Foul Deeds in Richmond and Kingston Read online

  Her brother knew of no enemies of her sister. Albert and John Davies, farmers in Wales, inherited her money as next of kin. It eventually added up to £14, 635 8s after the estate had been resworn, but there is nothing to suggest that they killed to obtain it.

  Whether Hadfield was rightly acquitted is another question. Certainly on the available evidence, it was right that he was given the benefit of the doubt, but circumstantial evidence is strong. Firstly, the killer had to be someone well known and trusted by the victim. Given that she had no known relatives or close friends in London, except Hadfield, this narrows down the number of suspects to him. Secondly, because nothing of monetary value was either taken or even searched for, the killer was evidently not a burglar. Hadfield had a financial motive: being in debt to her, and his character was none too good; and relations between them were strained at times. Perhaps there was someone else who had dealings with the victim, but as to who that was, we have no clue. Or perhaps Hadfield did kill her, then telephoned the police and made sure he was on hand at their arrival, to point out to them evidence that he had tried to call on her, unsuccessfully, in previous days. Yet for all the circumstantial evidence against him, there is no direct evidence, so whilst he may have killed her, the truth will never be known.

  CHAPTER 16

  A Middle-Class Murder

  1937

  Stand away from those panels or I will shoot you down like a dog.

  Although much fictional crime in both books and on TV concerns the middle class, in reality, it is the poor who tend to kill one another. Of course, this is not always the case and this tale concerns a double tragedy among Richmond’s middle class.

  The Tribes seemed a fairly well-to-do, late Victorian family. The Reverend Odell Tribe was a clergyman, who had been the Congregationalist minister at All Hallows’ church in Tottenham, until 1891, then became an Anglican and was ordained Vicar of St Ann’s, at Brondesbury. He and his wife had several children. One of them was Naomi Tribe, born in 1888 and the youngest was Maurice Odell, born on 4 June 1893, also in Tottenham. The early careers of both these young people began promisingly. Naomi was involved in hospital work in West London in 1909, whilst her brother attended Radley School (favoured by the sons of the Anglican clergy), Oxfordshire, from 1907–11. He then went to St John’s College, Oxford, from 1911–14, reading Chemistry and gaining a BSc and beginning a career in metallurgy. He was also a member of the OTC there. In 1914, Naomi qualified as a surgeon, gaining her diploma of MRCS and her LRCP.

  St John’s College, Oxford. Author’s collection

  Ambulance on the Western Front, 1914–1918. Author’s collection

  War changed both their lives. Naomi became resident medical officer at Great Ormonde Children’s Hospital – a post reserved for men only, in the 1930s. But it was her younger brother for whom the war had a greater effect. He volunteered to join the army as so many others did. He was a stretcher bearer in the 8th London Field Ambulance, RAMC, at first, enrolling as a private on 2 September 1914, and then on 23 January 1915 as a second lieutenant in the West Riding regiment. He displayed great bravery in 1916 on the Somme, rescuing under enemy fire seven men, who had been buried by shellfire, but in doing so he was seriously wounded in the head by shrapnel, losing the sight of one eye. For this act of bravery he was awarded the Military Cross (gazetted on 4 November 1916 and receiving the decoration on 24 March 1917). He was also awarded a disability pension of £150 per annum because of his severe injury. Although there was a danger of him being returned to active service, despite his wounds, he was discharged. Although he remained on the army list until March 1918, he worked as a secretary and technical assistant in the Ministry of Munitions.

  After the war, Naomi met Dr John Horace Dancy (whose father was also a doctor) at London University, where both were taking a year’s course for the Diploma of Public Health. He was three years her junior, born in January 1891. Ironically, Dancy had qualified as a surgeon in the same year as her. After being at Warneford School, then King’s College London, he had served in the RAMC in the war, as a temporary lieutenant, on 11 October 1914, and as a captain on 10 November 1915. He left active service in December 1916 and lived in Chiswick briefly, with his parents (now retired). After three weeks’ acquaintance, Dancy married the shy and beautiful Naomi (in 1921), and they had three children, all of whom, by the 1930s, attended boarding school (the eldest boy, aged seventeen, was at Winchester, the other, aged fifteen, was at Repton and the daughter was at a Richmond boarding school).

  Naomi did not – unusually – give up her career. The two doctors opened their practice over a boot shop on Erconwald Street, Shepherd’s Bush. Two years later, they moved into a house provided by Hammersmith Council in Norbrooke Street, where their practice was rapidly increasing. They moved again in 1924, this time to Old Oak Road. When they left in about 1931, one Dr Spiro took over. John’s health was failing and so they moved to Brighton, staying there until early 1936. They finally moved to a detached house in Queen’s Road, Richmond, in about June 1936.

  Naomi held a number of medical appointments. She did a great deal of lecturing, giving about 120 a year, especially on sociological questions. She held appointments at Tite Street (Chelsea) Children’s Hospital and Bristol Children’s Hospital. She was also the first woman doctor to be appointed to the Central Committee for Child Welfare at Carnegie House and was on the Central Committee of British Social Hygiene Council and was also an assistant medical officer of health for the borough of Hammersmith. She was a visiting physician at the Hammersmith Maternity Hospital, too.

  After his distinguished war record, her brother held some well-paid positions, including those of secretary to the Handley-Page Aviation Company and secretary to the Government Disposal Board. He also worked as a clerk in an employment agency and as secretary to the Headmasters’ Employment Committee (1919-22). He was a good public speaker and a brilliant wit, touring the USA as a lecturer. Until at least 1931 he was in employment with various organisations. He married Miss Dorothy May Heywood, a welfare worker, on 26 February 1921, living in a flat in Blomfield Road, Maida Vale. Tribe was also involved in voluntary social work and this was attested to by the Reverend Gill of St Augustine’s church, Whitton. He said, ‘He spent a lot of time in the East End, helping the underdog and working at boys’ clubs in the Bermondsey district.’ He also held weekly meetings in his flat where men from different classes would discuss matters over tea and buns. It was known as Tribe’s Den.

  Yet there was a darker side to Tribe’s character. This may have been caused by the injury he received in the war, which had left him with only one eye. Apart from the physical loss, he may have been mentally scarred too. It is not uncommon for a physical injury to lead the victim to serious crime in later life. One way of coping with this loss was to drink heavily. He also became very jealous of his sister; he envied her beautiful eyes, in contrast to him only now possessing one, and perhaps he also envied her successful career and happy marriage.

  Tribe’s health was a major problem in his life – and in those of others. In 1930, he had had a major operation on his head, to try and deal with the effects of his old war wound, and much bone tissue was removed. He was very sensitive about the matter and his sisterinlaw, Rhoda Conder, said, ‘He could not bear the thought of anyone looking at him. He had seen several specialists, but none had actually suggested he was insane, although he never seemed normal to me.’ Tribe had often talked of committing suicide, but he had never threatened to kill anyone else. In 1935, he had spent three months in a private home for those suffering from nervous diseases. It was thought there that he was more of a danger to himself than others. Mrs Ada Dancy, his mother-in-law, remarked, ‘Tribe had undergone operations and was becoming embittered. He was very intelligent, but his war wounds and the loss of an eye had changed him enormously. Under the strain, the sight of his other eye was failing.’ Perhaps in light of all this erratic behaviour, in 1931, his wife and he had amicably separated and she w
as living on All Saints’ Road, Bristol (he lived in a flat at Buller Square, Peckham). Yet the two still occasionally saw each other and went on holiday together. She often said she could take care of him, but he refused such help.

  What perhaps made Tribe all the more dangerous was that it was thought that he might still have his old army revolver, a Smith and Wesson, in his possession, though there was some doubt over whether he had disposed of it or not. His wife though, knew he had kept it as a relic of the war.

  The Dancys had done their best to help him. Under directions of an eye specialist, Dancy had been giving him eye injections throughout October and November 1937 at their house. This took place every Monday evening. This seemed to be going well. However, in early November, Tribe began drinking heavily again. On 12 November, his estranged wife appeared at his flat on Buller Square and found him in an unconscious state. He had been drinking. A few days later he rang Dancy and made threats against his sister. Miss Conder also told him about Tribe threatening his sister.

  Although this was not unknown, Dancy was concerned. He drove over to Hammersmith, where his wife was working and was happy to find that she was safe. On Monday 15 November, when Tribe came around to their house for his injection, Dancy ensured his wife stayed the night at her mother’s house, so she would not be in any danger from her brother.

  Yet, such was Tribe’s ‘Jekyll and Hyde’ nature, he soon changed his attitude towards his sister by 15 November. Dancy remarked, ‘He had a very kind side to his nature and he was hurt that she was not there when he was. He was afraid that he had hurt her feelings.’ On the following day, once Tribe had left the Dancy’s home, he rang Dancy that night, in a very excited state, as he had been drinking, and declared how fond he was of his sister.

  On 22 November, Dancy drove to Tribe’s flat, following a traffic accident in which he had hurt his knees, in order to ferry him to their home for his weekly injection. He was then placed in two armchairs because of his injuries. On arrival, Tribe looked sheepish.

  It is not certain exactly when this happened, but it was later alleged that Dancy gave Tribe a detective novel, Murder in the House. He also apparently gave him six ‘indecent photographs’, showing nude women in flagellation poses. All these were later found in Tribe’s possession and Dancy remarked, ‘Yes, he has always got trashy stuff like that.’

  The drama came to a shocking climax in the early hours of Tuesday 23 November 1937. At about 11 pm on the previous day, Naomi returned from her work in a maternity clinic based in Westways Library. She and her brother had a row on her arrival. This was over an insurance policy which Tribe had taken out with Legal and General on her life in 1922, for £1,500 without her permission. He had paid the first premiums, but her husband took over shortly afterwards. Tribe had also received a commission for these. The final payment on the policy was due that week, and Tribe thought his sister’s life should be reinsured, something he had been pressing her on for some time. Tribe threatened to kill his sister and her husband later recalled, ‘For the first time I began to think he was really serious about it.’ Yet Dancy was able to calm his brother-in-law down by making a joke out of it.

  A new insurance policy covering the family for £5,000 had been taken out by Dancy. Tribe told him, ‘Well, if that is the case you need not expect to live to draw the money’ and then ‘Anyhow, you can go your own way if you have left me out, but I think you are mean.’

  His tired wife went to bed shortly afterwards. Her husband stayed up, and went downstairs to stoke the fire, just after midnight. He then went to the first floor to his study to type some letters to his children. He could hear his brother-in-law moving about in the room next door, and so he kept the study door ajar so he could hear what Tribe was doing. He thought it was silly of the man to be out of bed and in the cold when the radiators had been turned off. Dancy then went downstairs to stoke the fire again.

  At 1.10am he heard Tribe go to the lavatory, and thought he had locked the door. Indeed, Dancy rattled the door, which was locked, and so, assuming that Tribe was inside, he felt relieved, because he no longer had to fear that Tribe might do something. It was then that tragedy struck, as Dancy later explained:

  I heard some [two] shots. I went to the door at once. My brother-in-law was coming from the bathroom which communicated with my wife’s bedroom. I shouted at him, ‘What have you done, Maurice?’ He was advancing towards me with a revolver in his hand, pointing it at my head. ‘Don’t point that at me.’ I could see that he meant to shoot me in the eye. I lolled against the door in a position of assumed ease, but all the time I knew there was a switch there where I could put my hand on it. When he stopped advancing, and I knew he was preparing to shoot, I switched the light out and dropped to the floor. He fired at me as I fell, dropping his aim.’

  Dancy lay still, when Tribe turned on the light:

  He looked at me, and I groaned. He thought he had got me, so he slowly turned around to the lavatory and locked himself in. I immediately got up and banged on the door and said, ‘Maurice, Give me that gun.’ He said, ‘Stand away from those panels or I will shoot you down like a dog.’ I went into the bedroom to see what he had done to my wife. I felt sure he had hurt her. I did not know he was as bad as that.

  Dancy then broke down the lavatory door and found Tribe hunched up inside. He had cut his throat with a razor and was dying. Dancy picked up the razor before replacing it. He also saw the revolver at his feet. Dancy then looked into his wife’s bedroom and later recounted the terrible sight, ‘I saw my wife in bed, she had been shot through both eyes and blood was spurting from one of her eyes.’ He then summoned Catherine Brooks, who had been housekeeper for thirteen years, shouting, ‘Katie, come down, come down, he has shot my darling.’ He then rang for the police. It was now 1.27am, just over a quarter of an hour since the shooting began. PS Ferne had been on duty that night when a call came to the station from the exchange, summoning them. He and PC Waddall arrived at 1.43am, and found Fireman Gibbs, who was also an ambulance attendant there. He told them that there were two corpses in the house. Dr Burn, the Divisional Surgeon, was then asked to come at once.

  Ferne also went into Naomi’s bedroom and saw a shocking sight:

  Mrs Dancy was lying on her back on the bed in night attire in the front bed room and apparently had been shot through both eyes while she was asleep. The bed clothes did not appear to have been disturbed.

  Dr Burn saw her corpse and issued a death certificate. He noted that either of the two wounds would have been fatal. Both had been fired from the Smith and Wesson revolver that was found by Tribe’s body. That revolver had been used to fire three shots. The third bullet hole was found by the window in Dancy’s study, about four feet from the floor. The police took these away, and also found a bottle of methylated spirits and a bottle of crystals termed cocaine hydrochlor in Tribe’s bedroom. Later, Dr Eric Gardner examined Tribe’s body and, unsurprisingly, found it to be in a most unhealthy state. The liver was hard and fibrous, and there was disease of the kidneys and spleen. The cause of death had been the three wounds to his throat caused by his razor. Gardner commented on these, ‘These wounds show evidence of, before commencing, of hesitation and uncertainty and exhibit all the characteristics of a suicidal wound.’

  The inquest was held on Friday 26 November. Most of the evidence was given by Dancy, who described both the fatal occurrence and the events leading up to it. Rhoda Conder, Tribe’s sister-in-law, also gave evidence about Tribe’s health. As with Dancy, she attested to his ‘Jekyll and Hyde’ nature, and also paid tribute to the Dancys’ kindness towards him. The jury returned a verdict of murder and suicide, committed when Tribe was insane. The police concurred with this view, one writing, ‘There is no doubt that the dead man as a lunatic,’ and another thought ‘in my opinion it could only have been carried out by a lunatic’. Likewise, Tribe’s widow said, ‘he was very fond of his sister and must have lost his reason to harm her’.

  There was much sympathy for
the widower, and he received hundreds of letters, which he eventually replied to. There were also public tributes among the council and people of Hammersmith for whom she had done so much good work. The memorial service at St Catherine’s church in Hammersmith, on Wednesday 24 November, was packed with civic leaders, former colleagues, and representatives of the many organisations she had been involved in. Sorrowful mothers from Hammersmith council estates also attended. The Vicar, the Reverend Beale, himself a close family friend, paid great tributes to her work, as might be expected. But he also made reference to her brother, too:

  If she were standing in my place today, she would ask, first, that you would extend to her brother the most merciful judgement that is possible. She would ask you to realise that he never, never wanted to go to war, that he went because he felt it was his duty. She would have you remember how, under heavy fire, he won the Military Cross, for having dug out seven of his men who had been buried by a shell. She would have you look upon this tragedy as one of the awful pieces of aftermath of the war, and realise that after twenty years, we have to bear the strain of tragedy and suffering of that war.

  Naomi was cremated at Golders Green Cemetery on 26 November in a private ceremony attended by close family only. There were no flowers, because she had previously said that money spent on flowers would be better spent on feeding the hungry.

  This had been a great tragedy, for Naomi Dancy appears to have been a most hardworking and popular woman, beloved of all who knew her, not least for her medical work, but also as a mother of three children. Lady Cynthia Colville wrote a piece espousing her virtues in The Times. Her brother, too, had been an intelligent and kind man, though his life and career had been blighted by the war and he never really recovered from his wound, which led to mental problems exacerbated by drinking in order to alleviate their symptoms. Perhaps it was because he had lost one eye and he envied his sister’s beautiful eyes, perhaps as well as everything else she had, he deliberately shot out her eyes when he murdered her.