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Speaker 1: This story contains adult content and language. Listener discretion is advised.

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Speaker 2: It's a nice bit of sound.

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Speaker 1: So this station, I wonder even how often trains would

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Speaker 1: run here.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's not going to be like today where you have,

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Speaker 3: you know, one every exactly. It's not like that. And

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Speaker 3: it would have taken I think the train was over

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Speaker 3: forty minutes from here to London. Now it's fifteen minutes.

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Speaker 1: Mega Edwards and I have just stepped off the train

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Speaker 1: in Slough, England, a town about twenty miles west of London.

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Speaker 1: Back in eighteen forty five, Slough was small and sleepy.

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Speaker 1: It was the perfect spot for John Tall to hide

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Speaker 1: his mistress, Sarah Hart and their two children. His new wife,

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Speaker 1: Sarah Appleby, seemed to have no idea that he had

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Speaker 1: a second family another life. Tall would take the same

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Speaker 1: train route we just took whenever he came to visit them.

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Speaker 3: How far do you know is it from Birkhamstead to

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Speaker 3: Birkhamsteed to Hear. Yeah, it's about a forty minute drive now,

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Speaker 3: so it's not easy to get in. Yeah, and he

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Speaker 3: would have had to go back into London presumably, so

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Speaker 3: from here back into London then back out to Birkhamstead.

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Speaker 1: Oh what Yeah, Slough is much busier on this day

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Speaker 1: than it was in eighteen forty five.

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Speaker 4: Okay, now which way.

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Speaker 1: Do look left or right?

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Speaker 5: This way?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, so you look both ways.

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Speaker 3: Also I look my ways, but that's because someone said

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Speaker 3: to me recently that I'm overcautious with crossing roads.

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Speaker 1: But I just don't trust people. I don't always trust

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Speaker 1: people either. Do you know anything about Slough?

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Speaker 3: Now, Yeah, it's Slough. It's quite industrial outside of the city.

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Speaker 3: The website was kind of fout Slough was a little

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Speaker 3: bit self deprecating. I was saying, like, people think of

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Speaker 3: Slough as a place with no culture, but we have

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Speaker 3: loads of culture.

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Speaker 6: So I wonder what this would have been like in

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Speaker 6: eighteen forty five and all.

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Speaker 7: This, It presumably would have been quite remote. These wouldn't

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Speaker 7: have been here, obviously, the buildings. This would have been

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Speaker 7: the one spot to get in and out.

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Speaker 6: So Slough would have been very raw, unassuming in eighteen forties.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, and the cottage was kind of in Salt Hill,

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Speaker 3: which is quite green, quite remote, very close knit community,

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Speaker 3: certainly different to the bustling parts of London that John

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Speaker 3: Tool was working in.

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Speaker 1: Sarah Hart and the kids lived in a small place

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Speaker 1: on the outskirts of Slough in a district called Salt Hill.

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Speaker 1: Surely no one would have recognized John Tall there. I

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Speaker 1: wonder also why he chose Salt Hill.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's interesting, isn't it. It's there's no reason that

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Speaker 3: anyone would need to go to Salt Hills now. I

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Speaker 3: think it's pretty pretty undetected, very.

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Speaker 8: Separate from his life.

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Speaker 1: Sarah Hart was incredibly unhappy with John Tall after a

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Speaker 1: seven year secret relationship. She was tired of struggling to

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Speaker 1: raise little Alfred and young Sarah. She needed more funds.

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Speaker 1: One pound a week just wasn't enough. That was about

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Speaker 1: one hundred and fifty dollars a week in today's money.

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Speaker 1: Taul was struggling himself, though you should feel much less

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Speaker 1: sympathy for him. He had returned from the Penal colony

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Speaker 1: in Australia a rich man for a while. His family

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Speaker 1: life had fallen apart after losing both of his sons

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Speaker 1: and his wife to tuberculosis, and then he had discovered

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Speaker 1: newfound security and acceptance by marrying a birthright quicker woman

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Speaker 1: named Sarah Appleby. But England was entering an economic depression.

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Speaker 1: And it was dramatically affecting John Tall's import and export business,

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Speaker 1: and now Sarah Hart, the secret mother of his two children,

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Speaker 1: was pressuring him for more child support. Crime historian Nel

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Speaker 1: Darby says John Tall's concerns went beyond just the money.

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Speaker 5: He was very concerned about his wife finding out about

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Speaker 5: the affair. And it's that kind of fear of being

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Speaker 5: discovered that you're kind of enjoying this illicit relationship, but

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Speaker 5: then when it's threatened with exposure, you have to face

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Speaker 5: the reality of it and what you could lose from it, and.

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Speaker 1: That kind of fear pushes you to take some action.

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Speaker 5: I've seen that in quite a few Victorian cases where

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Speaker 5: it's that fear of exposure, you know, because obviously appearances

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Speaker 5: matters so much in nineteen entry society, that there's this

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Speaker 5: fear of your kind of ordinary domestic life being kind

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Speaker 5: of blown apart.

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Speaker 1: And she's demanding more money.

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Speaker 5: And also the monetary fear that you know, being found

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Speaker 5: to be the father of Sarah Hant's children means that

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Speaker 5: then you know that there is this potential that there is

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Speaker 5: going to cost him money. He's going to have to

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Speaker 5: pay maintenance to her for the upkeep of herself and children.

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Speaker 1: We know that there's often a trigger in violent cases

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Speaker 1: involving family. I asked Arthur Carol Baxter about John Tole's

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Speaker 1: trigger in eighteen forty five.

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Speaker 4: There's always a trigger.

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Speaker 9: The trigger was that he wasn't giving Sarah Hart the

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Speaker 9: money she needed to support her children. She was being

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Speaker 9: forced to pawn her goods to get the money, and

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Speaker 9: so she sent him a letter saying, can you please

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Speaker 9: send me the money? I need more money to keep

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Speaker 9: supporting the children.

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Speaker 1: That was serious enough to make John Toll very nervous.

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Speaker 1: Sarah Hart had been pressuring him for a while. But

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Speaker 1: here's the real trigger. Carol Baxter and Hilary Fox say

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Speaker 1: that apparently Sarah appleby his wife, found that letter demanding

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Speaker 1: Tall provide her with more money. She read it and

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Speaker 1: then questioned.

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Speaker 9: Him, and she said, who is this woman who has

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Speaker 9: demands on you financially?

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Speaker 8: He was down on his luck at the time. I

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Speaker 8: couldn't afford to increase it. She wrote a letter that

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Speaker 8: Sarah knew about. That was outrageous as as he was

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Speaker 8: concerned because it was threatening to spoil his status in

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Speaker 8: Berkhamsteed ruin his life really.

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Speaker 4: And he managed to fob her off, but that was

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Speaker 4: the trigger.

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Speaker 1: Maybe if John Tall had only been wealthier than he

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Speaker 1: could have kept her and the children a secret forever.

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Speaker 1: But he didn't, and Sarah Hart had finally had enough

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Speaker 1: of John Tall's lack of support financially and emotionally. He

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Speaker 1: would never commit to her. He had married another woman,

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Speaker 1: a Quaker. He would never recognize their children together publicly.

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Speaker 1: Sarah Hart lived in shame, but not anymore. I asked

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Speaker 1: Angela Buckley about Sarah Hart's decision to demand more support

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Speaker 1: from Tall. It seemed very brazen for the nineteenth century.

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Speaker 6: Finally, this woman is standing up for herself, which I

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Speaker 6: don't do that think.

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Speaker 1: Common in the eighteen hundreds in England? Or do you

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Speaker 1: think most women just took what they could get if

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Speaker 1: they were mistresses with children.

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Speaker 10: Yeah, I suspect that's true, that they did take what

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Speaker 10: they could get, and they might have threatened.

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Speaker 4: I think those.

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Speaker 10: Women would have done all they could to get by.

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Speaker 10: You know, they might have ended up in the city

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Speaker 10: on the streets. They might have ended up as sex workers,

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Speaker 10: as all sorts, they might have ended up in the workhouse.

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Speaker 10: I think there were probably far more women in Sarah

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Speaker 10: Hart's position, who would have just been discarded and would

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Speaker 10: have just had to manage somehow.

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Speaker 1: I wondered why John Tall had just stopped paying long ago,

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Speaker 1: just stopped showing up. I asked Meg Edwards if it

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Speaker 1: had been perhaps fear.

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Speaker 4: I imagine it was a combination of things.

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Speaker 2: If he had gone cold Turkey and just not given

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Speaker 2: any more money, she's a liability for sure. I also

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Speaker 2: think traveling from Berkhamsted to Slough in those days was

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Speaker 2: quite a journey. It wasn't super easy, you know. He

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Speaker 2: would have gone from Berkhamsteed into London, changed stations and

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Speaker 2: then gone from Paddington to Slough.

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Speaker 1: It seemed clear that he was making this journey for

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Speaker 1: a reason, so.

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Speaker 2: I think it was a number of things. Convenience, perhaps

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Speaker 2: a sense of duty, a little bit. Perhaps he felt

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Speaker 2: a bit of guilt, but yeah, he was still absolutely

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Speaker 2: seeing her as a mistress. I'm sure part of those

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Speaker 2: reasons were was sex.

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Speaker 1: But Sarah Hart was practical. She needed more money, it

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Speaker 1: was that simple, and she felt no qualms about demanding it.

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Speaker 9: Suddenly, Sarah had gone from being a to being almost

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Speaker 9: a queen. She had started to have a voice and

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Speaker 9: She made that voice clear in her decision to ask

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Speaker 9: him for money, and that was when she became a threat.

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Speaker 9: So that was when everything started to unravel.

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Speaker 1: Basically, she was threatening to expose her secret.

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Speaker 9: He couldn't just give her money because he was struggling financially,

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Speaker 9: and perhaps he chose not to do so, and perhaps

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Speaker 9: he wanted the whole problem just to go away.

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Speaker 1: How would John toall make it all go away? Would

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Speaker 1: he scare Sarah Heart so much with threats of violence

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Speaker 1: that she would finally leave? Would he threaten to send

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Speaker 1: the kids away? Or worse? If you've listened to the

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Speaker 1: show before, you probably have a good idea.

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Speaker 2: He goes to the apothecary.

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Speaker 8: He purchased it from a regular place in London where

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Speaker 8: he would go for his apothecary needs. Apparently he used

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Speaker 8: this prussic acid, which is cyanide, for treating his varicus veins.

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Speaker 1: It was called Steel's acid, which was also known as cyanide.

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Speaker 1: People used to treat their varicose veins with a mixture

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Speaker 1: containing prussic acid, which is alarming because of course cyanide

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Speaker 1: is an incredibly lethal poison and if you didn't know

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Speaker 1: how to handle it, correctly, you could die. But John

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Speaker 1: Tall did know how to use prussic acid, so he

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Speaker 1: bought that bottle and then he dropped it.

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Speaker 8: On this occasion. I believe he went a second time

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Speaker 8: and told the apothecary that he dropped the first one

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Speaker 8: and he needed a replace the reason for him going

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Speaker 8: in again.

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Speaker 1: That's what he told the man at the apothecary. But

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Speaker 1: I doubt it. It sounds like an excuse to purchase

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Speaker 1: another bottle. But why would John Tall need two bottles

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Speaker 1: of prussic acid. He returned home and worried and then plotted.

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Speaker 9: The critical day is New Year's Day, eighteen forty five.

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Speaker 9: On that day, he heads to London and tries to

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Speaker 9: get the money he needs to pay Sarah. And he

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Speaker 9: does succeed in getting the money. So that's interesting in itself.

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Speaker 9: He does have the money. He's got a choice to make.

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Speaker 1: On that day, Tall slid the Bank of England bills

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Speaker 1: in his pocket, the amount he had agreed to pay

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Speaker 1: Sarah Hart to help support Alfred and young Sarah. He

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Speaker 1: also held the prussic acid.

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Speaker 2: Is equipped with the prossic acid, gets onto a train

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Speaker 2: from Paddington Station and goes to Salt Hill.

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Speaker 4: He goes to Sarah.

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Speaker 9: He gets the four o'clock train from London to Slab.

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Speaker 1: As the passenger train whizzed by houses along its route,

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Speaker 1: John Tall gazed out the window. He had two choices,

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Speaker 1: and both were hidden beneath his dark coat, the money

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Speaker 1: and the poison. The first one, the money, represented his

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Speaker 1: ruin if his wife discovered his infidelity. The other, the

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Speaker 1: Prussic acid, could solve all of his problems. He could

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Speaker 1: kill Sarah Hart, the mother of his children and the

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Speaker 1: keeper of his secrets. There would be no more threats,

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Speaker 1: no more expensive child support payments. John Tall mulled over

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Speaker 1: both choices. Would he make the right one? You wouldn't

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Speaker 1: be listening to me right now if he did.

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Speaker 9: He gets off the train and he walks to Sarah's

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Speaker 9: place at Salt Hill. It's January, so yes, it's dark,

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Speaker 9: but there are lights around the railway station so people

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Speaker 9: see him.

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Speaker 4: He's in his Quaker garb. He is distinctive. He is seen.

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Speaker 4: He heads to Sarah's place.

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Speaker 1: The darkness of the winter cloaked him that early evening,

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Speaker 1: and his clothing helped the clothing of a Quaker, As

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Speaker 1: Carol Baxter mentioned, people at the railway station in Slough

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Speaker 1: recognized his garb. He was clearly a Quaker. His clothing

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Speaker 1: gave him away.

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Speaker 2: It's very distinctive. A long, dark coat, a hat, even

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Speaker 2: just the silhouette of a Quaker would have been quitecognizable.

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Speaker 1: Angela Buckley says that wearing the Quaker clothing seems like

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Speaker 1: a careless mistake.

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Speaker 10: What strikes me is odd why he went dressed as

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Speaker 10: a Quaker, which was so distinctive. Because if he really

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Speaker 10: wanted to go and commit crime under the cloak of darkness,

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Speaker 10: why was he wearing something that was quite so distinctive.

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Speaker 1: It does seem a little self defeating, but I'm also

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Speaker 1: not really surprised. Sometimes people can't break their habits even

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Speaker 1: if they intend to commit a crime. I learned that

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Speaker 1: by researching my second book, American Sherlock. Forensic scientist Oscar

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Speaker 1: Heinrich was the focus of that book. In nineteen twenty one,

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Speaker 1: he worked on a case involving a Catholic priest who

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Speaker 1: had been kidnapped in Colma, California, right from his home.

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Speaker 1: The kidnapper had left a partially handwritten ransom note with

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Speaker 1: a distinctive writing style, sort of extra loopy. Investigators handed

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Speaker 1: Heinrich the ransom note and asked him to profile the

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Speaker 1: kidnapper who altered did kill the priest. Heinrich analyzed the

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Speaker 1: note and turned to the investigators. He said, I have

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Speaker 1: no idea who this man is. You can imagine they

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Speaker 1: didn't find that comment helped, but Heinrich gleaned some information

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Speaker 1: from those loopy letters. When you find him, he said,

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Speaker 1: you will discover that he was once a professional baker.

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Speaker 1: Heinrich said that the handwriting was distinctive a trained baker

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Speaker 1: had written a note, and he was right. Heinrich believed

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Speaker 1: that a baker who killed someone was still a baker

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Speaker 1: with a baker's habits. Perhaps John Tall's beliefs and Quakerism

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Speaker 1: were so deeply rooted in his identity that wearing his

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Speaker 1: Quaker clothing wasn't a conscious choice. It was who he was.

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Speaker 1: John Tall arrived that night and wrapped on Sarah Hart's door.

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Speaker 1: The kids were asleep, Sarah seemed happy to see him.

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Speaker 9: So he had praassic acid in his pocket when he

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Speaker 9: went to visit Sarah, and it seems like he sent

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Speaker 9: her out for a glass of porter to get some

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Speaker 9: beer at the local pub.

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Speaker 4: And she came back with it.

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Speaker 1: He poured her a stout and they drank together.

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Speaker 9: And all we can think is that he put it

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Speaker 9: in her drink. But there were doubts cast later on.

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Speaker 9: But whether they were just people with stories, it's very

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Speaker 9: hard to know. But I think the most likely thing

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Speaker 9: is that he put it in her drink.

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Speaker 1: We know little about what happened after that. We just

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Speaker 1: have what the neighbors say they heard, which was not

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Speaker 1: a friendly conversation.

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Speaker 2: Some sounds of fighting. The neighbors had some shouts.

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Speaker 1: We don't know what they were fighting about. He might

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Speaker 1: have tried to call off the affair. He might have

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Speaker 1: argued with her about the letter she sent his wife.

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Speaker 1: He might have refused to pay her child support. It

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Speaker 1: could have been all of those things. Maybe John Tall

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Speaker 1: was searching for any excuse to not do what he

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Speaker 1: was about to do. But whatever Sarah Hart and Tall

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Speaker 1: were arguing over, it soon stopped and now someone seemed

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Speaker 1: to be in pain.

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Speaker 9: The woman who lives next door hears some very strange moans.

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Speaker 1: The neighbor's name was Mary Anne Ashley. She heard moaning

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Speaker 1: and maybe a stifled scream. She was alarmed.

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Speaker 9: She picks up a candle and goes outside to see

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Speaker 9: what's happening. And she sees him, this man come out

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Speaker 9: the front door and hurry down to the front gate,

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Speaker 9: and she calls out to him, is anything the matter

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Speaker 9: with missus Hart? But he doesn't respond.

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Speaker 2: He is fleeing quite quickly from the scene and stops

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Speaker 2: by a neighbor. I don't know whether this is just

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Speaker 2: nosiness and neighborhood gossip. He was seen to be quite

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Speaker 2: a little bit startled, a little bit uneasy going from

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Speaker 2: the scene.

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Speaker 1: Marianne gripped her candle and walked faster in the cold

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Speaker 1: night down her garden.

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Speaker 9: Path, and she goes down to the front gate and

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Speaker 9: gets through hers and gets to his, and he's stuck

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Speaker 9: on the other side, unable to open the gate. And

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Speaker 9: so she says, you know, the gate gets stuck, and

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Speaker 9: I can help you do it, and she reaches over

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Speaker 9: and opens it for him. But if she lifts up

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Speaker 9: his candle, she can see that he is the Quaker

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Speaker 9: who comes to visit Sarah every so often. So he

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Speaker 9: walks through the gate and heads off back towards Slough station.

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Speaker 1: Once again, John Tole was silent and in a hurry.

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00:19:07,560 --> 00:19:11,040
Speaker 1: The wind blew as John Tall walked quickly from Sarah

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Speaker 1: Hart's house and slough to the train platform. He was

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Speaker 1: in a hurry to escape the scene he had left behind.

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Speaker 1: His great great granddaughter, Hilary Fox says, none of this

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Speaker 1: seemed to be well planned.

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Speaker 8: I don't think he was too clever on that side

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Speaker 8: of things. The way he did it. He was seen

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Speaker 8: going in and he was seen going out. Everyone heard

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Speaker 8: the christ and Yetie Doversei planned his escape.

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Speaker 1: Back at the cottage, the neighbor watched Tall disappear from

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Speaker 1: her view sometime after seven pm. Then she rushed to

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Speaker 1: Sarah Hart's cottage door.

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Speaker 9: She comes into the place, finds Sarah sprawled on the

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Speaker 9: floor with her mouth frothing and moaning, moaning, and she

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Speaker 9: calls the doctor.

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Speaker 4: But Sarah's glaze.

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Speaker 9: That's not really even moans, it's almost just expulsions of air.

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Speaker 1: Marianne tried to offer Sarah water, but she couldn't drink.

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Speaker 9: By the time they find Sarah, she's in her death throes.

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Speaker 9: She's just moaning, and they tried to give her some water,

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Speaker 9: but of course that wasn't That just dribbled out of

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Speaker 9: her mouth and could have drowned. Her.

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Speaker 1: She gripped her stomach and cried. It was a painful death.

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Speaker 1: Crime historian Angela Buckley says the doctor stared down at

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Speaker 1: Sarah and immediately looked for clues.

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Speaker 4: We don't know.

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Speaker 10: There are no witnesses to the only witness to the

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Speaker 10: actual crime is Sarah Hart herself, and she's died. The

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Speaker 10: children don't appear to have seen anything.

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Speaker 1: Sarah Hart was gone after a short, difficult life. Sarah

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Speaker 1: was a mother who tried all she could to give

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Speaker 1: her young son and daughter a good life, despite their neglectful,

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Speaker 1: difficult father. And now she had been murdered by that

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Speaker 1: same man, someone she had trusted, someone she had once

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Speaker 1: wanted to marry. At the cottage, the doctor examined Sarah's

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Speaker 1: body for trauma. She hadn't been shot or stabbed, or

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Speaker 1: beaten or strangled. There were no markings on her body.

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Speaker 1: It didn't look like there had been a struggle.

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Speaker 2: There's a doctor who is on site for Sarah as

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Speaker 2: she passes away, and immediately I think they suspect poisoning,

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Speaker 2: just in the way that she was found, the way

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Speaker 2: she was gasping for air poisoned.

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Speaker 1: The doctor knew she had been murdered, probably by the

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Speaker 1: man dressed as a Quaker who ran from the cottage.

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Speaker 1: Who else could it be?

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Speaker 9: And the doctor said to the neighbor what happened, and

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Speaker 9: the neighbor mentioned the quaker leaving Sarah's house and that

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Speaker 9: he came from London.

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Speaker 4: She didn't really know his name.

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Speaker 9: She thought his name was something like Talbot, and though

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Speaker 9: the kids did refer to him as tall, but they

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Speaker 9: thought it was Ta double Ill, not the name Tawe

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Speaker 9: double Il.

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Speaker 4: And so she told the police about that.

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Speaker 1: The doctor looked around the cottage for clues and he

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Speaker 1: found a few.

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Speaker 2: So they suspect poisoning straight away, and the circumstances that

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Speaker 2: they found the situation in There were a couple of bottles,

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Speaker 2: little bottles left, probably not in the way that the

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Speaker 2: newspapers had painted the picture, literally painted the picture of

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Speaker 2: just two open bottles next to her dad body. I

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Speaker 2: think that's a little bit too a little bit too obvious.

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Speaker 2: I don't think it was that silly.

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Speaker 1: I told Carol Baxter that this seemed to be a

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Speaker 1: very cruel way to murder someone. Cyanide is very painful,

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Speaker 1: but I had never heard it called prussic acid.

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Speaker 9: Most people have heard of cyanide. What they are unaware

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Speaker 9: of is the fact then the old days, cyanide was

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Speaker 9: called prussic acid. Acid devolved from the use of animals,

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Speaker 9: bones and things that actually made the color called Prussian blue.

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Speaker 4: So it was actually the first man may die.

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Speaker 1: I've read that they began to do experiments with it.

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Speaker 9: And out of their experiments with prussic acid, they found

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Speaker 9: that it was deadly, of course, but no one had

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Speaker 9: actually been convicted of a prussic acid murder at that time,

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Speaker 9: so it was quite a good drug to use to

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Speaker 9: try and kill someone because there was no history of

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Speaker 9: a conviction and it acted very quickly as cyanide does.

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Speaker 1: I know the spy stories of people using cyanide to

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Speaker 1: die by suicide, but you need to know what you're doing.

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Speaker 9: So with his medical knowledge, he knew what drugs to

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Speaker 9: try and use, because again he was a medical man,

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Speaker 9: he was able to get a poison like prussic acid,

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Speaker 9: which the ordinary person couldn't get.

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Speaker 1: After Sarah had died, the neighbor Marianne did something very smart.

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Speaker 1: She and a neighbor called someone to help track down

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Speaker 1: John Tall.

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Speaker 2: She calls for another neighbor I think, and then they

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Speaker 2: call for the reverend, the town reverend, who comes and

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Speaker 2: very quickly starts after him.

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Speaker 1: This reverend was the cousin of the doctor at Sarah's house.

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Speaker 1: He also stopped to alert a parish constable. Crime historian

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Speaker 1: Angela Buckley says that a constable would have represented law

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Speaker 1: enforcement in the mid eighteen hundreds and parts of.

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Speaker 10: England, so I think there's a parish constable, So presumably

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Speaker 10: that was somewhere local to Salt Hill, a tiny village.

401
00:24:48,760 --> 00:24:51,320
Speaker 10: Some of them still had parish constables at this time.

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Speaker 9: And they realized that the most likely place for him

403
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Speaker 9: to go would be to Slough railway station to get

404
00:24:56,359 --> 00:24:59,440
Speaker 9: the train back to London. So really their only opportunity

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Speaker 9: to fin find him for questioning.

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Speaker 1: John Tall was on the run literally, He was heading

407
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Speaker 1: quickly toward the Slough train station. He could board the

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Speaker 1: next train, the seven forty two PM, which was bound

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Speaker 1: for London's Paddington station. He might just get away. John

410
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Speaker 1: Tall claimed to be a Quaker to value and follow

411
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Speaker 1: their tenants, but those tenants limited him because really John

412
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Speaker 1: Tall mostly cared about himself and his own needs. He

413
00:25:48,920 --> 00:25:53,000
Speaker 1: needed money, he needed sex, and he needed a respected

414
00:25:53,080 --> 00:25:58,399
Speaker 1: reputation in a conservative community. Obviously, faith adds value to

415
00:25:58,520 --> 00:26:02,400
Speaker 1: so many people's personal lives, but there are certainly other

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00:26:02,520 --> 00:26:06,320
Speaker 1: stories like TLL's where someone hides criminal behavior behind the

417
00:26:06,359 --> 00:26:13,480
Speaker 1: cloak of religion. In nineteen sixty, Catholic priest John Fight

418
00:26:13,800 --> 00:26:17,560
Speaker 1: sexually assaulted and murdered a twenty five year old Texas

419
00:26:17,600 --> 00:26:22,320
Speaker 1: school teacher named Irene Garza. For decades, there were rumors

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Speaker 1: that the Catholic Church covered up the murder to protect

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00:26:25,480 --> 00:26:29,120
Speaker 1: one of their priests, despite a lot of evidence against him.

422
00:26:29,800 --> 00:26:34,800
Speaker 1: Fight wasn't convicted for Garza's murder until nearly sixty years later,

423
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Speaker 1: and he died in prison three years ago at age

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Speaker 1: eighty seven, having remained free for most of his life.

425
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Speaker 1: Author Esterzala says that religion doesn't always have as much

426
00:26:47,520 --> 00:26:51,480
Speaker 1: impact on positive behavior as people would hope, and both

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Speaker 1: John Fight and John Tall are good examples of that.

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Speaker 11: Most people are members of a religion, and yet forms

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00:27:00,320 --> 00:27:03,760
Speaker 11: of human behavior displayed in every religious community. So I'm

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00:27:03,760 --> 00:27:06,920
Speaker 11: not sure the religious community leadership or ideals has that

431
00:27:07,040 --> 00:27:09,639
Speaker 11: much impact on people's conduct and behavior. I think that

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00:27:09,680 --> 00:27:12,480
Speaker 11: comes from elsewhere, because otherwise we wouldn't have very good

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00:27:12,480 --> 00:27:15,640
Speaker 11: people and very bad people across the board in our religions.

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Speaker 1: Meg Edwards says that the Quakers were and are a

435
00:27:20,080 --> 00:27:25,320
Speaker 1: very respective religion and John Tall was a terrible representative

436
00:27:25,359 --> 00:27:25,720
Speaker 1: of them.

437
00:27:26,320 --> 00:27:28,639
Speaker 2: I just can't help but see that there are so

438
00:27:28,960 --> 00:27:33,159
Speaker 2: many parallels between what John Tall does and how he

439
00:27:33,280 --> 00:27:37,920
Speaker 2: uses his religion to benefit himself and to save himself.

440
00:27:38,000 --> 00:27:40,480
Speaker 2: One of the big things that we can learn about

441
00:27:40,520 --> 00:27:44,359
Speaker 2: this case is that it is incredibly relevant today to

442
00:27:44,480 --> 00:27:50,400
Speaker 2: how religious organizations, religious institutions are so quick to protect

443
00:27:50,440 --> 00:27:54,040
Speaker 2: their own, one to protect their own and two to

444
00:27:54,080 --> 00:27:57,879
Speaker 2: save face. This is something that we see all the

445
00:27:57,920 --> 00:28:03,159
Speaker 2: time with piousness of religion, particularly protecting white men from

446
00:28:03,200 --> 00:28:06,159
Speaker 2: doing very violent crimes against women.

447
00:28:08,480 --> 00:28:12,120
Speaker 1: John Tall had murdered a woman, the mother of his children.

448
00:28:12,560 --> 00:28:15,680
Speaker 1: He had discarded her when she asked for too much,

449
00:28:16,200 --> 00:28:19,120
Speaker 1: and he hoped that his clothing would mask who he

450
00:28:19,200 --> 00:28:19,960
Speaker 1: really was.

451
00:28:26,600 --> 00:28:31,840
Speaker 4: Is you know on the take? So you let her

452
00:28:31,920 --> 00:28:32,920
Speaker 4: just get my back?

453
00:28:32,960 --> 00:28:33,240
Speaker 11: Sorry?

454
00:28:33,240 --> 00:28:33,600
Speaker 4: What do you say?

455
00:28:33,680 --> 00:28:34,320
Speaker 1: Do you remember?

456
00:28:34,520 --> 00:28:35,320
Speaker 4: I've never been Hannah.

457
00:28:36,480 --> 00:28:39,680
Speaker 1: When Meg Edwards and I visited Slough, it wasn't just

458
00:28:39,720 --> 00:28:42,200
Speaker 1: to see the place where John Tall had kept Sarah

459
00:28:42,240 --> 00:28:45,880
Speaker 1: Harts and their children hidden away. We also wanted to

460
00:28:45,960 --> 00:28:48,640
Speaker 1: retrace his escape route from the night of the murder,

461
00:28:49,040 --> 00:28:51,880
Speaker 1: but first we'd have to find the right path.

462
00:28:53,000 --> 00:28:54,360
Speaker 3: Right Starbucks is there?

463
00:28:55,560 --> 00:29:01,080
Speaker 4: Okay, we want to go this way? I think you okay,

464
00:29:01,160 --> 00:29:02,200
Speaker 4: you think are around the corner?

465
00:29:02,320 --> 00:29:03,000
Speaker 5: Yeah, I think.

466
00:29:02,880 --> 00:29:05,880
Speaker 3: It's in this direction.

467
00:29:07,240 --> 00:29:11,240
Speaker 1: I don't get us killed. I don't think there's a

468
00:29:11,280 --> 00:29:12,600
Speaker 1: ton of crime in Slough.

469
00:29:12,280 --> 00:29:13,719
Speaker 2: But maybe I think that might be.

470
00:29:13,760 --> 00:29:17,280
Speaker 1: Actually, he think so, right, Slough maybe a small town

471
00:29:17,400 --> 00:29:20,280
Speaker 1: and a safe one, but that night, about one hundred

472
00:29:20,320 --> 00:29:23,400
Speaker 1: and seventy five years ago, it was anything but safe

473
00:29:23,520 --> 00:29:26,560
Speaker 1: for Sarah Hart. And if John Tall could just make

474
00:29:26,600 --> 00:29:29,920
Speaker 1: it back to London, he would likely get away with murder.

475
00:29:31,640 --> 00:29:36,600
Speaker 3: So he started from Salt Hill, which is where the

476
00:29:36,600 --> 00:29:39,800
Speaker 3: cottage was, to get to Slough Station, which would have

477
00:29:39,840 --> 00:29:42,280
Speaker 3: been I mean, now it's a twenty minute walk or

478
00:29:42,320 --> 00:29:44,400
Speaker 3: so he was on foot.

479
00:29:45,240 --> 00:29:48,720
Speaker 6: Yeah, so we're thinking twenty minute, fifteen to twenty minute.

480
00:29:49,760 --> 00:29:51,280
Speaker 1: I wonder if he was running or if it was

481
00:29:51,320 --> 00:29:52,320
Speaker 1: at risk walk.

482
00:29:52,480 --> 00:29:54,680
Speaker 12: I would assume it's a breastpall in the middle of

483
00:29:54,720 --> 00:29:57,360
Speaker 12: the n I think, yeah, I mean, you know, I

484
00:29:57,360 --> 00:29:59,480
Speaker 12: think the only thing that would draw more attention to

485
00:29:59,520 --> 00:30:05,160
Speaker 12: a Quaker as a running quick Yeah.

486
00:30:03,640 --> 00:30:07,760
Speaker 1: We did eventually orient ourselves, and then we retraced tall

487
00:30:07,840 --> 00:30:09,400
Speaker 1: steps toward the train station.

488
00:30:10,440 --> 00:30:14,240
Speaker 6: I always think it's weird this, you know, when you're

489
00:30:14,280 --> 00:30:17,400
Speaker 6: walking and you're like, these are you know, the higment's different.

490
00:30:17,440 --> 00:30:22,600
Speaker 6: These are the streets that somebody ran down to get away.

491
00:30:22,920 --> 00:30:25,080
Speaker 1: This would have been the station, right, Yeah, what a

492
00:30:25,120 --> 00:30:25,720
Speaker 1: real station.

493
00:30:25,880 --> 00:30:27,959
Speaker 3: Yeah? Look, look how old that looks?

494
00:30:28,520 --> 00:30:29,160
Speaker 4: That would have been.

495
00:30:29,720 --> 00:30:30,000
Speaker 3: Sure.

496
00:30:30,160 --> 00:30:31,600
Speaker 4: Let me take a picture of it while we're here.

497
00:30:34,200 --> 00:30:36,880
Speaker 1: Megs right, it really does look old. But you know

498
00:30:36,920 --> 00:30:39,760
Speaker 1: how I am about details. I needed to know for sure.

499
00:30:40,400 --> 00:30:42,160
Speaker 1: I would like to find out when the station was.

500
00:30:42,440 --> 00:30:44,760
Speaker 12: Yeah, maybe there'll be a plaque.

501
00:30:44,920 --> 00:30:45,680
Speaker 4: We like to do that.

502
00:30:45,840 --> 00:30:47,280
Speaker 6: You do love to do plants too.

503
00:30:48,080 --> 00:30:49,440
Speaker 4: We don't stick murderers on them.

504
00:30:49,440 --> 00:30:49,640
Speaker 10: There.

505
00:30:53,480 --> 00:30:55,600
Speaker 3: It looks old to me, it does.

506
00:30:56,880 --> 00:31:00,640
Speaker 2: That's just a stamb in the dark passage cover.

507
00:31:02,400 --> 00:31:08,480
Speaker 3: Snow Railway Station listed Grade two opened in eighteen eighty four.

508
00:31:09,600 --> 00:31:11,880
Speaker 6: So we would have missed this design to replace earlier

509
00:31:11,920 --> 00:31:16,400
Speaker 6: Great Western Okay, same place, yeah, same place, building, building,

510
00:31:16,720 --> 00:31:18,000
Speaker 6: And you would assume that because it's a.

511
00:31:17,920 --> 00:31:21,120
Speaker 4: Red broken okay, still old.

512
00:31:21,560 --> 00:31:24,080
Speaker 1: So while it is more than one hundred and thirty

513
00:31:24,080 --> 00:31:26,920
Speaker 1: five years old, this isn't the same building that John

514
00:31:26,960 --> 00:31:30,680
Speaker 1: Tall desperately made his way towards back in eighteen forty five.

515
00:31:31,320 --> 00:31:33,760
Speaker 1: And now we need to head back to London, just

516
00:31:33,840 --> 00:31:37,560
Speaker 1: like John Tall hope to do that cold January night.

517
00:31:38,320 --> 00:31:41,160
Speaker 3: Express services the eight. So you want to do that

518
00:31:41,240 --> 00:31:42,920
Speaker 3: right platform three?

519
00:31:43,000 --> 00:31:50,720
Speaker 6: Yeah, we have to learn.

520
00:31:49,000 --> 00:31:49,600
Speaker 1: Where's your up?

521
00:31:49,880 --> 00:31:50,800
Speaker 4: Yeah, okay, let's do it.

522
00:32:15,080 --> 00:32:18,520
Speaker 1: As he ran toward the train station's platform around seven

523
00:32:18,640 --> 00:32:22,720
Speaker 1: thirty pm, he was so close to freedom. John Tall

524
00:32:22,800 --> 00:32:25,840
Speaker 1: knew that if he were caught this time, the Quakers

525
00:32:25,880 --> 00:32:28,520
Speaker 1: couldn't save him. They wouldn't.

526
00:32:29,280 --> 00:32:32,480
Speaker 2: His history is so interesting with you know, this wasn't

527
00:32:32,520 --> 00:32:34,720
Speaker 2: the first time he was facing the death sentence, which

528
00:32:34,760 --> 00:32:38,400
Speaker 2: is you'd think terrifying and would really impact you and

529
00:32:38,480 --> 00:32:40,920
Speaker 2: change your psyche and make you a little bit more

530
00:32:41,080 --> 00:32:44,240
Speaker 2: wary of committing crimes, and it clearly didn't at all.

531
00:32:45,040 --> 00:32:50,080
Speaker 1: He apparently wasn't wary at all. Clearly this was premeditated

532
00:32:50,160 --> 00:32:53,960
Speaker 1: because he brought the acid. He had thought this through.

533
00:32:54,560 --> 00:32:59,000
Speaker 1: But Taul also seemed unconcerned about getting caught. He wore

534
00:32:59,160 --> 00:33:03,520
Speaker 1: recognizable clothing, He was spotted leaving her house, and he

535
00:33:03,600 --> 00:33:06,280
Speaker 1: killed her in a way that would cause her a

536
00:33:06,360 --> 00:33:10,240
Speaker 1: lot of pain, a lot of moaning, So that's why

537
00:33:10,320 --> 00:33:14,680
Speaker 1: neighbors were alerted immediately. I told Carol Baxter that I

538
00:33:14,800 --> 00:33:18,600
Speaker 1: was confused. Was John Tall overly confident, which is why

539
00:33:18,680 --> 00:33:21,960
Speaker 1: he didn't bother to hide his identity, or was he

540
00:33:22,200 --> 00:33:25,160
Speaker 1: a master of self sabotage?

541
00:33:25,360 --> 00:33:27,360
Speaker 4: Probably a combination of the two.

542
00:33:27,560 --> 00:33:29,920
Speaker 1: Why the thing.

543
00:33:29,840 --> 00:33:33,320
Speaker 9: Is he attempted to kill Sarah three months earlier and

544
00:33:33,360 --> 00:33:34,280
Speaker 9: he got away with it.

545
00:33:43,920 --> 00:33:47,760
Speaker 1: Three months earlier, John Tall made the same trip from

546
00:33:47,800 --> 00:33:52,840
Speaker 1: London to Slough. He took the same walk to Salt

547
00:33:52,960 --> 00:33:56,480
Speaker 1: Hill and knocked on the door of the cottage. He

548
00:33:56,560 --> 00:34:03,240
Speaker 1: poured cyanide into her drink. Sarah Hart became very sick,

549
00:34:03,680 --> 00:34:10,000
Speaker 1: violently ill, but Sarah didn't die.

550
00:34:10,239 --> 00:34:13,680
Speaker 9: So he tried three months earlier, didn't kill her. Eventually,

551
00:34:13,920 --> 00:34:18,600
Speaker 9: at some point found out that she wasn't dead, returned

552
00:34:18,800 --> 00:34:22,440
Speaker 9: to see her again. He returned to see her first

553
00:34:22,680 --> 00:34:24,160
Speaker 9: and probably found out she was live.

554
00:34:25,840 --> 00:34:29,799
Speaker 1: When Tall returned in December, he found Sarah Hart very

555
00:34:29,880 --> 00:34:33,279
Speaker 1: much alive. I'm sure to his dismay. I've said this

556
00:34:33,360 --> 00:34:37,399
Speaker 1: before about poison. It's a tricky weapon. A poisoner has

557
00:34:37,480 --> 00:34:40,359
Speaker 1: to know what they're doing too much, and there will

558
00:34:40,400 --> 00:34:44,040
Speaker 1: be clear signs of poison during an autopsy to little

559
00:34:44,160 --> 00:34:50,040
Speaker 1: and the victim's survise, and maybe they become suspicious. Unfortunately,

560
00:34:50,360 --> 00:34:54,640
Speaker 1: Sarah Hart was very trusting. She didn't seem to suspect

561
00:34:54,719 --> 00:34:57,359
Speaker 1: that Tall had tried to kill her. She never called

562
00:34:57,360 --> 00:35:02,120
Speaker 1: a constable. She continued to have relationship with him. When

563
00:35:02,160 --> 00:35:06,280
Speaker 1: John Tall discovered that Sarah was alive, that is when

564
00:35:06,320 --> 00:35:09,760
Speaker 1: he revised his plan. That's when he bought a second

565
00:35:09,840 --> 00:35:13,480
Speaker 1: jar of prussic acid. That's when he made a plan

566
00:35:13,800 --> 00:35:18,840
Speaker 1: to not make that mistake again. The next time. John

567
00:35:18,920 --> 00:35:30,280
Speaker 1: Toll would make sure she was dead. He smiled warmly

568
00:35:30,320 --> 00:35:34,000
Speaker 1: at Sarah Harts that night, masking his true intentions with

569
00:35:34,160 --> 00:35:38,080
Speaker 1: false affection, and then he kissed her goodbye.

570
00:35:38,239 --> 00:35:40,000
Speaker 9: And then he said he was going to come back

571
00:35:40,040 --> 00:35:41,120
Speaker 9: the next week.

572
00:35:43,280 --> 00:35:46,799
Speaker 1: Which was New Year's Day, the day he finally killed her.

573
00:35:47,680 --> 00:35:50,640
Speaker 9: And what's interesting is he came back on a day

574
00:35:50,920 --> 00:35:55,040
Speaker 9: on a Wednesday, when he normally attended his Quaker meetings,

575
00:35:55,200 --> 00:35:58,960
Speaker 9: so it wasn't his normal day for visiting. So from

576
00:35:58,960 --> 00:36:02,680
Speaker 9: that point of view, you can see a bit of intent.

577
00:36:03,160 --> 00:36:06,120
Speaker 1: Okay, So he was determined that this would be the day.

578
00:36:06,239 --> 00:36:09,319
Speaker 9: But he had the money, so I would say he

579
00:36:09,400 --> 00:36:12,840
Speaker 9: was still a little bit ambivalent about doing it, the

580
00:36:12,880 --> 00:36:15,279
Speaker 9: fact that he was wearing his Quaker garb, but did

581
00:36:15,320 --> 00:36:16,560
Speaker 9: he have any other garb?

582
00:36:16,880 --> 00:36:17,480
Speaker 4: Probably no.

583
00:36:18,560 --> 00:36:22,239
Speaker 9: I think he was a very arrogant, self confident mann

584
00:36:22,640 --> 00:36:26,360
Speaker 9: who saw himself as being able to get away with him.

585
00:36:26,880 --> 00:36:30,680
Speaker 1: If John Tall could only make it safely undetected to

586
00:36:30,719 --> 00:36:34,640
Speaker 1: Paddington Station in London, he could vanish. It didn't matter

587
00:36:34,719 --> 00:36:37,959
Speaker 1: who had seen him at Sarah Hart's cottage. No one

588
00:36:38,040 --> 00:36:41,280
Speaker 1: in Slough knew his real name, not even his own children.

589
00:36:41,800 --> 00:36:45,240
Speaker 1: Sarah was dead. Yes, he realized that he was dressed

590
00:36:45,239 --> 00:36:48,800
Speaker 1: as a Quaker, but who would ever suspect a Quaker

591
00:36:49,280 --> 00:36:53,880
Speaker 1: a pious man of murder. He could reach London, change

592
00:36:53,880 --> 00:36:57,680
Speaker 1: his clothing and disappear. He might even be able to

593
00:36:57,719 --> 00:37:01,520
Speaker 1: return to his other family in Birkhamsted. His life could

594
00:37:01,560 --> 00:37:06,120
Speaker 1: finally move forward, free of a demanding woman and dependence

595
00:37:06,360 --> 00:37:13,880
Speaker 1: he had never wanted. But the reverend and the parish

596
00:37:13,920 --> 00:37:17,920
Speaker 1: constable were right behind him. They knew where John T.

597
00:37:17,920 --> 00:37:20,719
Speaker 1: Hall was going, they knew that he was dressed as

598
00:37:20,760 --> 00:37:24,520
Speaker 1: a Quaker, and they knew Tall might have been a murderer.

599
00:37:25,880 --> 00:37:29,680
Speaker 1: The pair rushed onward through the night, desperate to catch

600
00:37:29,800 --> 00:37:31,440
Speaker 1: a Quaker at the train station.

601
00:37:32,480 --> 00:37:35,080
Speaker 9: They needed to catch him before he got on the

602
00:37:35,120 --> 00:37:37,480
Speaker 9: train from slow because once he got on the train,

603
00:37:37,719 --> 00:37:39,080
Speaker 9: he was gone forever.

604
00:37:56,719 --> 00:38:12,680
Speaker 1: On the next episode of tenfold More Wicked, on exactly right.

605
00:38:07,160 --> 00:38:11,719
Speaker 9: The clock is ticking, the train, the seven forty two

606
00:38:11,840 --> 00:38:16,240
Speaker 9: pm train from Slough is heading off to London.

607
00:38:17,160 --> 00:38:20,480
Speaker 2: A number of respectable people saw him, people who didn't

608
00:38:20,520 --> 00:38:22,440
Speaker 2: know each other. You know, he has a ticket, he

609
00:38:22,480 --> 00:38:23,680
Speaker 2: has a first class ticket.

610
00:38:24,560 --> 00:38:28,040
Speaker 9: Then suddenly, just before the train is about to depart,

611
00:38:28,239 --> 00:38:30,880
Speaker 9: they saw this man in quaker garb head.

612
00:38:30,719 --> 00:38:33,239
Speaker 4: To the first class carriages, hop on.

613
00:38:33,840 --> 00:38:36,799
Speaker 9: The bell whistled, and the train pulled out of the

614
00:38:36,880 --> 00:38:38,960
Speaker 9: station and was gone.

615
00:38:39,600 --> 00:38:43,920
Speaker 2: By some stroke of luck. The telegraph line was between

616
00:38:44,000 --> 00:38:44,920
Speaker 2: those two stations.

617
00:38:45,400 --> 00:38:48,120
Speaker 9: What did they do next because they didn't know who

618
00:38:48,160 --> 00:38:50,040
Speaker 9: he was or where he was going.

619
00:38:57,640 --> 00:39:00,760
Speaker 1: If you love a good real ghost story, my audio

620
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Speaker 1: book The Ghost Club is available wherever you get your

621
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Speaker 1: the head of the world's most famous ghost club and

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Speaker 1: how he investigated England's most famous haunted house. Please also

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Speaker 1: check out my book All That Is Wicked, which is

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Speaker 1: a deep dive into the criminal mind. This has been

627
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Speaker 1: an exactly right Tenfold War Media production producers Jason Whaling,

628
00:39:32,840 --> 00:39:37,440
Speaker 1: Alexis and Morosi, and Natalie Wrinn. Editors Jason Whaling and

629
00:39:37,520 --> 00:39:43,400
Speaker 1: Kate Winkler Dawson researcher Kate Winkler Dawson, sound designer Eric Friend,

630
00:39:43,760 --> 00:39:50,040
Speaker 1: composer Curtis Heath. Artwork by Nick Toga. Executive producers Georgia Hartstark,

631
00:39:50,239 --> 00:39:54,160
Speaker 1: Karen Kilgarriff and Daniel Kramer. Follow us on Instagram and

632
00:39:54,239 --> 00:39:58,120
Speaker 1: Facebook at tenfold War Wicked and on Twitter at tenfold War.

633
00:39:58,880 --> 00:40:00,720
Speaker 1: And If you know of a history the Oracle crime

634
00:40:00,760 --> 00:40:03,880
Speaker 1: that could use some attention, especially if it happened in

635
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Speaker 1: your family, email us at info at Tenfoldwarwicked dot com