History of Hertfordshire - Crime and Criminals

Crime and Criminals

King Stephen held court at St Albans in 1143. He arrested Geoffrey de Mandeville, who held shrievalty of London, Middlesex and Hertfordshire from the pretender Empress Matilda. De Mandeville surrendered his castles, including the one he had recently built at South Mimms, and went on to become a noted outlaw and bandit.

In one of the last witch trials recorded, Jane Wenham, of Walkern, was convicted of witchcraft in 1712. The accused was over the age of 70 at the time. Queen Anne pardoned Wenham, who "lived on in a cottage at Gilston". In 1751, John and Ruth Osborne of Gubblecot, Tring, were accused of witchcraft. A mob dragged them through the village pond until Ruth drowned. One Thomas Colley, a chimney sweep and apparently the ringleader, was hanged; but the people disapproved of the hanging and did not come to watch.

There are records for Hitchin court from the 17th century. William Bogdani wrote in 1744:

... these Hitchiners are the most litigious people on earth, and most of them pretty rich, so that whenever I have attempted a distress they removed the cause to a superior court, where you may believe it is not worth my while to try it for the value of perhaps a 10 shilling or 20 shilling amercement.

In 1783 the vestry organised a watch to "put a stop to the daring robberies almost nightly committed in or near the town."

Also in the late 18th Century, Hertford's branch of Woolworth's (now closed) was formerly an inn called the Maiden Head. From this inn, Walter Clibborn, the "murderous pie man of Hertford", operated. He pretended to be deaf, so that people would talk freely while he moved among them selling pies, overhearing their destinations and the location of their valuables; and, with his sons who blackened their faces, would ambush them later that night. Clibborn was shot dead in 1782 by one George North on the Datchworth to Branfield road.

In 1823, the murder of William Weare in Radlett became known as the first trial by newspaper. The murderer, who was the Mayor of Norwich's son John Thurtell, a notorious gambler, pleaded that the sensational newspaper coverage had prejudiced the court against him. It only took 20 minutes of deliberations for the jury to sentence him to death by hanging. The crowds that gathered for the trial were so large that the judge had trouble getting to the courthouse through the gridlocked streets, and about 15,000 people attended the hanging itself.

The murder of Mercy Nicholls in Railway Street, Hertford, in 1899, ultimately led to a major re-organisation of Hertfordshire's police force.