B-Berry and I Look Back (18 page)

“Good God,” said Jonah.

“Sorry,” said Jill. “What was The Tichborne Case?”

“There you are,” said Berry. “The most famous case that has ever come to be tried, and the younger generation doesn’t even know its name.”

I smiled.

“My darling,” I said, “Berry does you an injustice. The Tichborne Case took place thirty years before you were born. Its story has been told very often and books have been written about it, so I’ll only summarize it here. But it was a most sensational case and the British public ate it from beginning to end. Coles Willing told me that people talked of nothing else. Sides were taken and heated arguments were conducted in Clubs, at dinner parties and in the public house. It was headline news for years – and when I say ‘years’, I mean it, for civil proceedings began in 1871 and the criminal proceedings, which followed straight on, finished in 1874.”

“Refresh our memories,” said Berry.

“Well, it was a most romantic and sensational affair. A young man, whose Christian name was Roger, who was the eldest son and heir of a baronet, Sir James Tichborne, was on the way from South America to Australia, when his ship foundered and was never seen again. He had been in the Army, but had retired. Had he succeeded his father, his income would have been some twenty thousand a year. The ship foundered in 1854 when he was twenty-five years old. His mother refused to accept the fact that he was dead. His father presently died and his second son succeeded to the title and the estates. This drove the poor mother frantic, for Roger was her favourite son, and in 1865, although eleven years had passed since his ship had foundered, she began to advertise for him. Her advertisements bore fruit. A firm of solicitors wrote saying that they were happy to inform her that they had found her son: that he had escaped with some members of the crew from the sinking ship, had reached Australia and had been living there ever since under the name of Castro. Poor Lady Tichborne was overjoyed, sent the money necessary for him to come home and went to Paris to meet him. There she fell upon his neck, but, when he reached England, the rest of the family refused to believe that he was Roger Tichborne indeed. Some of his brother officers said he was: some said he wasn’t. After all thirteen years had gone by, since his ship went down.

“Well, he set up his claim to the baronetcy and the income. This was resisted by his ‘nephew’, for his ‘brother,’ the baronet, had died, and his son was reigning in his stead. After long Chancery proceedings, the case came to be tried by a Judge and jury.

“As I have said, it lasted for more than one hundred days. In the middle of it came the long vacation, when of course, it was adjourned. While it was on, the defendant and his advisers kept seeking and finding fresh evidence to prove the plaintiff’s claim false; and at last they discovered the truth, which, of course, the plaintiff denied. But the jury believed it and, after listening to a speech by Coleridge, who led for the defence, which lasted for twenty-six days, they found in favour of the defendant.

“As he left the court, the plaintiff was arrested on charges of perjury and forgery and cast into Newgate jail. Shortly afterwards he was tried before the Lord Chief Justice and two other Judges, when it was proved that he was, in fact, one Arthur Orton, a butcher, who had plied his trade in Wapping, had later emigrated to Australia and had there been groomed to impersonate the dead Roger Titchborne. After a trial, which began in April and ended in the following February, he was found guilty and sentenced to fourteen years’ hard labour. Ten years later he was released on ticket-of-leave and ten years after that he confessed his guilt.

“And that was the end of a business which had been head-line news for nearly three years, the cost of which to the Tichborne family and the British public must have approached one hundred and fifty thousand pounds. It was probably the boldest and most determined attempt to steal away another man’s birthright that ever was made, and but for the tireless efforts made by Sir Henry Tichborne’s advisers it would undoubtedly have succeeded. It made the name of Henry Hawkins, the famous Judge, for he led for the Crown in the criminal proceedings, and it was the end of Dr Kenealy, who led for the defence, for he afterwards attacked the Judges with such violence that he was disbarred.”

“Astounding,” said Jonah.

“That,” I said, “is the word. That a Wapping butcher could have put up such a show is amazing. But he had been wonderfully coached. Sir Roger Tichborne, whom he pretended to be, had been, I think, at Eton and had had a classical education: the claimant, Arthur Orton, was accordingly cross-examined on what he had learned at school. And he got a lot of it right. The names of masters and boys, and things like that. Of course he made mistakes: but always then he blamed his memory. Coles Willing told me that he heard him asked to translate
Laus Dei
, when he at once replied, ‘The laws of God’. Well, that was forgivable, but it made an educated man think. Mercifully, his poor, deluded ‘mother’, who started the ball rolling by her advertisement, died before the criminal proceedings began: she was therefore spared the anguish of seeing her ‘son’ go down.”

“Well, I’m much obliged,” said Berry. “Your summary has interested me no end – and told me quite a lot that I didn’t know. I suppose you couldn’t do the same with the loss of the
Titanic
?”

I hesitated. Then –

“How you jump about,” said Daphne. “Why should Boy be able to give you the low-down on the
Titanic
?”

“You never know,” said her husband. He got up and filled my glass. “He has a knack of picking up bits and pieces, which never appear in print.”

“As a matter of fact,” I said, “I do know one or two things about that dreadful occurrence. For I happened to meet one of the officers who had served under Captain Smith, who was in command of the
Titanic
, shortly after the disaster. He was not on the ill-fated ship. He had served regularly under Smith on the
Olympic
, but, just before the
Titanic
had completed her trials, he had had a difference with Smith and it had been amicably arranged that he should leave Smith’s command for two or three months. So he stayed with the
Olympic
, instead of going with Smith to the
Titanic
.

“Not long before the
Titanic
’s first and last voyage, I saw Captain Smith in court, in the witness-box. So I was able to size him up.

“He was a bluff sailor – rough, downright, with no party manners at all. He looked about fifty-five. His hair was grey, going white.”

“How,” said Jonah, “did he happen to be there?”

“You’ll remember when I remind you. Not very long before the loss of the
Titanic
, HMS
Hawke
, a cruiser, collided with the
Olympic
at Southampton or just outside. As a result, The White Star Line claimed damages from the Admiralty and the Admiralty counterclaimed. Smith gave evidence for his Company. The Admiralty won the case. They maintained that, such was the size of the
Olympic
, she sucked the
Hawke
into her side and that the Commander of the
Hawke
was powerless to avoid the collision. This theory, the jury accepted. Their finding was widely discussed and criticized: but never was a verdict so handsomely vindicated. A few months later, as the
Titanic
was leaving Southampton on her maiden voyage, she passed an American ship which was tied up to the quay: as she drew level with this, the American ship snapped her cables as if they were threads and began to move towards the
Titanic
as though drawn by invisible cords: a collision was only just averted.”

“I remember now,” said Jonah. “A most remarkable thing. Sorry. Please go on.”

“Well, we all know what happened. At a quarter to twelve on a Sunday night in April 1912, the
Titanic
struck an iceberg in mid-Atlantic and presently sank with a loss of nearly two thousand lives. That Sunday afternoon her Captain had been warned by wireless that if he held on his course he would encounter icebergs. The ship’s course was not altered.

“When I met the officer to whom I have referred, I asked him to what he attributed the disaster. Without hesitation he replied, ‘To the speed the
Titanic
was going.’ I said, ‘When the iceberg was sighted, it was some way off. How was it that they couldn’t avoid it or pull the
Titanic
up?’ He smiled. ‘When the iceberg was seen it was almost certainly less than a hundred yards away. An iceberg is black at night, and as the sea was dead calm, there was no line of surf. And when a ship of sixty thousand tons is doing twenty-three knots or more you can stop her engines and put them into reverse, but you won’t stop that ship in less than three miles.’”

“God bless my soul,” said Berry.

“Three miles,” I repeated. “To tell you the truth, I’m not sure he didn’t say four. But I don’t want to exaggerate. I believe the order was given to put the helm hard over, but it was, of course, too late.”

“Smith went down with his ship?”

“Yes.” I hesitated. “But here is a curious thing. On Sunday at luncheon, ten or eleven hours before she struck, the
Titanic
had a definite list to port. To this, passengers at his table called the purser’s attention. He replied, ‘Probably coal has been taken mostly from the starboard side.’ I make no comment, but that is what he said. When she struck, she was holed on the starboard side. She did not sink for two and a half hours. During this time she listed heavily to port. Finally, she went down by the head. These facts may mean nothing at all. But there they are.”

“They seem strange to me,” said Jonah: “but, as a landsman, I have nothing to say.”

“Nor I,” said Berry. “She was an ill-fated ship.”

“They boasted that she was unsinkable. So Nature stretched out an arm.”

“It does look like that,” said Jonah…

“Before the
Titanic
sailed, it had been announced that the White Star Line was having a sister ship built and that she was to be called the
Gigantic
. But if the ship was built, the name was changed.”

My sister shuddered.

“Give us something less dreadful, darling, before we turn in.”

“I know,” said Jonah. “Books. How and when did books begin?”

I put a hand to my head.

“Well, the very first books, I believe, were written on tablets of lead.”

“That must have been fun,” said Berry. “I wonder how many tons
The Odyssey
weighed?”

“Be quiet,” said everyone.

“But about 500 BC papyrus came in. Papyrus was a reed, and strips of it were soaked and pasted together to make a sort of paper. This was rolled round a stick. Still, books which were so made were inconvenient to handle and easily damaged. And then at last somebody thought of sheepskin or parchment. This was a great step forward, for parchment is indestructible and you can write on both sides: and leaves of parchment were cut and stitched together, just as is done with the books of today.”

“Was there any publishing?”

“In Cicero’s time there was – say about 50 BC. Cicero went to a publisher called Atticus, and Atticus paid Cicero a royalty on every copy of his books which he sold.”

“Every copy,” said Berry, thoughtfully.

I smiled.

“Yes, they really were copies then. When the author had delivered his manuscript the publisher dictated it to a whole army of scribes. If the edition consisted of a thousand copies, as it sometimes did, this was an exhausting procedure for all concerned: and I need hardly say that the copies produced were often full of mistakes. This used to infuriate Cicero, who felt unable to read and correct one thousand copies himself: but he did sometimes revise copies which his friends had bought.”

“Booksellers?” said Jonah.

“Yes, there were booksellers then. They used to hang up a list of the books they had for sale outside their doors. And there were libraries, too.”

“And all books were hand-written?” said Jill.

“Yes, indeed. Printing didn’t come in till the fifteenth century – into Europe, any way. I always find it strange that some monk who was fed up with copying didn’t get the idea before.”

“Quite so,” said Berry, thoughtfully. “All the same, it might be argued today that the discovery of printing was not altogether for the good of the human race.”

“One incident, I remember,” said Berry, “which shows forth with remarkable accuracy the outlook of the Boche.”

“Oh dear,” said Daphne.

“It’s not revolting,” said Berry. “It’s not even bestial. But it shows the infinite pains which the Boche will take – the very great inconvenience to which he will put himself in order to achieve something, which cannot possibly advance his interests, so long as its achievement will cause another being distress.

“The incident belongs to the very last days of the first great war. The Boche was on the run, being hounded out of France: and we were hard on his heels. What had been his old front-line was miles away, and German units which had been comfortably housed for years had to clear out of their ‘homes’ and run for their lives.

“One such unit – some headquarters, of course – had been installed in a pleasant country-house – a
château
, the French would have called it. Any way, it was a handsome residence of some importance and many years old. It had all the amenities of an agreeable country home, and I have little doubt that the Boches who lived there were very comfortable.

“Now they had to leave in some haste, and so, no doubt to their annoyance, they were prevented from ruining the residence. A few minutes after they had gone, the new tenants, British troops, took possession. First on the scene was a British cavalry regiment: and there this was ordered to stay for twenty-four hours. They had been going all out, and the horses needed a rest.

“Now it happened that the French liaison officer attached to that particular regiment had known the
château
well in other and better days and he was delighted to find that little irreparable damage had been done. The house had been fouled, of course, and would have to be cleaned, fumigated and redecorated from bottom to top. And the furniture would have to be scrapped. But it was not a ruin, for the Boche had been pressed for time.

“A feature of the property was the English kitchen-garden. This was an acre in size and was comfortably walled all round: and even on that November morning it made an agreeable pleasance. The liaison officer strolled round it with the second-in-command. The latter was enthusiastic. ‘This is superb,’ he said, ‘and by Jove, they’ve kept it well.’ The other shrugged his shoulders. ‘It suited their stomachs,’ he said. ‘But what espaliers!’ cried the second-in-command, pointing to the great fruit-trees splayed out upon the walls. ‘Never in my life have I seen such magnificent trees.’ ‘Aren’t they superb?’ said the other. ‘The Count was most proud of them. How old would you say they were?’ ‘Heaven knows,’ said the other. ‘I’m no authority. But what magnificence!’ ‘The fruit they bore was far too much for the house, and the Count used to send his neighbours baskets full day after day.’ ‘I can well believe it,’ said the other. His brows drew into a frown. ‘That one doesn’t look too good.’

“It was the first to die. That very morning, before the Boche cleared out, the last thing he did was to saw through every espalier three inches above the ground.”

My sister covered her face and Jill cried out.

“Well there you are,” said Berry. “For the truth of that tale, I can vouch, for the liaison officer told it me with tears in his eyes. It shews forth the outlook of the Boche. When an army is in retreat – not to say flight – with the enemy close behind, there are, as you may imagine, a thousand things to be done, and every single soldier is either on the move or working all out. Yet, pressed for time as they were, with the British hard on their heels, men were detailed to commit that cruel, abominable waste. It served no military purpose. It was done in hatred and malice, to injure the innocent man they had forced to be their host for more than four years. But that is the Boche. More. It will always be the Boche. That cruel and beastly outlook is bred in the bone: and it is ineradicable.

“I don’t suppose that everyone who reads it will believe this tale. A young man I met, who had seen the Belsen film, assured me that it was faked, ‘to put the Germans in a bad light’. And some, who do believe, will maintain that the outlook of the Boche has changed. But we know better.”

“But what is the matter with them?” said Daphne.

“It’s inherent vice,” said Jonah. “The blood is dangerous. And Berry is perfectly right. Those who read these words will say that they are untrue. But they are not untrue. People are unable to believe them because such wickedness is ‘not dreamed of in
their
philosophy’.”

There was a little silence. Then –

“Oh, I know,” said Berry. “Curtis Bennett. Or would you rather not?”

I raised my eyebrows.

“I can tell you as much as I know – for what that is worth.”

“If you please.”

“Derek Curtis Bennett, QC, who died in 1956, was the son of Henry Curtis Bennett, QC, who was at the Bar with me, and the grandson of Curtis Bennett, who was for some years the third magistrate at Bow Street and later Chief Magistrate for a little while.

“I’ll deal with the grandfather, first.

“When I was a solicitor’s pupil, I was frequently before him, so I had many opportunities of observing him as a magistrate and as a man. As a magistrate, he was adequate, but undistinguished. He was disliked by his colleagues – that I know for a fact.”

“Who were his colleagues?” said Jonah.

“Sir Albert de Rutzen, the Chief Magistrate, and Marsham, the second magistrate at Bow Street. Curtis Bennett was certainly in a different class to them. He was never natural on the bench, as they were: he seemed to be striving for effect: and he loved publicity. Not very grave faults, perhaps, but ill becoming a magistrate. And Muskett never cared about appearing before him. He often had to, of course – nearly all the militant suffragist cases seemed, to Curtis Bennett’s delight, to come his way. But if a summons had to be applied for, and Muskett was to do the case, the police always applied to Sir Albert or Marsham, so that the case would be heard by one of them. Mead of Marlborough Street was another magistrate before whom Muskett would never appear, if he could help it. He was a remarkable man – Mead; and an efficient magistrate. But he was most damnably rude. And Cluer was rude, too. But they were the only three that Muskett disliked.”

“If I may say so,” said Jonah, “Mead was much more than rude: he was deliberately offensive. And, with respect, I don’t agree that he was efficient.”

I laughed.

“I’d forgotten,” I said, “that you had suffered at his hands.”

“Once only,” said Jonah, “but that was more than enough.”

“Let’s have it,” said Berry.

“I was only one of many,” said Jonah, “for I know that Mead’s name was a byword just after the first great war. Be that as it may, early one afternoon I was stopped by keepers in Regent’s Park for exceeding twenty miles an hour. They said I was going twenty-five, as I think I was. It was just about one o’clock. The broad road was empty – mine was the only car in sight. The pavements were empty, too: only three pedestrians were in sight. I pointed out these facts to the keepers, who admitted that they were true. I asked them to acquaint the magistrate with them, if they got the chance. This, they promised to do.

“Well, I was summoned to appear at Marylebone Police Court. I went blithely enough. As I came to the door, I asked one of the police who was sitting. When I heard his reply, I got the shock of my life.

“‘Mr Mead, sir,’ he said. ‘But he sits at Marlborough Street,’ I said. ‘That’s right, sir. But he’s taking the duty here today.’ Sheer misfortune, of course: but there you are.

“There were about six of us – all charged with exceeding the speed-limit in Regent’s Park. The case of a nice-looking fellow was taken first. I can’t remember his name; but we’d had a word together, before Mead took his seat. ‘D’you think he’d believe me if I said I was a chauffeur?’ he said. ‘I don’t think I should,’ I said, ‘but you never know. Why do you ask?’ ‘You’ll soon see,’ he said. Here Mead took his seat. After one or two applications, my friend’s name was called and he stood in front of the dock. The charge was read out. ‘Guilty or not guilty?’ snapped Mead. ‘Guilty,’ said my friend. A park-keeper entered the box and stated the facts. He was said to have been doing twenty-four miles an hour. ‘Owner-driver or chauffeur?’ snapped Mead. ‘Owner-driver,’ said my friend. ‘Fined four pounds,’ said Mead. ‘Next.’

“Now the next offender was a chauffeur. More. He happened to be the chauffeur of some people I knew. More. Less than a fortnight before, on my way with them to the theatre, he had driven us down Park Road at seventy miles an hour. And I had protested to my hostess. ‘He’ll smash you up one day,’ I said. ‘I know he will,’ she replied. ‘But, except for this failing, he’s really terribly good. He’s summoned once a week, but he’ll never learn.’

“Well, he pleaded guilty, looking the while the picture of innocence. He had been driving in the park at thirty-two miles an hour. ‘Chauffeur, aren’t you?’ says Mead. ‘Yes, sir.’ ‘Which means, of course, that you have to do as you’re told. Fined fifteen shillings. Next.’

“That was me. I pleaded guilty and the park-keeper said his piece. He didn’t say that the park was empty and, as he was about to step down, I asked if I might ask a question. ‘No,’ snapped Mead. ‘You’ve pleaded guilty. Owner-driver or chauffeur?’ ‘Owner-driver,’ I said. ‘Fined four pounds,’ said Mead. And that was that.

“Well, comparing those three sentences, I decline to agree that Mead was efficient. In the first place, I find it impossible to believe that he did not realize that a chauffeur’s fine was always paid by his employer. In the second place, my friend and I were each fined more than five times as much as the chauffeur, although our speed was considerably less than his. Thirdly, I think I had a clear right to ask the park-keeper a question, provided I was not disputing my guilt.”

“You certainly had,” I said.

“Fourthly,” said Jonah, “I think the fines Mead imposed upon my friend and myself were out of all proportion to the offence.”

“I entirely agree.”

“Fifthly, to ask us whether we were owner-drivers or chauffeurs was meant to be rude.”

“Undoubtedly,” I said.

“Finally, if you can give me a finer example of ‘one law for the rich and another for the poor’, I’d like to hear it.”

“Jonah,” I said, “you have all my sympathy. At Marlborough Street, summonses were always applied for when Denman was sitting, because Muskett couldn’t bear Mead. We were only before him two or three times, and Mead always improved the occasion by being intolerably rude. Still, rudeness is not incompatible with efficiency. And he did deal with his work with commendable dispatch. And I don’t think he was ever taken to the Divisional Court. According to his lights, he did his duty for very many years: and that is the kindest way in which to remember him.

“Wait a moment. Something else about Mead has just occurred to me. I was before him, I suppose, five or six times in all: but never once was I able to see his eyes. Even sitting with Muskett at the solicitors’ table, which was well below the bench yet very close, and looking up, I never saw his eyes. I don’t think anyone ever did: for they were always hooded. I will swear that there was never more than an eighth of an inch – if that – of the eyes themselves to be seen.”

“Quite right,” said Jonah. “Now that you mention that, I remember it well. Looking upon him, you might have thought he was blind.”

“Yes indeed. I have never seen any other man, who was not blind, so hood his eyes. It was, I suppose, a mannerism, for I never saw him use glasses, even to read. But that mannerism and the fact that he never smiled did lend him, let us say, an unsympathetic air.

“Which reminds me of Horace Smith who sat at Westminster Police Court. He was benevolence itself. He was very cheerful, invariably wore a frock-coat and had a white beard. He always made me think of Father Christmas.

“And now let’s get back to Bow Street. All the courts, except Bow Street, have two magistrates: but Bow Street has (or had) three, because of the amount of work at that, the principal Police Court of the Metropolis. I can’t remember the days upon which each sat; but I do remember that Curtis Bennett sat on Saturdays and Sir Albert on Mondays. And now please bear in mind that I said that Curtis Bennett had a weakness for publicity or advertisement.

“As you know, from the word ‘go’, the Crippen case was headline news. Well, Crippen was arrested in Canadian waters and presently brought back to England on board a liner whose name I forget. Extradition cases are always taken at Bow Street. Now when a prisoner has been extradited, he is brought directly to Bow Street and, if the Court is sitting, is immediately brought before the Magistrate, who hears evidence of arrest and then orders a remand. And once having been before that Magistrate, his case can be dealt with by no other Magistrate: in other words, the Magistrate before whom he first appears must deal with his case. If the Court is not sitting, then the prisoner is held, I think in the cells at Bow Street, until the next sitting of the Court.

“Well, it seemed pretty clear that Curtis Bennett, who was mad to get the case, would have his heart’s desire; for the liner was due to reach Liverpool on Saturday morning and the boat-train would almost certainly reach London before the Court at Bow Street rose. On Saturdays the Court usually rose earlier than usual, for there was not so much work as on ordinary days. All the same, unless the liner was delayed, Crippen would certainly reach Bow Street while Curtis Bennett was there. (This, I may say, to our disgust, for we would much have preferred that Sir Albert or Marsham should take the case.)

“Well, the liner
was
delayed – by fog in the Mersey. Not for very long: but the boat-train left Liverpool very late… Sitting at Bow Street, Curtis Bennett was beside himself. His list was almost finished, but Crippen had not arrived. And he knew that he
should
have arrived, if the train was running to time. I wasn’t there, of course, but I was afterwards told that Bennett wasted time in the most barefaced way. He did everything he could think of to keep the Court in session. The Chief Clerk, the ushers and the police were simply wild: but until the Magistrate rose, they had to stay where they were. And then at last Curtis Bennett threw in his hand and left the bench. Half an hour later Crippen reached Bow Street, was held over the weekend and brought up on Monday morning before Sir Albert de Rutzen.