EXECUTION OF MARY ANSELL, IN A STATE OF COLLAPSE ON THE SCAFFOLD.

Mary Ann Ansell, eighteen, a domestic servant, was executed in St. Alban’s Gaol on Wednesday morning for murdering her sister Caroline, an inmate of Leavesden Asylum. Watford, by means of a poisoned cake conveyed to deceased through the post in September last. Prisoner insured her sister’s life for £22 odd, and after Caroline’s death last March Mary Ann applied for the insurance money, which was refused. Inquiries were made into the circumstances of the girl’s death, and the result was that Mary Ann was arrested. She was found guilty, and Mr. Justice Mathew said never in the course of his experience had he had the misfortune to try a case in which so cold-blooded and revolting a crime had been committed to obtain so miserable an end. A largely signed petition was presented to the Home Secretary last week praying for a reprieve, but the Secretary of State intimated his inability to interfere with the course of the law. A petition on Tuesday night, signed by 100 M.P.’s, praying for a postponement of the execution was also ineffectual. The execution was private, and the prison officials are very reticent, but the Press Association representative learns that the details were carried out in a satisfactory manner by Billington. The condemned girl seemed scarcely to realise even up to the last that she would be hanged, and, though assured that all hope of a reprieve was useless, she held tenaciously to the belief that one would be granted. It was only when the procession to the scaffold was actually formed that her last hope vanished, and she was in a condition of collapse when the bolt fell and she was launched into eternity. During the period which elapsed between the death sentence and the execution Ansell bore up remarkably well, and received the ministrations of the chaplain with great attention. Her health was maintained, but she was naturally very much distressed by the painful interviews which she had with her parents, who on Tuesday took a final farewell of her. Her earnest pleading to both of them for forgiveness, and the bestowal of that forgiveness by her father and mother, were pathetic incidents in a painful scene. On behalf of the prison chaplain, it is stated that the alleged interview with him was the result of a few words spoken to a reporter and amplified beyond recognition. The police-court commission was interviewed on Wednesday morning by the Press Association correspondent. He had opportunities of conversation with Mary Ansell before the death sentence was passed, and, though reluctant to speak, he at length did so, as he said, in the interests of truth. “Candidly,” he said, “I do not think she was insane. In all my dealings with her I have come to the conclusion that her demeanour was more sullen than anything else. I have seen the parents, and the father emphatically denies there is insanity in the family.” As to the murdered sister Caroline, the father said to the commissioner, “She was as right as you are until her brother was killed, and she then fretted so much that her mind gave way.”

THE INQUEST.

The inquest on the body of Mary Ansell was held at ten o’clock within the gaol. The chief warder having given the usual formal testimony, the Coroner observed, “I suppose everything was carried out in a satisfactory manner?’ to which the witness replied, “Yes, it was.” A Juryman: Was death instantaneous? Witness: It was. There was not a movement of any kind. The Medical Officer said that death was due to dislocation of the vertebral column. Death was instantaneous, there being no movement or struggle of any kind. Councillor Samuel (another of the jurors): What has been her conduct or demeanour during her incarceration? The Coroner: That is scarcely within the purview of this inquest. Councillor Samuel: I am sorry I asked the question. The Coroner then summed up, and the jury returned the customary verdict in such cases.

Black Mary, the Gipsy.

 Brother and Sister Lived as Man. and Wife.

An inquest was held at Camberwell on Wednesday night on the body of Henry George Pickett York Lee, aged 55, a tailor, who died from poisoning by taking spirits of lemon. It was stated that shortly before his death the deceased divulged an awful secret. He said that some 45 years ago, while with a tribe of gypsies at Epsom, his father placed a dagger in his hand, and he plunged it into the back of a lady whom he subsequently heard was his mother. The jury found a verdict of “Suicide whilst temporarily insane.” The London evening newspapers published a remarkable story that was told by the widow of Lee. It is stated that she said she was the daughter of Squire Wagg of Chingford, Essex. Shortly after birth she was sold to a tribe of gypsies by the name of Lee, and placed in the custody of Rebecca Durham, of Collingwood-street, Shoreditch, who held the documents proving her birthright. Two or three years afterwards both she and the documents were stolen by a woman known as Black Mary, sister of Rebecca Durham, who brought her up for a time and subsequently placed her in the workhouse. After a while she was taken from the infirmary and again went to live with Black Mary, but in 1846 was stolen by the men of a gypsy tribe known as Johnson, who was a relative of the Durhams, and was taken on board a vessel lying off Wapping. She was then thrown overboard, but was rescued by a black named Jack Watson, a cabin boy, and sent to the house of Black Betty Benn, another member of the gypsy tribe, living in Wapping, where she stayed for around six months. At the expiration of that time a negro brought a woman named Mary Ann Ellis, and stated that she was her aunt. This woman actually turned out to be her own mother, and they all left. Ellis was afterwards murdered on Epsom Downs. The deceased was also the son of Squire Wagg, by Charlotte Powell, and was brought up by the gypsies until the murder, when he enlisted for a soldier to get away. She first saw deceased last November, and was married to him the following month. Shortly before Derby Day deceased met an old friend, who told him he and his wife were by the same father, and promised to introduce both to the father, but news was subsequently received that the father was abroad. After this deceased told her of the part he had taken in the murder, and he also told her he was present twenty years ago at a murder at a card party at Salter’s Hill, Norwood, known at the time as the “Card Party Affair.” Deceased had several times lately threatened to give himself up to the police, for the Epsom murder preyed so much on his mind, especially after he discovered they were brother and sister as well as man and wife.

Evening Express, 29th July 1897

BODY SNATCHING.

A Relic Discovered in a Scottish Graveyard. While a grave was being dug in Lockerbie Old Churchyard, Dumfriesshire, which is now closed under certain restrictions, there was come upon two strong frames of malleable iron which had apparently been welded round a coffin which no longer remained, the smaller frame being got out intact. They had apparently been put round the coffin to protect the remains from the body snatchers, who were a terror to rural parishes at the beginning of tins century. The first of the interments was indicated on the stone in 1812.

Evening Express, 13th  September 1893

Historic Sign