Category: History

Witnesses for the Prosecution: Forensic Science During Agatha Christie’s Life

Posted on by Harley

Agatha Christie (1890-1976): Polymath and Natural Scientist

Agatha Christie was born in September 1890 and lived through 1976, so her work was inspired by and utilized the concepts of forensic science that were established during this time period.  

Christie had no formal education during her upbringing but was a polymath and a natural scientist.  Her father taught her arithmetic, and she had an inherent understanding of quantity, scale, and proportion.  She also taught herself to read and read a range of books and newspapers throughout her life, including the Daily Mirror and the Telegraph.  Examples of forensic science in action from these newspapers are shown below to illustrate what Christie was exposed to.

Agatha Miller
Young Agatha Christie

Foundations of Forensic Science

The earliest written accounts of the use of forensic science were in 6th century China.  The term “forensics” comes from the Latin “forensis,” which means “of or before the forum.”  The primary definition of “forensic” is belonging to, used in, or suitable to courts of justice or to public discussion and debate.

Forensic science, the focus of this post, refers to the application of scientific principles and techniques to matters of criminal justice especially as relating to the collection, examination, and analysis of physical evidence.  According to the Canadian Society of Forensic Science, 

Forensic science is therefore the application of science, and the scientific method to the judicial system. The important word here is science. A forensic scientist will not only be analyzing and interpreting evidence but also challenged in court while providing expert witness testimony.”

Criminalistics refers to the specific scientific tests or techniques that are used in connection with the detection of crime.  Criminalistics is a subset of forensic science and started with the “scientific aids” movement in the UK.  An example of criminalistics would be the collection of fingerprints at the scene of a crime by a CSI technician, which are then examined by a forensic scientist with an expertise in fingerprinting.

Forensic Science and Agatha Christie at the Turn of the 20th Century

At the turn of the 20th century, around the time that Agatha Christie was born, the field of forensic science had evolved to suit the need to present evidence in a courtroom, which was (as it is now) primarily done through expert witnesses.  The earliest types of witnesses were medical experts, such as a doctor testifying as to the cause of death, but by the end of the 19th century, other scientific fields were beginning to be represented.

Below is an example from the Daily Telegraph from the Dreyfus trial in 1899 detailing the testimony of a handwriting expert.  This was Captain Alfred Dreyfus’s second trial for treason against France, and he was erroneously found guilty based on this expert handwriting analysis.  The case is an example of the theoretical nature of many areas of forensic science as well as the influence that the media has in portraying forensic science as a single source of truth.  The case was also an example of unchecked antisemitism, which was also present in Christie’s early works though lessened as she matured as an author and a human.  Dreyfus was subsequently pardoned and served in World War I.

Early forensic science celebrity Bernard Spilsbury

At this time, a few forensic science techniques were already widely accepted, most notably fingerprinting analysis. One of the first celebrities in forensic science in the UK was Bernard Spilsbury, a Home Office forensic scientist. His authoritative performances in the witness stand, for example at Crippen’s trial, were held as an example until the 1980s. But his celebrity status led the public to conclude that forensic science would provide absolute, unquestionable proof.

Spilsbury gave compelling evidence based on his microscopic examination of human remains recovered in Crippen’s home that a scar on a piece of skin identified the remains as those of Crippen’s wife, whom Dr. Crippen killed and then escaped with his mistress via ship to Canada.

The Crippen case was among the first true crime cases to receive full media coverage complete with descriptions of recent scientific advances such as the wireless telegraph.  Christie would have read about the case and its trial, and even used it as inspiration for the historical crime in the 1952 Poirot novel Mrs. McGinty’s Dead.

Also in the 1910’s, Christie began volunteering as a nurse and may have chosen nursing as a career, if she had not become a successful writer.  But many of the best scientists are inherently creative, and Christie had a keen interest in science throughout her life.  She also married science with her creative writing, for example with her poem “In a Dispensary.”

She transitioned from nursing to dispensing (also known as pharmacy) during World War I.  As part of her training, she learned chemistry and physics and kept notebooks listing various substances (their appearances and properties) in alphabetical order.

Christie volunteered as a nurse and dispenser during World War I
pharmacy, apothecary, dispensary
Worshipful Society of Apothecaries arms

In 1917, she passed 2 of the 3 parts of the Society of Apothecaries’ examination: chemistry and medica (composition of medicines).  She passed the practical portion on her second try.

Forensic science to address criminal poisoning cases developed early in natural history, as early as the mid-18th century.  In the mid-19th century, the Society of Apothecaries began to require their candidates attend lectures in medical jurisprudence.  At this stage, a doctor could harvest samples and organs for testing for the presence of poisons.

Christie’s knowledge from her dispensary training was most applicable to the study of poisons and toxicology.  More broadly, analytical chemistry was widely used for extracting metals, manufacturing synthetic dyes, and conducting quality control.  Analytical chemistry is an area of applied science that answers the questions about an unknown substance: what is there and how much exists.

The Institute of Chemistry was founded in 1877 in the UK, which formalized the field of analytical chemistry.  Additional formality to scientific careers was introduced in the early 20th century when the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research was established following World War I.

Daily Telegraph, Home Office
Excerpt from The Daily Telegraph, 23 Nov 1907

Christie used her knowledge of poisons to craft her first mystery novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, around 1916.  The book was not accepted for publication until several years later.  In the original draft of the novel, Hercule Poirot revealed the solution while serving as an expert witness in a murder trial, showing Christie’s knowledge of the forensic application of science.

The Relationship Between Mystery and Science

The transition from practical science into mystery writing was a natural one.  Essentially, science seeks to solve the mysteries of the universe.  Below on the left, this diagram shows the Scientific Method, which is the accepted stepwise process for conducting scientific endeavors.  After making observations, a scientist poses a question, which is answered by a hypothesis.  A hypothesis is a statement about the question that can be disproven or rejected.  The scientist then conducts experiments to test their hypothesis.  Once the experiments are complete, the scientist can reject or fail to reject their hypothesis, which leads to a conclusion to their question.  It may not be the answer, but it will provide information hopefully leading to the answer eventually.  It is a cyclical process that repeats ad infinitum.

Below on the right is a similar diagram showing the structure of a mystery story.  Of course, stories can vary in their presentation, but generally every mystery story has a central crime.  After the crime has occurred, a detective or other character collects clues to inform a theory of what has happened.  When the detective is confident in their theory, there is a confrontation with the criminal.  And like science, when the theory is tested, there is a conclusion to wrap up loose ends in the story and perhaps point to future stories.

detective, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Dr. Watson
Statue of Sherlock Holmes in Edinburgh

Christie was not the only author to transition from medical sciences into mystery fiction.  Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes, was a physician, and Richard Austin Freeman, the creator of Dr. John Thorndyke, was educated in medicine.  But Christie distinguishes herself with her breadth of knowledge specifically regarding poisons

Forensic Science in the 1920s Through 1940s

The following decades were a period of growth by Christie the author and also in the field of forensic science in the UK.  Detectives with Scotland Yard had acknowledged that more knowledge and coordination were required to detect and apprehend criminals.  Below is an overview of the key forensic scientists and developments during this important time period, as Scotland Yard worked to incorporate forensic science to solve crimes. 

Hans Gross

Toxicology may be the first true forensic science, as the field developed in the 19th century specifically to be used to solve crimes. Somewhat later, crime scene analysis was developed by Hans Gross in his Handbook for Examining Magistrates.  His work was practical and addressed how to manage and preserve evidence from crime scenes. However, his work was marred by frequent references to the Romani as criminals.  When his handbook was first translated into English, it was done so in the British colony of India and transposed these racist beliefs onto the native tribes.  Eventually, newer editions of the work edited out these racist segments.  The importance of Gross’s work was its reliance on the materials at a crime scene that could be properly collected and serve as objective “witnesses” to a crime.  Crime scene analysis inspired by Gross’s work was adopted by Scotland Yard in the 1930s.

forensic science, crime scene analysis
forensic science, crime scene analysis
Clapham Crime, Hans Gross
Excerpt from The Ballymena Observer 18 Jan 1911

Cesare Lombroso

Cesare Lombroso measured and categorized an untold number of skulls in the hopes of quantifying criminality.  His work was translated into English in 1927 and introduced the notion of a “born criminal” that could be identified through physiognomy, and examples are shown below on the right.  It was never fully accepted in the UK, likely due to Lombroso’s reliance on theory rather than empirical science. 

forensic science

Alphonse Bertillon

Alphonse Bertillon created the Bertillon System, an anthropometric approach to measuring criminals and criminality, in 1879, but he also pioneered crime scene management and forensic photography.  Bertillon developed precise photography techniques of the face and profile of criminals, and his photographic techniques were applied to crime scenes as metric photography, which used physical measuring scales (such as rulers) to provide a permanent and accurate record of the crime scene including the location and size of objects.  Although fingerprinting ultimately proved superior to anthropometry in identifying criminals, the 2 techniques were used in concert for many years.  And of course, the mug shot technique developed by Bertillon is still in use.

Hand measurements in the Bertillon System

Juan Vucetich and Edward Henry

Fingerprinting for criminal identification was first used by Juan Vucetich in 1891 in Argentina.  Sir Edward Henry developed a fingerprinting system that was adopted by Scotland Yard in 1901 and was the basis for the US FBI criminal files created in 1924.  This adoption followed the recommendation by the Belper Committee of the Home Office to utilize fingerprinting alone for criminal identification.  Henry’s system includes subclassification of fingerprints with more than 1024 categories and subcategories.  Matches were made through manual examination of fingerprints with a magnifying glass and was therefore not useful if there was not a print in the catalogue to match to, and the system was also flawed by classification errors that could prevent the identification of a print.  In the 1960s, the first computer programs for fingerprint identification were based on the Henry system.

Edward Henry, Juan Vucetich
Juan Vucetich, Edward Henry

Edmond Locard

Edmond Locard was a French forensic scientist with an impressive laboratory in Lyon that was held as an aspirational example to forensic scientists in the UK.  Locard was known as the “French Sherlock Holmes” and proffered his exchange principle, which asserted that whenever there is contact between 2 items, there is an exchange of material; this is the basis of several forensic sciences such as fingerprints and fiber analysis.

forensic science

Sydney Smith

Sydney Smith served as a medicolegal expert for the Egyptian government prior to his appointment as a Professor of Forensic Medicine at the University of Edinburgh.  In 1924, he and his colleagues employed one of the earliest uses of ballistics to identify the gun used to assassinate Sir Lee Stack Pasha.  Similar to fingerprinting, the unique markings left on a bullet by a particular firearm were evaluated using a comparison microscope.

ballistics, forensic science, firearm

Alfred Lucas

Another early work in the field was Forensic Chemistry and Scientific Criminal Investigation by Alfred Lucas, first published in 1920.  Lucas was a British analytical chemist who had worked alongside Howard Carter in his Egyptian archaeological excavations.  The book was highly detailed and a basis of forensic science in the UK for several decades.  Lucas was also a correspondent of Nigel Morland, a crime fiction writer from the 1930s through the 1970s who would reference Lucas’s work throughout his fiction.

Nigel Morland, mystery, detective, crime, novel, pulp

Forensic Science and the Public

The media was a primary source of information about forensic technologies to both the public and criminals.  Alfred Lucas stated in Forensic Chemistry, “

...in fact the criminal is becoming so scientific, not only in his work, but also in the means he adopts to escape detection, that a scientist is needed to cope with him, that is to say, a scientist must be set to catch a scientist.”

As early as the Victorian era, there was considerable public interest in crime reporting.  At the turn of the century in the UK, the creation of tabloids capitalized on this appetite.  The reporting of the Crippen case offers the best study of the role of the press in disseminating knowledge of criminals and forensic science.  Most notably, the use of the wireless telegraph in apprehending Crippen was so widely described in the media that scholars have suggested 

the Crippen saga did more to accelerate the acceptance of wireless as a practical tool than anything the Marconi company had previously attempted.”

The Departmental Committee on Detective Work for England and Wales

In the 1930s, the Home Office commissioned the Departmental Committee on Detective Work for England and Wales “to inquire and report upon the organization and procedure of the police forces of England and Wales for the purpose of the detection of crime.”  Their report was submitted in 1938 and provided substantial evidence of the relationship between scientific training and analysis to the detection of crime.  This allowed for the establishment of additional laboratories with the purpose of solving crimes and essentially formalized the field of forensic science.

The Detective Committee report acknowledged that the majority of crimes in the 1930s were against property and not people.  Violent crimes (including sexual crimes) comprised about 2.5% of all crimes, violent crimes against property about 19.5%, nonviolent theft about 75%, and forgery about 1%.  Burglary and breaking and entering crimes had tripled since the beginning of World War I.  The report also acknowledged the ability of criminals to move location and evade detection, and so recommended the centralization of records as well as maintaining adequate local police forces.  The Detective Committee report estimated that 4% of crimes (>10,000) would require scientific analysis of evidence. 

Departmental Committee on Detective Work for England and Wales, forensic science
Excerpt from Linlithgowshire Gazette 30 Sep 1938
Excerpt from The Leeds Mercury 11 Apr 1935

Around the same time, in 1935, the Metropolitan Police opened its first forensic science laboratory in Hendon.  However, it initially struggled to work in concert with the police force, and little work was forwarded from Scotland Yard.  Coordination between police officers and forensic scientists was a continual challenge in the UK, as there were often class and educational divides between the 2 professions.

In 1946, a public education campaign released a film entitled Science Fights Crime to announce the resumption of detective training courses.  The video demonstrated the newest scientific methods in forgery, fingerprinting, burglary, self-defense, identification of suspects, ballistics, and infrared and ultraviolet photography.

Scientific Aids

Forensic science theories evolved along with technology.  In 1946, Sir John Maxwell, former Chief Constable of Manchester stated, 

...great progress has been made in the application of science as an aid to police work.  The introduction of the motor car...the use of wireless, the gradual development of police laboratories to help in crime investigation and the adoption of traffic signal lights are typical examples of the process of mechanization.”

This was the era of “scientific aids” in policing.  

Throughout this era, “scientific aids” were developed and promoted for use by police officers.  These are roughly equivalent to “criminalistics” and were to be used by police officers during their investigation of crimes to help allow for objectivity in the processing of crimes.  An instructional pamphlet published in 1936, Scientific Aids to Criminal Investigation, provided highly detailed descriptions for what to do at a crime scene.  There were several parts to this publication, a few of which are shown here.

The goal of scientific aids can be described by the following quote:

Scientific evidence, when properly interpreted, may thus provide, in certain classes of cases, a kind of proof which never lies and never alters its tale, and which, if placed before the Court by a competent witness, can be seen by Judge and jury for themselves.”

Forensic Science from the 1950s Onwards

As with many other fields, the development of forensic science paused during World War II, which stagnated scientific advancement for many years.  According to author Alison Adam, “the development of the forensic science profession was complex and piecemeal.”  The forensic science principles described in this presentation continued to be used throughout the remainder of Agatha Christie’s life, with few notable breakthroughs until the mid-1980s with the advent of DNA identification.

Dame Agatha Christie
Crime fiction evolved along with criminals and forensic science, and Alison Adam posits that both science and crime fiction strove to establish and maintain social and moral order at the turn of the 20th century.  Agatha Christie had a strong interest in criminology and forensic science throughout her career and stated in her autobiography, 
As a result of writing crime books one gets interested in the study of criminology.  I am particularly interested in reading books by those who have been in contact with criminals, especially those who have tried to benefit them or to find ways of what one would have called in the old days ‘reforming’ them–for which I imagine one uses far more grand terms nowadays!”

The Motley Few, Act I

Posted on by Harley

**Contains major plot spoilers for The Affair at the Victory Ball.**​

“To Harlequin the invisible.”
Agatha Christie
Agatha Christie

A Singular Dedication

This dedication by Agatha Christie in her collection of short stories The Mysterious Mr. Quin is wholly unique because it marks the only time Christie dedicated one of her works to one of her fictional characters.  It is apposite, however, as Harley Quin was probably her favorite among her creations.  In her Autobiography, Christie states,

Actually my output seems to have been rather good in the years 1929 to 1932: besides full-length books I had published two collections of short stories. One consisted of Mr. Quin stories. These are my favourite. I wrote one, not very often, at intervals of perhaps three or four months, sometimes longer still. Magazines appeared to like them, and I liked them myself, but I refused all offers to do a series for any periodical. I didn’t want to do a series of Mr. Quin: I only wanted to do one when I felt like it. He was a kind of carry-over for me from my early poems in the Harlequin and Columbine series.

Unlike Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple, Harley Quin is not a detective.  Rather he is an ephemeral being, arriving at the scene of mysterious circumstances (often involving romantic entanglements) to guide Mr. Sattherthwaite (who could be considered the detective in stories involving Mr. Quin) to the truth about the situations.  Although he wears a typical dark suit, it is often described that the light hits him in certain ways to produce effects of a colorful motley or black domino mask.  Christie continues,

Harley Quin, Agatha Christie
First UK edition, 1930
Mr. Quin was a figure who just entered into a story--a catalyst, no more--his mere presence affected human beings. There would be some little fact, some apparently irrelevant phrase, to point him out for what he was: a man shown in harlequin-coloured light that fell on him through a glass window; a sudden appearance or disappearance. Always he stood for the same things: he was a friend of lovers, and connected with death. Little Mr. Satterthwaite, who was, as you might say, Mr. Quin’s emissary, also became a favourite character of mine.

The Mysterious Mr. Quin was published in 1930, shortly after the death of Christie’s brother Monty from a stroke possibly related to wounds suffered in World War I.

The character of Harley Quin only appeared in 14 stories, assembled into one collection (The Mysterious Mr. Quin) and as part of other collections (The Harlequin Tea Set and Problem at Pollensa Bay and Other Stories).  Apart from a silent movie in 1928, there has never been a cinematic or television adaptation of the works, and Harley Quin remains one of Christie’s lesser known characters.

Christie and the Harlequinade

As mentioned in What’s in a Dame?, Christie participated in amateur theatricals in her youth, and a common performance piece at the time was the Harlequinade.  Derived from the Italian Commedia dell’Arte, the Harlequinade as a pantomime, play, or ballet tells the story of Harlequin (from the Italian “Arlecchino”), a servile rogue with a predilection to aid lovers with the help of magic and invisibility.  He romantically pursues Columbine, an intelligent and compassionate servant.  His rival for her affections is Pierrot, who downplays his disappointment when spurned by playing tricks and pranks.  The character of Pierrette was a female counterpart to and love interest of Pierrot.  Punchinello and Pulcinella may also be servants but more often seem to be the masters in a situation, imposing figures with long noses and broad bellies.  The Harlequinade would tell a variety of stories with this cast of characters, often involving some scheme to separate Harlequin and Columbine, and Harlequin would use a magical stick called a “slapstick” to resolve the silly situations – this is the origin of the term slapstick humor.

harlequin, pierrot, slapstick
Commedia dell'arte characters Harlequin (left) and Pierrot, illustration on paper, c. 1874–88; in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam. Courtesy of the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam; Gift of F.G. Waller, Amsterdam

Pierrot was traditionally played by an actor without a mask and wearing white make-up, which is thought to be the origin of white clown make-up. Harlequin was traditionally masked with a dark brown or black mask, suggesting African influences on the character but more likely related to systemic racism within theatre and society in relation to the character of a servant. Punchinello appears to be the origin of the character Punch from Punch and Judy puppet shows.

Inspired by these theatrical scenes, young Agatha composed a great deal of poetry in her childhood.  Some of the poems she wrote around age 17 were published in The Road of Dreams in 1924, including verses about Harlequin, Columbine, Pierrot, and Pierrette; the young Christie even set her Harlequin poems to music.  “Harlequin’s Song” describes the character with,

I pass
Where’er I’ve a mind,
With a laugh as I dance,
And a leap so high,
With a lightning glance,
And a crash and a flash
In the summer sky!
I come in the wind,
And I go with a sigh…
     And nobody ever sees Harlequin,
     “Happy go lucky” Harlequin,
Go by…
[…]
I must play my part…
     For never a soul has Harlequin,
     Happy go lucky Harlequin,
Only a broken heart…

Christie’s grandmother also owned a set of Dresden figurines from the Italian comedy, which are still part of the family’s collection. Drawing inspiration from her love of this set of characters, particularly Harlequin, Christie included them (and a similar set of figurines) in her first short story to feature Hercule Poirot, The Affair at the Victory Ball.  The story was published in Sketch in 1923 and tells the story of the murder of Lord Cronshaw at the Victory Ball, which was followed closely by the death of the actress Coco Courtenay by cocaine overdose.

A Victorious Affair

Lord Cronshaw, 25 years of age, was rumored to be engaged to Ms. Courtenay.  The pair attended the Victory Ball, dressed as Harlequin and Columbine, in the company of Punchinello (Lord Eustace Beltane, uncle to Cronshow who would inherit his title), Pulcinella (Mrs. Mallaby, an American widow), Pierrot (Chris Davidson, an acting friend of Coco’s), and Pierrette (Mrs. Davidson, Chris’s wife), in costumes inspired by Lord Beltane’s figure collection.  The mood was tense between Cronshaw and Courtenay, who requested Chris Davidson escort her home following dinner.  After accompanying the tearful actress home, Davidson returned to his flat in Chelsea.

Harlequinade figurines

At the Ball, Lord Cronshaw was scarcely seen by the party for the rest of the evening until 1:30 a.m., when he was spotted by a Captain Digby.  He asked Lord Cronshaw to rejoin the group, but he had not done so after several minutes.  A small search party was formed with Digby, Mrs. Davidson, and Mrs. Mallaby, who discovered Cronshaw stabbed to death in the supper room.  On his body was a small enamel box half filled with cocaine and with the name “Coco” inscribed in diamonds.  Also discovered tightly clenched in the Lord’s fist was a small green pompon, with ragged threads as though it had been pulled forcefully from its source.  The next morning, the body of Coco Courtenay was found in her bed, her death due to an accidental or intentional overdose of cocaine.

These facts of the case are related to Hercule Poirot by Chief Inspector Japp, whose highest talent, according to Captain Hastings, “lay in the gentle art of seeking favours under the guise of conferring them!”  Poirot visits Lord Beltane to view the original sculptures and the Davidson home to view the Pierrette costume, which had green pompons.  At the conclusion of this investigation, Poirot arranges for a Harlequinade of his own, hiring actors to portray each of the members of the Cronshaw party.  Through this elaborate reconstruction, Poirot reveals that Chris Davidson had killed Harlequin and worn a duplicate costume to pose as Lord Cronshaw at 1:30 a.m., several hours after the original Harlequin had been murdered.

Central to the dispute between Davidson and Cronshaw was the use of cocaine by Ms. Courtenay.  Lord Cronshaw strongly disapproved of the use of the drug and had demanded Coco’s supply earlier in the evening; therefore, Coco’s enamel box was found on his body.  Davidson, who supplied cocaine to Coco, murdered Cronshaw to prevent his exposure as a drug trafficker.  While escorting Coco home, he was able to provide her with more cocaine, likely encouraging her to take a larger dose out of spite for Cronshaw’s objections.  The tragic result was the death of the young actress, as well.

By viewing the figurines, Poirot was able to ascertain that the elaborate rump and ruffle of the Punchinello costume would have prevented Lord Beltane from changing into the Harlequin costume without assistance.  The two women were eliminated because Cronshaw was stabbed with a dull table knife, which would have required considerable strength.  And upon visiting the Davidson’s house, Poirot noted that the green pompon missing from the Pierrette costume was cut with scissors rather than being torn off, as the pompon in the fist of Cronshaw was; therefore, the pompon was from Pierrot’s costume.  These facts pointed directly to Chris Davidson as the perpetrator, who stabbed Cronshaw shortly following dinner and before returning Coco Courtenay home.  Presumably, Davidson had a second Harlequin costume made before the Victory Ball expressly for the commission of his crime, but this is not detailed in the story.

Chris Davidson and his wife as Pierrot and Pierrette from the Acorn adaptation, 1991

True Crime Inspiration

This story was very obviously inspired by the death of Billie Carleton (whose given name was Florence Leonora Stewart), a young actress who died from a cocaine overdose after attending a Victory Ball at the Royal Albert Hall in 1918.  Carleton was close friends with Reginald DeVeulle, a dressmaker who reportedly hosted opium parties at his house.  DeVeulle, dressed as Harlequin, attended the Victory Ball in the company of his wife Pauline (costume unknown).  While at the Ball, DeVeulle allegedly provided a supply of cocaine in a small silver or gold (reports vary) box to the actor Lionel Belcher to pass to Carleton.

Billie Carleton, National Portrait Gallery

After the festivities at the Ball, Belcher and two other actresses, Olive Richardson and Irene Castle, returned to Carleton’s apartment to continue their revelry.  It is not known what exactly transpired, but Carleton retired to bed early in the morning, and the others returned to their respective homes.  Later in the morning, Carleton’s maid noticed she had stopped snoring; the maid was unable to wake her, and she was pronounced dead a short time later.

Carleton’s death was ruled to be the result of cocaine overdose.  The police and public focused on her decadent lifestyle, as she was known to attend opium parties and her reputation had cost her at least one role.  Looking to blame a “foreign” influence on her behavior and death, Carleton’s friend and costumer Reggie de Veulle, who allegedly supplied her with cocaine, was ruled to be culpable for her death at the coroner’s inquisition but then acquitted on a formal charge of manslaughter; however, he was charged with supplying cocaine to Carleton.  A husband-and-wife duo, Lo Ping Yu and Ada Lo Ping, also received several months of jail time for their roles in supplying opium to the dead actress, among others.

Reginald De Veulle, Billie Carleton
Daily Sketch from January 2019 detailing the coroner's inquest of Billie Carleton

Christie was no doubt inspired by this sensational story from a Victory Ball in 1918.  However, her story added the murder of Lord Cronshaw in the guise of Harlequin.  Cronshaw adamantly opposed drug taking and was murdered for his beliefs, so this appears to be a way for Christie to reclaim one of her favorite characters as a noble martyr after being used as a costume by a perceived villain such as de Veulle.

Christie even borrowed the name “Cronshaw” from a previous criminal lawsuit that involved Reggie de Veulle, where one of the victims was named William Cronshaw.

Cocaine possession was illegal in Britain following the Defence of the Realm Act 1914, which was passed in 1916.

Cocaine use is featured in several other Christie novels, including Peril at End House, Hickory Dickory Death, and the Labours of Hercules.  Christie seems to have some sympathy for addicts, but her knowledge of the drug’s effects was more often used to typify the questionable morality of some of her characters.

Physiological Effects of Cocaine

Cocaine is a tropane alkaloid.  It exerts physiological effects by binding proteins within the body, most notably the serotonin transporter, dopamine transporter, and norepinephrine transporter.  These three transporters are involved in the transmission of the respective neurotransmitters from neuron to neuron in the central nervous system.  When cocaine binds, the reuptake of the neurotransmitters is reduced or eliminated, causing prolonged stimulation of the downstream neurons.

Cocaine molecule
Cocaine molecule

Inhibition of the reuptake of the neurotransmitter serotonin is the primary function of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), which are popular antidepressant medications.

Additionally, cocaine binds to voltage-gated ion channels in the heart, which can result in cardiotoxicity.  These channels are present on cellular membranes and control the amount of electrolytes present within cells versus between cells.  Electrical changes in the cellular membranes control whether the channels are open or closed.  Therefore, an interruption in the function of these channels can lead to deadly electrolyte imbalances.

Electrolytes are ionic (or positively or negatively charged) forms of mineral elements, for example, sodium (+1), potassium (+1), and calcium (+2).

Research has shown that the interaction of cocaine with dopamine receptors is the primary mechanism that drives addiction.  In animals genetically manipulated such that their dopamine receptors do not bind cocaine, addictive behaviors do not manifest when the animals are provided and/or deprived of cocaine.  However, the interaction between cocaine and the serotonin receptor may cause convulsions, so the displacement of serotonin does play a role in cocaine toxicity.  Lastly, the inhibition of norepinephrine signalling by cocaine can lead to rapid increases in blood pressure.

Cocaine also interacts with cholinergic receptors and prevents reduction in heart rate.  This interaction would cause an increase in heart rate (similar to atropine as described in Tuesday Night Fever).  Coupled with the effect on voltage-gated channels and the increase in blood pressure from norepinephrine inhibition, damage to the heart is a central component of cocaine toxicity.  Because the neurotransmitter receptors have a higher affinity for cocaine (in other words, cocaine can bind strongly at lower concentrations), the central nervous system is affected first; for example, the user begins to have seizures.  With higher doses or concentrations of cocaine, the voltage-gated ion channels are then affected, and the cardiotoxic effects of cocaine are seen.  The interference of cocaine with voltage-gated sodium, potassium, and calcium channels will cause cardiac arrhythmias, which are abnormal changes in heart rate.  These arrhythmias can cause sudden cardiac death in cocaine users, even without any pre-exisiting cardiac conditions.

Christie does not provide specific details of Coco Courtenay’s death (nor other characters who perish from cocaine), but it is plausible that the victims suffered sudden cardiac death or a severe seizure.  At Reggie de Veulle’s trial, a doctor testified that Billie Carleton had cocaine present in her nostrils and died as a result of an increase in blood pressure and the formation of blood clots in her heart due to the cocaine, which starved her body of oxygen and led to death.  Interestingly, the doctor who attended Carleton the morning of her death stated he administered strychnine (and brandy) in an attempt to resuscitate the actress.  She was 22 years old at the time of her death.

calcium channel, potassium channel, cholinergic receptor
Some molecular targets of cocaine

Rigor Mortis

Another intriguing scientific principle that features in The Affair at the Victory Ball is rigor mortis, the stiffening of muscles following death.  Because Chris Davidson donned a harlequin costume and impersonated Lord Cronshaw within 10 minutes of his cohorts finding the body, a doctor testified that the stiffening of Cronshaw’s body was abnormal.  However, because Cronshaw had been killed several hours prior, this was actually the natural process of rigor mortis.  In addition to suggesting the time of death, it also led to the discovery of the important clue of the green pompon, which was clenched in Cronshaw’s fist.

Skeletal muscle diagram

Immediately following death, all muscles in the body are fully relaxed.  Within the first hour, some of the smaller muscle groups (such as the jaw and eyelids) begin to stiffen, followed by larger muscle groups.  The timing of onset and development of rigor mortis can vary considerably due to factors such as the ambient temperature, and rigor mortis develops more quickly in higher temperatures.

In a living body, the functional unit of skeletal muscles, myofibrils, comprise the myofilaments actin and myosin.  To contract, they are acted upon by adenosine triphosphate (ATP), which is an enzymatic cofactor that is involved in intracellular energy transfer.  In the presence of ATP, actin and myosin form the compound actomyosin, which physically shortens during muscle contraction.  Shortly after death, the production of ATP ceases, and the crossbridges formed between actin and myosin no longer break down.  This results in the muscle stiffening and shortness that is characteristic of rigor mortis.  

An enzyme is a protein that catalyzes chemical reactions by reducing the energy required, and they are not consumed by the reaction. An enzymatic cofactor is a molecule that binds to a specific region of an enzyme and is required for the normal function of the enzyme.

Diagram of muscle contraction. After death, ATP is not available for Step 4; therefore, the muscles remain contracted.

Rigor mortis may take 6 to 18 hours to fully take effect but can occur more quickly in higher temperatures.  If the individual who dies was engaged in vigorous exercise, such as a struggle, before death, the onset may even be more rapid; this was likely the case with Lord Cronshaw as he attempted to fight off Chris Davidson.

The discovery of the green pompon clasped tightly in Cronshaw’s fist may be less scientifically plausible.  A theory of “cadaveric spasm” posits that rigor mortis can instantly appear following death based on the appearance of dead bodies during World War I and World War II.  However, there remains no credible biological explanation for such a phenomenon, and it is more likely that rigor mortis set in with the typical delay during the wars, but the bodies had continued to be affected by explosions on the battlefield until it fully set in. 

rigor mortis, cadaveric spasm
Leaves clasped within the hands of a body recovered from water, from Toskos and Byard, 2016

Consequently, it is highly unlikely that Lord Cronshaw’s fist remained tightly clasped around the pompon from the time just before his death until his discovery.  Because all muscles relax after death, he would have dropped the pompon, but as long as it remained just beneath the palm of his hand, he would have re-grasped it when rigor mortis took effect.  This is possible but somewhat unrealistic given the short period of time between his death and the discovery of his body.  Nevertheless, the inclusion of this plot point illustrates Christie’s basic understanding of rigor mortis.

The next blog post will further explore the characters of Harley Quin and Mr. Satterthwaite and describe medical conditions whose names are derived from the character of Harlequin.

Night Train to Perdition, Act III

Posted on by Harley

See Night Train to Perdition, Act I, for a summary of Murder on the Orient Express, and Night Train to Perdition, Act II, for a summary of related true-crime cases, including the kidnap and murder of Charles Lindbergh, Jr.  The post you are reading details the forensic science responsible for the capture and conviction of one of the kidnappers, in particular the wood evidence provided by the ladder used in the kidnapping.

The Wooden Witness

As noted in Act II, two key pieces of evidence were discovered immediately following the crime at the Lindbergh estate: a handwritten ransom note and a custom ladder.  In their preliminary examination of the three-sectional ladder, the investigators postulated that the user was neither too tall nor too short and was left handed.  The left handedness of the user was based on the pattern of saw blade cuts in the wood as well as the placement of the ladder to the right of the nursery window, which would allow the user to navigate entry into the nursery from his left side.  The runners used in the ladders appeared to resemble wood crates that were used to protect bathtubs during transit, and police reported that the ladder was similar to those used with pipe organs.

However, these initial theories brought investigators no closer to an actionable lead.  Dr. Erastus Mead Hudson, an independent fingerprint expert and specialist in chemistry and bacteriology proposed to examine fingerprints that may have been left by the kidnapper or kidnappers on the ladder.  Instead using fingerprint powder, which was the custom practice at the time, Hudson used silver nitrate (AgNO3) to identify prints.  Unfortunately, the ladder had been handled so extensively since the kidnapping that there were approximately 500 latent fingerprints present, which could not be used to identify any criminals.

Silver nitrate interacts with salt deposits found in human sweat and shed with fingerprints, which can then be visualized with ultraviolet light.

In the middle of 1932 and still at a loss for any leads, the investigators turned to the federal government for assistance.  They sent the ladder, a chisel that was also found at the Lindbergh estate, and a soil sample to the Department of Justice.  Drawing on the expertise within various federal departments, the DOJ sent samples from the ladder to the US Forest Service, of which 7 samples were sent to the Forest Products Laboratory in Madison, WI, a joint research venture with the Forest Service.  Upon receipt, FPL Director Carlisle P. Winslow told Arthur Koehler, considered the nation’s top wood identification expert, to disregard all other projects and immediately identify the source of the wood in the Lindbergh kidnapping ladder.  To do so, Koehler would apply his specialty in xylotomy, which is the art of preparing sections of wood for microscopic examination.

The Wood Expert

Arthur Koehler had established himself as a skilled xylotomist and had been serving as an expert witness in criminal trials following his promotion to the Head of Wood Technology at the FPL.  He had recently testified in the murder trial of John Magnuson regarding the source of wood used by the criminal to encase a bomb, which led to a conviction.  Koehler had even offered his assistance to Lindbergh after the kidnapping with a personal letter:

I read further in the newspaper about that homemade ladder left behind by the fellow who had done the crime and I grew excited.  You see, that ladder, because it was made of wood, seemed just like a daring challenge.

Within a few days after that I wrote a letter to the Lindbergh baby’s father, saying I thought it might be possible to trace that ladder’s members until the wood matched up with other wood so as to compromise the man involved.  Of course, I’m no Sherlock Holmes, but I have specialized in the study of wood.  Just as a doctor who devotes himself to stomachs or tonsils or human vertebrae narrows down his interests to a sharp focus on the single field of his pet passion, so I, a forester, have done with wood.

He did not receive a response from Lindbergh. 

Less than one week after receiving samples from the kidnapping ladder, Koehler had identified the various sources as Douglas fir, paper birch, Ponderosa pine, and Southern pine through comparisons with the FPL’s library of wood specimens.  After submitting his report to the Department of Justice, Koehler wanted to continue helping with the investigation, his goal to make the ladder a “wooden witness.”

The Wooden Autopsy

In early 1933, the New Jersey State Police would take Koehler up on his offer.  Koehler was given full access to the ladder, which he dismantled to perform an “autopsy.”  Each rung and rail was numbered, measured, and calipered.  Koehler identified the source for each piece and closely examined the components for marks made during the assembly of the ladder.  As relatively few sources of wood were used to construct the ladder, Koehler concluded “that the maker had a limited amount of material to choose from.”

Among all the pieces of the kidnapping ladder, Rail 16 seemed to offer the greatest potential for confirmatory evidence to match to a criminal.  Rail 16 was North Carolina pine (the same as Rails 12 and 13), but it was more knotty and had not been machine planed.  Rather, it had been hand-planed on both edges, leading Koehler to believe that the rail was worked down from a wider piece of wood:

Diagram of the Lindbergh kidnapping ladder

Why he planed both edges of rail 16 is a mystery unless it was rough edged to begin with.  The edges were not always at right angles to the face, and scratches made by the plane wobbled back and forth along the edge…the scratches left by a hand plane on both edges of this rail were exactly the same as those on one side of each of the [cleats], proving conclusively that they were made by the same plane, and presumably at approximately the same time, probably when the ladder was made.

Furthermore, Rail 16 had four nail holes that had been made by square-cut or 8-penny iron nails, which had been phased out of production by the end of the 1800s in favor of cheaper wire nails made from soft steel.  In the 1930s, square-cut nails were still used in home construction, and the regular spacing of the nail holes in Rail 16 suggested they may have come from a building.

Keen to pursue multiple avenues of investigation, Koehler also fully characterized the marks from the machine planer used on Rails 12 and 13.  He sent letters to the known manufacturers of wood planers to inquire as to which mills they may have sold the characteristic planers, and then solicited the mills for samples for examination.  From April to September 1933, Koehler sent a total of 1596 requests and received 23 samples.  Despite the small number of samples, he was able to identify Rails 12 and 13 as having been planed in a mill in South Carolina by examining the planer knife marks microscopically and measuring the marks to 1/100th of an inch.  Ultimately, Koehler was unable to trace the kidnapper(s) based on Rails 12 and 13 because the Bronx lumber yard from which it was likely sold was a cash-only business.

Meanwhile...

At the same time that Koehler was examining the wood of the kidnapping ladder, the police were actively tracing the ransom money.  The $50,000 that was paid on behalf of the Lindbergh family by the go-between John Condon primarily comprised $20 and $10 gold certificates.  Elmer Irey, an IRS accountant, proposed this mechanism to allow for easier tracing of the ransom money as the gold certificates were being phased out of circulation.  The remaining ransom money was $5 bills with red seals and red serial numbers.  All of the ransom money was printed in 1928, and a list of the serial numbers was sent to banks across the country.

Lindbergh kidnapping ransom money
1928 $10 gold certificate

Bills from the lot of ransom money would occasionally surface over the year and a half following its payment in 1932, most often in New York City.  On 17 Sep 1933, a man paid for 98 cents of gasoline with a $10 gold certificate at a gas station in Manhattan.  The station manager questioned the legitimacy of the bill and wrote down the man’s license plate number in its margin, in case the bank refused to deposit it.  The manager questioned the customer about the bill, who was reported to reply, “I have a hundred more just like it.”

The license plate number was traced to Bruno Richard Hauptmann, an unemployed carpenter who was pulled over for a search shortly after leaving his house in the Bronx.  When detectives found money in his wallet with serial numbers matching the ransom money, he was arrested.

The Wooden Key

Upon hearing of Hauptmann’s arrest, Koehler suggested that investigators take note of any lumber in his house that may have been used for Rail 16 as well as for any woodworking tools.  In their first search of the house, investigators found a total of $13,750 of the ransom money and an automatic revolver concealed in wooden 2×4’s in the garage; they also found a large wooden plane with a nicked blade that could have been used in the construction of the ladder.

At the time of Hauptmann’s arrest, a news article reported that he once worked odd jobs at the National Lumber and Millworker Corp in the Bronx, where Koehler had traced Rails 12 and 13.

Attic floor of Richard Hauptmann
Missing wood from Hauptmann's attic floor (Source: Dr. Regis Miller/Forest Products Laboratory)

During a second search of Hauptmann’s attic, the investigators noted that the flooring comprised 27 pieces of 1×6 North Carolina pine.  The final board on the south side was not the same length as the others, and they were able to discern that a piece approximately 8 feet long had been removed, leaving traces of saw marks and saw dust.  A sample of the remaining board and the nails that had been used to connect the board to the joist were provided to Koehler for comparison.

Koehler observed nicks in the largest knife of the plane recovered from Hauptmann’s house that produced marks exactly matching those on Rail 16 and the pine rungs of the ladder.  He concluded, “There is no question but [that] the rungs and rail were planed with that plane.”

The nails removed from the boards in Hauptmann’s attic fit into the holes in Rail 16 precisely, which lead Koehler to conclude “the board probably was removed from some of Hauptmann’s previous work either for others or for himself.”  Koehler testified before the grand jury at the Hunterdon County Courthouse in Flemington, New Jersey, to these points.  Along with testimony pertaining to the ransom note, ransom money, and various eyewitnesses, the grand jury found enough evidence to indict Hauptmann for the murder of Charles Lindbergh, Jr.

Meanwhile, Koehler continued his examination of Rail 16 in comparison to the wood removed from Hauptmann’s attic.  He and the investigators took Rail 16 to Hauptmann’s attic, where it fit snugly into the place of the missing board.  Koehler reflected that “Such a result could not happen as a mere coincidence.”  Koehler had calculated the probability of all 4 nail holes matching the joists in Hauptmann’s attic perfectly as 1/1016, and he dismissed the possibility that this was mere circumstantial evidence.

1/1016, or 1 in 10 quadrillion, is the probability of 2 people randomly picking the same word out of 110 billion average-sized books.

Finally, he compared the grain, which is the appearance of the natural rings of a tree when it has been cut lengthwise to form a board: 

It is a pattern that is always varied and yet the pattern of the grain in the ladder rail and floor board matched as perfectly as if the interrupted curving lines they plotted years ago had been etched within the tree just to be a trap for anyone who dared so to misuse wood as to form it into a kidnap ladder.

Rail 16 matched to Hauptmann's attic floor
The wood of Rail 16 matched with Wood from Hauptmann's attic (Source: Dr. Regis Miller/Forest Products Laboratory)

Every tree within itself has written all its history.  The growth in spring shows white and pithy, but in the summer the slower growth becomes, in most trees, darker tissue.  This is repeated year by year, and that is why these rings seem double and confuse those who try to say a tree is such and such an age.  Count the band of white and black as one year’s growth.  The board end of the piece of flooring that had been robbed to make a ladder showed its rings quite clear, and so did the ladder rail.  A gap of one and three-eighth inches had been trimmed off, yet the rings matched.

The Wooden Evidence

At Hauptmann’s murder trial, Koehler testified his findings regarding Rail 16, but he was challenged by one of the defense lawyers, who stated, “We say that there is no such animal known among men as an expert on wood.  That is not a science that has been recognized by the courts; that is not in a class with handwriting experts, with fingerprint experts or with ballistic experts.  That has been reduced to a science and is known and recognized by the courts.”  The judge allowed the defense council to cross-examine Koehler to ascertain the extent of his credentials.  At the end of Koehler’s lengthy exposition regarding his publications in the field of wood science, the judge confirmed he was indeed a wood expert.

Koehler provided the court with complete details regarding his examination of the kidnap ladder, in particular Rail 16’s nail holes and grain.  His xylotomical examination of the wood source and grain was essential to tying Hauptmann to the ladder used in the Lindbergh kidnapping.  Following the testimony, Koehler was lauded as “the only real detective (in the case)” by the Reading, Pennsylvania Times, and The New York Post wrote, 

The Hauptmann trial may go down in legal history less as the most sensational case of its time than as the case which brought legal recognition to the wood expert on par with handwriting, fingerprint and ballistic experts.

After 42 days of testimony from Koehler and others involved in the Lindbergh case, the jurors retired to deliberate on the verdict of Hauptmann.  Less than 12 hours later, the jury returned with a verdict of guilty.  The judge passed down a death sentence to the convicted murderer of Charles Lindbergh, Jr.  Koehler’s testimony stood up to several appeals by Hauptmann, and on 03 Apr 1936, his death sentence was carried out by electric chair.  Hauptmann never confessed to the crime and never indicated if other kidnappers were involved.

Koehler continued working as a wood identification expert but never in so sensational a trial as the Lindbergh case.  He died in his home on 16 Jul 1967 at the age of 82.  Although wood evidence continues to be valuable to forensic science, it has never again been at the forefront of a crime as in the Lindbergh kidnapping.

Night Train to Perdition, Act II

Posted on by Harley

**Contains major plot spoilers for Murder on the Orient Express .**​

See the previous post, Night Train to Perdition, Act I, for background on Murder on the Orient Express as well as a synopsis of the book.  The post you are reading will summarize some related true-crime cases, particularly the kidnap and murder of Charles Lindbergh, Jr.  As mentioned in the previous post, the setting of a railway train is particularly evocative for a mystery.  To date, no single crime has comprised all the elements from the novel, but there have been several noteworthy cases involving trains since its publication.

Maria Farcasanu

In 1935, shortly after Murder on the Orient Express was published, the body of a Romanian fashion designer named Maria Farcasanu was found near the tracks of the Orient Express in Admont, Austria.  She had been traveling from Bucharest to Paris, and her purse was discovered 5 km from the body.  Her husband stated she would have been wearing a silver fox fur stole that was not found with the body.  Although the death may have looked like a suicide or accident initially, these facts led the police to suspect foul play.

Three days following the discovery of the body, Farcasanu’s baggage was located in a check room in Basel, Switzerland, and all items of value had been removed.  Police originally suspected Trajan Theodorescu, a swindler who targeted female Orient Express passengers, but he had an alibi during Farcasanu’s trip.  Pawn brokers were asked to be on the lookout for the fox fur stole and a pricey wristwatch missing from her baggage.

Maria Farcasanu
Maria Farcasanu

Some time later, a Swiss detective name Karl Nievergelt noted a fur piece worn by a Sunday morning churchgoer.  She stated it was a gift from her Hungarian student boarder, Karl Strasser.  Strasser was arrested shortly thereafter and confessed to committing the crime for financial gain.  Initially sentenced to death, Strasser’s fate was commuted to life in prison in 1937.

Two Unsolved Cases

Within the year after the publication of Murder on the Orient Express, a man’s body was discovered in a passenger car of a train as it entered a station in Cincinnatti, Ohio.  A pair of shoes next to the body that did not belong to the man was the only clue to his mysterious death, and the crime was never solved.

In The Life and Crimes of Agatha Christie, Charles Osborne recounts the following:

On 3 May 1981, the London News of the World reported a murder in Bamberg, West Germany, which it called ‘a carbon-copy crime of Agatha Christie’s thriller, Murder on the Orient Express’.  The method by which a sixteen-year-old girl was killed certainly suggested a knowledge of the novel or the film.

Unfortunately, this writer has been unable to locate additional information about this tantalizing case and encourages the reader to make contact if he or she can provide any details.

The Big One

Undoubtedly, the most notable true-crime case associated with Murder on the Orient Express is the one that inspired it: the kidnapping and murder of the Lindbergh baby, Charles Lindbergh, Jr.  In what may be the actual Crime of the Century, the 20-month-old son of the famous aviator Charles Lindbergh and Anne Morrow (daughter of Ambassador Dwight Morrow) was kidnapped from his nursery on the evening of 01 Mar 1932.  A ransom note was found on the radiator below the window of the room and demanded $50,000 for the safe return of the baby.

Anne and Charles Lindbergh (Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

At the time of the kidnapping, Anne Morrow was 7 months’ pregnant with her second child, which Christie paralleled with Sonia Armstrong in Murder on the Orient Express.

The nation erupted.  Charles Lindbergh was one of the most famous and highly regarded individuals at the time, having been the first aviator to cross the Atlantic Ocean in 1927.  After the kidnapping, a popular song posed the questions:

Who stole the Lindbergh baby?
Was it you? Was it you?
After he crossed the ocean wide,
Was that the way to show our pride?
Was it you? Was it you? Was it you?

 Despite the Lindberghs paying the ransom, the body of young Charles Lindbergh, Jr., was found on 12 May 1932.  The extent of decomposition of the body suggested he was murdered very shortly after being kidnapped.  During autopsy, the cause of death was concluded to be “fractured skull due to external violence,” but it was never known if this violence was accidental or intentional.

Original poster circulated following the Lindbergh baby kidnapping

Prior to the Lindbergh case, kidnapping was not a federal crime.  After the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby, the US Congress passed the Lindbergh Law, which made it one.

An Inside Job?

An early theory of the police was that the kidnapping was an inside job.  The Lindberghs had begun construction on an estate in Sourland, New Jersey in 1930.  By 1932, the Lindberghs lived with Anne’s parents in Englewood, New Jersey, but spent weekends at the Sourland property.  However, the family happened to be staying at Sourland the Tuesday night of the kidnapping.  Police surmised that an inside source such as a member of the household staff may have inadvertently betrayed this to or were deliberately colluding with the kidnappers.

The police centered some of their investigation on Violet Sharp, a 28-year-old English maid.  The staff had informed the police that Sharp had a date with an unknown man on 28 Feb.  When she was interviewed on 10 Mar, the police reported Sharp was evasive and could recount no details of the man or the date.  Additionally, Sharp’s sister, Emily, returned to England shortly after the ransom money had been paid without notifying the police of her travel plans.

Sharp was interviewed 3 more times, with each subsequent interview increasingly more invasive.  The police interrogated Sharp regarding her relationships with men so forcefully that the fourth interview was cut short by an attending physician due to Sharp’s rapid pulse and high blood pressure.  The following day, the investigators returned for a final attempt to speak with Sharp.  Sharp refused to be interviewed and retreated to her bedroom with a measuring glass filled with powdered silver polish.  In her desperation, she drank the polish (cyanide chloride) and died a short time later.

A total of 18 characters in 14 of Christie’s stories and novels died from cyanide poisoning.

To date, there has been no direct evidence linking Violet Sharp to the kidnapping and murder of Charles Lindbergh, Jr.  Her travails are mirrored by the character of Susanne Michel (daughter to Pierre Michel) in Murder on the Orient Express.

Countess Andreyni (sister to Sonia Armstrong) recounted:

Poor Susanne? Yes, I had forgotten about her. The police questioned her. They were convinced she had something to do with it. Perhaps she had—but if so, only innocently. She had, I believe, chatted idly with someone, giving information as to the time of Daisy’s outings. The poor thing got terribly wrought up—she thought she was being held responsible.” She shuddered. “She threw herself out of the window. Oh it was horrible.”

Notably, Christie’s characters most directly based on individuals involved in the Lindbergh kidnapping (Susanne Michel and John, Sonia, and Daisy Armstrong) were only referenced by characters in Murder on the Orient Express and not active participants in the plot.  This may have been done by Christie out of respect for the Lindbergh family.

A Promising Lead

Although the police devoted time and resources to characterizing Violet Sharp’s romantic relationships, the most valuable clues were uncovered immediately during their investigation: the ransom note and a hand-made ladder, custom built to reach the window to Lindbergh’s nursery.  Police suspected that the ransom note left on the radiator was written by someone from Germany, given the placement of the dollar signs and the grammatical construction.

Lindbergh baby kidnap ransom note
Ransom note left in the window of Charles Lindbergh, Jr

This note and the subsequent ransom notes were helpful to secure a conviction for one kidnapper, but the smoking gun in this case was the ladder found about 70 feet from the Lindbergh estate.  

The examination of the ladder using forensic xylotomy, the tracing of the ransom money, and the conclusion of the Lindbergh case will be the focus of the next blog post.

Night Train to Perdition, Act I

Posted on by Harley

**Contains major plot spoilers for Murder on the Orient Express and a minor plot spoiler for The Double Clue.**​

 ”The impossible cannot have happened, therefore the impossible must be possible in spite of appearances.”
Hercule Poirot, Agatha Christie, Detective
Hercule Poirot

Murder on the Orient Express, written by Agatha Christie in 1933 and published the following year, is perhaps her seminal work.  It is certainly the most famous, with 2 notable feature film adaptations and references in “SCTV” and “Parks and Recreation” (to name a few).  It is easy to understand the longevity of the work: a locked room mystery set on a glamorous sleeper train wherein “a repulsive murderer has himself been repulsively, and, perhaps deservedly, murdered.”  But while the mysteries at the center of the story are neatly wrapped up by Hercule Poirot as he enacts his own interpretation of justice, fascination around the true-crime case that influenced the book persists to this day.

Christie's Train Journeys

Christie first traveled on the Orient Express in 1928, shortly after the divorce to her first husband Archie was finalized.  She had met a Commander and Mrs. Howe at a dinner party in London, and they urged the author to visit Baghdad via the Orient Express.  During this trip, Christie stayed at the Tokatlian Hotel in Constantinople before continuing on to the Middle East. It was through friends she made at an archaeological dig near Baghdad that she would meet her second husband, Max Mallowan.

Source: antiquesnavigator.com

Christie’s time at archaeological sites with Mallowan inspired her novels Murder in Mesopotamia, Appointment with Death, and Death Comes as the End.

Mallowan was a 25-year-old archaeologist at the dig at Ur the following year when Christie returned.  The pair traveled together back to England after Christie received a telegram that her daughter was ill, and they formed a close friendship.  Letters turned into visits, and Mallowan proposed marriage to the 38-year-old Christie. They were married on September 11, 1930. Christie wrote Murder on the Orient Express during her time at an archaeological dig at Arpachiyah with Mallowan in 1933.  The novel is dedicated to him, and he has been credited with originally suggesting the solution to the mystery to Christie.

As with many of her novels, Christie drew inspiration from her own experiences and observations.  Most notably, Christie’s travel via the Orient Express in December 1931 was delayed for 2 days as the result of a violent thunderstorm that had flooded the rail line.  An American woman traveling is the obvious inspiration for Mrs. Hubbard in the novel; in a letter to Mallowan, Christie notes she exclaimed,
But why aren’t they doing anything?  Why, in the States, they’d have motored some automobiles along right away – why, they’d have brought aeroplanes…
and
My daughter said I’d have no trouble at all – no trouble at all.  I’ve never travelled to Europe before and I’ll never travel in it again.
During this journey, she also encountered two Danish missionaries, a Hungarian Minister and his wife, and a Director of the Wagon Lits Company, all of whom inspired other characters in the story.

All Aboard ... for Murder

Original cover of the Murder on the Orient Express
Source: Collins Crime Club

Murder on the Orient Express is Christie’s 16th book and her 8th mystery with Hercule Poirot as the central detective.  The novel begins with Poirot returning from Syria, where he has participated in some unspecified intrigue. He arrives in Istanbul, checking into the Tokatlian Hotel (where Christie herself stayed).  After receiving a telegram recalling him to London, Poirot books passage on the Simplon-Orient Express. Surprisingly, the train is fully booked, but Poirot conveniently enlists the help of his friend M. Bouc, a director of the Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits, to secure a second-class compartment.

While at the Tokatlian Hotel, Poirot first notices a brash and despicable American traveler. Regarding the man, Poirot tells Bouc,

I could not rid myself of the impression that evil had passed me by very close.

While aboard the Orient Express, Poirot again encounters this individual, who calls himself Ratchett and attempts to enlist Poirot’s help with a series of threats he has received. Poirot refuses, telling him,

If you will forgive me for being personal—I do not like your face, M. Ratchett.

That night, Bouc offers his first-class compartment to Poirot, which is adjacent to Ratchett’s on the Calais Coach.  Shortly before 1 o’clock, Poirot wakes to a cry from the American’s compartment, followed by an explanation in French that “it was nothing.”  Poirot has also noticed that the train has been stopped for some time. An older American woman, Mrs. Hubbard, rings her bell and reports loudly that a man has been in her compartment, which is adjacent to Ratchett’s on the opposite side as Poirot’s.  Poirot asks the conductor for some mineral water and learns that the train is stuck in a snowdrift. He manages to fall asleep but is awoken later in the night with a loud knock on his compartment door; when he looks down the corridor, he sees a woman in a scarlet kimono walking away from his door.

After this eventful night, the talk in the dining car centers around the interminable delay of the train journey, until it is discovered around 10 o’clock that Ratchett has been stabbed to death.  The crime scene has several clues; in addition to the presence of the burned remains of flat matches and a piece of paper, a pipe cleaner, and a fine woman’s handkerchief embroidered with the letter “H”, the window to the compartment is open but there are no tracks in the snow, and the dead man’s watch has been stopped at 1:15.  Ratchett had been stabbed 12 times across the chest and abdomen. A Greek doctor staying in the Athens-Paris Coach, Dr. Constantine, assists with the examination of the body and states,

Image by M. Maggs from Pixabay
The blows seem to have been delivered haphazard and at random. Some have glanced off, doing hardly any damage. It is as though somebody had shut their eyes and then in a frenzy struck blinding again and again.

Poirot Investigates!

Of course, Poirot is enlisted to solve this mystery and sets about interviewing all the passengers of the Calais Coach:

  • Hector MacQueen:  Ratchett’s young American secretary, who reports functioning more as a courier since the deceased knew no foreign languages; he describes the threatening notes received by Ratchett 
  • Pierre Michel:  The Wagon Lit conductor, deeply shaken by the crime on his train
  • Edward Henry Masterman:  The English valet of the deceased, somewhat unaffected by the murder
  • Caroline Martha Hubbard:  An elderly American woman, who reports there was a man in her compartment around the time of the murder and also provides the button from a Wagon Lit conductor’s uniform that appeared in her compartment.  She later recovers the murder weapon, a bloody dagger.
  • Greta Ohlsson:  A Swedish missionary, who was the last person to see Ratchett alive after mistakenly opening his compartment door
  • Princess Natalia Dragomiroff:  An aged Russian princess, with no notable clues to report
  • Count Rudolph Andreyi:  A Hungarian nobleman with little to report from the night of the murder
  • Countess Elena Andrenyi (née Goldenberg):  The wife to the Count, who took a sleeping draught the night of the murder
  • Colonel John Arbuthnot:  An English military officer, recently serving in India, who spoke with Hector MacQueen until nearly 2 o’clock the night of the murder
  • Cyrus Hardman:  Traveling as a typewriting ribbon salesman, he reveals he is a detective from McNeil’s Detective Agency in New York enlisted by Ratchett for his protection.  According to Hardman, the deceased man said he feared a small dark man with a womanish voice.
  • Antonio Foscarelli:  An Italian automobile salesman based in the United States
  • Mary Debenham:  An English governess previously working in Baghdad, who reports seeing the woman in the scarlet kimono but denies that it was her
  • Hildegarde Schmidt:  The German maid to Princess Dragomiroff; she states she encountered a Wagon Lit conductor who was not Pierre Michel and was a small dark man with a womanish voice.  She also seems to recognize the handkerchief found in the deceased man’s compartment.
Image by Goran Horvat from Pixabay

Additionally, Poirot manages to ascertain the identity of the murdered man using the burned note fragment at the crime scene and some hat boxes.  Ratchett was in truth the notorious American criminal, Cassetti, who was responsible for the kidnapping and murder of Daisy Armstrong. Daisy was the daughter of Colonel and Sonia Armstrong; she was abducted from the family’s home with a ransom demand for $200,000.  After the ransom was paid, Daisy’s body was found, and it was evident that she had been dead for some time.

Mrs. Armstrong was pregnant at the time and gave premature birth to a still-born child; the mother died during childbirth. Colonel Armstrong, devastated at these compounded losses, died by suicide.  Furthermore, Daisy’s French nursemaid, Susanne, was suspected of assisting in the crime and also died by suicide, though her innocence was subsequently proven. Cassetti was apprehended and charged with the crime, but due to his wealth and connections, he was acquitted on a technicality. He escaped from America.  Christie drew obvious inspiration from the kidnapping and murder of Charles Lindbergh, Jr, which occurred the year before she wrote the novel.

Through his inquiries, Poirot manages to prove a connection between each of the passengers and the Armstrong case.  In a stunning denouement, he reveals two potential solutions to the passengers when they are assembled in the dining car later in the day following the murder.  

The first solution is that a stranger boarded the train after it departed Stamboul and used a Wagon Lits conductor uniform and pass key to enter Ratchett’s compartment–these items had been found in the luggage of Hildegard Schmidt during a search of the Calais coach.  The stranger stabbed Ratchett and escaped into Mrs. Hubbard’s compartment, which is supported by Mrs. Hubbard sensing a man in her compartment and finding the missing button of the Wagon Lits conductor uniform. The stranger then escaped the train before it departed from the last station; the inconsistency in the time of the crime versus Ratchett’s watch may be explained by the deceased forgetting to adjust his watch when entering the Central European Time Zone.

Image by S. Hermann & F. Richter from Pixabay

One notable reveal by Poirot is that the “H” on the handkerchief is from the Cyrillic alphabet, corresponding to an “N” in the Latin alphabet, and therefore belongs to Natalia Dragomiroff. A similar device is used in Christie’s short story The Double Clue as well as in Season 11, Episode 11 of Murder, She Wrote (“An Egg to Die For”).

Several of the passengers (most vociferously M. Bouc and Dr. Constantine) note that this explanation fails to account for several small details of the crime.  Poirot then recounts his second–and correct–solution. Every passenger in the Calais Coach on the night of the murder, save himself, had some connection to the Armstrong case.  Conspiring together with Mrs. Hubbard–mother to Sonia Armstrong–as the ringleader, they decided to carry out a death sentence on the criminal during this journey on the Simplon-Orient Express.  Twelve passengers (with the Count Andreyni standing in for his wife, Sonia Armstrong’s sister) stabbed Cassetti after Masterman had drugged his sleeping draft; like a firing squad, the death could not be ascribed to any one participant.

Faced with the two possible solutions, Poirot allows Bouc to decide which will ultimately be reported to the Yugoslavian authorities.  The Director elects the former solution of a stranger boarding the train to commit the murder. Poirot accedes and “has the honour to retire from the case.”

Reception and Film Adaptations

Murder on the Orient Express remains one of Christie’s most popular works and has been present in the zeitgeist since its publication.  The novel has been adapted into 2 noteworthy feature films. While the 1974 version is fairly loyal to the source material, the 2017 version departs quite a bit and will not be further discussed.

Following the Miss Marple films released in the 1960s, Christie was hesitant to grant the film rights for any more of her work.  It required some delicate finagling by Lord Louis Mountbatten, a naval hero and father-in-law to British film producer John Bradbourne.  Eighteen months later, Christie granted the film rights to EMI. The resulting film, directed by Sidney Lumet, has an all-star cast and employed genuine Orient Express train cars on loan from the Compagnie Internationale des Wagon-lits Museum in France.  At the age of eighty-four, Christie attended the movie premiere and appreciated the film. The adaptation became the highest grossing British film for a time.

Murder on the Orient Express (1974) film poster

While it is certainly an enjoyable–if improbable–story, part of the endurability of Murder on the Orient Express must be credited to the contemporary true-crime tale of the kidnapping and murder of Charles Lindbergh’s child.  The original Crime of the Century parallels the tragic story of Daisy Armstrong and will be explored (in addition to some other related true-crime stories) in the next post.

The next two blog posts will explore the kidnapping of Charles Lindbergh, Jr, (Act II) and forensic xylotomy (Act III).

Dressed to the Strychnines, Act III

Posted on by Harley

**Contains major plot spoilers for The Mysterious Affair at Styles.**

See the previous post Dressed to the Strychnines, Act I for a summary of the creation of Agatha Christie’s first novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, as well as a synopsis of the book; see Dressed to the Strychnines, Act II for an in-depth description of strychnine poisoning in the context of Christie’s first novel.  The post you are reading will describe the history behind the legal concept of double jeopardy in England and the United Kingdom.

Double Sin

In addition to the poisoning discussed previously, another clever feature of The Mysterious Affair at Styles planned by the criminals but ultimately foiled by Hercule Poirot was the use of double jeopardy to prevent one of the criminals (Alfred Inglethorp) from receiving justice.  The plan, somewhat ill conceived, was for Alfred to be arrested for his wife’s murder and brought to trial, at which point he would produce a witness who would provide his alibi.  This would result in his acquittal without the possibility of a second trial due to the legal principle of double jeopardy.  This seems a very risky strategy, as was clearly shown by Poirot’s uncovering of multiple alibi witnesses before Alfred’s arrest.  Had the police uncovered such witnesses, Alfred would never have been arrested and therefore not brought to trial.

In the United States, double jeopardy is prohibited by the 5th amendment to the constitution, which states “[N]or shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb.”  In England, double jeopardy was part of the common law for centuries and was formalized after the US constitution was ratified.

Origin in Antiquity

The notion that a person should not be punished twice for the same crime was proffered as early as Ancient Greece, with the Greek orator Demosthenes stating in 355 BCE that “the laws forbid the same man to be tried twice on the same issue, be it a civil action, a scrutiny, a contested claim, or anything else of the sort.”  Even in antiquity, pleaders (precursors for barristers in the UK) sought loopholes to reopen cases upon which courts had already ruled.  In Ancient Rome, The Digest of Justinian, which was a collection of writings of the contemporary Roman legal system in 533 AD, asserted that “[t]he governor must not allow a man to be charged with the same offenses of which he has already been acquitted” and that “a person cannot be charged on account of the same crime under several statutes.”  In addition, double jeopardy was a component of Ancient Jewish law cited in the Talmud.

Pleaders have no direct corollary in the US legal system but can be thought of as legal scholars, counselors, or advocates. 

Double Jeopardy in the UK

In English history, the first recorded instance of the use of double jeopardy was in 1201.  Goscelin, the son of Walter, sought punishment via appeal against Adam de Rupe for killing Goscelin’s brother, Ailnoth.  Adam’s defense consisted of stating that Alinoth’s wife had previously brought an appeal against him for the same crime, and during that trial, “he withdrew quit therin by judgment of the lord king’s court,” ie, he was acquitted.  In Goscelin’s appeal, the court recognized this previous acquittal and also cited the fact that Goscelin was in Ireland at the time of the killing and could therefore bring no new evidence to the court.

There are three theories as to how the notion of double jeopardy was introduced into British common law: that the principle was carried over from the continent, that it arose following the disagreement between Thomas Becket and King Henry I, or that it was merely a logical progression of the law.

A Normandy Import

The first theory suggests that double jeopardy immigrated to England following the Norman conquest in 1066.  After William the Conqueror’s victory, the principle might have been introduced in England along with the other canon laws from the continent.  This theory also posits that during the process of developing common law around this time, legal scholars applied concepts from Roman law that might have been discussed during their training in the church as most common law judges were members of the clergy.

Agatha Christie, Double Jeopardy, William the Conqueror
The Norman fleet arriving at Pevensey, depicted in the Bayeux Tapestry (© Rolf Richardson / Alamy Stock Photo)

The Murder at the Cathedral

The second theory is appropriately enmeshed in an important historical murder.  After the Norman conquest, William the Conqueror appointed the Italian lawyer and theological scholar Lanfranc to be the Archbishop of Canterbury, who at the time was the head of the Catholic Church in England.  At William’s encouragement, Lanfranc established a system of ecclesiastical churches that were regarded equally with the royal courts and prosecuted all criminal and civil cases in which a cleric was accused.  This series of events can be viewed as recompense to the Pope by William for supporting his conquest of England.

After William the Conqueror’s death in 1087, a gulf began to form between the Church and the King.  This conflict culminated in the 12th century, when King Henry I moved to regain legal power from the Church, now led by Archbishop Thomas Becket.  Specifically, the King wanted the royal court to have jurisdiction over clerics who committed secular crimes.  Becket argued that such individuals could not be brought to trial in the royal courts after being convicted in the ecclesiastical courts because it would violate the maxim “nec enim Deus iudicat bis in idipsum” (for God judges not twice the same thing).  With neither man willing to compromise, the conflict escalated, and Becket fled to France. After a few years a fragile truce was reached, and Becket returned to England in 1170. Later that year, Becket began excommunicating clergymen appointed by King Henry. Upon hearing the news, Henry was reported to ask “What miserable drones and traitors have I nourished and brought up in my household, who let their lord be treated with such shameful contempt by a low-born cleric?” Shortly thereafter, four of Henry’s knights brutally murdered Becket in the Canterbury Cathedral on 29 December 1170, slicing off his priestly crown and the top of his head with it.

T. S. Eliot’s play, Murder in the Cathedral, is about the assassination of Thomas Becket. The play includes verses inspired by The Musgrave Ritual, a Sherlock Holmes story: 

Who shall have it?
He who will come.
What shall be the month?
The last from the first.
What shall we give for it?
Pretence of priestly power.
Why should we give it?
For the power and the glory. 

Thomas Becket, Agatha Christie
Getty Images

Although Henry was victorious over the late Archbishop, the changes in the law were short lived.  In 1176, the King reversed the constitutional provision that permitted a cleric to be further punished in the royal court, possibly due to Becket’s martyrdom and subsequent canonization as well as the persuasion from many of the royal judges, who were bishops and archdeacons.  At this point, a strong precedent for double jeopardy would have been established.

Saint Thomas Becket (original source unknown)

Origination Unknown

The final theory on the origin of double jeopardy in English law suggest that it was a slow, natural progression without any influence from Roman law, which could have been enacted formally at any time.  Its proponents offer as evidence that there were numerous exceptions to the rule during the first 500 years of English law.  Furthermore, a case in 1203 (very soon after the showdown between Thomas Becket and King Henry I) is described as possibly violating the principle of double jeopardy.  Following the trial of Reiner Reid for assaulting another man and cutting off his fingers, wherein Reid paid the victim 10 marks, the wronged man (surname Jordan) raised a civil appeal charging Reid with the same crime.  Reid’s defense cited the double jeopardy principle, but given that all appeals were tried in the civil courts at the time and double jeopardy only applied to criminal offenses, it was a moot point.

Any of these three theories (or a combination thereof) would be plausible to explain the origin of double jeopardy in England.  By the 16th century, a formal legal document by Sir William Staunford presented the pleas of autrefoits acquit (a former acquittal) and autrefoits convict (a former conviction) as legal principles.  In the latter half of the 17th century, the Court of King’s Bench expanded the protection afforded by double jeopardy; the Court established that a prosecutor could not raise new charges for the same crime after an acquittal and that exceptions could not be granted even if a writ of error was issued for the case.  (Typically, a second proceeding was allowed when a conviction was reversed due to a writ of error.)  In the second half of the 18th century, Sir William Blackstone, a notable legal scholar, asserted that the principle that “no man is to be brought into jeopardy of his life, more than once for the same offence” is “a universal maxim of the common law.”  In contrast to the law eventually adopted in the US, in England the scope of double jeopardy was narrow and only applied to capital cases, ie, those punishable by death.

During this time, the Court of King’s Bench also prohibited the practice frequently used by trial judges of excusing the jury when an acquittal was imminent to provide the prosecutor the opportunity to bring a stronger case in a new trial.

Back to Styles

At the time of Alfred Inglethorp’s trial—in the late 1910s had it transpired as the criminals intended—he would have been exonerated by an alibi witness and would have been protected by double jeopardy, as the murder of his wife was a capital offense.  Provided that Poirot and the police did not uncover any substantial new evidence and appeal to the courts, Inglethorp would not have been able to be tried for his wife’s murder.  In addition to the manipulation of chemistry, this scheme to exploit the English legal system is further evidence of the ingenuity of the criminals, which of course is no match for Poirot’s order and method.

Cards on the Table

After numerous campaigns by victims’ families and advocacy groups, the double jeopardy law in the United Kingdom was overturned in 2005 for serious crimes, such as murder, rape, and war crimes.  In order to bring an acquitted defendant back to trial for the same crime, a sufficient amount of reliable and new evidence not available at the time of the original trial must be presented.

This change in the law arose in part due to the case of Stephen Lawrence, who was murdered in 1993 at the age of 18 by a group of racist men.  During the first trial the subjects were acquitted, but Sir William MacPherson, a retired high court judge, released a report in 1999 that documented the institutional racism present in the Metropolitan Police during their investigation of the crime.  The report also recommended that the guarantee of protection against double jeopardy be re-evaluated. 

After the change in the law, the chief subjects were again brought to trial in 2011.  Early the following year, they were found guilty.  Several other investigations have been reopened in cases where acquittals were previously reached.  Given the storied history of double jeopardy, this recent change would no doubt have inspired Agatha Christie to formulate another clever mystery plot.

Coming Soon...

The next blog post series will examine one of Christie’s most famous and enduring works—Murder on the Orient Express—in the context of one of the most illustrious crimes of the 20th century—the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby.

If you have any questions or contributions, please comment below or email me at [email protected].