Florence Elizabeth Chandler Maybrick (3 September 1862 – 23 October 1941) was an American woman convicted in the United Kingdom of murdering her husband, cotton merchant
James Maybrick
James Maybrick (25 October 1838 – 11 May 1889) was a Liverpool cotton merchant. After his death, his wife, Florence Maybrick, was convicted of murdering him by poisoning in a sensational trial. The "Aigburth Poisoning" case was widely report ...
.
Early life
![McGill Institute](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/18/McGill_Institute.jpg)
Florence Maybrick was born Florence Elizabeth Chandler in
Mobile, Alabama. She was the daughter of William George Chandler, a one-time mayor of Mobile and a partner in the banking firm of St. John Powers and Company,
[Maybrick, Florence E. ''Mrs Maybrick's Own Story: My Lost Fifteen Years'' Funk and Wagnalls Company (1904)] and Caroline Chandler Du Barry, née Holbrook. Florence's father had died before her birth. Her mother remarried a third time in 1872 to
Baron Adolph von Roques, a
cavalry officer in the Eighth Cuirassier Regiment of the
German Army.
Marriage
While travelling by ship to the United Kingdom with her mother, Florence met
James Maybrick
James Maybrick (25 October 1838 – 11 May 1889) was a Liverpool cotton merchant. After his death, his wife, Florence Maybrick, was convicted of murdering him by poisoning in a sensational trial. The "Aigburth Poisoning" case was widely report ...
, a cotton merchant from
Liverpool
Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a populat ...
.
[ Other passengers were either amused or shocked by a 19-year-old girl spending so much time alone in the company of Maybrick, who was 23 years her senior. On 27 July 1881, the couple were married at St James's Church, Piccadilly, in London. They settled in Battlecrease House, Aigburth, a suburb of Liverpool.][Ryan Jr., Bernard. ''The Poisoned Life of Mrs. Maybrick'' (1977)]
Florence made quite an impression on the social scene in Liverpool, and the Maybricks were usually to be found at the most important balls and functions, the very picture of a happy, successful couple. But Maybrick, a hypochondriac, was a regular user of arsenic
Arsenic is a chemical element with the symbol As and atomic number 33. Arsenic occurs in many minerals, usually in combination with sulfur and metals, but also as a pure elemental crystal. Arsenic is a metalloid. It has various allotropes, ...
and patent medicine
A patent medicine, sometimes called a proprietary medicine, is an over-the-counter (nonprescription) medicine or medicinal preparation that is typically protected and advertised by a trademark and trade name (and sometimes a patent) and claimed ...
s containing poisonous chemicals[ and had a number of ]mistress
Mistress is the feminine form of the English word "master" (''master'' + ''-ess'') and may refer to:
Romance and relationships
* Mistress (lover), a term for a woman who is in a sexual and romantic relationship with a man who is married to a ...
es, one of whom bore him five children. Florence meanwhile, increasingly unhappy in her marriage, entered into several liaisons of her own. One was with a local businessman, Alfred Brierley, which her husband was told about. A violent row ensued after Maybrick heard reports of Florence's relationship with Brierley, during which Maybrick assaulted her and announced his intention of seeking a divorce
Divorce (also known as dissolution of marriage) is the process of terminating a marriage or marital union. Divorce usually entails the canceling or reorganizing of the legal duties and responsibilities of marriage, thus dissolving the ...
. The wish for divorce seemed mutual.
James Maybrick was taken ill on 27 April 1889 after self-administering a double dose of strychnine. His doctors treated him for acute dyspepsia
Indigestion, also known as dyspepsia or upset stomach, is a condition of impaired digestion. Symptoms may include upper abdominal fullness, heartburn, nausea, belching, or upper abdominal pain. People may also experience feeling full earlier ...
, but his condition deteriorated. On 8 May, Florence wrote a compromising letter to Brierley, which was intercepted by Alice Yapp, a nanny who hated Florence. Yapp intercepted all letters sent by Florence and passed them on to Maybrick's brother, Edwin, who was staying at Battlecrease. Edwin, himself by many accounts one of Florence's lovers, shared the contents of the letter with his brother Michael Maybrick
Michael Maybrick (31 January 1841 – 26 August 1913) was an English composer and singer, best known under his pseudonym Stephen Adams as the composer of " The Holy City", one of the most popular religious songs in English.
Early life
Maybri ...
, who was effectively the head of the family and who also hated Florence. By Michael's orders, Florence was immediately deposed as mistress of her house and held under house arrest. On 9 May, a nurse reported that Florence had surreptitiously tampered with a Valentine's Meat Juice bottle that was afterwards found to contain a half-grain of arsenic. Florence later testified that her husband had begged her to administer it as a pick-me-up. However, he never drank its contents.[Davenport-Hines, Richard. "Maybrick, Florence Elizabeth (1862–1941)", ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', Oxford University Press, 2004]
Maybrick died at his home in Aigburth on 11 May 1889. In her memoir, ''Mrs. Maybrick's Own Story: My Fifteen Lost Years'', Florence describes the following, as she knelt down by her late husband's bedside:
Murder charge
His brothers, suspicious as to the cause of death, had his body examined. It was found to contain slight traces of arsenic, but not enough to be considered fatal. It is uncertain whether this was taken by Maybrick himself or administered by another person. In April 1889, Florence Maybrick was accused of using flypaper containing arsenic from a local chemist's shop and later soaked in a bowl of water. After an inquest held in a nearby hotel, Florence was charged with his murder and stood trial at St George's Hall, Liverpool, before Mr. Justice Stephen
Stephen or Steven is a common English first name. It is particularly significant to Christians, as it belonged to Saint Stephen ( grc-gre, Στέφανος ), an early disciple and deacon who, according to the Book of Acts, was stoned to death; ...
, where she was convicted and sentenced to death
Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty, is the state-sanctioned practice of deliberately killing a person as a punishment for an actual or supposed crime, usually following an authorized, rule-governed process to conclude that t ...
. Her trial was reported in newspapers as being a miscarriage of justice
A miscarriage of justice occurs when a grossly unfair outcome occurs in a criminal or civil proceeding, such as the conviction and punishment of a person for a crime they did not commit. Miscarriages are also known as wrongful convictions. Inno ...
, as the prosecution
A prosecutor is a legal representative of the prosecution in states with either the common law adversarial system or the Civil law (legal system), civil law inquisitorial system. The prosecution is the legal party responsible for presenting the ...
evidence was baffling. After the verdict, crowds shouted in favour of Florence, believing she was being accused of a murder she did not commit.
After a public outcry, Henry Matthews, the Home Secretary
The secretary of state for the Home Department, otherwise known as the home secretary, is a senior minister of the Crown in the Government of the United Kingdom. The home secretary leads the Home Office, and is responsible for all national s ...
, and Lord Chancellor
The lord chancellor, formally the lord high chancellor of Great Britain, is the highest-ranking traditional minister among the Great Officers of State in Scotland and England in the United Kingdom, nominally outranking the prime minister. Th ...
Halsbury
Halsbury (pron. "Haulsbury") is a historic manor in the parish of Parkham in North Devon, England. It is situated 2 miles north-east of the village of Parkham and 4 miles south-west of the town of Bideford. Halsbury was long a seat of the anc ...
concluded 'that the evidence clearly establishes that Mrs Maybrick administered poison to her husband with intent to murder; but that there is ground for reasonable doubt whether the arsenic so administered was in fact the cause of his death'. The death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment as punishment for a crime with which she was never charged. During the 1890s, new evidence was publicized by Florence's supporters, but there was no possibility of an appeal, and the Home Office was not inclined to release her in spite of the strenuous efforts of Lord Russell of Killowen, the Lord Chief Justice
Lord is an appellation for a person or deity who has authority, control, or power over others, acting as a master, chief, or ruler. The appellation can also denote certain persons who hold a title of the peerage in the United Kingdom, or are ...
.
The case became something of a ''cause célèbre
A cause célèbre (,''Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged'', 12th Edition, 2014. S.v. "cause célèbre". Retrieved November 30, 2018 from https://www.thefreedictionary.com/cause+c%c3%a9l%c3%a8bre ,''Random House Kernerman Webs ...
'' and attracted considerable newspaper coverage on both sides of the Atlantic. Arsenic was then regarded by some men as an aphrodisiac
An aphrodisiac is a substance that increases sexual desire, sexual attraction, sexual pleasure, or sexual behavior. Substances range from a variety of plants, spices, foods, and synthetic chemicals. Natural aphrodisiacs like cannabis or cocai ...
and tonic, and Maybrick had certainly taken it on a regular basis. A city chemist confirmed that he had supplied Maybrick with quantities of the poison over a lengthy period and a search of Battlecrease House later turned up enough to kill at least fifty people. Although her marriage was clearly over in all but name, Florence had little motive to murder her husband. The financial provision Maybrick had made for her and his children in his will was paltry and she might have been far better off with him alive but legally separated
Legal separation (sometimes judicial separation, separate maintenance, divorce ', or divorce from bed-and-board) is a legal process by which a married couple may formalize a separation while remaining legally married. A legal separation is gra ...
from him. Many people held the view that Florence had poisoned her husband because he was about to divorce her which, in Victorian society
The Victorian Society is a UK amenity society and membership organisation that campaigns to preserve and promote interest in Victorian and Edwardian architecture and heritage built between 1837 and 1914 in England and Wales. It is a registered ...
, would see her ruined. An even more compelling motive might have been the prospect of losing the custody of her beloved children.
After fifteen years of research, writer and film director Bruce Robinson
Bruce Robinson (born 2 May 1946) is an English actor, director, screenwriter and novelist. He wrote and directed the cult classic ''Withnail and I'' (1987), a film with comic and tragic elements set in London in the late 1960s, which drew on hi ...
published ''They All Love Jack: Busting the Ripper'' (2015), a massive study of Jack the Ripper
Jack the Ripper was an unidentified serial killer active in and around the impoverished Whitechapel district of London, England, in the autumn of 1888. In both criminal case files and the contemporaneous journalistic accounts, the killer w ...
, in which he makes a case that Florence and her husband were the victims of her brother-in-law, Michael, whom Robinson claims was actually the Ripper.
Time at Woking Convict Prison
Following the commutation of Florence's sentence, she was transported to Woking District Female Convict Prison, where she remained until 1896 when she was moved to Aylesbury Prison. Florence spent her first nine months in solitary confinement before being moved to a different cell but remaining under the strictures of the silent system, whereby silence was enforced at all times. Her memoirs reveal the physical and mental toll that solitary confinement had on her. She dubbed the practice 'by far the most cruel feature of English penal servitude' and emphasised the 'desolation and despair' that the 'hopeless monotony' of confinement led her to feel. During her time at Woking, Florence suffered from insomnia
Insomnia, also known as sleeplessness, is a sleep disorder in which people have trouble sleeping. They may have difficulty falling asleep, or staying asleep as long as desired. Insomnia is typically followed by daytime sleepiness, low energy, ...
and frequent ill health caused, she claimed, by the frequent shrieking and destruction of the content of cells during the night by weak-minded inmates, which left her with 'quivering nerves' and unable to sleep.
Having passed through the first stages of solitary confinement and a probation
Probation in criminal law is a period of supervision over an offender, ordered by the court often in lieu of incarceration.
In some jurisdictions, the term ''probation'' applies only to community sentences (alternatives to incarceration), such ...
ary period, Maybrick then entered a third stage of hard labour whereby she was permitted to leave her cell during the day to assist in carrying meals from the kitchen. Her day commenced at 6.00 a.m. and ended at 5.30 p.m., during which she had, according to her memoirs, to wash ten four-quart cans, scrub one twenty-foot table and two twelve-foot dressers, clean knives, wash a sack of potatoes, assist in serving the dinners and scrub a piece of floor twenty by ten feet. During 1896, Maybrick entered into the prison infirmary for two weeks, suffering from a 'feverish cold' caused, she claimed, by the inadequate clothing, bedding and draughty cells. It was at the end of her time in the infirmary on 4 November 1896 that she was transferred to Aylesbury prison.
Maybrick did speak well of the warders she encountered during her incarceration, describing their 'patience, civility, and self-control'.
Release
After detention in Woking and Aylesbury prisons, Florence was released in January 1904, having spent more than 14 years in custody. Although she had lost her U.S. citizenship when she married her British husband, it was restored when she returned to her home country. Initially she earned a living on the lecture circuit, speaking on prison reform
Prison reform is the attempt to improve conditions inside prisons, improve the effectiveness of a penal system, or implement alternatives to incarceration. It also focuses on ensuring the reinstatement of those whose lives are impacted by crimes ...
and protesting her innocence. In later life, she moved to Connecticut
Connecticut () is the southernmost state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, New York to the west, and Long Island Sound to the south. Its capita ...
and used her maiden name, Florence Elizabeth Chandler. After some months spent unsuccessfully as a housekeeper, Florence became a recluse, living in a squalid three-room bungalow in Gaylordsville, Connecticut, a village in New Milford, Connecticut, with only her cats for company. A few sympathetic residents eventually discovered Florence's true identity but kept her secret.
Florence Maybrick died alone and penniless in her home in New Milford on 23 October 1941, and the next day her obituary was published at the top of Page One of ''The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
''. She was buried at her request next to her dear friend, Clara Dulon, in South Kent, Connecticut on the grounds of South Kent School
South Kent School, a private all-boys boarding school in South Kent, Connecticut, United States, is located on a campus in western Litchfield County. It is sited on Spooner Hill east of Bull's Bridge, overlooking the former Housatonic Valley ...
. Among her few possessions were a scrapbook with newspaper clippings of her former life and a tattered family Bible. She never saw her children again; they were raised by the family's doctor. Her son, who became a mining engineer, died in 1911 of accidental poisoning when he mistook a cyanide
Cyanide is a naturally occurring, rapidly acting, toxic chemical that can exist in many different forms.
In chemistry, a cyanide () is a chemical compound that contains a functional group. This group, known as the cyano group, consists of ...
solution for a glass of water.
Soon after her release, Florence wrote a book about her experiences, '' Mrs. Maybrick's Own Story: My Fifteen Lost Years'', which is available online. A rare copy is still held by Liverpool City Libraries.
Non-fiction books and pamphlets about the case
* Boswell, Charles, and Lewis Thompson. ''The Girl with the Scarlet Brand'' (1954).
* Christie, Trevor L. ''Etched in Arsenic'' (1968).
* Colquhoun, Kate. ''Did She Kill Him?: A Victorian Tale of Deception, Adultery and Arsenic'' (2014).
* Daisy Bank Print. and Pub. Co. ''Full Account of the Life & Trial of Mrs. Maybrick: Interesting Details of her Earlier Life'' (ca. 1901).
* Densmore, Helen. ''The Maybrick Case'' (1892).
* Graham, Anne E. and Carol Emmas. “ The Last Victim : The extraordinary life of Florence Maybrick” (1999).
* Irving, Henry B. ''Trial of Mrs. Maybrick'' (Notable English Trials series, 1912).
* Irving, Henry B. "Mrs. Maybrick", ''in'' James H. Hodge (ed.), ''Famous Trials III'' (Penguin, 1950) pp. 97–134
* J.L.F. ''The Maybrick Case: A Treatise Showing Conclusive Reasons for the Continued Public Dissent from the Verdict and "Decision."'' (1891).
* L.E.X. ''Is Mrs. Maybrick guilty?: A Defence Shewing that the Verdict of Guilty is not Founded on Fact, and is Inconsistent with the Presence of a Strong Element of Doubt; with Reasons for Mrs. Maybrick's Release'' (1889).
* Levy, J. H. ''The Necessity for Criminal Appeal: As Illustrated by the Maybrick Case and the Jurisprudence of Various Countries'' (1899).
* MacDougall, Alexander. ''The Maybrick Case'' (1891 and 1896).
* Mason, Eleanor. ''Florie Chandler: or, The Secret to the Maybrick Poisoning Case'' (1890).
* Maybrick, Florence E. ''Mrs. Maybrick's Own Story: My Fifteen Lost Years'' (1904).
* Morland, Nigel. ''This Friendless Lady'' (1957).
* Robinson, Bruce ''They All Love Jack: Busting the Ripper'' (Fourth Estate, 2015)
* Ryan Jr., Bernard. ''The Poisoned Life of Mrs. Maybrick'' (1977).
* Tidy, Charles Meymott and Rawdon Macnamara. ''The Maybrick Trial: A Toxicological Study'' (1890).
* Hutto, Richard Jay, "A Poisoned Life: Florence Chandler Maybrick, the First American Woman Sentenced to Death in England," McFarland Publishers (2018). www.poisonedlife.com
Other works on the case
The Maybrick case was dramatised on the radio series ''The Black Museum
''The Black Museum'' is a radio crime-drama program produced by Harry Alan Towers, which was broadcast in the USA on the Mutual network in 1952. It was then broadcast in Europe in 1953 on Radio Luxembourg, a commercial radio station, and was not ...
'' in 1952 under the title of "Meat Juice".
The 1952 film noir, ''A Blueprint for Murder
''A Blueprint for Murder'' is a 1953 American film noir thriller film directed and written by Andrew L. Stone and starring Joseph Cotten, Jean Peters and Gary Merrill.
Plot
Whitney "Cam" Cameron (Joseph Cotten) arrives at a hospital to be with ...
'', mentions Florence Maybrick, along with other notorious poison murderesses Madeleine Smith
Madeleine Hamilton Smith (29 March 1835 – 12 April 1928) was a 19th-century Glasgow socialite who was the accused in a sensational murder trial in Scotland in 1857.
Background
Smith was the first child (of five) of an upper-middle-class ...
, and Lyda Trueblood.
The BBC Radio
BBC Radio is an operational business division and service of the British Broadcasting Corporation (which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a royal charter since 1927). The service provides national radio stations covering ...
series ''John Mortimer Presents Sensational British Trials'' featured an episode about the Maybrick case, entitled "The Case of the Liverpool Poisoner".
Maybrick is mentioned in an episode of television show ''Law & Order: Criminal Intent
''Law & Order: Criminal Intent'' is an American police procedural Drama (film and television), drama television series set in New York City, where it was also primarily produced. Created and Executive producer#Motion pictures and television, p ...
'' called "Sound Bodies" from season 3, episode 8 about an arsenic poisoning at a church.
The case was re-examined in the BBC programme ''Murder, Mystery and My Family
''Murder, Mystery and My Family'' is a BBC One series featuring Sasha Wass KC and Jeremy Dein KC., which examines historic criminal convictions sentenced to the death penalty in order to determine if any of them resulted in a miscarriage of ...
'' (series 4, episode 2) and revisited in ''Case Closed?'' (Series 4, episode 1).
Examined in the TV Series “In suspicious circumstances”, Series 4 episode 1:
1994
“Poisoned whispers”
Fiction inspired by the case
* Ackroyd, Peter. '' Dan Leno and the Limehouse Golem'' (1994).
* Berkeley, Anthony. ''The Wychford Poisoning Case'' (1926).
* Edwards, Martin. ''The Case of the Choleric Cotton Broker'' (2015).
* Fessenden, Laura Dayton. ''Bonnie Mackirby'' (1898).
* Lowndes, Mrs. Belloc. ''Letty Lynton'' (1931).
* Lowndes, Mrs. Belloc. ''Story of Ivy'' (1928).
* Purdy, Brandy. ''The Ripper's Wife'' (2014).
* Sayers, Dorothy L. ''Strong Poison
''Strong Poison'' is a 1930 mystery novel by Dorothy L. Sayers, her fifth featuring Lord Peter Wimsey and the first in which Harriet Vane appears.
Plot
The novel opens with mystery author Harriet Vane on trial for the murder of her forme ...
'' (1930).
* Shearing, Joseph. '' Airing in a Closed Carriage'' (1943).
* Goodland, David. ''The Voice of Angels'' (BBC Radio, 2003)
See also
* William Herbert Wallace
William Herbert Wallace (29 August 1878 – 26 February 1933) was an Englishman convicted in 1931 of the murder of his wife, Julia, in their home in Wolverton Street in Liverpool's Anfield district. Wallace's conviction was later overturned by the ...
* Ann Bilansky
References
External links
''Mrs. Maybrick's own story; my fifteen lost years''
by Florence Elizabeth Maybrick, online copy at The Internet Archive
The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music, ...
''Verdict in Dispute''
by Edgar Lustgarten, online copy at The Internet Archive
The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music, ...
Casebook: Jack the Ripper - Background of the Maybrick Family
at casebook.org
at www.lawbuzz.com
Jack The Ripper And A Belle From Mobile , Alabama Heritage , Find Articles at BNET
at www.findarticles.com
at www.old-merseytimes.co.uk
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Maybrick, Florence
1862 births
1941 deaths
1889 murders in the United Kingdom
19th-century American criminals
20th-century American criminals
19th-century American women
20th-century American women
People from Mobile, Alabama
Poisoners
American female murderers
Murder in Liverpool
People convicted of murder by England and Wales
American people imprisoned abroad
American prisoners sentenced to death
American people convicted of murder
Prisoners sentenced to death by England and Wales
American emigrants to England
Mariticides
Criminals from Alabama