoisted, and directly after the crowd gave vent to their feelings in a loud cheer.

The day before her execution, Mrs Pearcey was visited by her solicitor, Mr Palmer. She asked him to distribute certain trinkets as keepsakes to relatives and friends. She also asked him to put an advertisement in the Madrid papers, addressed to certain initials. Mr Palmer inquired if this had anything to do with the case. ‘Never mind,’ said Mrs Pearcey. He asked her: ‘Do you admit the justice of the sentence?’ ‘No,’ she replied. ‘I do not. I know nothing about the crime.’ ‘Are you satisfied with what we have done for your defence and the efforts we have since made on your behalf?’ ‘I am perfectly satisfied,’ she said. He continued: ‘If you have any facts to reveal and will let me know them, even at this late hour, I will lay them before the Home Secretary in the hope of obtaining mercy.’ ‘I have nothing more to say,’ she replied. ‘Don’t forget about those things. Goodbye.’ She walked away across the yard to her cell.

She had repeatedly asked to see Frank Hogg, and permission had at last been given for him to visit her between two and four o’clock that Monday afternoon. Her expectation of seeing him again was great. But as time passed and he did not appear, she became ‘nervous and impatient’. When she realised that he would never appear she was overcome, and lay on her prison bed, her hands over her face, sobbing. After a while she controlled herself and got to her feet, her face now quite calm and composed. She sat down at a table in the cell and began to read.

Her executioner was James Berry, a Yorkshireman and a former policeman and boot salesman, aged forty-two, who had been hangman since 1884. During this more recent occupation he hanged 131 people, including five women. In his autobiography he described Eleanor Pearcey’s last hours:

The night before her execution was spent in the condemned cell, watched by three female warders, who stated that her fortitude was remarkable. When introduced to her, I said: ‘Good morning, madam,’ and she shook my proffered hand without any trace of emotion. She was certainly the most composed person in the whole party. Sir James Whitehead, the Sheriff of the County of London, asked her if she wished to make any statement, as her last opportunity for doing so was fast approaching, and after a moment’s pause she said: ‘My sentence is a just one, but a good deal of the evidence against me was false.’ As the procession was formed and one of the female warders stepped to each side of the prisoner, she turned to them with a considerate desire to save them the pain of the death scene and said: ‘You have no need to assist me, I can walk by myself.’ One of the women said that she did not mind, but was ready and willing to accompany Mrs Pearcey, who answered: ‘Oh, well, if you don’t mind going with me, I am pleased.’ She then kissed them all and quietly proceeded to her painless death.

She weighed 9 stone and was given a 6 ft drop. Reporters, who had been excluded from the execution by special order of the sheriff, were also refused permission to see the body, which was, however, viewed by the coroner’s jury.

Her final message duly appeared in the papers. It was: ‘Have not betrayed – Eleanor.’ After her death, Frank Hogg sold several items and furnishings connected with the murder, including the poker and the pram, to Madame Tussauds for a large fee, and for many years these items and a tableau containing a waxwork of Mrs Pearcey was a popular attraction there.