John Turtell and the case that fascinated England in the Regency.


Written by Pete Goodrum


Hill Lane. The magistrates went straight there and were instantly suspicious given that Probert’s goods were already packed for departure. They arrested him on the spot.


W


He was still being questioned at 2:00am when the constable returned from London with the well-known and minor celebrity detective, George Ruthven.


At 3:00am Probert stated that his weekend guests had been Joe Hunt and Jack Thurtell. A warrant was issued for their arrest.


Events then moved quickly. One of the magistrates, Clutterbuck, had returned home exhausted and was woken by two visitors. They introduced themselves as John Noel, a London solicitor, and the billiard saloon owner William Rexworthy. Noel claimed that on his way to the theatre in London he had heard from a patrol on the Edgware Road that there had been a murder


illiam Probert’s Hertfordshire cottage was just north of Elstree and to the west of the main road. It stood on the eastern side of Gills


Clutterbuck took his visitors straight to the Essex Arms where the hearing was about to commence, and where Noel quickly took legal control.


There followed a period of intense questioning of the growing number of witnesses and people involved, beginning with Rexworthy.


Meanwhile, the detective, Ruthven, had been back to London and arrested Hunt at his lodgings. He found Thurtell in the Coach and Horses, Conduit Street.


Thurtell played a clever game of bluff. He appeared contrite, but seemingly because he had expected trouble for several reasons. There were his mounting debts and growing army of creditors, not to mention his involvement in the arson and insurance swindle. At no time did he acknowledge involvement in any other crime - incredible as his cuffs, waistcoat and hat were bloodstained and he was cut and bruised.


By 5:00pm he and Hunt were at the Essex Arms, in handcuffs.


Probert, Hunt and Thurtell were questioned separately and, as was the custom at the time, without knowledge of the submissions of others. Their three testimonies varied enormously and were soon seen to be threadbare.


The most glaring hole in their fabric of lies, though, was in Jack Thurtell’s pocket. On being searched at the time of his arrest in London his


of an unknown victim in Hertfordshire. Putting two and two together, he had become anxious that the victim might be his client William Weare. He had heard from Rexworthy that Weare had planned a trip to Hertfordshire with someone called Jack Thurtell. However, Weare could not be found back in London. His lodgings were locked and he’d not been seen in any of his regular haunts.


32 Fine City Magazine 2010


pockets had revealed a pistol. Questioned at the Essex Arms, he’d pointlessly denied owning a pistol until reminded of it being in his pocket, after which he suddenly remembered ‘finding it’ near Probert’s house on Sunday morning. Noel questioned Thurtell. He said: ‘You say you found the pistol near Probert’s. What would you say when I told you I can produce the fellow to it, found within yards of the same spot?’


Thurtell replied: ‘I know nothing about that.’


With a theatrical flourish, Noel took out the blood- and brain-stained pistol from Gills Hill Lane. It was


the other of a matched pair. Observers said that Thurtell’s manner underwent an extraordinary change.


Evidence and reports were mounting so fast and in too much complexity to detail in full here. The position, though, was clear. There could be little doubt that the three men had killed Weare. The problem was: where was Weare? Nobody knew where the body was.


It was Hunt who told them. The otherwise upstanding John Noel had, completely without authority, promised Hunt his life if he gave up the whereabouts of the corpse. Hunt, scheming as ever, seems to have assumed that if he didn’t take advantage of the offer then one of the others would. He gave them directions to a pond called Hill’s Slough, three miles from Probert’s cottage.


The grisly find


They took out of it a naked body with a sack wrapped round it. The corpse was taken to the Artichoke Inn at Elstree, and the Watford bench informed. Jack Thurtell was instantly committed for murder.


Under further questioning, Hunt continued to spin out a story that, amazingly, did not touch on his own involvement or guilt. Unbelievably, he had been asked to sing at Probert’s ‘party’ on the Friday night, after the murder had been committed and the three made merry. He claimed he had been paid £6 for this, and that was his only financial transaction. In fact, he had been given money by Thurtell to buy the sack and cord to wrap the body and hire a horse and carriage for Jack to travel separately.


Probert, too, protested innocence, contradicting Hunt’s version and waxing so lyrical on his


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PART II


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