The Southampton Garage Murder
| Published date | 01 October 1931 |
| Date | 01 October 1931 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/0032258X3100400402 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
The
Southampton Garage Murder
(THE PODMORE CASE)
PART
I1
(Continuedfrom
Vol.
IV,
No.
3,
page
336)
was on 18th January, 1929, eight days after the discovery
and taken to Southampton to be interviewed by Chief In-
spector Prothero.
It
was eleven months later, on 17th
December, 1929, that he was arrested and charged with
the murder. During the intervening period he was in the
custody of the police or in prison, firstly for stealing a motor-
car at Manchester and after that for the theft of E143 from
Mr. Mitchell, the Downton contractor, whose employment he
had entered when he left Southampton on 3rd November.
This long deferment of the murder charge gave rise
to
much
comment and criticism, and enabled the defence at the trial to
make a strong point
of
this apparent doubt and hesitation on
the part of the authorities.
When Podmore had made his statements to Chief Inspector
Prothero on 18th and 20th January, 1929, and was handed over
to the Manchester police, the case had certainly not reached
the stage at which there was sufficient justification for bringing
him before the Southampton magistrates charged with the
murder
of
Messiter, and it will be useful to summarize how
matters stood some weeks later when the inquest, which had
been opened
on
14th January, was resumed on 9th March, and
an open verdict returned by the Coroner’s jury.
The evidence available can be conveniently stated and
analysed under eight heads
:
(I) Messiter had unquestionably been murdered at the
garage42 Grove Street. The nature of the injuries put
484
IT
of Messiter’s body, that Podmore was found in London
THE
SOUTHAMPTON GARAGE
MURDER
485
manslaughter or suicide out
of
the question. He must have
been taken unawares and struck down from behind and then
his
head had been battered with savage blows, causing blood to
splash all over the cases of oil upon which he had fallen.
(2)
The weapon was clearly the hammer found among the
oil drums. The medical evidence, after Sir Bernard Spilsbury
had been called in, was quite definite that the wounds were all
caused by a blunt instrument. One of the blows had fallen
just above the left eye, and hairs were found adhering to the
hammer which matched those of the dead man’s eyebrows.
The hammer also bore bloodstains which had been analysed
by the Home Office Analyst (Dr. Roche Lynch) and found to
be human blood.
If
possession of the hammer could have been brought
home to Podmore, this (coupled with Podmore’s own admis-
sions-see below) would have been sufficient to warrant a
charge of murder, but unfortunately the hammer did not pro-
vide the decisive clue which
it
might well have done.
No
finger-prints could be found on it, and Mr. Marsh, the man to
whom it belonged and who had lent it to Podmore, failed at
the identification parade to pick out Podmore as the borrower.
Shortly after the parade Podmore was confronted in Chief
Inspector Prothero’s room with Mr. Marsh, Mr. Penn (Mr.
Marsh’s foreman who had been present when the hammer was
borrowed), Mr. Galton and Mr. Card, and he was asked
whether he could identify one of them as the agent who accord-
ing to his statement had been at the garage with Messiter.
This he was unable
to
do, but Mr. Marsh,.having been afforded
this further opportunity of seeing Podmore, informed In-
spector Prothero that he now recognised Podmore as the man
who had borrowed his hammer. But the previous failure to
identify Podmore seriously invalidated this subsequent recog-
nition, and when Mr. Marsh came to give evidence at the trial
he stated that he was unable to say definitely who borrowed
his hammer. (Mr. Card, it should be mentioned, also identi-
fied Podmore on this second occasion after failing on the first,
and his testimony was equally unreliable.)
(3)
The
‘
W.
F. Thomas
’
whose association with Messiter
had been established by
(a)
the letter in answer to Messiter’s
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