Mary Ann Cotton has long been considered the first female serial killer in England, with allegations that she used arsenic to poison over twenty people, including her children, mother and husbands in the 1850s, 60s and 70s. But was she really a heartless killer who preyed upon those in her care for money to buy the expensive dresses she loved so much?
My guest, Martin Connelly, is author of “Mary Ann Cotton: Dark Angel: Britains First Female Serial Killer.” He says the answer isn’t as cut and dry as many have come to believe it is, and shares his conclusions with us on this latest episode of Most Notorious.
Buy the book on Amazon here: https://www.amazon.com/Mary-Ann-Cotton-Britain-Female-ebook/dp/B01M0LDR8G
The author’s publisher page here: https://www.pen-and-sword.co.uk/Mary-Ann-Cotton-Dark-Angel-Paperback/p/12432
Episode Transcript:
Erik: Welcome all to another episode of The Most Notorious Podcast. I’m Eric Rivenes. Back again. 1s So pleased to have Martin Connolly as my guest to day. He is from Belfast, Ireland, and has had his writing published in numerous magazines and teaching materials in multiple disciplines. He has also written multiple books, including Hitler’s Munich, Man, The Fall of Admiral Sir Barry Domvile. And he is here to talk about Mary Ann Cotton, Dark Angel, Britain’s first female serial killer. Great to have you on.
Martin: Thank you. A pleasure, Erik. Pleasure.
Erik: So you were encouraged over the years by readers of your other books to tell the story of Mary Anne Cotton?
Martin: That’s correct. I used to be a sub postmaster in the village of West Auckland. And obviously, I wrote a short history of the village, which was different items which were important in the village. And one of them was Mary Ann Cotton. And a number of people, more than a number, quite a few said, well, it could be no more about this Marianne Cotton, because what we hear on the phone, web and what have you really doesn’t amount to what we believe is the truth. And so my job then was to do research into her and find out what was happening.
Erik: And to make matters more interesting, you worked in close proximity to the actual locations associated with her. Does that help connect you to the case?
Martin: It’s very much so. I mean, I could see her house from the window of my post office, past it every day of my life, so I knew the house very well. I knew the graveyard where the bodies were buried, that took the deaths that took place in West Auckland, and I was able to walk around the graveyard. I also was able to go to the very villages where she lived and had a good look around all the towns and villages where she was. So I got a very good grasp of the kind of place it was in terms of the modern towns and villages. But if you want to know Mary Ann Cotton, you really have to go and live in Victorian England. And for a lot of people in America and indeed England, that’s hard to do because there’s an awful lot of anachronisms in which people bring modern ideas into the story and therefore cloud the truth of what actually happened.
Erik: Interesting. Yeah.
Martin: Give you a bit of background of the Victorian era to get you there, if you like.
Erik: That would be lovely. Yeah.
Martin: Okay, let’s take you there. I want you to imagine a situation in which there is a huge new industrial landscape building up where the mining industry has been going on for centuries and years. And you have a dirty, filthy place where sometimes 20 to 100 people could share one toilet, sanitation. The whole place would stink, Rivers would stink. It was a dark, dirty place and it was a place where only the exciting, if you like to use that term, murders made into the papers and into the publicity. For instance, there was the Mannings in 48. Now, they invited Patrick O’Connor across for dinner. And while he was having dinner, they murdered him and buried him in the kitchen of their home to get the money. They were finally caught. You’ve got a girl called Amelia Dyer who killed 400 babies and threw their bodies into the Thames river. And you had Katie Webster, another famous killer. She killed her employer with an axe and then boiled her body, all except the head and foot, which she threw away. So these were the kind of background murders which made the headlines. But you’ve also got the Jack the Ripper, which everybody is familiar with. But the thing is this, a lot of murders went undetected, because if you take the police force, they were only beginning to emerge. They were very poor. There was no Detective agency and an Inspector of police would probably do the investigations. So a lot of killings went undetected and a lot of them were done by poisoning, particularly arsenic. Now, the reason why arsenic was a good one to use, its symptoms were very similar to a lot of diseases which were rampant. For instance, there was a cholera outbreak in Victorian England where 30,000 people were killed in one year. And you had typhus, you had Scarlet fever, you had an awful lot of diseases. So a lot of death occurred and there was no serious investigation. And against that background, you find Mary Ann Cotton, and that’s why it’s important to understand that background, to understand her and her life.
Erik: What were the symptoms of arsenic poisoning?
Martin: Well, you could rise and have a kind of a fit. You could foam with the mouth and you have vomiting and the hot fevers. Gastric fever, for instance, which was a common disease for children. That’s exactly what happened with that. So that’s why the arsenic poisoning was very similar to the sort of fevers. And therefore they could pass unnoticed. And don’t forget that arsenic was very easily obtained because you got it. Now, listen to this. This is the crazy thing. You could buy a thing called arsenic soap, which was used to clean and disinfect the dirty houses, but you could reduce the soap down and the arsenic could be extracted. There was also green wallpaper. Now, the green wallpaper. Queen Victoria removed it from all of her palaces and houses because it contained arsenic. That when you rubbed it or tried to wash it in heat, the arsenic could peel off and fill the room with arsenic. So you can see the situation of deaths happening and looking like disease, but also being contributed to by things which at that time were not fully understood. And therefore, this whole scene was where Mary was existing.
Erik: Interesting. So let’s begin if you don’t mind with what we know about Mary Ann Cotton’s early life. She was born in 1832 as Mary Anne Robson.
Martin: That’s correct, yeah. She was born in West Auckland in the north of England into a very strict Methodist family and she herself as she grew up as a teenager, a young girl was a Sunday school teacher and she taught Sunday school to the children. Her father was a minor and he worked hard as a minor would do. He was one of the guys who used to start the pit off which was very dangerous. So in her early life, her father died when she was only ten years old. This trauma came into her life as well.
Erik: He died in a mining accident.
Martin: That’s right. He fell down the shaft that he was beginning to build. And the thing is I want you to put again, helping you to get into the picture. Can you imagine a young girl, ten years of age, and how they delivered the body to the house was they put it on a cold cart, which is like a hand cart, covered it with a bag with the mining company’s name on it, brought it home to the house and handed it over to the widow. Can you imagine the ten year old seeing that?
Erik: Yeah, I can only imagine the trauma she might have suffered from. Do you think that was the defining moment for her early on?
Martin: I believe it was because what it contributed to was the moving into her home of a man called George Stott, who became her stepfather. And that relationship was never an easy one for Mary because evidence shows she was a very headstrong girl and wanted to make her way. And you can imagine that a rigid stepfather coming in would sort of squash her individuality. And that’s why at 16 years of age, she left home to work as a child minder for a mine manager, Potter. So she needed to get away from that situation. And that wouldn’t have happened if the death happened. Do you see what I’m saying? So that trigger then spurred her into the world at 16 to look for her, let’s put it this time to look for her fortune. And I think that’s where it all starts from.
Erik: Do you think she was actively seeking a fortune at that young age?
Martin: Yes, I think she was, because, again, you’ve got to live there to understand it. Erik, you’re a kid. You’re in a minor home where the money is tight. You’ve got very few pleasures. And we know from the history that Mary liked to have fancy dresses. She liked to look good, and therefore there was no money. And your mother and father and then your stepfather are scraping the pennies together. And here you are as a child who you like at 16, which is a teenager today, we would say they’re very free but knows there’s a 16 year old wanted money and wanted to live. And that’s why I believe she left home to go to work, because then she would have her own income. Right?
Erik: Yeah. And around the age of 18, she meets an older man named William Mowbray.
Martin: Yes. William Mowbray. She met him and became pregnant to him outside marriage in 1852. Now, again, you’re asking for point where what does trigger things? Well, if you can imagine the situation, she has been a young girl who taught Sunday school, strict Methodist background. William Mowbray was also a Methodist. And here they are not married. And suddenly she has to announce she’s pregnant. Can you imagine the reverberations through this strict religious order of a village? You can see the problem she’s going to face. The prejudice against her would be immense. They don’t even get married in the Methodist Church. They get married in a registry office but they go to the Church at Newcastle for a blessing. But they have to leave the area now because she cannot bring up what people would call a bastard child born outside marriage. So she had to get away so she could have the baby with her husband William and that’s why they moved to the south of England.
Erik: How many children does she have with William?
Martin: Well this is a good question, Erik, because the truth is we don’t know. What we do know is that there was definitely one. She was pregnant and we do know that she brought one back with her when she moved back from the south of England. Now there are rumors that she had four to five children while they were away. I have done intense research on this and I could not find any records of birth for her and William over the period. Now that is not unusual because in those days you didn’t have to register a birth as such. You would get them baptized and that’s where the record would be. But there is no records of any children over that period. So the answer is we don’t know.
Erik: So, as we’ll soon learn, in almost routine fashion, the people who surround her die. And it’s either just by incredible coincidence or, of course, something more sinister was…
Martin: Well, let’s look at that for a second. In the sort of gossip, if you like, of history, she is said to have killed 20 people and pigs. She’s also accused of poisoning pigs. You see, you give a dog a bad name and the dog lives forever with that name. Let me just give you a. I won’t read the whole thing to you, but there’s a song written while she was in prison by outsiders. I’ll just read you the first verse and chorus because it’s too long to read. The West Auckland poisoner at last has been tried. That she is guilty could not be denied. Her crimes have struck terror all over the land and deep indignation on every hand. No feelings of pity was in her hard heart. She never has acted the good woman’s part with dark deeds of murder. She periled her soul and her children destroyed for possessions of gold. No one can pity, no one can bless Mary Ann Cotton for her wickedness. The West Auckland condemned a fly. She murdered her children and soon she must die. That gives you a flavor of the way people looked at her over the years. But let me tell you, she was only convicted of one murder. And when you look at the history of the time she lived in, and this is why my book leaves the question open as to whether or not she was guilty. I leave people to make up their own mind. But when you go into the deaths, I don’t know how much detail you want, but every single death, including the one she was finally convicted of as murder, every one of them, including that last death, were certified by doctors as natural causes illnesses, every single one of them. And you have to ask yourself the question then were the doctors all stupid? Did they not understand their own diagnosis? And there’s a good question or did they not? And when you go through the deaths, I don’t know how much detail you want, but all the children’s deaths were due to either gastric fever or typhus or one of the childhood illnesses. Now remember, Erik, that in England in those days, a whole household could be wiped out in a week with disease. Because it was so rampant in some homes, because you also had multiple family occupancy. And there were also deaths which were a nation. Let me give you one example. There were three children in England down in London. And initially, the parent was accused of killing them, but let’s call them the health Inspector from the Council went out to the home and he discovered green wallpaper. And when they did test, they then found that the three kids had not died from being poisoned by the parents. It was the green wallpaper that killed them. And a doctor who was in this study where the heat was on, began to become ill. So when he came out of the room where he was, he recovered and he worked out again, it was the green wallpaper. And this is one of the problems with Mary Ann Cotton is that she used arsenic soap to clean her and she also had green wallpaper, which she used to wash with the arsenic soap. So her house was probably filled with arsenic in the air. And there’s one of the difficulties of trying to say every single death was a murder.
Erik: But the question, of course, that seems to be the obvious one. Why everyone but her? She doesn’t die, but everyone around her does.
Martin: There was two occasions where she was sick or two of the deaths where she herself took ill. So she did experience illness on two occasions. Does that answer the question that she why did she not die of it? Also, you have to understand that when the arsenic poisons in the air, you have to be very robust to try and survive it. And if you look at some of the adult deaths, they were already ill or weak. When they then didn’t recover. So again, you have to ask yourself the question. I agree with you that it’s suspicious, no doubt about that. But is it definitely slam dunk she is guilty? My problem is I don’t know whether she is or not. All I’m asking people to do is to stand back and ask themselves the question as to whether or not she was. And that’s what my book is about. It’s about this idea of showing you how the background suggests that there were some deaths. Now if you take the death of George Ward, one of her husbands now, he was under the care of her in a hospital. She was, if you like, a nursing assistant and she nursed him and then married him. Now the thing about this is that there were three doctors involved in his care, three doctors who then hired had public arguments about his treatment because the newspapers then got a hold of it and the doctors were disputing with each other why he died, but they would treat them, so she would have to have poisoned him onto the eyes of three doctors. Is that possible?
Erik: Yeah. Good question. So I think it would be helpful for listeners if we did a timeline of her marriages and children and address the deaths chronologically. We’re at William now.
Martin: Yes. Well, after William. And they come back, as I say, to the north of England. They have one daughter with them, Margaret Jane. But then Mary Ann Mowbray dies in 1857, and then Isabel Mowbray is born in 1858. And in 1859, Mary Anne Mowbray dies, and again that was the second child. And then Mary Margaret Jane Mowbray dies. So you’ve got deaths there pretty regular. Of the children. And it seems that a child is born and in 1863, John Robert is born and in 1864, he dies at one year of age. Looking at it in a circumstantial, it does appear strange that all these kids are being born and dying in such a short period.
Erik: I mean, the child mortality rates, of course, were higher during that era.
Martin: That’s correct.
Erik: Was anyone suspicious of these deaths or was it all…
Erik: It’s an excellent question, but no, no one raised any questions. And every one of the children who died that I’ve just given you were all examined by doctors who declared them to die of natural causes, natural disease. And there was no outcry. It wasn’t until it’s where William Mowbray, her husband, dies. And he again is examined by doctors and people have accused her of killing him, but the doctor certified him as dying from typhus fever. What’s important about that is typhus fever has a particular rash and the doctors noticed this and that’s why they certified him as dying from typhus fever, not poisoning. So the likelihood of her killing him I think in that case is pretty remote because you’ve got a doctor looking at the circumstances and coming to a very specific diagnosis of typhus fever and certifying it because of the rash that was involved. That was in January 1865. In 1865, April, just a few months later that Margaret Jane Mowbray dies. Now, again, the doctor certified her death as typhus fever. So you can see once there is a pattern of death, all these doctors are involved and they’re saying it’s natural causes.
Erik: Right.
Martin: So you can see, Mary Ann Cotton is bedeviled by death. And there are some where you don’t know, you can’t understand, everything is fine. Nobody complains. Doctors are happy. We’ve got the death of William and Margaret here in ’65. And again, doctors saying, no, it’s typhus fever, there’s a rash. So how do you call it? Erik? You can see the problem.
Erik: Right. So at this point, Mary Ann leaves her remaining daughter, Isabella with her mother.
Martin: That’s correct.
Erik: And then goes off and meets her second husband.
Martin: Well, be careful the way you phrase that. Can I just caution, she didn’t go up to meet her second husband. What she did was she wanted to work again. And the place where she wanted to work was a hospital. And she became a fever nursing assistant in the hospital. But in order to be free to do that job, she decided that Isabella would be better off with her mother, whom she had reconciled with after the pregnancy that she was moved to south for because her mother actually traveled to the south to meet her in the south to reconcile. And that’s why she came back to the north, because her and her mother had reconciled and got on very well. Now, at this point, before I go on to another death, there’s an important point to say about Isabella. The fact that she’s with Mary’s mother is to Mary’s benefit. Because that means she’s free. Now, bear that in mind, because there will be a death coming up soon. Where I want to come back to that. Sure. So therefore, she goes there. And then, 1865, she marries. August ’65, she marries George West. I’m sorry. George Ward. So George is married in August, 65 to her. I remember what I said about his death in 1866. October he dies, but he already was seriously ill. So the three doctors are attending him, fighting each other and getting annoyed with each other because you’re interfering with my patients sort of thing. So you’ve got three doctors involved, a man who is already extremely ill, and he dies. Who killed him? Did she? What would you think, Erik?
Erik: It’s difficult, of course, without being able to speak with her now…
Martin: Wouldn’t that be lovely? It’s interesting what the doctor certified his death as. By the way, they certified English cholera, a specific disease. Again, so my problem and I struggle with this one. Is he’s dying anyway, three doctors are supervising it. They’re even putting leeches on them to drain his blood -using leeches. And so if she is determined to kill him, do you think she would risk it on the dying man who three doctors are attending? That’s my problem with that one.
Erik: Did she have financial motive at all?
Martin: Yes. In the William Mowbray and the children there, there was some insurance money that came to our benefit. I think from memory I kind of have in front of me. I think it’s about 1500 pound in today’s money. It would be – that she would have gotten for those debts. But again, we have to not be anachronistic here. It was quite traditional in Victorian England for the Penny insurances. Everybody took insurance out on people because death is so frequent and the taking out of Prudential insurance was quite common. It’s very rarely excepting the high profile cases would have been done for nefarious reasons. So the fact that you had insurance on these people that were dying. Cannot be suggested as a motive because everybody had insurance on their people, cheap insurance. Prudential would come round and collect it, you know what I mean? So it was easy to do. So the money motive is possible, don’t get me wrong, it’s possible. And with Mary, who likes money, and you’ll see later on that she definitely is a woman who wants money and will do anything to get it. But did she do it for that reason? Open question. Now, George Ward, he didn’t have any major finance or wealth. That’s why I remember when I was writing this story and researching it, I felt it’s strange that you married him because there didn’t appear to be any financial gain in it. And if you wanted to be charitable, you could say she felt sorry for him, but on the other hand, you could say, well, why did she marry him? There didn’t appear to be a financial incentive. Because he was quite a poor man. Now, I’ll give you something else which makes it as she did murder him. Let me give it to you. In 1866, December, right? She moves in with James Robinson as a housekeeper. Now, that is October, her husband George dies in December, she’s moving in as a housekeeper. And if I said gently to you, Erik, being sort of a religious man as I am, I don’t think the motive as housekeeper wears well when you discover she gets pregnant outside marriage again through this man and he was in a very good position in terms of his job, and therefore had a bit of money. So having discussed George Ward and whether she killed him or not, under the auspices of three doctors, here she is a few months later moving into a man who she may have had her eye on. You see the point I’m trying to do here? I’m trying to disturb the status quo and say, let’s not rush to judgment, but at the same time trying to be balanced and say there are arguments on both sides and there are are good reasons why these murders might have occurred. But could there be coincidence and could be other reasons
Erik: Right. Well, I’d like to ask you about the title of your book. The subtitle. Britain’s First Female Serial Killer.
Martin: That’s correct.
Erik: Is that the final verdict from you, or is that what history has labeled her?
Martin: The reason why I put it in the title is because that is what she was called. And the book, The Dark Angel, basically reflects the fact that this is how she was seen. And the book is to say this is who who people have claimed her to be. And what I do in the book is I don’t give a verdict. I leave it open because I want the reader to read it, especially the court case, which I hope will come to eventually. But to read it and say to themselves, what do you think? What do I think? And let you, the reader, make the judgment.
Erik: Yeah. Your book is very even handed towards the case.
Martin: Definitely.
Erik: So back to the timeline.James Robinson.
Martin: So she moves in with James as a housekeeper in December, and in the same month, one of his sons dies. His son he has been under the care of a doctor and who certifies him as dying of natural causes. Now she just moved in, but the child was already ill before she moved in. Now you have to say that when she moved in, she immediately goes in and kills them. Or he dies of natural causes, as the doctor said, what do you think? Do you jump to the conclusion that just because she moved in, he died, she must have done it right? Is that a fair conclusion? Sorry, that was just a rhetorical question.
Erik: Oh, no, I understand.
Martin: I’m not making any jump to judgment there. I’m just simply saying she moved in in December as a housekeeper, and in December of that year, the same month the son dies. But he was ill before. We then come up to in 67, which is March, just a few months later, Mary’s mother dies. Now, again, people accuse in hindsight because none of these deaths attracted attention at the time, Erik, but none of the people who because of her reputation when she was caught saying she killed her mother. Now, again, let’s look at this on an even handed basis. Mary’s mother had Isabella. That was to Mary’s advantage, because it meant that Mary had not the burden, if you like, of having that child with her while she was in the Robin situation. Mary’s mother was already ill. That was why she was called to the mother’s home. And therefore, she went to that home because her mother was ill. And during her visitor, the mother dies. Now I’m going to throw some mud on the wall here. Mary went there. Mother’s looking after the child to Mary’s advantage. Why would you kill her? That’s the question I put in the air. Then let me give you another little bit, which is interesting. Do you remember her stepfather, George?
Erik: Sure.
Martin: Well, when the mother dies, George, a couple of months later marries the next door neighbor. What do you make of that? Well, let me just say Elvis Presley song, Suspicious Minds. If you want to be suspicious, you might say, well, how do you had his eye on her all along? Or was it just a coincidence and was it just a coincidence that the mother dies when Mary’s there? I just put it in the air, Erik, and let the reader decide.
Erik: So she takes Isabella back to the Robinson house.
Martin: That’s correct.
Erik: And once she returns, death follows.
Martin: Well, it definitely does. Within a month in April, 3 deaths occur. Isabella, James Robinson Jr. And Elizabeth Robinson, all three children die. Within that month. Now, do you remember I said to you it was not a coincidence. A lot of children did die of diseases. Quite wrong. But let me say to you that Dr. Shaw, he was in attendance to all these deaths. Now the interesting thing here is he certifies all three deaths as connected by gastric fever. And the interesting thing here, Erik, because you asked about this earlier on, this was one of the occasions where Mary Ann became seriously ill. Now again, what do we say the house is, obviously, according to the doctor, filled with the gastric fever, which was contagious. And if Mary was looking after these children, washing, cleaning their vomit and what have you, she got seriously ill as well. So did she poison the children and accidentally swallow some poison herself? A rhetorical question, obviously. Of course.
Erik: Yeah.
Martin: Do you see the difficulty, Erik? Jumping to any conclusion is difficult in these circumstances. But having said that in 1867, March, next month. Mary is pregnant and Mary gets seriously ill. And then in August that year, she marries James Robinson.
Erik: I have to say, in her defense, if James had been suspicious of her in the slightest, one would assume he wouldn’t go on to marry her after what had happened in the house…
Martin: Exactly. Now it’s interesting you should say that because when she was then arrested for the murder, which she was convicted, both James and his sisters start saying, oh, I thought so much. I thought this and what have you. So they’re being anachronistic, even in that time, putting it back to Mary. But nobody at that time raised a single question as to these deaths. The doctor Shaw, who attended them was quite happy that the whole thing and couldn’t bear his illness was gastric fever. You see what I’m saying? It’s easy when people start charging her with this, that and the other to go back in history and say, oh, she must have done that as well. And that was the problem, as you just raised, Erik, no one at the time raised a single question. 1s
Erik: What is gastric fever exactly? That’s not a term widely used now.
Martin: Well, no gastric citric fever. We actually do get it today. I think it’s a norovirus that comes what it is. It’s a virus which infects the gut, and it causes the child and whoever gets it as an adult to react with a fever, a very high temperature fever. There is vomiting, there is the inability to keep down fluid, inability to keep down food. And so the weakness comes in, and eventually, especially with children, because obviously there’s less strength in the child. And if it’s a prolonged effect, that is what they die from, the whole fever. And the vomiting eventually kills them because they just cannot stand. That’s why Mary survives, because an older woman, she obviously was more robust.
Erik: Does that have something to do with salmonella?
Martin: Yes, it could be. Because, you see, in those days, don’t forget this is one of the problems with Victorian murders. There’s no forensic. There’s no DNA. There’s no way to test anything properly. There was no test to say that it could have been seminal, but I would suggest it was gastric flu. Sorry. Fever. For one reason is that remember what I said about sanitary conditions? They were very poor. And therefore, one of the ways the gastric fever was transmitted was by bad hygiene. And if you want to become quite crude about it, when you’re pooing and the poo is contaminated with the virus and you’re trying to clean it up and you’re going onto somebody else without doing proper cleansing, you could be carrying it to another person. So the spread of it is quite possible.
Erik: After they’re married, she takes over the household finances.
Martin: Yes, that’s right. She takes over the finances of the home. 1s And she has the child who was born, Mary Isabelle Robinson was born, but she was born in November 67, by 1867, and by 1868, February, she dies. That’s the child that she was pregnant with. Now the doctor again certifies it as convulsions but not certified, which is interesting. It means that he wasn’t present at the death, that he has to take the description of the death to come to a conclusion.
Erik: So then they separated.
Martin: Well, before we get there, don’t forget there’s George is born as well, another child before that happens. But this is where we get to the character of Mary and money. Because this is where she steals the money and tries to get loans by forgery. And it’s at that point because of that action, her thievery and her wanting to get money. One of the questions that I raised is what did you do with the money other than buy dresses? There doesn’t seem to be any way she spent them, but that was enough for him. And at that point he goes away and he takes his natural son with him. So he takes his children with him. But George, the son that was just born, Mary Ann, takes him. So James Robinson goes off to his sisters with his children and Mary Ann goes with George and disappears at that point. And that’s the sequence. It’s the stealing and the forgery of the trying to get loans that cause James to leave her.
Erik: And he doesn’t suffer an untimely death, right?
Martin: No, he doesn’t. He lives to an ice ripe old age.
Erik: Interesting. (Laugh)
Martin: Right. (Laugh) Very interesting. I deliberately say that did or didn’t do it. But the trial a chemist comes forward from Newcastle and he says that he accuses Mary Ann of buying arsenic in his shop in January 1869 onto the name Mary Ann Booth. Now, why that’s interesting is Mary Ann Booth was an early neighbor of Mary Ann Cotton. Sorry, Mary Ann Robinson. She was in the village in the north of England. Now, is that a coincidence or is that just a name that Mary used because she could use it and do it? Because when people use false names, sometimes they tend to use names they’re familiar with. And here we have Mary Ann Booth buying arsenic in Newcastle because you had to give your name. You see, when you’re purchase it. Was that Mary Ann the chemist says it was.
Erik: Right. Right.
Martin: You see how difficult this is getting? Because we cannot prove that that was Mary Ann the chemist said it was. But is he saying that because he’s not in the middle of a murder trial where she’s been accused left, right and center in the newspapers? And he says, oh, well, it must have been her. You see, what I’m saying? Is the evidence credible? That’s all I’m posing in this case after such a time, which is about two or three years later, four years later, when he’s given evidence. Did she buy that? We don’t know. Right. So she doesn’t divorce James Robinson, right? No, she doesn’t. But let me again, I need to put something in there with this child, George. If she is such a murderess of children, why is it that she brings George back to a neighbor and leaves him with the neighbor and goes off? Why didn’t she kill him? 1s
Erik: That’s true.
Martin: Again, a rhetorical question, Erik, because there’s no answer. But if she was a murderer of children, what I said, Erik, was why did she bring George back to her neighbor her to give him back to his father while she disappeared? Why didn’t she kill him? You see, what I’m saying is she’s such just a ruthless killer of children here she brings the child, George back to give him to his father, and then she disappears. Why didn’t she murder him? It’s a question. And then, as I said, there is a period of her life where she disappears. There’s kind of a gap where we don’t know where she was or what she was doing after she leaves James Robinson, and she then turns up and Spennymoor. And in 1869, we now come to some more deaths which she was accused of being involved in. In. There are three deaths that happen. Sorry, two deaths that happen. Margaret Cotton, which is Fred Cotton’s daughter, And Frederick Cotton, his wife, she dies as well. Adelaide. She dies in January 1870. Now, again, the doctors certify all these people as dying from natural causes. 1And yet and hindsight people began to accuse her of those deaths as well. But I struggle with that because she doesn’t seem to have a connection at this point with this family – or she may have had. And we don’t know because Margaret Cotton, Fred’s sister, she apparently knew Mary before this incident. And there is a question as to whether or not Margaret Cotton introduced her to Fred at some point and at what point she actually arrives at Fred’s residence. That’s uncertain. And it’s in that situation where she was accused of poisoning the pigs because there were pigs around. And in 1870, Margaret Cotton, Fred’s sister, also dies. Now, this death was also attributed to Mary by gossip. But the doctor certified pneumonia as the cause, which is the same disease the pigs died from. How do we jump to the conclusion that Mary killed them as well? There is no evidence. Evidence? Absolutely no evidence outside of speculation and gossip that she was involved in any of those deaths.
Erik: So she’s not living at the Cotton house?
Martin: That’s correct. She’s working for another family. She’s working in a laundry. But the point is, can I throw a spanner in the works here again in 1870? June, which is not too long after Margaret Cotton died. She died in March. Guess what? Mary Anne is pregnant.
Erik: And who is the father?
Martin: Well, eventually, Fred Cotton accepts responsibility. She marries Fred in September of 1870. So if you take it that she’s pregnant in 1870, June, do we assume that she has known him and before that leading up to that pregnancy, which would put her in connection with Fred in 69, 70. You know what I mean? If there was a kind of a courtship to put it in that terms, she may have connected with the family before then. Speculation, we don’t know. She’s pregnant again. And then in September of 1870, she marries Fred. Now, there you go again to get Mary’s character. She’s a thief, no doubt about it. She’s a woman who forges signatures, no doubt about it. Here, she’s a bigger mystery. She hasn’t got a divorce and she marries Fred. Now, Fred is indentured. That means he has to work out his contract with the mine because they obviously want to move away from water bottle where they were and they moved to West Auckland, which is the village where I was the sub postmaster because Fred has now moved to a mine in West Auckland. It’s in West Auckland. Then in 1871 February that Robert Robinson Cotton was born. That was in 1871 February. And you will not be surprised to hear the 1871 in September Fred Cotton her husband dies. But again let me say to you this was certified by Dr. Kilburn who was the village doctor that he died from typhoid hepatitis. Very specific. He was also ill before he died as well from an accident. But the point I make is here we have another death which seems suspicious because there was financial gain in this case for myriad of insurance. But again that was natural in those days Prudential insurance. But the point is the doctor certifies it very specifically as typhoid hepatitis. The thing about it is again this is where we have to put things into the mixture which causes great suspicions. 1872 Joseph Nattress makes a will out in favor of Mary Ann Now Joseph Nattress, have you watched, in America. Did you see the series Dark Angel was written but sensationalized her life? And they say that Mary had a longterm relationship with this man, Joseph Natress. But I doubt that because he was married to Katherine Thorborn and didn’t appear to have any known contact with Mary until West Auckland. Because he used to live in Children, which is not far from West Auckland and then moved to West Auckland. And he became a lodger eventually with Mary. And he then obviously is having a relationship with Mary. And in ’72 makes out his will in favor of Mary Ann. So you can see that the circumstances suggest there might be something the furious going on. But yet the doctor says it’s definitely typhoid hepatitis. So when did you come into this contact with Joseph? Was it after or before the death? An awful lot of questions, Erik, isn’t there?
Erik: There are a lot of questions, yes.
Martin: Now the interesting thing then in March, 72, Frederick Cotton Jr. Dies again. Dr. Kilburn certifies it as gastric fever. 1872, March, Robert Robinson Cotton dies and is certified natural death. Teasing three week convulsions. So, two deaths in March and you will not be surprised to hear in 1872, March the same month Marianne is pregnant.
Erik: Congratulations to her? (chuckle) Oh, right.
Martin: (laughing) Well, it even gets more curious. 1872, April the first. The month after she’s pregnant, Joseph Natress dies. Again, doctors say natural causes typhoid fever. Charles Edward Cotton dies. Dr. Kilburn takes an inquest and certifies it as natural causes. He’s the last one to die. Now, it’s interesting that Kilburn did an inquest and certified is natural. So here we have all these deaths, as I said, at the beginning, 2012. At all. And she’s not in West Auckland with these 20 deaths in her wake. And as I’ve tried to do is say, was she or was she not guilty of all these deaths?
Erik: When does someone finally grow concerned about these deaths?
Martin: Okay, I’m glad you’re asking that question, because there’s a guy called Thomas Riley. Now, Mary Ann was obviously, I don’t know how attractive her picture doesn’t make her look that attractive. But she must have had something that appeals to her because this guy, Thomas Riley, it’s rumored, rumored that he wanted to have a relationship with Mary Ann. He was married and Mary Ann apparently refused him. And so he’s living a ride with a wee bit of resentment. And the doctor says it’s natural causes. Mary goes to him because he’s in charge of the parish finances. And says, look, I have got no money. Will the parish bury the child? Now, this is interesting. He agrees. He says, yes, we’ll bury the child. Why does he agree that? And then all of a sudden he goes to the police and says, Listen, I don’t agree with the doctor. Can we do something about this? And so we have Mary now, who has been cleared of this death through an inquest being put in the dock by Thomas Riley, and he demands a second autopsy is done. Now, this is interesting, Erik. The first autopsy was done in a public house which is next door to Mary’s house. And that’s where the child was examined and found to be of natural causes. The next time the inquest is done, it’s done on a table in the room of Mary’s house, where there is green wallpaper on the walls. Now, Dr. Kilburn has taken some samples and he does a forensic test for arsenic, which proves positive. But what he does with the samples that you believe this for the doctor, he buries it in his garden in a bottle in his garden. Now, forensic science would say to me and I’m not a forensic scientist, does that not have a suspicious of causing contamination from soil which could contain poison. Right. So they send off the samples to leads to Dr. Scattergood, who was one of the most prominent, if you like forensic experts at the time in arsenic and he confirms arsenic’s present. And so now Mary has got a problem.
Erik: So what do they do?
Martin: They dig up the bodies, Erik. That’s what they do. Now again, these people are buried in the churchyard. No gravestones or anything. And I’ve walked around that churchyard. The coffins are very cheap coffins, obviously, because they’re buried under parish rolls. Soil has probably got in and then they take these up under very lax sanitation if you like. There’s just dug up. And the bodies were examined. And Joseph Nattress and Frederic Cotton Jr. And Robert Robertson, three of the bodies that were claimed they couldn’t find Fred’s, but the three that they did find when they were examined, it’s claimed that there was arsenic in all three bodies. Now there’s a dilemma, isn’t it? There’s an argument. And what Mary says is she went to Thomas Riley’s shop. You want to shop and bought some product. And she said it could have been contaminated with the arsenic. She had bought arsenic soap from the chemist and used it in her home. And here’s another little thing to throw into the plot. Erik. Dr. Kilburn and one of his other doctors who are with him have a problem because Kilburn says there’s no possibility of arsenic being mixed up by him with a product called bismuth, which was given to treat the people that Mary Ann was looking after. And they visited Mary Ann’s home quite regularly to treat the young child. But another doctor who was in the surgery with them says there was a snake. So the two doctors at the trial have a dispute. One says there was none, the other says there was that was common for bismuth to be mixed up and could sometimes contain arsenic. So then what I’m saying to you is, it’s not that I’m saying Mary’s innocent. I’m saying here regain is another anomaly which causes a problem. So you combine the green wallpaper, combine the possibility of contamination from a medicine or a mixed up product from Riley’s shop, you’ve got all these different problems. Now, what you have to come to a conclusion is, is Mary responsible for all those deaths? Or were they a coincidence.
Erik: And did someone ever come forward and say that they saw her administering arsenic to someone in a drink or…
Martin: She had two lodgers in the house living with her. And while they report that she was the one looked after it, no one can put their hand on their heart and say, I saw her do this. Everything was circumstantial. Because they had poisoning their bodies. Or she did it because she’s the one looking after them. But who else would look after them? Certainly not the lodgers. But no one saw her administer. There’s no evidence whatsoever of the to that effect. And, you know, this is where I have to put into the pot again, Erik, just to confuse things, once it broke the news that this poisoner was at work, all hell was let loose in the newspapers. Before the trial, she was completely condemned. And all of a sudden, people were digging up things from her past and said, oh, she did this, she did that, she did the other. And then newspapers, as you would probably appreciate, swallowed it up. What a sensation. Multiple poisoner serial killer. Wow. She must have done them all. And so the whole outrage was already there before she was even tried, before the court case was a sham initially at Bishop Auckland, where her solicitor didn’t even turn up for one of the hearings. And she had to sit there listening to the evidence and couldn’t say nothing because her sister told her not to say anything. And then she was accused of not saying anything, but she was doing what she was told by her solicitor, who didn’t turn up. So you can see again that respect against her for making the defense. 2s
Erik: Where did she get the nickname Dark Angel?
Martin: Well, that was a modern one that was more a modern one that was put on tour just because it has this connotation of evil, if you like. But it wasn’t at the time. At the time, she was just simply called the West Auckland Secret Poisoner. That’s what they called her. And as I said, the poem and song that they wrote about her had her tried and condemned before she even was. And that was the onslaught of the newspapers. It wouldn’t be allowed today. 2s
Erik: So Doctor Scattergood was the star witness for the prosecution.
Martin: Definitely. He’s the one that he brought the bacon home. But when she turned up for the Durham trial again, she found that she had no representation, so one had to be appointed for her to defend her. And he had very little time to prepare the case because it was done in such a hurry. So she was left with this guy who had just a very quick survey of the paperwork, and Thomas Campbell, who was not a qualified counselor, he hadn’t taken silk yet. He was the one who was lumbered, if you like, with this problem. How do I defend this woman? And as I said to you, he did his best. He did an excellent job of doing his best to try and point to the fact that the contradiction in the doctors, he pointed to the different green wallpaper, the bottle mix up, the purity of the bismuth that was recommended for the sick people. No one had analyzed the powders to see if there’s any impurity in them, even though Foster knew that there was bismuth which could at times be contaminated. But Campbell brought up all these things, including the arsenic, soap and the wallpaper. He did his best. But the prosecutor charged Russell, again, an excellent prosecutor. And the judge, Thomas Dickson, I think, to be quite frank, they already made up their mind. And I don’t think she stood a chance of ever being acquitted. Now, whether or not she was guilty, I’m not making a conclusion. I’m just asking that in today’s world, if we want to bring it into today, she would never have been found guilty day because of so many forensic problems, so much about the way the newspapers had berated her, so much about the way her defense was conducted. There was an awful lot of ways that that trial was a sham. And I don’t think that at the end of the day, there was a fair hearing. That’s not to say she wasn’t guilty. It’s just to simply say that no matter how bad people paint you, you deserve to be heard and have given a fair crack of the whip. And I don’t think this happened to Mary Ann Cotton.
Erik: It was during these proceedings that she gave birth to her final child, correct?
Martin: That’s correct. She gave birth to Margaret Quick-Manning. Let me just give you a little sort of thing, which I don’t know whether it means anything or not, but Mary’s in the prison cell and the baby has been given away to adoption and they come to pick her up. Now, Mary has a shawl that she really treasured, shawl she wrapped around her shoulders, and she takes that shawl and rips it in two and gives it to the parents to wrap the baby in because she really loved that child, I believe, and had nursed her until the people came and took her and she gave her the name Margaret is a Quick-Manning Cotton. Now, that was Mary’s last attempt to protect the child, because Quick-Manning is the name of a very rich customs guy who used to be in West Auckland with her. And the rumors were that she had a relationship with him, but there was no evidence of that at all. I think that was later speculation. And if you look at the birth certificate, so you can’t look at it, but when you look at the birth certificate for Margaret, it says the father is unknown. So she doesn’t give any name of the father in the birth certificate, but it’s likely to have been Joseph Natress. But Quick-Manning was a better name. She thought that might help Margaret in her future life. And Margaret did live. She lived in 1954 and she was a lovely lady. She went blind and her sons fought in the First World War. She had a good life. And if you want a legacy, then there it is. She gives birth to a lady who turned out to be quite a lovely person. And her other son, George, who she left with a neighbor, George Robinson. He turned out to have a very nice life and a great family. 2s
Erik: So the two children separated from her at the end. They were her only children who lived long, healthy, productive lives.
Martin: And also George, the one she’s took with and brought back to the neighbor. So the three of them out of the darkness, if you like, of the whole episode, we have these wonderful flowers that grow and prosper, despite all the situation that was behind them.
Erik: Some witnesses had remembered that she had shown some emotion, some sadness after her children had passed away. Right. She wasn’t cold or distant or anything like that?
Martin: No. Especially in the West Auckland deaths. Her neighbors testify that she was very upset. And you’ve got to understand, in the West Auckland cases, she was the one that pestered the doctors to come and look after them. She went down to them. She harassed them again. I just posed the question without any judgment. If you were murdering someone, would you go down a pest or doctor to come and have a look?
Erik: So do you think she goes down in history as a woman with some of the worst luck ever?
Martin: Well, I think she was dying in history as a woman who lived through a very dark period, Victorian times, where death was all around you. Death was common and a lot of deaths were never, ever looked at. So you had this problem where you’ve got doctors. Now, the doctors have a responsibility, you would imagine, to ensure that when they certify a death, it’s been certified correctly and that they have done due diligence. So that’s one question. The second question is why had nobody else in the whole history of Mary Ann Cotton not raised any suspicions? Neither the doctors, neither the neighbors. No one did. It was only until after she was arrested. People started to come out and accuse her of all these things. Now you either say she is guilty and she did murder more than one person, or you say that she has had a lot of difficulties in her life and that the circumstances were such that a lot of people died around her. But here’s a sort of thought to put into this. When you look at someone like myself, I’m 71 years of age. I wonder how many deaths I have experienced that were close to me? Over the years. You know what I mean? And none of them were suspicious. None of them were my involvement. But in Victorian England, it was very unusual for someone not to have the experience of death around them.
Erik: So the final death in this story is hers.
Martin: That’s right. She was hung in Durham Jail on March 24, 1873. Yeah, she was hung. And the inquest was held by the car, in her chest, award held the inquest. And she was certified as having died by hanging.
Erik: I found it interesting that as she awaited her execution, her stepfather visited her.
Martin: Yes. And that was not an easy meeting. Apparently. You can understand stand it. He’s come. And I’m a terrible one for doing this. Please forgive me. I just threw these things in because I’ve got a very suspicious mind. I wonder what he was trying to come for because he hadn’t no contact with her. It bothered his backside to have a relationship with her. Was he afraid of her saying something about his wife’s death before he married the neighbor? You see, this is my problem as a researcher, as someone who in historical terms, I question everything because you have to ask questions, no matter how difficult they are, to arrive at some kind of truth or at least at some kind of understanding of possibilities that might be there and of those possibilities. Sometimes because you don’t have the person sitting in front of you, you have to make up your own judgment as a human being with a brain as to what you feel and what you think. And that’s the way I leave Mary Ann Cotton in my book, I ask you as a reader to say, well, I’ve read the book. I’ve seen this here. I’ve looked at the court case, happened to her. Issue or issue is she not.
Erik: I appreciate your skepticism – that you didn’t pass judgment already on her before you begin your project.
Martin: As a local historian, I’ve never done that. I think that you’ve got to be open to the fact that history is written by the victors and those who survive. And when you look at history that way, you then ask yourself, what has the people who survived got to gain by the history they’re telling? And then you examine that, and that’s where you begin to uncover truth.
Erik: So I haven’t seen that movie you referred to about her, Dark Angel. What did you think of it?
Martin: I thought it was rubbish. Sorry, after being so blunt, because what it did was it took the sexual side of Mary Ann and really emphasized that more than anything else, her as a loose woman and her as a sort of I think the decision had been made that she was this wicked woman. So let’s paint it as a wicked woman. And as you said before there and I when you entered this project, did you decide at the beginning of the Dark Angel series, I’m going to convict her and she’s going to be found guilty. That’s it. She’s guilty. And the story I didn’t think it was a fair assessment of the woman’s life and did not fairly consider the evidence.
Erik: No, you’ve certainly approached it the right way.
Martin: I think, as I said, I repeat myself, it’s the only way to approach history. If you don’t question history, you will not know it’s truth.
Erik: Yes. And with a story this old, especially with chunks of her life, a mystery, will never, of course, know the full truth.
Martin: You can’t it’s impossible. It’s judgment, Erik. It’s judgment because you can look back and you can see everything. You can analyze everything. As I said before, you question history and all of that. But at the end of the day, you were not there. And therefore, you cannot know. 1s
Erik: Well, this has been great. I know that your publishers out of the UK Pen and Sword, but your book is definitely available to purchase for North American listeners.
Martin: Well, I know that there’s a lot of Americans who bought it, Erik, so that someone over there is buying it.
Erik: That’s great.
Martin: Now, I tell you, it was number one in Amazon in its category at one point, because I think the first attempt to try and really look at the subject with an open mind, because it’s doing that. It’s asking people rather than take everything for granted. Use your own intelligence, your own feelings, and you judge. And I go to school sometimes when I was in West Auckland teaching kids about Mary Ann because it was a topic on their history. And every single time, without exception, the majority of children went home to their parents. And the letters from the parents confirmed this, saying she may not be guilty. I had left that sort of impression with them that they were no longer sure that the gossip they were hearing in the local village was true anymore because they were encouraged to question the truth that they were hearing to find out whether it stood up to investigation. Even as children. And they were remarkable kids. They’re so astute. And a lot of people who have written about it to me have said it really has caused them not to say she’s innocent, but to say, was she guilty. There’s a difference.
Erik: That’s great. Excellent. Well, this has been fun. Thank you so much.
Martin: It’s been great talking to you, Erik.
Erik: Again, I have been talking with Martin Connolly. His book is called Mary Ann Cotton: Dark Angel: Britain’s First Female Serial Killer. This has been another episode of the Most Notorious podcast, broadcasting to every dark and cobwebbed corner of the world. I’m Erik Rivenes and have a safe tomorrow.
