Murder In The First-Class Carriage: The First Victorian Railway Killing (2011) - Plot & Excerpts
The London underground railway, the first in the world opened with great fanfare in 1863. This is an account of the first railway murder that occurred only a year later in 1864 and created a great sensation as Londoners realised that they were not safe on this form of public transport. The first trains had no corridor for internal travel between compartments and passengers had no way of calling for help if assaulted. Mr Briggs, a 69 y old banking clerk was travelling home from Fenchurch station to Hackney after dining with his niece and her husband. However, when the train arrived at Hackney station, two clerks found the compartment empty but blood all over the seat, walls and window.Inside they found Mr Wigg's bag and cane and under the seat a squashed black hat (of inferior quality). It is the presence of the hat that forms the focus of this account as it turned out not to belong to Mr Briggs. Mr Briggs' body was eventually found on the rail line but whether he was dead when he fell or was pushed out of the train or whether he died after hitting his head on rocks next to the rail could not be established. His own very good quality hat is missing and a gold watch and chain was found to have been stolen from his coat and the hunt for the perpetrator was on.Not a lot happens in this real life crime and readers of modern fast paced crime novels may be disappointed. The book is perhaps a little longer than it needs to be and I found it somewhat slow to read. However, I enjoyed the meticulous research that has gone into putting together this account and the fascinating documentation of the small details involved in the search for the murderer/attacker of Mr Briggs. Not only does it highlight Victorian society at that time but also the capabilities of Victorian policing and the criminal justice system. Eventually a putative murderer is found and the evidence of the hat and the fate of Mr Briggs' hat plays a large part in bringing him to trial. There is the complication of a chase across the Atlantic as the wanted man emigrates to New York, during the time of the American Civil War. With no trans-atlantic communication system, police and witnesses must chase him on a faster ship to effect an extradition.The details of the trial based on circumstantial evidence and the lack of following up additional details of the crime ultimately leave some unresolved doubts about whether the police had caught the right man and whether he was in fact murdered or died after falling from the train and the reader is left to make up their own mind. This was an absolutely fascinating book and much, much more than a Victorian Whodunnit. The vivid descriptions of life in London, life of a poor, striving, skilled immigrant at a time when the population explosion hit England, modern technologies were changing society were excellent, as were the subtle comparisons between middle class and working class expectations, lifestyles and access to justice. We are tumbled from growing, modern, but staid and prim London to rough and ready, grasping, exciting New York, during civil war, with death and fighting mere miles away and a mass of humanity swarming across the Atlantic in sailboat and steamboat. We are thrown between upstanding, proper Hackney Wick, to the house of an upstanding, proper banker, to the lodgings of a deaf prostitute in Camberwell, the only individual who really shows the ill-fated Franz Muller in a human light. We learn about the lawyers, the detectives, the judges, the witnesses, the crowds, the victim, the Home Secretary, but the accused remains an incredible enigma, as he should for someone who was denied a voice in his own defense.The writing is really excellent and draws you along so easily that not only is the historical detail accessible, but the comparisons and insinuations are also accessible. I couldn't help asking myself whether anyone could receive a fair trial under such circumstances, or consider justice in Victorian England compared to that in modern America. How can society reconcile its desire for retribution through capital punishment against the demands of a modern, progressive civilization? Is the risk of miscarried justice ever outweighed by the need for the "ultimate deterrent"? Just for the record, I'm personally against capital punishment, but it is almost reassuring, yet very, very sad to see how Victorians struggled with this. Mobs need to feel a victim is avenged, it seems, but I can't help thinking of those who may have lost their lives as innocently as the victims of crime, particularly in an age with a horrifyingly limited appeals process, fast trials, rudimentary techniques of detection and high levels of political interference. If you like reading about what life was like in Victorian England, or about a real-life murder case which shocked and mesmerized the country, then this is a great book. It is difficult to have a "favorite" part in a book which essentially explains what may have been a terrible miscarriage of justice (we'll never know), but the comparisons between London and New York were amazing - hit me like a steam train!Great stuff. 5 stars.
What do You think about Murder In The First-Class Carriage: The First Victorian Railway Killing (2011)?
I really enjoyed this book - a true life whodunnit! Was the right man convicted of the murder?
—randomcob2
Sensational indeed, well researched, well written, poignant
—nefertari
