The Shop of Secrets

The most famous unsolved Cambridgeshire murder took place on Wednesday 27^th July 1921.

In the 1920s King Street, Cambridge was a small busy street and at No. 70 was a general store owned by Alice Maud Lawn. Miss Lawn was aged around 50 and she had run the shop for at least 20 years before this point.

Alice Maud Lawn 

Miss Lawn was unmarried and lived alone with just her cat, but she did have relatives nearby, her brother, a motor mechanic called Horace lived across the street with his wife at No. 79. She also had another brother and Sister – in – law living in the Cambridgeshire area.

Miss Lawns shop sold a variety of items including Bread, Tobacco and a range of dairy products.

The shop it’s self was an end terraced two – storey property, backing onto a green known as Christ’s Piece.

 

The building  had originally been a private house before it was converted and a narrow alley way called Milton Walk ran alongside the building, with a public house called the Champion of the Thames on the opposite of this passage.

At the back of the shop was a foot path and a tennis court, which is still found there today.

Although Cambridge is known for its market on Market Hill, in the 1920’s a second Wednesday market was being held in King Street. Friends of Miss Lawn said this had become a big concern to her because it would attract a large number of out of town strangers; she was a very nervous person and was noted to even tell customers of her concerns connected to the band performances on Christ’s Piece by saying

‘When the band performs on Christ’s piece there is such a rough crew who worry me. They rush into the shop for all sorts of things, that makes me very nervous indeed’

She had felt the same about the Wednesday markets, which even brought strangers as far from London.

Part of her routine was to keep the back door locked, most of all on Market day.

The shop at the time it was owned by Miss Lawn

She was also known to go out at points throughout the day, so it was not strange if customers found the shop closed during what would be normally opening hours, they would just think she popped out and would be back soon.

When a visitor to the shop at 11:30am on Wednesday the 27^th July 1921 found the shop closed, they thought she had popped out, but when the husband of a neighbour still found the shop closed after lunch he notified Miss Lawn’s sister- in – law across the street. On receiving the news she was not aware Miss Lawn had gone out, and if she was going out more than a few minutes Miss Lawn would normally make her or her husband Horace aware. With some concern she contacted her husband, who was working close by.

It was at 3pm when Miss Lawn’s brother and his next- door neighbour Mr. Kirkup went to check the shop. Entering from the back door they immediately noticed a clear sign of a disturbance and within moments found her body.

She was lying at the foot of the stairs in a pool of blood, it was oblivious she had been dead for sometime and suffered a violent attack.

She had wounds to her head and a gag hung loose around her neck.

Once the police were called the first to the scene was Constable Alfred Flint, an officer who had been on duty outside the Post office. When Flint arrived Horace claimed he had heard something move upstairs, Flint carried out a search, but no one was found.

In the days after the murder, the police were satisfied the murderer could not have been that of a local man, and the person they were looking for was one of those market strangers.  If the crime had been planned, then the assailant evidently wanted the market day to perform the attack, when owing to the noise in the street, any cry might have been drowned out.

During these few days two theories also arose, the first was that the killer had gone to the shop posing as a customer and asked for something that would have needed her to go to the back and while she was out of sight the outside door was locked before the killer followed to murder her. The second theory was the killer had gained access though the back of the shop and hidden until he had the opportunity to attack.

On Saturday 30^th July 1921 Miss Lawn’s funeral took place at Mill Road cemetery.

The case then went silent, that is until Friday 5^th August 1921 when a man calling himself Jack Varden handed himself into Tottenham Court police station claiming to be the Cambridge murderer. He signed a statement and was interviewed by Chief Inspector Mercer who straight away noticed his confession was fake.

It was later revealed Varden had never been to Cambridge and his real name was really Ernest Shaw, he was just looking for food and shelter for the night and thought this to be an easy option as they would know by the morning his story was made up and he would be released.

A name which did come forward as the possible murderer was Thomas Clanwaring, Clanwaring was 23, he claimed to come to Cambridge to look for work as a French polisher.

Clanwaring was known for inventing stories and it soon came to light that some of his story could have been a lie.

He made a range of statements to the police, his first claiming the following.

‘My home address is 66, New Street, Slivertown; I was born in Bethnal Green, then moved to Slivertown and lived there ever since I came from Baldock to Cambridge on Friday night. I have been in the town just over a week. I stayed at the black bull, Baldock, I was there four days. I came from Manchester to there. I had come through Manchester. I Walked from Manchester to Baldock is, I think about 400 miles. I slept at nights under stacks. I had been from Slivertown  over 3 ½ years, during that time I have been working for chaps on the road shovelling up and sweeping. I came to Cambridge trying to get work as a French Polisher. I tried at Leavis and other places I have been with two chaps on two occasions. Since I have been in this town I have been with two, making three persons otherwise I have been by myself.'

The statement went on, but the two chaps he referred to were Albert Briggs and Frank Turner, who were also out of work labourers.

Bits of his statement were reasonable accurate, but parts were wrong because Clanwaring had been in Bedford gaol until the 16^th July 1921. He had been imprisoned charged with theft of five bicycles.

Before his imprisonment he had been in Bedford for five days and had no luck finding work and his money soon ran out. He went to Bedford pretending to be deaf and dumb.

Thomas Clanwaring

His trial opened on 17^th October 1921 and at the end it was clear even the judge in his summing up felt that Clanwaring should be found not guilty and the jury of eleven men and one woman after an hour and 33 minutes returned announcing him not guilty.

Within the following weeks the press were reporting the case would remain unsolved, either the guilty man had been freed or they had no more leads.

They were correct because no one else was ever charged with Miss Lawn’s murder, the shop today as now had an extension and its home to a fast food company, even the houses across the street where Miss Lawn’s brother Horace and his wife had lived has now gone and new buildings are in their place.

Everyone saw her as a sweet kind lady with no enemies, but with that in mind this did not stop her becoming a part of Cambridge’s most notorious unsolved pre- war murder case.

A life of a sweet kind lady was tragically taken and no one was ever found guilty of her murder, so the shop, once her home to this day remains the shop of secrets.

These article may also be of interest: The Last Execution in Cambridgeshire
                                                               Murder at King's College
                                                               Murder on Midsummer Common 

Queen Victoria's Coronation Celebration on Parker's Piece.

On the 28th June, 1838 Parker's Piece, named after Edward Parker in 1613, was home to a remarkable feast to celebrate the coronation of Queen Victoria. It is recorded that 15,000 of the towns poorer inhabitants attended the celebrations.


In the centre of the piece was a orchestra which performed from a bandstand covered in flags and flowers. Below the centrepiece bandstand was a extensive promenade area for those who had purchased tickets to help pay towards the costs of the celebration. Around the promenade was space occupied by 2,762 Sunday school children, and then, like spokes from a wheel were 60 tables to cater for 12,720 adults. At hand on the day were 351 stewards, 547 carvers, 441 waiters, 297 beer- waiters and 41 tapsters. There were 7,029 joints of beef, mutton, pork, veal and bacon, this worked out about 1lb of meat per head. Also available was 72lb of mustard, 125 gallons of pickles, four-and-a-half thousand 2lb loaves and endless supplies of salt. For sweet there were 1,608 plum puddings available.

The dinner began at two o'clock after grace had been sung, and while the meal was being ate, the band played and the combined choir of King's and Trinity Colleges sang. After completing the dinner everyone sang a special grace composed for the celebration, then pipes and tobacco were placed on tables, and glasses were charged from 99 barrels of ale, and the mayor proposed the Queen's health, it was responded with a deafening cheer, before everyone sang the Nation Anthem.

At five o'clock, led by the mayor and the band, everyone marched to Midsummer Common for rural sports and to see Mr. & Mrs. Green ascend in a balloon ( it later descended near Fulbourn ). A firework display ended the celebrations.

The day had been a wonderful success, it was the only day that week which had see good weather. The poor who were unable to attend from age or illness were entertained in their homes, and so were those in the workhouses.

The whole celebration cost £1,709 19s 6d. in documents I found in the Cambridgeshire collection, but other sources have said it totalled to £1,767 14 shillings and 10 pence. 

The Society for Psychical Research's Cambridge Roots

Frederic Myers a well-known poet and classical lecturer at Trinity College, Cambridge, along with colleagues who included Edmund Gurney, a Classical Scholar at Cambridge, Professor Henry Sidgwick, a Cambridge philosopher, and Frank Podmore, together formed the Society of Psychical Research in 1882.

Frederic Myers 

The SPR was formed to investigate apparitional accounts.

Frederic Myers, Edmund Gurney and Frank Podmore in 1886 published what was called at the time  'The most ambitious piece of psychical research to date'.

The report contained 1,400 pages and was called 'Phantasms of the living' and Fredrick Myers is reported to have said it was 'To open an inquiry which was manifestly impending and to lay the foundation - stone of a study which will loom large in the approaching age'

The authors hoped the report would banish any remaining doubts about the reality of phantom encounters.

The reports in 'Phantasms of the Living' looked at a theory based on telepathy. The authors noted that ' The ability of one mind to impress or be impressed by another mind other than through the recognized channels of sense' Basically the percipient could be receiving a telepathic signal from the apparent.

The theory also states the apparition does not need to be present in any order to be represented as a phantom.

Edmund Gurney

Frederic Myers is said to sum it up as 'Instead of describing a ghost as a dead person permitted to communicate with the living, let us define it as a manifestation of persistent personal energy'

The report became controversial and of the 701 cases reported more than half coincided with either the approach of the death of the apparent or with some critical moment in a person's life. It was suggested that in such moments of crisis, telepathic communication seemed more likely to take place.

Another report looked at by the SPR was put together by Professor Henry Sidgwick and called 'Census of Hallucination'

Sidgewick hoped to discover what proportion of the public had experienced hallucinations that could be apparitional.

He looked at three types of hallucinations: sight, hearing and touch.

The question on the census paper read: ' Have you ever, when believing yourself to be completely awake, had a vivid impression of seeing or being touched by a living being or animate object, or of hearing a voice, which impression , so far as you could discover, was not due to any external physical cause?'

The question was on a form that required a simple Yes or No answer.  Those who answered Yes were provided with another form on which they were asked to put all the details.

Henry Sidgwick

The census had 17,000 responses and turned into an international one, with answers from Brazil, Germany, France, Austria, Italy and Russia as well as Great Britain.

Nearly ten percent admitted to having experienced sensory hallucination.

The figures were 1,029 women, 655 men.  Of the total numbers reported, 1,087 were visual and 493 where audio, two had been by touch and 129 of the phantom encounters had been experienced by more than one person.

Sidgwick discovered crisis apparitions occurred with far greater regularity than any other type; in fact, apparition at a time of crisis proved 440 times more frequently than the chances of one appearing for any other discernible reason.

This article may also be of interest:  The Silver Street Ghost 

The Tale of Green Street

Green Street in the 1910s

The origins of the name of Green Street are said to come from a man named Oliver Green who was involved with property in the area and is believed to have lived from about 1563 to 1623.
That is of course the recorded history, but while I was researching some information on the street I came across this alternative version of where the name came from and it is this alternative version I want to share with you now.

It is said that during the time of the plague it was this street that was heavily affected in Cambridge, and it was decided that because of this the houses on both sides of the street had to be boarded up to contain it.

When the boards were finally taken down grass had grown thick and long behind them all, and it was from this day that the street was called Green Street.

This is a truly wonderful tale and I had to share it with you all after I read it. It is amazing how it has stayed alive for so long and been passed through the generations. .

World War 2 Air Attacks on Cambridge 1940 -1942

During the Second World War there were a total of about 30 people killed and up to 70 hurt during air attacks on the city, the damage was up to 51 houses destroyed and 1,271 less badly damaged.

Below is details about some of those attacks on Cambridge from 1940 - 1942.

If you study the history of air raids on Cambridge you will discover the first devastating air attack took place on Vicarage Terrace in June 1940, but few people, even now, are aware that about 10 weeks before the Vicarage Terrace attack 11 H.E bombs were aimed at Cambridge, but fell in sugar beet fields on the outskirts of the city, only causing damage to the crops.

The Vicarage Terrace Attack

After the attack on Vicarage Terrace, (Story HERE) One August night in 1940 eight H.E bombs were dropped at different parts of the city, including Fenner's cricket ground. No casualties were reported, but there was damage from the blast.








On the 28th August a total of eight bombs fell on Cambridge again ( One failing to go off), there were again a large number of people who escaped the attack. The unexploded bomb fell a few feet from a house at the top of Leys Avenue, there was slight damage to the property, but the people inside went unharmed. Some other bombs fell in Pemberton Terrace and Shaftesbury Avenue.

On the 15th October one person was killed when a single bomb hit a house in Barrow Road.

It was during the next year, 1941, Cambridge saw the worse year for bombing.

On the 16th January, a cold icy night, 200 incendiary bombs, most of them in the area of Hyde Park Corner were dropped on the city. Perse School was severely damaged by fire, while a warehouse nearby in Regent Street, also suffered damage. Firemen were hampered by hydrants either buried in the snow or found they got frozen up.

On the 30th January at four o'clock in the afternoon attacks were made in the Mill Road bridge area, where two small cottages were hit at the side of the bridge. Two people lost their lives and ten others were injured.

On the 15th February a bomb fell in front of a house in Cherry Hinton Road, The porch was blown apart, but all eight people inside escaped unhurt.

On the 24th February the city suffered a attack that resulted in the death of eleven people, including wardens and firewatchers on duty. This attack was carried out in three phases.

The attack started with incendiaries being dropped in the Cherry Hinton Road area at about 10pm. At 10:35pm two H.E's made a direct hit on a house at Grantchester Meadows, killing two woman. At 11.15 a whole batch of H.E's and a score of incendiaries fell on Hills Road between Hyde Park Corner and Station Road. Wardens and firewatchers were caught up in the attacks, while others were injured in their homes.

On the 9th May a more determined attack happened with fire bombs. Hundreds of incendiaries were showed in the area between Hills Road and Trumpington Road. Fifty houses received direct hits, yet all but four or five of the resulting fires were put out within minutes.

On the 29th August Romsey Town was the scene of a serious attack. 10 H.E bombs, presumably aimed at the railway, hit two houses in Great Eastern Street, causing two deaths and injuries to seven people.

On the 29th September on a wet evening at about 11 o'clock incendiaries hit Huntingdon Road, just beyond the top of Castle Hill. Extensive damage was caused to telephone wires and public service pipes, but luckily there was no traffic about and nobody was in the road at the time, or they would not have survived.

Ten months elapsed before the next air raid.

On the 28th July 1942 when the bombing started again, it was on a sharp scale. A single low-flying raider, clearly visible in the moonlight, attacked Bridge Street and Sidney Street with eleven H.E's and many incendiaries. It was with this attack that the Germans are said to have made use of their new explosive incendiary bombs, one of which caused the big fire at the Union Society building. As the result of this attack three people were killed and seven injured; 10 buildings were destroyed or rendered unsafe so they had to be demolished, and another 127 properties were damaged to a much lesser extent.

The results of the attacks would of been much worse but for the fact that three of the H.E's failed to explode. One of the bombs went through a roof of a house in Portugal Place and rested just above the basement where the residents were sheltering. One lodger who was still in bed awoke to see the bomb sticking through the wall.

These article may also be of interest: The Bombing of Vicarage Terrace  
                                                               The Cambridge Evacuee's