Murder in the house
I found this tidbit on Trove in an article in the Maitland Daily Mercury on 4 May 1917. They must have had lots of exciting stories in this issue as the "Shooting Tragedy" didn't appear until page 6!
The article about the inquest concerned the shooting of 32-yr old Cecil Boyne Lambert, a local municipal council worker (George's brother-in-law). Cecil had been living with Ivy (his sister) and our George at Louth Park Road, in West Maitland. The other party in the proceedings was a tall dark-haired blue-eyed young woman of 26 years, Margaret Ethel Andrews (house servant) who was present throughout the hearing and who "frequently burst into tears".
A Constable Badlor gave evidence that he had seen Margaret Ethel Andrews (aka Ethel Andrews ) down at the police station and she was weeping, and when asked what was the matter she replied "I shot a man by the name of Lambert down near Louth Park."
She took the Constable and the Inspector to where she had left the gun concealed under a stone against a post, which was part of the railway bridge nearby.
She had fired only one shot, and the police found five unspent cartridges still in the gun. She commented to the police that she thought she should have also done away with herself because now she was in a great deal of strife. Not only was she likely to be charged with murder but it seems she was also pregnant!
It was said they had been seeing each other since Cecil's wife had died 3 years previous, other accounts say that they were having a liaison for some years before his wife died, and all accounts say that she had been staying with him for 6 months before the shooting. She had been in "trouble through him" on three previous occasions, once having been "operated on", I can only assume she means she had an abortion, and on the other two occasions "doing it herself", the deceased having suggested particular drugs to affect the outcome.
The morning of the shooting she asked him if he would pay her expenses for her latest "troubles" but he refused and according to her "gave her all kinds of abuse".
By all accounts, Margaret's threats of "I'll do for him" had happened on several previous occasions mostly after quarrelling, and people took no notice. Cecil had told George and several other people that he wanted to get rid of Margaret as she was "full up with her".
One account tells how the night before the incident she had waited on the corner in High Street for him to come past in his sulky, and when he did she bailed him up and asked him where he was going, upon which he told her he was going for a drive with a young woman.
Not likely! She got in the sulky herself and went driving with him asking him to make up. She stayed at his place that night, wanting to speak to him about the question at hand (the other girls and her medical expenses to take care of her "troubles"), but he fell asleep and she sat all night never laying down on the bed, just waiting for him to wake up.
It seems likely from the many varying reports that he woke in the early hours sometime around 5am and she had pleaded with him to give up the other girls and upon his refusal had shot him in the side of the head with a revolver! On doing the deed she went and banged on the neighbour's window and declared what she had done. He called her "a mad woman". She went to turn herself in to the police.
The neighbour, Charles Calwell (who was another of Cecil's brothers-in-law) went to the room where Cecil had been living, which was external to the main house, and found the door ajar and Cecil laying unconscious in a pool of blood. He was transported to the hospital where they operated to remove the bullet, but his injuries were to be fatal, he never regained consciousness and it ended him. The coroner brought back a verdict of murder!
Other accounts provide information that Margaret was already married and had been disowned by her husband, a man of independent means, presumably for running around with Cecil. Though it seems Cecil seduced her to leave her husband with the promise of marrying her after she divorced.
Now pregnant and disowned, she was committed to stand trial for murder. During the trial, her lawyer asked the question "Does pregnancy cause mental disturbance and loss of control?" the answer "It does" and again "Would pregnancy cause loss of control?" to which the answer was "It might". There you go girls, you heard it right here :)
At her trial in June 1917 she spoke with a "weak kind of voice...mingled with lots of whimpering and promptings to speak up." One paper reported that "in the witness box one would think she lacked will enough to harm a cat, and was just the poor, weak kind of creature that might fall in with any man's wishes especially a fellow for whom she entertained a passion", though some asked after the treatment she had been given to, why she should have such a passion for him at all.
She argued that he had "led her astray", that she had received a lot of provocation, he had treated her badly and had threatened to abandon her. He is said to have accused her of certain things which distressed her and that is when she fired the pistol. So many variations on what set her off. She had bought the pistol three weeks earlier for the purpose of merely frightening him, she said. She also declared that the shooting was accidental and that she had never meant to injure him, but that she was very jealous.
The jury returned a verdict of "guilty of manslaughter" and recommended mercy due to her treatment.
The judge sentenced her to 7 years of penal servitude in Long Bay Penitentiary for Women. I wonder if this was considered merciful?
Notes:
Records in a family tree on Ancestry show that Margaret had a male child with Cecil in Tingha in 1909. He then married Elsie in 1911 and she married John Standerwick Campbell in 1912. She had and lost two babies to John, one in 1913 and the other in 1914. Then the child she (supposedly) had with Cecil died in 1917, only 2 months after she was sentenced. He had been ailing for some time, he was only 8 yrs old.
She lived to the age of 65. I wonder if losing those children and then being forced to have 3 abortions may have sent her mad! I have seen no evidence of another child. Were her troubles "taken care of"?
Cecil had married Elsie Mildred Pearl Kauter (m.1908), she died in 1914 likely of complications from childbirth, dying less than three weeks after Elsie Doris was born, and is recorded in the death records as Mildred P.E, they had two daughters. Thelma M (1910), Elsie Doris J (b.19/10/1913 - d. 17/1/1914). Thelma was left orphaned, at least she was with her aunts and uncles. She lived and married Claude Watson in 1928 aged 18.
The neighbour reported as Charles H Caldwell (another brother-in-law to Cecil) is recorded at marriage with the surname Calwell and was married to Cecil's sister Ruby A Lambert in 1911.
On reading more accounts, one very long account listed those 9 people who were staying in the two-bedroom + 1 external bedroom house at the time of the murder!
It includes:
- George and Ivy
- Cecil (the victim) in the external room
- Cecil's parents Emanuel and Mary Ann Lambert
- Cecil's sister, likely the youngest daughter of Emanuel and Mary who was Florence aged 21 at the time,
- and visiting were George's sister and her two children (though not named I believe it was my Auntie Etty and her sons Rod and Mel)
It certainly creates a picture of the events.
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