The Murderess Tales from the Old Bailey

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I am the court reporter.

Since 1674, every trial that's been played out between these walls

at London's Old Bailey court, every single one of them,

has been faithfully recorded by a reporter like me.

I sat just here.

I wrote down what was said by whom,

and now you, some while later, can listen in.

You can put your ear to the walls

and hear once again these voices from the past.

Here's a case to make the hairs on the back of your neck stand on end.

Here's a case that speaks to the dark heart of fear in every man.

A case so shocking, so gruesome

that beyond these walls there is much easy talk of it.

Bloody murder, no less.

The year is 1726.

Two young men, Billings and Wood,

have already been found guilty of their hands in this deadly deed.

But today, the light will shine on the part played by another who,

you might say, is in some very deep water.

Silence in the court!

Order!

Catherine Hayes is indicted for petty treason

in being traitorously present, comforting and maintaining the said

Thomas Billings in the murder of the said John Hayes, her husband.

CROWD GASPS

A murder, and a woman accused, no less.

And for a woman to dispose of her husband amounts to a crime

more heinous than just plain murder. It's called petty treason.

By definition, the betrayal of a master by his subordinate.

Be a traitor to one's husband, and face the punishment

considered equal to the crime.

It has already been established that Thomas Billings

and Thomas Wood were equal parties to the murder of John Hayes.

What we have to establish today is the part played by the said

John Hayes' wife, Catherine Hayes, who stands before you.

Catherine Hayes, how do you plead to the indictment set down before you?

-Not guilty, sir.

-Speak up, woman!

Not guilty, sir.

I...I did not do it.

-I...

-Ahem!

I will show without question how this wife, this mother,

went to some pains to see to the demise

of he who she should unquestioningly serve.

Firstly, I will show how, on the day in question,

Hayes and her accomplices set out to inebriate Mr Hayes, to dupe him

into drunkenness and render him unable to defend his own person.

I call my first witness, Mr John Blakesly.

I swear by Almighty God that the evidence I give

will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

John Blakesly, you are resident at the Brawn's Head in New Bond Street.

-That I am, sir, yes.

-When did you see the accused?

Er...

..March 1, last. Around four in the afternoon.

The prisoner and two of the men who pleaded guilty

came into our house for six quarts of Mountain,

which she paid for at the bar and then saw it put into bottles.

About nine the same night, one of those two men brought back

the empty bottles and had another quart of wine away with him.

In your, erm, qualified opinion then,

this is quite a quantity of wine, is it not?

It is a fair quantity, sir, yes, by all accounts, yes.

Thank you, Mr Blakesly. I should like to call upon

the neighbour of Mr Hayes, Mrs Mary Springet.

Can you tell us, Mrs Springet, in your own words,

exactly what you saw and heard on the day in question?

Well, I'd been out all day at work

and returned about eight or nine at night.

My husband told me there had been great merrymaking below.

Drinking and dancing and singing.

Well, I was tired and I wanted to go to bed, but I was willing first

to know that their liquor was almost out and so I came down

and tapped at the door, and asked her if they'd almost done drinking.

"Aye, child," says she. "I'm just not going to bed."

And so up I goes again. And not long after, I heard the door open.

I called and asked who it was that went out.

"Oh," says she, "'tis my husband."

He's gone into the country with a charge of money.

I'm frightened out of my wits that he should be murdered.

I've never met such an obstinate man in all my life

when he gets a little liquor.

There was no persuading him to stay till morning.

I fear he has been set upon by some wicked rogue or other,

who might have knocked him on the head for his money.

I went into my own room, but had not been there long before I heard

something drooling along the floor.

I looked out and I saw the two men that was with her

go out at the door.

In a little time, I heard another bustling below.

SHE BANGS ON THE FLOOR

I heard the men going out again

and I stepped to the stairhead and looked down.

The next day, which was Thursday, I saw Wood go out with a bundle

and turn down Swallow Street. Well, I asked her what that bundle was.

"Why," says she, "'tis a suit of clothes."

Well, pray, Mistress Hayes, tell me, what is the matter?

Nothing, Mrs Springet, I beg you, make yourself easy.

Gentlemen, I will show that this account is consistent

with what occurred next.

The very next day, there was an horrific discovery.

Some poor soul came upon a head found floating close

to the shore of the River Thames,

quite separated from the body to which it was once attached.

This head, gentlemen, was raised on a spike

and stood in the churchyard of St Margaret's

that anyone recognising the features

might give some account of the person.

Later, the arms, thighs and legs of a man cut asunder

were discovered wrapped in a blanket in a pond by Marylebone.

Mrs Springet, what did you know of the head that was found?

The head that was thrown into the Thames at Millbank,

and the pail that it was carried in, was both brought to me

at the gatehouse to see if I knew them.

And I did know that the head was Mr Hayes's

and that the pail was his pail.

This being the said pail, Mrs Springet?

Yes, sir. That pail, sir.

Gentlemen, the heart of this case is dark indeed.

What you have seen and heard so far, you will have noted,

is entirely circumstantial.

And yet, the woman who stands before you has herself,

in her own words, given a clear confession

and account of her hand in the murder of her husband.

I call my next witness - Mr Watkins.

Mr Watkins, you made a visit to the prisoner

after she was taken to Newgate, did you not?

I went to visit her several times.

"For God's sake," says I, "what could put it into your head

"to commit such a barbarous murder on your own husband?"

"Why," says she, "I can't account but that the devil put it into my head."

The devil put itself in here and I couldn't get it out.

John Hayes was never the best of husbands,

for I've been half-starved ever since I was married,

but I do not repent for anything that I have done.

Only for drawing those two poor men into this misfortune.

And what account did she give of the night in question?

What she said was this.

"My husband was made so drunk that he fell out of his chair..."

..and Billings and Wood carried him into the back room

and laid him on the bed.

They told me that Billings struck him

over the head twice with a poleaxe and would cut his throat.

When he was dead, I went into the room and held the candle

while Wood cut his head right off.

And then afterwards they cut off his legs and his arms.

And why did you use your husband in such an inhumane manner?

Because we wanted to get him into an old chest.

But he was too long, and too big.

We thought we could do it by cutting off his head and his legs,

and then we was forced to cut off his arms and his thighs,

but the chest wouldn't hold them all.

So the body and the limbs were wrapped in blankets

and thrown into a pond.

"And what," says I,

"can you say for yourself when you come before the judge?"

I'll hold up my hand and say that I am guilty for nothing can save me.

Nobody can forgive me.

So she clean confessed it.

Mr Watkins, you saw the prisoner again soon after, did you not?

And the account she gave of herself had altered, I believe.

"I'm glad you've come," said she, "for the men who did the murder..."

..they have confessed it.

For I was not with them, see, the night that they did it,

for I was sat upon a stool by the fire.

But I heard the first blow being given and I heard somebody stamp.

-And why did not you cry out?

-Because I was afraid they would kill me too.

"What," said I, "was the first occasion

"of you contriving to do this?"

"Why," she says, "my husband came home drunk and he beat me."

Billings said this fellow deserves to be killed.

Wood said he'd be his butcher for a penny and I told them

they might do as they would, so I made a contrivance to kill him.

Why did you not tell your husband of this design to murder him?

Because I was afraid he might beat me again.

She spoke much of Mr Hayes beating and mortifying her,

and sometimes breaking her ribs and bones.

-And of him having murdered two newborn children of hers.

-Thank you.

Mr Watkins, that will be all.

May I remind you, gentlemen, that the woman hath confessed it,

and then she tried to confess it again

in a manner that might lessen her part,

but her guilt in this matter is plain to see.

She importuned Wood and Billings to do her bidding.

She stood watch whilst one of them struck him with an axe

and the other took a knife to his throat!

And then, for a final indignity, she held a candle close

whilst they cut off the unfortunate's head.

Gentlemen, you must do your duty and decide the defendant's part,

bearing in mind all that you have heard

in cool assessment of the facts before you.

So now they must decide the fate of a woman

who stands accused of the charge of petty treason.

They never take long.

A few hushed whispers and the matter will be settled.

Have you reached your verdict?

On the charge of petty treason, we find the defendant,

Catherine Hayes,

guilty.

JUDGE BANGS HIS GAVEL

Catherine Hayes...

..I sentence you to be burnt at the stake.

SHE GASPS

Catherine Hayes will face a grisly fate, burnt to death at the stake.

Her story might remain untold,

how she came to such a place,

but her name will be remembered,

though be it a sombre epitaph.

Catherine Hayes will be the last woman ever

to be burnt at the stake for the crime of petty treason.

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