that such acts of savage atrocity are rather out of place in so
civilized a community as that in which we live. They are not in unison
with the moral tone of society. Crimes of violence are generally
supposed to be the natural product of barbarism. They grow up to
frightful maturity in that congenial soil; and all savage communities
are accordingly distinguished by cruelty, and the most profligate
indifference to human life. As mankind improve, and as knowledge
is diffused, those crimes disappear, and are succeeded by others
sufficiently odious, no doubt, but still of a less atrocious nature.
The same process by which we cultivate the intellectual faculties,
would seem also to open the heart to more humane sentiments, and to
more kindly feelings. But however we may improve society and diffuse
instruction, there is still a vast expanse of ignorance, poverty,
and vice, which we may lessen by active efforts, but which we cannot
altogether remove; and it is in this intellectual desert, if we may
so speak, where nothing that is humane, enlightened, or moral ever
springs up to refresh the eye, that crimes are produced. Under the
influence of ignorance, all the best affections of the human heart
wither and lie dead; and it is chiefly from those who are within its
sphere that the ranks of crime are recruited, and that occasionally
such wretches arise as Burke, Bishop, Williams, and Cook, who distance
all competitors in iniquity, and shock the feelings of the age by
their enormous crimes. It will generally be found that these criminals
are not only wicked and immoral, but that they are uneducated and
ignorant, living, no doubt, in a civilized community, and with certain
habits of civilization, scarcely, if at all, raised above the level
of savages. Hence the vast importance to society of the diffusion of
knowledge, of bringing all ranks under some process of mental tuition,
and of establishing schools where instruction and morality--for they
go together--are retailed at a cheap rate. It is only in this way that
we can insure the decrease of crimes, and more especially of such
atrocious crimes as have been recently perpetrated.
It may appear paradoxical, but it is nevertheless true, that in
proportion as civilization has advanced in this country, crime has
risen in its enormity. The philosopher is at a loss to account for the
existence of this anomaly; for if an effect be in direct opposition to
the principles of the cause, there must be either something deficient
in that cause, or that it has been erroneously selected as the means
requisite to produce the desired end. The cosmopolite looks into the
history of other nations, and comparing the extent of crime which
took place whilst they were in a state of barbarism and ignorance,
with that which is exhibited when they have emerged from their savage
state, and the light of science and of learning has been diffused
around them, he is struck with astonishment at the difference which is
displayed, and is thence apt to draw his conclusion, that it would have
been better for the interests of society if man had remained in his
rude, uncultivated state, than, by enjoying the supposed advantages of
civilization, have progressed in crime and villainy.
In regard to the principle that it is only the uneducated and the
ignorant who are the perpetrators of the greatest crimes, our daily
experience flatly contradicts it. May was by no means an uneducated
man. And if we take a still further retrospective view, and investigate
the character and condition of Burke, we are led still more decidedly
to adhere to the opinion that the quantum of crime does not depend
upon the extent or the deficiency of education. In fact, such is the
strong tendency of mankind to revolt from the idea of such unnatural
enormities being committed in aught of human shape, that when the
system of traffic which had been practised by Burke and his associates
first flashed in full disclosure on men's understandings, not a few
were inclined to search, in some extenuating circumstances of this
kind, for a cause of palliation of this unparalleled wretch's iniquity.
It was at least not an impossible supposition that the wretched man
might have been labouring under a total insensibility of moral and even
of intellectual feeling, arising from an entire want of education,
from a mind dull and inert in its perceptions, originally, and not
only in after life allowed to lie waste, but rendered still more
callous and impassive every day by a constant contact with scenes of
infamy. Could we, indeed, imagine that Burke had been left to have
his character formed under an accumulation of influences fatal and
awful to contemplate as these are,--that his life had been always
spent in profligate habits and dissolute haunts,--that he had been
born with a ferocious and indocile nature, and bred in situations
which barred all progressive movements to good,--that, in short, he
never had any ideas poured into his intellect, or any human feelings
generated in his bosom,--then, perhaps, it might furnish matter of
curious investigation to the metaphysician, whether he were not, after
all, a case which called for deep sympathy. But a sufficiency of the
history of this extraordinary man has transpired to show that he at
least was not placed in any such deplorable predicament. His education
and rank of life, instead of having been by any means of the lowest
order, were such as, in the judgment of the world, and on the authority
of experience, are held of necessity to humanize and inform the mind,
and to communicate perfectly just conceptions of moral distinctions.
It must also appear singular that the mind of Burke was by no means
closed against the truths of religion. He was brought up in the Roman
Catholic faith; but as a Catholic, he was considered wonderfully free
from prejudice, frankly entering into discussions upon the doctrines
of his church, or those of other sects, with whose tenets he showed
some acquaintance. He read the Scriptures, particularly the New
Testament, and other religious books, and discussed their merits. On
a Sabbath especially, although he never attended a place of worship,
he was seldom to be seen without a Bible, or some book of devotion
in his hands. He attended the prayer meetings which were held on the
Sunday evenings in the Grass-market, Edinburgh, and was for some time
remarked as one of its most regular and intelligent members. He never
omitted one of its meetings, and expressed much regret when they were
discontinued. In addition to this, many people hold it to have been
made out that Burke was a man of strong mind, and of an understanding
much superior to his condition. When, therefore, he stood convicted
before his country as one who, for his livelihood, had been a wholesale
dealer in human slaughter, he stood without the benefit of one single
mitigating circumstance to weaken the profound sense of horror and
indignation which pervaded all hearts.
We have touched upon this trait in the character of Burke, for the
purpose of establishing the negative, that even religion is not
sufficient to deter men from the commission of the most horrid crimes.
We have recently had an instance in the case of Holloway, in whose
mind the principles of religion were inculcated at an early period,
and who professed to adhere to those principles whilst standing on the
scaffold, that they were in themselves incompetent to deter him from
the commission of one of the most horrid murders recorded in the annals
of the country. If, therefore, neither education, civilization, nor
religion be sufficient to effect the prevention of crime, to what other
power are we to have recourse in order to bring about such a desirable
benefit for the human race? We despair of giving a satisfactory answer
to that question. The penal laws of the country have been found
insufficient; in fact, notwithstanding their unexampled severity, and
which is stigmatized as a national disgrace, the most heinous crimes
continue to be perpetrated, as if there were no laws existing by which
the criminal could be punished for his misdeeds.
It would occupy too much of our pages to enter here into any
disquisition on the effect of capital punishments on the morals of
the people; but we cannot forbear expressing our opinion that the
legislators of this country appear to be the most ignorant of any of
those nations professing to be civilized, in all matters on which the
prevention of crime depends; and whilst they have before them such a
splendid example of human wisdom as the code of Napoleon, they will
still adhere to the customs of their forefathers, which assimilate not
with the present state of society, and which have been found to be, and
are declared wholly inefficacious as a remedy for the evil which they
pretend to cure.
As a female, Mrs. Cook may be considered as one of the most atrocious
murderers of the age in which she lived, or of any preceding one.
Essentially, and in her real character, an ignoble, base, meanspirited
wretch, this wholesale assassin, by the mere extinction or obliteration
of every moral principle and feeling of her nature, now stands out in
strong relief from the long and black catalogue of those who have most
signalized themselves by their daring violation of the laws both of God
and man. Ordinary homicides slay from passion or revenge; the murders
they commit are the product of an ungovernable and overmastering
impulse which hurls reason from her seat, and in the wild conflict of
guilty passion, precipitates them into the commission of acts, which
are no sooner done, than they would perhaps give the universe if
they were undone. But Cook and her criminal predecessors possess the
horrid and anomalous distinction of having, without the palliation of
passion, or of any other motive which a just view of human infirmity
can admit in extenuation, and from a base and sordid love of gain,
and of acquiring the means of rioting in drunkenness, profligacy and
iniquity of every sort, established a traffic in blood, upon principles
of cool calculation, and an utter recklessness of either God or man,
which would have done no discredit to Mammon himself. Hence it is that
Bishop, Williams, and the others convicted of the horrid crime of
Burking, are perhaps the only criminals who have died on the scaffold,
not only without exciting an emotion of pity in a human bosom, but
amidst the curses, both loud and deep, of the assembled thousands who
witnessed the ignominious termination of their guilty career. The wild
shouts of exultation which saluted them upon their appearance on the
scaffold, and which rung in their ears with still fiercer acclamations
when the world was closing on them for ever, must have appalled even
the hearts of ice within their worthless bosoms, and sounded as the
knell of a judgment to come, where the spirits of the slain would rise
up before them, to demand a just retribution.
Were we to select any of the most atrocious cases which are recorded in
the Newgate Calendar, we could not perhaps select one more appropriate
to warn the juvenile offender from the horrid vice of drunkenness, than
the case which is now before us of Mrs. Cook. To her inordinate love of
spirits may be traced almost all the crimes which she committed. Her
first step, after obtaining possession of her ill-gotten wealth, was
to the gin-shop; where, having drank to excess, she would take home
with her an additional quantity, wherewith to plunge herself in all the
loathsomeness of drunkenness.
Would that we could here read a warning lesson to those who indulge
themselves in the horrid vice of drunkenness, as the certain precursor
of their final ruin, and the destruction of all their earthly hopes.
There is scarcely any vice which entails more complicated misery
upon the unhappy wretch that is a slave to it, than intoxication. It
gradually undermines the strength and vigour both of body and mind. We
every day see the most deplorable effects of this most shameful vice
in the ruined health, constitution, and fortune of vast numbers of our
fellow-creatures. How many ingenious and industrious persons has this
vice rendered useless and worthless! How many happy families does it
daily reduce to beggary and indigence! How many innocent sufferers does
it involve in its deplorable consequences! How many have we known who
began life creditably and reputably, with a basis on which, through
industry and virtue, to rear the structure of an ample fortune, by
contracting these fatal and cursed habits, have ruined themselves and
their families for ever; for of all vices, there is no one so incurable
as this, when it is once contracted. Other vices leave us with age;
this fixes its roots deeper, and acquires strength and firmness with
declining years. It kindles an infernal spark, which is absolutely
inextinguishable.
It was, however, against the juvenile part of the community that Mrs.
Cook directed her thieving propensities, in order to supply herself
with the daily means of satisfying her desire for spirits. It was about
two years ago that she decoyed a little boy from his home, by telling
him that she would take him to see his aunt. She conducted him through
several courts and alleys, from East Smithfield to Goodman's-yard; and
then, having enticed him into one of the dark corners, took from him a
quartern loaf, and the change of half-a-crown. She even took the frill
off the child's neck, and then told him to stay until she returned.
It is, however, surprising with what acuteness some boys are apt to
watch the motions of others; and on this occasion all the actions of
Mrs. Cook were strictly watched by a youth, as if a suspicion had
taken root in his juvenile mind that some nefarious action was about
to be perpetrated. He followed Mrs. Cook and her youthful victim to
Goodman's-yard, and after having watched her departure, he joined the
little dupe, who was anxiously awaiting the return of the 'good old
lady,' and immediately took him home to his father, a jeweller, of the
name of Harris, in East Smithfield, who made the boy a present of a
silver medal for his good and meritorious conduct.
When Mrs. Cook was brought before the magistrates at Lambeth-street
office, charged with the murder of Mrs. Walsh, she was identified
as the person who had committed the theft on the unsuspicious boy.
She, however, did not deny the charge, thinking it perhaps of minor
importance, and seemed to treat it as a mere trifle, and wholly
unworthy of her consideration. This, however, was by no means the
only case which has come to our knowledge, in which this female fiend
committed her depredations on the young and the helpless. About
eight months ago, she was observed by a gentleman of the name of
Chapman, from his back window in Prescott-street, which looks upon
the Tenter-ground, playing with two children, and giving them cakes
and apples. This lasted for about half an hour, when she ultimately
succeeded in enticing them out of the ground. Mr. Chapman suspected
that the woman had some evil design in view towards the children, as
he judged, from the style of their dress, that they did not belong
to her, and went into Prescott-street, for the avowed purpose of
meeting her with the children. On coming up to her, he inquired if the
children belonged to her; to which she answered, that, although they
did not belong to her, she knew them very well, and was going to take
them home; giving him at the same time to understand, that it would
be as well if some people would attend to their own business, and not
interfere with that which does not concern them. Mr. Chapman, however,
was not to be daunted by the rude and insolent conduct of the wretch;
and on further inquiry he found that everything which she had said was
false, and done with the intent to deceive him. Her real design was to
decoy the children to her home, and there either to rob them of their
apparel, and turn them shivering into the streets, or secretly to make
away with them, to replenish her funds towards the support of her
drunken habits. During the time that she was confined at Lambeth-street
office, under the charge of the murder of Mrs. Walsh, Mr. Chapman came
to the office, and identified her as the same woman from whose devices
he had rescued the two children.
Mr. Lea informs us, that he is acquainted with five persons whom Mrs.
Cook had attempted to entice to her lodgings to sleep, but who were
saved by the suspicious nature of her proceedings, and the infamy of
her character, which was so well known throughout the whole of the
neighbourhood where she resided. One circumstance, however, deserves
particular mention, as it will display the art and cunning with which
this wretch carried on her nefarious practices, and against which
the most wary could not be always upon their guard. There was an old
woman, whom Mrs. Cook had selected as one of her victims, and into
whose good graces she had tried, though in vain, to ingratiate herself.
She had pertinaciously refused to accept of her frequent invitations
to drink a cup of coffee with her, and to spend a _social_ hour, as
both of them had a great deal of time upon their hands, which might
be agreeably passed over a cup of coffee; and perhaps she would be
able to raise a sufficiency to purchase a quartern of gin wherewith
to regale themselves before parting. Mrs. Cook soon found, that
although no immediate attraction existed for the old woman in a cup
of coffee, yet that there was something which could not be resisted
in the glass of gin. She therefore began by throwing herself in the
way of the old woman, who hesitated not to accept the invitation to
enter the first gin-shop which presented itself; and Mrs. Cook began
to rise many degrees in her good opinion, on account of the kind and
liberal manner in which she treated her with her favourite beverage.
Mrs. Cook soon perceived that the suspicions of the old woman were
beginning to be lulled; and she at last admitted Mrs. Cook so far into
her confidence, as to inform her of her place of residence; and it
ultimately turned out, when almost in a state of complete intoxication,
that the old woman confessed that she had for some time gained a
precarious livelihood by robbing little children of their apparel, or
any valuables that might be about them. Mrs. Cook was, however, too
much upon her guard to make the same disclosure; but she saw in the
confession of the old woman a certain instrument of accomplishing the
purpose which she had in view. She was therefore determined to watch
the motions of the old woman more narrowly, not doubting that she
should soon succeed in entrapping her in one of her petty thefts, and
then the remainder of her plan was easy of execution. The opportunity
was not long in presenting itself; for having once detected her in
taking a coral necklace from the neck of a child, she quietly betook
herself home, and in a few hours afterwards she repaired, apparently
in the greatest bustle, to the lodgings of the old thief, informing
her that the police officers were in search of an old woman, answering
in every particular her description, who was accused of having stolen
a coral necklace from a little girl; and although she did not mean to
say that the theft had been actually committed by her, yet as it was
by no means improbable, she considered that it was but acting the part
of the friend, supposing her to be guilty, to warn her of the danger
which impended over her; and in what manner could she show her regard
more strongly than by offering her an asylum in her lodgings until the
officers had slackened in their pursuit, or had wholly relinquished it
as a fruitless task. The snare was deeply laid; but in this instance it
was cunning arrayed against cunning, and the victim escaped by removing
herself from the neighbourhood altogether; but she was afterwards
detected in her thefts in another part of the town, and sentenced to
six months imprisonment, and hard labour in the House of Correction.
In regard to the manner in which Mrs. Cook disposed of the bodies,
a considerable degree of light was thrown upon it by an anonymous
letter, received by the Hon. G. C. Norton, of Lambeth police-office,
in which letter some dark insinuations were thrown out respecting a
medical gentleman, who was in the habit of giving lectures within
four hundred yards of Mrs. Cook's house. It was also stated in this
letter that Mr. J----y was very fond of cheap subjects; and, in fact,
intimating that his house was the receptacle of dead bodies, no matter
by what means they were procured. In consequence of the receipt of this
letter, Mr. Lea requested Mr. J----y to attend before Mr. Norton, as
it was natural to suppose that some information might be elicited from
him, which might supply some links that were wanting in the chain of
evidence against Mrs. Cook; for it was not improbable that the body of
Mrs. Walsh might be actually traced into his possession. Mr. J----y,
however, when before the magistrate, positively denied all knowledge of
the body of Mrs. Walsh; and further, that he never knew the prisoner
under the name of Cook, but under that of Ross; and that was merely
from attending her in his professional capacity. At the time when she
was under examination in the name of Cook, Mr. J----y almost took upon
himself the character of her advocate; and he endeavoured very much to
draw Mr. Norton's attention from the statement of young Cook, and even
to discredit it altogether. He alluded particularly to that part of
the statement which touched upon Mrs. Walsh having taken coffee with
Mrs. Cook; as it was not to be supposed that a person of her character
was not better acquainted with the anti-narcotic power of coffee,
than to administer it to the person whose life she contemplated; and
consequently the taking of the coffee would go in some degree to defeat
the measure which she had in view. He himself, he said, always took
coffee to keep him awake, whenever he had any nocturnal cases in hand;
and there was no proof adduced that any soporific medicine had been
administered to Mrs. Walsh, which, in all probability, would have been
the case, had she committed the murder with which she was charged. He
then proceeded to remark on the impossibility of the death of the old
woman having taken place, according to young Cook's statement, without
the most violent struggle; and further, that it almost amounted to an
impossibility for Mrs. Cook to have committed the murder by her own
individual power, without the assistance of some other person; nor was
it likely that the father of the boy should be standing all the time
that the work of death was going on, near the fireside, and withhold
his assistance towards the accomplishment of the murder.
There is an old adage, which says, an injudicious friend is a dangerous
enemy; and in this instance the warm and indiscreet manner in which
Mr. J----y espoused the cause of Mrs. Cook, only aggravated the
suspicions against her, at the same time that neither the private nor
the professional character of the individual himself was exalted by the
measure.
On leaving the office, Mr. J----y said to Lea, 'Some one will be let
in for this by and bye;' an insinuation which had at the time its
various interpretations; but the one to which the greatest probability
was attached, was, that it had some reference to the collusion which
existed between himself and the accused parties, relative to some
previous transactions in the disposal of dead bodies, all of which
were supposed to find their way to the lecture-room of Mr. J----y.