Lord William Russell (aristocrat)
Encyclopedia
Lord William Russell a member of the British aristocratic family of Russell and longtime Member of Parliament
, did little to attract public attention after the end of his political career until, in 1840, he was murdered in his sleep by his valet.
, eldest son of John Russell, 4th Duke of Bedford
. He was the youngest brother of Francis Russell, 5th Duke of Bedford
, and John Russell, 6th Duke of Bedford
, and uncle of Francis Russell, 7th Duke of Bedford
.
Russell married Lady Charlotte Villiers, eldest daughter of George Bussy Villiers, 4th Earl of Jersey, on 11 July 1789; they had seven children. Lady Charlotte died in 1808. As was mentioned in evidence at the trial of his murderer, Russell had a locket containing some of his wife's hair, which he valued greatly.
The Times
, reporting on proceedings where Russell's eligibility to register as a voter in Middlesex and Surrey was challenged in 1836, included the information that he spent much time abroad, living in hotels when in England. However, by 1840 Lord William was residing in the London house where he was murdered.
(who was Colonial Secretary
at the time of the murder), Lord William was a Whig
politician.
Russell represented the county of Surrey
in the House of Commons
from 1789 until he was defeated in the 1807 election
. Russell held junior ministerial office in the Ministry of all the Talents
, being appointed a Lord of the Admiralty in 1806 and retaining the post until the fall of the ministry in 1807.
Russell, taking advantage of the fact that different constituencies polled on different dates, remained in Parliament by being elected for the Russell family pocket borough of Tavistock
. He represented that constituency from 1807 until he stood down in 1819, and again from 1826 until he retired from Parliament in 1831.
Lord William continued to support the Whig Party after he left the legislature. The Times reported in 1837 that few Whigs supported the government at the Great Middlesex Meeting, "inasmuch as not a man of them, barring the young Lord who had taken the chair, and his aged uncle Lord William Russell, ever showed fight at all".
The police, however, came quickly to the conclusion that the "robbery" had been staged in order to draw suspicion away from some member of the household. Numerous small gold and silver articles, as well as a ten-pound
banknote
, were found to be missing; some of the articles were soon discovered wrapped in a parcel inside the house, which was curious – a thief would have carried them off straightaway rather than leave them behind. The discovery of several more gold articles, as well as the banknote, hidden in the wainscoting and in Courvoisier's pantry cemented their suspicion of the valet. Additionally, a screwdriver
in his possession was found to match the marks on the pantry door as well as marks left by the forcing of the silverware
drawer.
Courvoisier was put on trial, but the question was whether his guilt could be conclusively proved. His counsel, Charles Phillips, was doing well on the paucity of evidence, and had actually hinted at the guilt of a maidservant in the house, when an inventory indicated that several further items of silverware were missing, and silver matching their description was located in a French hotel in Leicester Square
.
This report was conveyed to Courvoisier by his barrister, and he immediately confessed to both the thefts and the murder. Phillips asked his client if he now planned to change his plea from not guilty to guilty. Courvoisier insisted on maintaining the not guilty plea, and said he expected Phillips to continue the defence on that basis. The legal interest in the case arises from Phillips' approach to the judge for guidance. He was forcefully told he could not ask for such advice, so he continued the defence, knowing that his client was guilty and trying to blame the maid for the crime. It led to considerable public criticism of Phillips after the trial.
It emerged in Courvoisier's confession that Russell had discovered his silverware thefts and ordered Courvoisier to resign from the household. Rather than lose his position, Courvoisier decided to conceal the matter by murdering Russell.
Courvoisier had reportedly read William Harrison Ainsworth
's novel Jack Sheppard
in the days leading up to the crime, and several news reports implied that the novel's glorification of criminal life had led him to commit the murder. However, the concept was not pursued in Courvoisier's court defence.
Courvoisier was publicly hanged outside Newgate Prison
on 6 July 1840. Charles Dickens
was among the estimated crowd of 40,000 who attended; he wrote afterwards "I came away that morning with a disgust for murder, but it was for the murder I saw done ... I feel myself shamed and degraded at the brutal curiosity that took me to that spot." Also present was the novelist William Makepeace Thackeray
, who subsequently wrote an anti-capital punishment essay, On Going to See a Man Hanged.
Soon afterwards the murder scene was portrayed in a peep-show at a travelling fair.
Member of Parliament
A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
, did little to attract public attention after the end of his political career until, in 1840, he was murdered in his sleep by his valet.
Life
Russell was the posthumous child of Francis Russell, Marquess of TavistockFrancis Russell, Marquess of Tavistock
Francis Russell, Marquess of Tavistock was a British politician and the eldest son of the 4th Duke of Bedford....
, eldest son of John Russell, 4th Duke of Bedford
John Russell, 4th Duke of Bedford
John Russell, 4th Duke of Bedford KG, PC, FRS was an 18th century British statesman. He was the fourth son of Wriothesley Russell, 2nd Duke of Bedford, by his wife, Elizabeth, daughter and heiress of John Howland of Streatham, Surrey...
. He was the youngest brother of Francis Russell, 5th Duke of Bedford
Francis Russell, 5th Duke of Bedford
Francis Russell, 5th Duke of Bedford was an English aristocrat and Whig politician, responsible for much of the development of central Bloomsbury.-Life:...
, and John Russell, 6th Duke of Bedford
John Russell, 6th Duke of Bedford
John Russell, 6th Duke of Bedford KG, PC, LLD, FSA , known as Lord John Russell until 1802, was a British Whig politician and notably served as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland in the Ministry of All the Talents...
, and uncle of Francis Russell, 7th Duke of Bedford
Francis Russell, 7th Duke of Bedford
Francis Russell, 7th Duke of Bedford KG, PC , styled Marquess of Tavistock from 1802 to 1839, was a British peer and Whig politician.-Background and education:...
.
Russell married Lady Charlotte Villiers, eldest daughter of George Bussy Villiers, 4th Earl of Jersey, on 11 July 1789; they had seven children. Lady Charlotte died in 1808. As was mentioned in evidence at the trial of his murderer, Russell had a locket containing some of his wife's hair, which he valued greatly.
The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
, reporting on proceedings where Russell's eligibility to register as a voter in Middlesex and Surrey was challenged in 1836, included the information that he spent much time abroad, living in hotels when in England. However, by 1840 Lord William was residing in the London house where he was murdered.
Political career
As with many members of the Russell family, notably his nephew the future Prime Minister Lord John RussellJohn Russell, 1st Earl Russell
John Russell, 1st Earl Russell, KG, GCMG, PC , known as Lord John Russell before 1861, was an English Whig and Liberal politician who served twice as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom in the mid-19th century....
(who was Colonial Secretary
Secretary of State for War and the Colonies
The Secretary of State for War and the Colonies was a British cabinet level position responsible for the army and the British colonies . The Department was created in 1801...
at the time of the murder), Lord William was a Whig
British Whig Party
The Whigs were a party in the Parliament of England, Parliament of Great Britain, and Parliament of the United Kingdom, who contested power with the rival Tories from the 1680s to the 1850s. The Whigs' origin lay in constitutional monarchism and opposition to absolute rule...
politician.
Russell represented the county of Surrey
Surrey (UK Parliament constituency)
Surrey was a constituency of the House of Commons of the Parliament of England then of the Parliament of Great Britain from 1707 to 1800 and of the Parliament of the United Kingdom from 1801 to 1832. It was represented by two Members of Parliament until 1832....
in the House of Commons
British House of Commons
The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, which also comprises the Sovereign and the House of Lords . Both Commons and Lords meet in the Palace of Westminster. The Commons is a democratically elected body, consisting of 650 members , who are known as Members...
from 1789 until he was defeated in the 1807 election
United Kingdom general election, 1807
The election to the 4th Parliament of the United Kingdom in 1807 was the third general election to be held after the Union of Great Britain and Ireland....
. Russell held junior ministerial office in the Ministry of all the Talents
Ministry of All the Talents
The Ministry of All the Talents was a national unity government formed by William Wyndham Grenville, 1st Baron Grenville on his appointment as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom on 11 February 1806 after the death of William Pitt the Younger...
, being appointed a Lord of the Admiralty in 1806 and retaining the post until the fall of the ministry in 1807.
Russell, taking advantage of the fact that different constituencies polled on different dates, remained in Parliament by being elected for the Russell family pocket borough of Tavistock
Tavistock (UK Parliament constituency)
Tavistock was the name of a parliamentary constituency in Devon between 1330 and 1974. Until 1885 it was a parliamentary borough, consisting solely of the town of Tavistock; it returned two Members of Parliament to the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom until 1868, when its...
. He represented that constituency from 1807 until he stood down in 1819, and again from 1826 until he retired from Parliament in 1831.
Lord William continued to support the Whig Party after he left the legislature. The Times reported in 1837 that few Whigs supported the government at the Great Middlesex Meeting, "inasmuch as not a man of them, barring the young Lord who had taken the chair, and his aged uncle Lord William Russell, ever showed fight at all".
Death and investigation
On the morning of 6 May 1840 Russell's housemaid, Sarah Mancer, discovered the lower floors of the house in disarray. Fearing that a robbery had taken place in the night, she went to the room of the valet, François Benjamin Courvoisier, and found him already dressed. Upon seeing the state of the house, he agreed that a robbery must have occurred; Courvoisier and Mancer then went to Russell's bedchamber, where Courvoisier immediately began to open the shutters, as he always did. Thus it was Mancer who first noticed that Russell was dead; his throat had been cut. The police were summoned; Courvoisier drew their attention to marks of violence upon the door to his pantry, asserting that this was where the robbers had entered the house.The police, however, came quickly to the conclusion that the "robbery" had been staged in order to draw suspicion away from some member of the household. Numerous small gold and silver articles, as well as a ten-pound
Pound sterling
The pound sterling , commonly called the pound, is the official currency of the United Kingdom, its Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, British Antarctic Territory and Tristan da Cunha. It is subdivided into 100 pence...
banknote
Banknote
A banknote is a kind of negotiable instrument, a promissory note made by a bank payable to the bearer on demand, used as money, and in many jurisdictions is legal tender. In addition to coins, banknotes make up the cash or bearer forms of all modern fiat money...
, were found to be missing; some of the articles were soon discovered wrapped in a parcel inside the house, which was curious – a thief would have carried them off straightaway rather than leave them behind. The discovery of several more gold articles, as well as the banknote, hidden in the wainscoting and in Courvoisier's pantry cemented their suspicion of the valet. Additionally, a screwdriver
Screwdriver
A screwdriver is a tool for driving screws and often rotating other machine elements with the mating drive system. The screwdriver is made up of a head or tip, which engages with a screw, a mechanism to apply torque by rotating the tip, and some way to position and support the screwdriver...
in his possession was found to match the marks on the pantry door as well as marks left by the forcing of the silverware
Silver (household)
Household silver or silverware includes dishware, cutlery and other household items made of sterling, Britannia or Sheffield plate silver. The term is often extended to items made of stainless steel...
drawer.
Courvoisier was put on trial, but the question was whether his guilt could be conclusively proved. His counsel, Charles Phillips, was doing well on the paucity of evidence, and had actually hinted at the guilt of a maidservant in the house, when an inventory indicated that several further items of silverware were missing, and silver matching their description was located in a French hotel in Leicester Square
Leicester Square
Leicester Square is a pedestrianised square in the West End of London, England. The Square lies within an area bound by Lisle Street, to the north; Charing Cross Road, to the east; Orange Street, to the south; and Whitcomb Street, to the west...
.
This report was conveyed to Courvoisier by his barrister, and he immediately confessed to both the thefts and the murder. Phillips asked his client if he now planned to change his plea from not guilty to guilty. Courvoisier insisted on maintaining the not guilty plea, and said he expected Phillips to continue the defence on that basis. The legal interest in the case arises from Phillips' approach to the judge for guidance. He was forcefully told he could not ask for such advice, so he continued the defence, knowing that his client was guilty and trying to blame the maid for the crime. It led to considerable public criticism of Phillips after the trial.
It emerged in Courvoisier's confession that Russell had discovered his silverware thefts and ordered Courvoisier to resign from the household. Rather than lose his position, Courvoisier decided to conceal the matter by murdering Russell.
Courvoisier had reportedly read William Harrison Ainsworth
William Harrison Ainsworth
William Harrison Ainsworth was an English historical novelist born in Manchester. He trained as a lawyer, but the legal profession held no attraction for him. While completing his legal studies in London he met the publisher John Ebers, at that time manager of the King's Theatre, Haymarket...
's novel Jack Sheppard
Jack Sheppard (novel)
Jack Sheppard is a novel by William Harrison Ainsworth serially published in Bentley's Miscellany from 1839 to 1840, with illustrations by George Cruikshank...
in the days leading up to the crime, and several news reports implied that the novel's glorification of criminal life had led him to commit the murder. However, the concept was not pursued in Courvoisier's court defence.
Courvoisier was publicly hanged outside Newgate Prison
Newgate Prison
Newgate Prison was a prison in London, at the corner of Newgate Street and Old Bailey just inside the City of London. It was originally located at the site of a gate in the Roman London Wall. The gate/prison was rebuilt in the 12th century, and demolished in 1777...
on 6 July 1840. Charles Dickens
Charles Dickens
Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...
was among the estimated crowd of 40,000 who attended; he wrote afterwards "I came away that morning with a disgust for murder, but it was for the murder I saw done ... I feel myself shamed and degraded at the brutal curiosity that took me to that spot." Also present was the novelist William Makepeace Thackeray
William Makepeace Thackeray
William Makepeace Thackeray was an English novelist of the 19th century. He was famous for his satirical works, particularly Vanity Fair, a panoramic portrait of English society.-Biography:...
, who subsequently wrote an anti-capital punishment essay, On Going to See a Man Hanged.
Soon afterwards the murder scene was portrayed in a peep-show at a travelling fair.
Further reading
- The Parliaments of England by Henry Stooks Smith (1st edition published in three volumes 1844-50), second edition edited (in one volume) by F.W.S. Craig (Political Reference Publications 1973) out of copyright
- The TimesThe TimesThe Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
, 29 October 1836 (Middlesex registration), 1 November 1836 (Surrey registration) and 26 January 1837 (Great Middlesex Meeting). - David Mellinkoff, The Conscience of a Lawyer (St. Paul, Minnesota: West Publishing, Co., 1973), 304p. A study of the legal problems facing Courvoisier's barrister, Charles Phillips, in the defence of his client.
- Michael Diamond, Victorian Sensation, (Anthem Press, 2003) ISBN 1-84331-150-X, pp. 154–158. An account of Courvoisier's trial.
- Herbert Candy, "Old Haslemere", The Gentleman's MagazineThe Gentleman's MagazineThe Gentleman's Magazine was founded in London, England, by Edward Cave in January 1731. It ran uninterrupted for almost 200 years, until 1922. It was the first to use the term "magazine" for a periodical...
, Vol CCLXXVI, January–June 1894, p 208
External links
- Information on the case in The Newgate CalendarThe Newgate CalendarThe Newgate Calendar, subtitled The Malefactors' Bloody Register, was a popular work of improving literature in the 18th and 19th centuries....
- Information on the case in The TabletThe TabletThe Tablet is a Catholic international weekly review published in London. Contributors to its pages have included Evelyn Waugh, Graham Greene, Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Paul VI ....