Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, a production
Speaker 1: of iHeartRadio. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Holly
Speaker 1: Frye and I'm Tracy B. Wilson. Happy Almost Halloween. Yeah.
Speaker 1: As I mentioned on an earlier episode this month, I
Speaker 1: haven't been as halloweene, I feel like as usual. I
Speaker 1: don't know if that's just the time anxiety lurking in
Speaker 1: the air everywhere around, or if I'm just more of
Speaker 1: a skeptic than ever. I don't know, but anyway, this
Speaker 1: one is probably our most Halloween. Today's episode covers a
Speaker 1: case of a lot of people believing there was a
Speaker 1: ghost hanging around and something that happened as a consequence
Speaker 1: of that concern over a ghost that then became a
Speaker 1: huge legal battle. This is a case of mistaken identity
Speaker 1: and I feel like it also uh needs a little
Speaker 1: bit of a heads up that there is some gun violence.
Speaker 1: But it's also legally an interesting story because this is
Speaker 1: a case that brought to light a problem in British
Speaker 1: law that would have ramifications for a long time before
Speaker 1: it was conclusively settled. And we'll get into all of
Speaker 1: that today as we talk about the Hammersmith Ghost murder.
Speaker 1: So in late eighteen oh three, frightening accounts started circulating
Speaker 1: in Hammersmith, England today that is a borough of London.
Speaker 1: The stories were all really similar, and they were told
Speaker 1: by a variety of local residents who all appear to
Speaker 1: have witnessed the same thing. That was a tall figure
Speaker 1: draped in white, described as an apparition. This apparition was
Speaker 1: seen in town, often in the churchyard, but occasionally moving
Speaker 1: outside of that space. Some people claimed to have been
Speaker 1: attacked by this phantom. As these accounts became more and
Speaker 1: more common, they also became more and more detailed. The
Speaker 1: ghost was said to appear right after the town clock
Speaker 1: struck one am, although it could also pop out at
Speaker 1: other times. It was associated with Black Lion Lane, specifically
Speaker 1: which was at the edge of the neighborhood, near undeveloped fields,
Speaker 1: and soon the ghost even had an identity and was
Speaker 1: believed to be the spirit of a man who had
Speaker 1: died by suicide in eighteen oh two, allegedly by slitting
Speaker 1: his own throat. Some accounts even stated that this apparition
Speaker 1: occasionally appeared with horns. Others said that he had glass eyes,
Speaker 1: and sometimes instead of all white, he was said to
Speaker 1: wear the skin of a beast in an account that
Speaker 1: was written mere months after the events were talking about.
Speaker 1: In this episode, which was part of the series of
Speaker 1: books cataloging the interesting happenings of the time called Kirby's
Speaker 1: Wonderful and Scientific Museum, there was even the assertion that
Speaker 1: locals believed there might be multiple ghosts. These accounts persisted
Speaker 1: to the point that the whole area started to be
Speaker 1: genuinely concerned. In one instance, a mister Russell, who was
Speaker 1: the driver of an eight horse carriage, was so frightened
Speaker 1: by the ghosts that he abandoned his team and a
Speaker 1: carriage filled with sixteen people and just ran away. Those
Speaker 1: passengers were just left hanging with the ghost. I guess
Speaker 1: as the ghost things got worse as rumors spread that
Speaker 1: people were even dying of shock upon seeing or interacting
Speaker 1: with the ghost. In one such case, a pregnant woman
Speaker 1: was described as having fainted when she saw the ghost
Speaker 1: after passing near the graveyard at Saint Paul's, and then
Speaker 1: it is said to have reached out and put its
Speaker 1: arms around her. She was found unconscious on the ground
Speaker 1: and taken to a home of a nearby resident. She
Speaker 1: reportedly died there a couple of days later, although there
Speaker 1: isn't any real substantiation for this story. For example, nothing
Speaker 1: ever mentions her name. Because of all this, though there
Speaker 1: were very real fears about being on the street, people
Speaker 1: started staying inside after sundown. In an effort to put
Speaker 1: an end to the perceived threat that was holding the
Speaker 1: town in a state of constant fear. Armed patrols were
Speaker 1: made up of citizens and they started mounting these patrols
Speaker 1: at night. This was more than twenty five years before
Speaker 1: London got its official police force, the Metropolitan Police, so
Speaker 1: this was not an unusual means of dealing with a
Speaker 1: problem involving public safety. Some of the men in these
Speaker 1: patrols did not think there was a ghost. They suspected
Speaker 1: a very real person was just scaring the area's residence
Speaker 1: and they wanted it to stop. On one patrol, a
Speaker 1: ghost was chased, but this supposed ghost was able to
Speaker 1: elude his pursuers, he said, who have removed the sheet
Speaker 1: as he ran, but then could not be identified. In
Speaker 1: a lot of cases, it seemed that the purported ghost
Speaker 1: knew which roots the patrols would take and then stuck
Speaker 1: to alternate streets. And paths. Yeah, this is often described
Speaker 1: as being a neighborhood that had a lot of alley's sideways,
Speaker 1: et cetera. So it was kind of amaze and it
Speaker 1: was easy for someone to evade capture. On January third
Speaker 1: of eighteen oh four, one of these patrols was out
Speaker 1: and about, but in this case it was not a group.
Speaker 1: It was a man on his own named Francis Smith.
Speaker 1: Smith was an excise officer who was twenty nine years old,
Speaker 1: and he and another man, William Girdler, were both out patrolling,
Speaker 1: but they had decided to separate to cover more ground.
Speaker 1: The two men had worked out a call and response
Speaker 1: set of phrases so that if one approached the other,
Speaker 1: they would know that it was the person that was
Speaker 1: also on patrol and nothing sinister. So one of them
Speaker 1: would open with who goes there or perhaps a similar
Speaker 1: sentiment like who is it? The other would respond with
Speaker 1: a friend, and then the final confirmation was advance friend.
Speaker 1: So this seems like a great code, but it is
Speaker 1: all based on the presumption that no one else would
Speaker 1: be out in the streets except the two of them
Speaker 1: and perhaps something or someone sinister. After the two men
Speaker 1: parted ways, to patrol, Francis Smith spotted a figure in
Speaker 1: white near Black Lion Lane. Hoping to end this terror
Speaker 1: in the community, Smith raised the weapon he was carrying
Speaker 1: and fired, and the figure fell to the ground. When
Speaker 1: Smith approached his target, he was horrified to see that
Speaker 1: it was a man wearing white work clothes that were
Speaker 1: white linen trousers with a white waistcoat, apron, and even shoes.
Speaker 1: The victim was twenty two year old Thomas Millwood that
Speaker 1: was a bricklayer who was walking home from visiting his
Speaker 1: father after work when Francis Smith mistook him for the
Speaker 1: ghost or a prankster pretending to be a ghost. Allegedly,
Speaker 1: this was not the first time someone had thought he
Speaker 1: was the ghost, but previous incidents had ended without any
Speaker 1: kind of serious repercussions. After Smith realized what he had done,
Speaker 1: he went looking immediately for help, and he ran into
Speaker 1: two men named Stowe and Locke, and he told them
Speaker 1: that he had shot a man that he had believed
Speaker 1: to be a ghost. Initially, according to a statement given
Speaker 1: by Stowe to the paper, Smith didn't really seem to
Speaker 1: realize that he would be in trouble legally, or that
Speaker 1: he had done anything wrong. Smith then told them that
Speaker 1: he had spoken to that person twice and received no
Speaker 1: answer before he fired. Stowe and Locke returned with Smith
Speaker 1: to the scene of the shooting to see that Millwood
Speaker 1: was indeed dead. Smith also put out word at a
Speaker 1: local pub that he needed to speak with William Girdler,
Speaker 1: the man he had been out on watch sort of with,
Speaker 1: but not really, and then when Girdler got the message,
Speaker 1: he too went to the scene of the shooting. The
Speaker 1: coroner's examination indicated that Thomas Millwood died from a single
Speaker 1: gunshot to the head. The bullet had entered through his
Speaker 1: mouth at the left jaw, passed through his spine to
Speaker 1: the exit at the back of his neck. According to
Speaker 1: the coroner's report, his face was blackened from the flash
Speaker 1: of gunpowder, and the death was recorded as a quote
Speaker 1: rash act of wilful murder. Locke and Stowe had advised
Speaker 1: Smith to go home, although he had, according to their
Speaker 1: later testimony, asked them to take him into custody themselves,
Speaker 1: but they wanted to wait and see how things played out,
Speaker 1: and when the police went to Smith's home once the
Speaker 1: situation had escalated with that coroner's determination, Smith went with
Speaker 1: the authorities readily. We'll talk about how his legal case
Speaker 1: played out after we pause for a sponsor break. A
Speaker 1: lot of people had come to Francis Smith's defense in
Speaker 1: the course of the coroner's inquiry. He was not disputing
Speaker 1: the fact that he had fired the shot that killed Millwood.
Speaker 1: He acknowledged that he was panicked and agitated when he
Speaker 1: saw the white figure. But Smith was also known to
Speaker 1: everyone as a very gentle and kind man. No one
Speaker 1: believed he went out on patrol the night of the
Speaker 1: shooting with anything but good intentions. Additionally, a lot of
Speaker 1: people willingly made statements about the low visibility in the
Speaker 1: town the night of the shooting, noting specifically that if
Speaker 1: you stood on one side of Black Lion Lane, the
Speaker 1: low lighting, mist and hedges planted along it made it
Speaker 1: difficult to see across the lane in the dark. Black
Speaker 1: Lion was known to be dim and shadowy because there
Speaker 1: were hedges on both sides of the lane, so seeing
Speaker 1: a white form, it actually would have been pretty difficult
Speaker 1: to make it out as a corporeal human person. This
Speaker 1: is something paranormal. Based on the coroner's findings, Francis Smith
Speaker 1: was arrested He pleaded not guilty, with the defense that
Speaker 1: his actions were accidental based on a case of mistaken identity.
Speaker 1: He was tried at the Old Bailey on January thirteenth,
Speaker 1: ten days after the incident, on the charge of wilful murder.
Speaker 1: The case that played out would impact British law and
Speaker 1: change the way people talked about murder charges. Francis Smith
Speaker 1: was adamant during the trial that his actions were born
Speaker 1: out of a very real fear, and that he had
Speaker 1: believed he came into the presence of the ghosts that
Speaker 1: had been rumored to be terrorizing the neighborhood. He had
Speaker 1: initially told the court that he wished for his counsel
Speaker 1: to speak for him, but he was told that in
Speaker 1: terms of answering the charges, he had to speak for himself,
Speaker 1: and that his counsel was there solely to question the witnesses.
Speaker 1: So Smith stated in his first remarks to the court quote,
Speaker 1: I can only declare that I went out with a
Speaker 1: perfectly good intention. After calling to the deceased twice and
Speaker 1: receiving no answer, I became so agitated that I did
Speaker 1: not know what I was about. But I solemnly declare
Speaker 1: that I am innocent of any malicious intention against any
Speaker 1: person whatever. There are some inconsistencies in the various accounts
Speaker 1: as to whether Smith believed he was shooting at a
Speaker 1: specter or whether he believed he was shooting at someone
Speaker 1: pretending to be a ghost to menace the neighborhood. Some,
Speaker 1: including the testimony of John Locke, make it sound as
Speaker 1: though Smith knew it was a person. Locke specifically said
Speaker 1: during the trial testimony quote he informed me he had
Speaker 1: shot a man who he believed to be the pretended
Speaker 1: ghost of Hammersmith. But that leaves a little room for interpretation,
Speaker 1: as Smith was relaying the news of the shooting to
Speaker 1: Locke after he himself had discovered that he had shot
Speaker 1: a man. As we'll see in a moment, the defense
Speaker 1: made the case that there was a very real sense
Speaker 1: of a ghost threat in the neighborhood. The prosecution's case
Speaker 1: made the entire ghost story out to be just utterly ridiculous.
Speaker 1: Even news accounts that ran ahead of the trial had
Speaker 1: dismissed the apparition rumors. It's really silly. The Morning Chronicle
Speaker 1: ran a piece about the shooting on January sixth, so
Speaker 1: that's three days after it, which read quote the neighborhood
Speaker 1: of Hammersmith has for some time been alarmed by a
Speaker 1: ridiculous rumor of a ghost, which is said to have
Speaker 1: paid its nocturnal visits to the fields adjacent to Black
Speaker 1: Lion Lane. That same article quoted Thomas Millwood's sister Anne
Speaker 1: Millwood as describing a snippet of speech that she heard
Speaker 1: when she went to the door to watch her brother
Speaker 1: as he walked away from the house. She heard a
Speaker 1: voice say quote, damn you, who are you? And then
Speaker 1: stand else I'll shoot you right before she heard the
Speaker 1: gun being fired, and worried about her brother, but unable
Speaker 1: to see him again because these gloomy and dim lighting situation,
Speaker 1: call her brother's name and got no answer, And at
Speaker 1: that point she alerted her father and her mother and
Speaker 1: a lodger who lived with the Millwood family about it,
Speaker 1: but they dismissed what she had heard as street noise,
Speaker 1: and still very worried about her brother Thomas, went out
Speaker 1: by herself and she found him dead in the lane.
Speaker 1: A lot of witnesses came forward to vouch for Smith's
Speaker 1: good character. Even Millwood's mother in law, missus Fulbrook, was
Speaker 1: a witness for the defense. She told the court quote,
Speaker 1: on Saturday evening, he and I were at home, for
Speaker 1: he lived with me. He said he had frightened two
Speaker 1: ladies and a gentleman who were coming along the terrace,
Speaker 1: and a carriage. For that, the man said he dared
Speaker 1: to say, there goes the ghost. That he said he
Speaker 1: was no more a ghost than he was, and asked him,
Speaker 1: using a bad word, did he want a punch of
Speaker 1: the head. I begged of him to change his dress.
Speaker 1: Thomas says, I, as there is a piece of work
Speaker 1: about the ghost, and your clothes look white, pray do
Speaker 1: put on your greatcoat that you may not run any danger.
Speaker 1: I don't know what answer he made. He said he
Speaker 1: wished the ghost was catched, or something of that sort.
Speaker 1: One thing the defense counsel asked witnesses was about the
Speaker 1: many groups of men who had gone on patrol. According
Speaker 1: to court proceedings, They asked John Locke, quote, you know,
Speaker 1: I believe, however unfortunate, it has turned out that almost
Speaker 1: all the young men had gone out. When Locke answered
Speaker 1: in the affirmative, the follow up question was quote, which
Speaker 1: was publicly known and talked about. So it seems this
Speaker 1: line of questioning was to establish before the court that
Speaker 1: everyone knew that armed men were prowling the streets looking
Speaker 1: for a specter, so in disregarding that danger, Thomas had
Speaker 1: somehow been responsible for what had happened to him. Then
Speaker 1: the defense introduced the idea that there was potentially a
Speaker 1: legitimate ghost haunting Hammersmith. They called a man named Tom
Speaker 1: Groom who worked for a brewer named Burgess, and Grun
Speaker 1: stated that while he and a colleague were walking through
Speaker 1: the churchyard, he very clearly felt hands around his throat,
Speaker 1: though neither of the men could see anything. This was
Speaker 1: laying the groundwork that there were enough credible instances of
Speaker 1: people saying they had interactions with the Hammersmith ghost that
Speaker 1: it was reasonable for Francis Smith to believe that was
Speaker 1: what was before him when he pulled the trigger. The
Speaker 1: Lord Chief Baron MacDonald gave orders to the jury that
Speaker 1: they must decide if Smith was guilty or not. Those
Speaker 1: orders included the instructions quote it would be impossible to
Speaker 1: calculate the dangerous consequences which would ensue if men were
Speaker 1: permitted to take upon themselves the right of shooting others
Speaker 1: for certain crimes. If a man goes out with the
Speaker 1: intention of shooting robbers and kills a person who is
Speaker 1: offering him no violence. He is guilty of murder. However,
Speaker 1: are disgusted the jury might feel in their own minds
Speaker 1: with the abominable person guilty of the misdemeanor of terrifying
Speaker 1: the neighborhood. Still, the prisoner had no right to construe
Speaker 1: such misdemeanor into a capital offense, or to conclude that
Speaker 1: a man dressed in white was a ghost. In this case,
Speaker 1: there was a deliberate carrying of a loaded gun, which
Speaker 1: the prisoner concluded he was entitled to fire, but which
Speaker 1: he really was not, and he did fire it with
Speaker 1: a rashness, which the law does not excuse. In all
Speaker 1: the circumstances of the case, no man is allowed to
Speaker 1: kill another rashly. The judge also told the jury that
Speaker 1: they could not take into account whether Francis Smith was
Speaker 1: a good man or not, that they just had to
Speaker 1: consider the facts of the case, and the facts of
Speaker 1: the case were obvious. Francis Smith admitted to shooting Millwood,
Speaker 1: but because of the odd circumstances, it seems the jury
Speaker 1: tried to mitigate the outcome of the trial by fining
Speaker 1: Smith guilty not of murder but of manslaughter that would
Speaker 1: automatically carry a much lighter sentence. The problem, though, was
Speaker 1: that MacDonald and the two other judges in the case,
Speaker 1: Justices Rooke and Lawrence, stated they could not accept that
Speaker 1: outcome because Smith had not been on trial for manslaughter.
Speaker 1: This was just a matter of following the letter of
Speaker 1: the law. So the jury was instructed to once again
Speaker 1: deliberate with the option of delivering a guilty verdict or
Speaker 1: an acquittal for murder based on the evidence of the case.
Speaker 1: The judges also reminded the jurors that Thomas Millwood had
Speaker 1: not done anything on the night of the shooting other
Speaker 1: than walk home wearing white. He had not menaced anyone,
Speaker 1: he had not tried to run. But they also noted
Speaker 1: that even if he had, even if he had been
Speaker 1: a prankster trying to scare people by feigning to be
Speaker 1: a ghost, that could only be considered a nuisance, which
Speaker 1: at most could be cited as a misdemeanor. After the
Speaker 1: second round of deliberation, which took an hour, the jury
Speaker 1: came back with the verdict that Francis Smith was guilty
Speaker 1: of murder. This automatically resulted in a death sentence, and
Speaker 1: the bench ruled that Smith was to be hanged and
Speaker 1: that his body would be donated to a medical college.
Speaker 1: Knowing this was bound to stoke a controversy, the Lord
Speaker 1: Chief Baron Archibald MacDonald promised to bring the matter before
Speaker 1: King George the Third. This was a scenario where the
Speaker 1: facts of the case were covered in the press in
Speaker 1: detail and everyone knew what had happened. It was perceived
Speaker 1: by almost everyone as an accidental shooting, but also with
Speaker 1: the understanding that in legal terms there wasn't much leeway
Speaker 1: to find Smith anything other than guilty. Still, he did
Speaker 1: have a lot of public support, and the King also
Speaker 1: recognized the unusual circumstances in the way that the law
Speaker 1: did not not really allow for any kind of nuance
Speaker 1: in a case like this, so the monarch actually issued
Speaker 1: a pardon three weeks after the initial guilty verdict. The King,
Speaker 1: unlike the jury, did have the power to change the
Speaker 1: outcome of the case and issue a guilty verdict instead
Speaker 1: for the lesser charge of manslaughter, and to dictate the
Speaker 1: terms of the sentencing. Francis Smith was to be imprisoned
Speaker 1: for one year to perform hard labor. The proceedings of
Speaker 1: the Old Bailey list a remission of imprisonment for Francis
Speaker 1: on July twelfth of eighteen oh four, so his sentence
Speaker 1: was reduced at that point for good behavior. But after
Speaker 1: that he sort of vanishes from the historical record. But
Speaker 1: what about the ghost? Thomas Millwood was a plasterer or
Speaker 1: a bricklayer, Various different accounts call him, each of those.
Speaker 1: He happened to be wearing white work clothes. He was
Speaker 1: not a spirit lurking in the graveyard waiting to scare people.
Speaker 1: So what had all those ghost sightings about. Well, initially
Speaker 1: after the shooting, sightings of the ghost did stop, and
Speaker 1: then the day after Francis smith sentencing, the Hammersmith Ghost
Speaker 1: stepped forward to confess. And we'll talk about that right
Speaker 1: after we hear from the sponsors that keep the show going.
Speaker 1: On January fourteenth, a shoemaker named John Graham reached out
Speaker 1: to authorities to state that he had been putting a
Speaker 1: sheet over his head and then walking around Hammersmith scaring
Speaker 1: people as a prank. This had initially started just as
Speaker 1: a prank against his employees. The men had been telling
Speaker 1: Graham's kids ghost stories and it really frightened the children.
Speaker 1: So Graham thought he would frighten the grown men to retaliate,
Speaker 1: and then it turned out he liked doing it. It
Speaker 1: was fun to scare people, so he started going out
Speaker 1: into the graveyard in his ghost disguise. Although Graham had
Speaker 1: come forward, a lot of people in Hammersmith were not convinced.
Speaker 1: They continued to believe that something spectral was lurking in
Speaker 1: their neighborhood, waiting to reach out and get them if
Speaker 1: they found themselves in close proximity to it, and there
Speaker 1: were reports that the ghost was cited many times after
Speaker 1: the trial concluded, and John Graham claimed to have been
Speaker 1: the ghost. This has given rise to theories that there
Speaker 1: may have been copycats wanting to just keep the prank going,
Speaker 1: but finding any hard evidence about that is just about
Speaker 1: impossible given that nobody else ever came forward, So it
Speaker 1: could just as easily be that people thought they saw
Speaker 1: the ghost even if no one was keeping up the prank.
Speaker 1: And some of these sightings, which continued for several decades,
Speaker 1: really upped the ante on the odd details, including some
Speaker 1: accounts that this ghost was seen breathing fire. I love
Speaker 1: that he becomes much more demo on it be as
Speaker 1: time goes on. Now he's got horns, Now he's got
Speaker 1: glass eyes, Now he breathes fire. The idea that Francis
Speaker 1: Smith's murder trial introduced that the British legal system needed
Speaker 1: to be able to handle cases where a person truly
Speaker 1: believed they were acting in self defense or for the
Speaker 1: good of someone else against something supernatural, was actually debated
Speaker 1: for the next one hundred and eighty years, and it
Speaker 1: wasn't until another case in nineteen eighty three that there
Speaker 1: was a definitive ruling on such cases, though it did
Speaker 1: not involve the supernatural, but a case of misunderstanding the situation,
Speaker 1: and that was Regina versus Gladstone Williams. So Regina is
Speaker 1: the word often used in British cases to indicate that
Speaker 1: the case is brought by the Crown. I think the
Speaker 1: Brits might pronounce it regina. I think so too, but
Speaker 1: I don't love that now, sorry to all of my
Speaker 1: British friends. It sounds so much like other things to
Speaker 1: me that I cannot do it in my soul. This
Speaker 1: appellate case is written up with the following information as
Speaker 1: its introductory explainer quote On ninth March this year, Gladstone
Speaker 1: Williams appeared in the Inner London Crown Court charged with
Speaker 1: assault occasioning actual bodily harm. After a trial, he was
Speaker 1: convicted and was given a conditional discharge for twelve months,
Speaker 1: together with certain financial penalties. He now appeals on a
Speaker 1: point of law against his conviction. The facts were somewhat
Speaker 1: unusual and were as follows. On the day in question,
Speaker 1: the alleged victim, a man called Mason, saw a black
Speaker 1: youth seizing the handbag belonging to a woman who was shopping.
Speaker 1: He caught up with the youth and held him, he said,
Speaker 1: with a view to taking him to a nearby police station,
Speaker 1: but the youth broke free from his grip. Mason caught
Speaker 1: the youth again and knocked him to the ground, and
Speaker 1: he then twisted one of the youth's arms behind his
Speaker 1: back in order to immobilize him and to enable him.
Speaker 1: He said, what once again to take the youth to
Speaker 1: a police station. The youth was struggling and calling for
Speaker 1: help at this time, and no one disputed the fact.
Speaker 1: Upon the scene. Then came the appellant, who had only
Speaker 1: seen the latter stages of this incident. According to Mason,
Speaker 1: he told the appellant first of all that he was
Speaker 1: arresting the youth for mugging the lady, and secondly that
Speaker 1: he Mason was a police officer. That was not true.
Speaker 1: He was asked for his warrant card, which obviously was
Speaker 1: not forthcoming, and thereupon something of a struggle ensued between
Speaker 1: Mason on the one hand, and the appellant and others
Speaker 1: on the other hand. In the course of these events,
Speaker 1: Mason sustained injuries to his face, loosened teeth, and bleeding gums.
Speaker 1: The appellant put forward the following version of events. He
Speaker 1: said he was returning from work by bus when he
Speaker 1: saw Mason dragging the youth along and striking him again
Speaker 1: and again. He was so concerned about the matter that
Speaker 1: he rapidly got off the bus and made his way
Speaker 1: to the scene and asked Mason what on earth he
Speaker 1: was doing. In short, he said that he punched Mason
Speaker 1: because he thought if he did so, he would save
Speaker 1: the youth from further beating and what he described as torture.
Speaker 1: So the cliff notes, a person claiming to be an
Speaker 1: off duty policeman saw a kid stealing a woman's bag
Speaker 1: and chased and tackled him, and a passerby thought that
Speaker 1: the kid was being attacked by this person who said
Speaker 1: they were an off duty policeman and interceded, But that passerby,
Speaker 1: Gladstone Williams, thought he was protecting an innocent person because
Speaker 1: he did not have all the facts of the situation
Speaker 1: when he acted, and there was that confusion where it
Speaker 1: was claimed that he was a policeman and he wasn't.
Speaker 1: And Williams, the one who interceded, thinking he was saving
Speaker 1: this kid, was charged and convicted of assault, but Williams
Speaker 1: appeal led to a ruling that established precedent regarding charges
Speaker 1: where people use force but can establish that their intent
Speaker 1: and understanding of the situation was inherently lawful. That ruling reads,
Speaker 1: in part quote, in a case of self defense or
Speaker 1: the prevention of crime is concerned, if the jury came
Speaker 1: to the conclusion that the defendant believed or may have believed,
Speaker 1: that he was being attacked or that a crime was
Speaker 1: being committed, and that force was necessary to protect himself
Speaker 1: or to prevent the crime, then the prosecution have not
Speaker 1: proved their case. If, however, the defendant's alleged belief was mistaken,
Speaker 1: and if the mistake was an unreasonable one, that may
Speaker 1: be a peaceful reason for coming to the conclusion that
Speaker 1: the belief was not honestly held and should be rejected.
Speaker 1: Even if the jury come to the conclusion that the
Speaker 1: mistake was an unreasonable one, if the defendant may genuinely
Speaker 1: have been laboring under it, he is entitled to rely
Speaker 1: upon it. I'm so sorry all of that legal discussion
Speaker 1: landed in your basket, but also legal discussion that I
Speaker 1: hate for the record, Like, what do you mean if
Speaker 1: I am understanding this correctly? This is the kind of
Speaker 1: argument that's used to justify people being like I shot
Speaker 1: that guy. Oh, yes, one hundred percent. We should talk
Speaker 1: about this on behind the scenes. Yeah but yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: we should talk about it behind the scenes. Although the
Speaker 1: law may have become a settled matter according to some locals,
Speaker 1: Thomas Millwood has not, because now there are reports that
Speaker 1: Milwood has, in his ghost form, been haunting the Black
Speaker 1: Lion Pub on the street where he died. The pub
Speaker 1: has been there since the latter half of the seventeen hundreds,
Speaker 1: although specific dates on its origin do seem to vary.
Speaker 1: The pub would have been one of the primary public
Speaker 1: places where the Hammersmith Ghost would have been discussed and debated,
Speaker 1: and Millwood's body was taken there for examination by mister Flowers,
Speaker 1: who worked for the Coroner's office after he had been shot.
Speaker 1: There have been employees of the pub who have claimed
Speaker 1: over the years that they see Thomas frequently. In two
Speaker 1: thousand and four, the Ghost Club, which was founded by
Speaker 1: Charles Dickens in eighteen sixty two, had a meet up
Speaker 1: at the Black Lion Pub to mark the two hundred
Speaker 1: year anniversary of the shooting. There is a plaque outside
Speaker 1: the pub that mentions the ghost. It reads quote the
Speaker 1: Black Lion, formerly known as the Black Lion spelled with
Speaker 1: a y, A public house has stood on the site
Speaker 1: for well over two hundred years. Originally a piggery, it
Speaker 1: is reputed that the pig farmer started brewing beer for
Speaker 1: himself and his friends. This proved so popular that it
Speaker 1: overtook his agricultural interests as his main occupation. The Hammersmith
Speaker 1: Ghost started haunting Black Lion Lane in Saint Paul's Churchyard
Speaker 1: in eighteen oh four. One night in Excise, Officer Francis
Speaker 1: Smith filled his blunderbuss with shot and him self with
Speaker 1: ale before killing an unfortunate white clothes bricklayer, Thomas Millwood,
Speaker 1: whom he had mistaken for the ghost. It was at
Speaker 1: the Black Lion that the body was taken and an
Speaker 1: inquest held later. So, in a bit of historical irony,
Speaker 1: a man mistaken for a ghost and shot because of
Speaker 1: that mistake has now become a ghost in his own right,
Speaker 1: at least according to local lore. And that is the
Speaker 1: last of our halloweeners for the year. Do you have
Speaker 1: some email that may or may not be Halloween related,
Speaker 1: has nothing to do with Halloween? Oh well, it's a suggestion,
Speaker 1: but also one that I have had a lot of
Speaker 1: people ask me about this lately. Even it came into email,
Speaker 1: and I have been doing a number of book signings
Speaker 1: at conventions lately for Killer Cocktails, and several people have
Speaker 1: asked me if we were going to do this topic.
Speaker 1: So I feel I should just tell people wear them
Speaker 1: at on it. This is from our listener Samantha, who writes, Hello,
Speaker 1: all have loved your podcast for many years and was
Speaker 1: excited and surprised to look through the catalog and not
Speaker 1: find anything on this particular subject. Perhaps I missed it
Speaker 1: but maybe it would be a fun upcoming episode. My
Speaker 1: six year old daughter asked to understand the history of
Speaker 1: stuffed animals, and in our research we found how interesting
Speaker 1: the life of Margaret Steife, the German seamstress turned toy
Speaker 1: maker was. Perhaps something was mentioned during the many different
Speaker 1: Teddy Roosevelt pods, but I could not find anything particularly
Speaker 1: about her life and experiences. Would love to know your thoughts. Sam. Okay, Sam,
Speaker 1: here's the scoop. It's always on my list. I'm always
Speaker 1: poking at it. And because I had been talking about
Speaker 1: in the last year my Koala project that talked about
Speaker 1: ad nauseum on the show, a lot of people have
Speaker 1: been like, ooh, is this part of a lead up
Speaker 1: to do a maybe? Is the answer kinda yeah. Part
Speaker 1: of it is that I want to be thorough. And
Speaker 1: there are instances of stuffed toys of a variety of
Speaker 1: types going back way deep into history, and some of
Speaker 1: those are a little bit tricky because plushies like clothing
Speaker 1: are made of things that degrade really easily compared to
Speaker 1: things like oh yeah, metal and whatnot. So there's a
Speaker 1: lot of theoretical we think this may have been a
Speaker 1: toy or maybe it's just a piece of cotton wadding
Speaker 1: that we were confused by. There's a lot of those,
Speaker 1: but I'm it's always in the back of my head
Speaker 1: and it's one I would love to do. It's a
Speaker 1: slow burner, that's the answer. But the introduction of Margaret
Speaker 1: Stiffe is a subject is actually a great idea. So
Speaker 1: that may be the thing that turns the corner at
Speaker 1: least a little bit, because I love plushies. Yeah, when
Speaker 1: I read this email, I'd like, did a super quick
Speaker 1: google and I was like, oh, that does sound very
Speaker 1: interesting because I like, I know about Stife, I know
Speaker 1: about the company, but I do not know about this person. Really. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there are a few kind of heritage stuffed toy companies
Speaker 1: would be fun to talk about as well as there's
Speaker 1: another really cool initiative regarding recycling stuff toys that I
Speaker 1: would love to talk about. So it's on my list,
Speaker 1: my love list, and hopefully I'll get to it sooner
Speaker 1: than later. Maybe that would make a good holiday episode
Speaker 1: this year, because who doesn't listen. Plushes are very near
Speaker 1: and dear to my heart. I am a grown adult
Speaker 1: woman who carries a plush with me everywhere I go. Listen.
Speaker 1: Peeps rides in my carry on bag on all my trays. No,
Speaker 1: he's been all over the world with us. I just
Speaker 1: love them anyway. Thank you so much, Sam for that idea,
Speaker 1: for reminding me to think about this in a new way.
Speaker 1: And the answer is, hopefully I will meet your six
Speaker 1: year old's history needs, but I don't know when. Sorry,
Speaker 1: that's not more substantial of an answer. If you would
Speaker 1: like to write to us about stuffed animals or anything else,
Speaker 1: you can do that at History Podcast at iHeartRadio dot com.
Speaker 1: You can also subscribe to the show on the iHeartRadio app,
Speaker 1: where you listen to your favorite shows. Stuff you Missed
Speaker 1: in History Class is a production of iHeartRadio. For more
Speaker 1: podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
Speaker 1: wherever you listen to your favorite shows.