How Sherlock creator helped clear an innocent man of murder
The story of how Sir Arthur Conan Doyle applied Holmes’ famous method of detection to the extraordinary case of Oscar Slater is now the subject of a book
WITH his deerstalker hat, briar pipe and extraordinary powers of observation, Sherlock Holmes reigns as the world’s most famous fictional detective.
Since his first appearance in print 130 years ago the sleuth of Baker Street has been immortalised in books, movies and television, never encountering a mystery he could not solve.
Yet his creator, writer Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, was proudest of using Holmes’ style of deductive reasoning to solve real-life crimes in the era before forensics.
One of his greatest, longforgotten cases – helping to free a man wrongly convicted of murder – is in a gripping new book Conan Doyle For The Defence by Margalit Fox to be published in June.
“The case will remain immortal in the classics of crime as the supreme example of official incompetence and obstinacy,” said an outraged Conan Doyle after investigating the murder and uncovering a gross miscarriage of justice.
The drama unfolded on December 21, 1908, when 82-year-old Scottish spinster Marion Gilchrist was found battered to death in the Glasgow flat where she had lived for 30 years. Her body lay sprawled across the dining room floor, her skull shattered. Her papers were strewn around and a valuable diamond brooch was missing.
Conan Doyle called it: “As brutal and callous a crime as has ever been recorded in those black annals in which the criminologist finds the materials for his study.”
Oscar Slater, a suspected pimp, conman and gambler, fled to America days after the slaying. Having tried to sell a pawn ticket for a diamond brooch before departing Scotland, the 36-year-old German seemed like a prime suspect. Scotland Yard ordered his extradition and Slater returned voluntarily, apparently confident that a fair trial would prove his innocence.
The key witnesses were housemaid Helen Lambie, 21, and Mary Barrowman, 14. While Lambie, who found her mistress’s body, admitted she hadn’t seen the killer’s face she claimed to recognise his distinctive walk, which matched Slater’s gait. Barrowman also glimpsed a man running from Gilchrist’s street on the night of the murder.
SLATER vaguely matched witnesses’ descriptions of the man fleeing the scene: tall, thin, clean-shaven but that hardly narrowed it down.
Prosecutors savaged Slater’s character and he was quickly convicted in the High Court in Edinburgh by a Scottish jury of 15, of whom nine voted for “guilty”, five for “not proven” and one for “not guilty”. In an English court this would have necessitated a retrial but not in Scotland.
“I know nothing about the affair, absolutely nothing!” cried Slater from the dock. Unmoved, Judge Lord Guthrie donned his black cap and sentenced him to be hanged from the neck until dead.
Outraged at the prosecution’s character assassination of Slater and the deeply divided jury, public outcry was swift, prompting a secret royal pardon that saw Slater’s death sentence commuted to life imprisonment.
But Conan Doyle, who had tried applying Holmes’ logical thinking to other real-life criminal cases, decided that an investigation was needed to exonerate Slater. It was to be his greatest case. The brooch that Slater had pawned turned out to belong to a lady friend and was not the one stolen from Gilchrist. It became clear that witnesses, including the spinster’s housemaid, had been coached by police in what to say.
Outrageously, Barrowman and Lambie were shown photos of Slater before being asked by police to identify him as the killer. Slater’s trip to America was found to have been planned months ahead and was not a desperate escape. None of his clothing matched witnesses’ descriptions of the killer or carried any traces of blood.
Conan Doyle interviewed new witnesses, hunted for fresh evidence and even paid some of Slater’s lawyers’ fees. He published the results of his investigations: The Case Of Oscar Slater.
Raging that he was “morally certain that justice was not done”, Conan Doyle wrote: “There is really no single point of connection between the crime and the alleged criminal.”
He branded the injustice “a serious scandal if this man be allowed upon such evidence to spend his life in a convict prison”.
Conan Doyle’s exposé inflamed public indignation at the verdict yet prosecutors refused a retrial, and for 18 long years Slater languished in Peterhead prison.
Distraught, Slater wrote again to Conan Doyle, in a letter smuggled out of prison, begging for help. The author did not fail him. He contacted high-society friends and politicians, made public speeches, and prompted a book by Glasgow writer William Park, which echoed Conan Doyle’s conclusion that Gilchrist must have known her killer and invited him into her home.
At Conan Doyle’s urging Labour Party leader Ramsay MacDonald wrote to the Scottish Secretary pleading for Slater: “The Scottish legal authorities strove for his conviction by influencing witnesses and withholding evidence.”
Witnesses who testified against Slater came forward to confess they had been coached by police into identifying the suspect and in 1927 Slater was finally released by the Scottish Secretary of State.
Ultimately cleared of all charges he was awarded £6,000 in compensation – around £350,000 today. But who was the real killer?
All the evidence pointed towards Gilchrist’s own wealthy relations who pressured police into framing Slater. Two likely suspects stood out.
Wingate Birrell was her nephew and a known criminal, secretly engaged to her maid, Lambie, who could have let him into the flat.
However, Glasgow police officer John Trench claimed that the killer was Dr Francis Charteris, a relative of Gilchrist’s with a plausible motive for murder.
POLICE had wondered why only a diamond brooch had been stolen from Gilchrist when other expensive jewellery had been left untouched, yet her personal papers were ransacked and scattered about her flat.
Charteris was related to Gilchrist’s niece, who was originally the heir to the spinster’s £80,000 fortune, worth about £4.7million today. But months before her death Gilchrist changed her will, leaving her fortune instead to a beloved former maid’s family.
Charteris, possibly with the assistance of his brother Archibald, is suspected to have argued with Gilchrist and they killed her in their search for the revised will that they hoped to destroy.
The Charteris brothers bore a resemblance to Slater and their family were friends of the Scottish Lord Advocate who prosecuted the case against Slater with such vitriol.
Yet despite Slater’s reprieve, nobody else was ever charged with Gilchrist’s murder.
And though Slater owed his freedom to Conan Doyle, the duo’s friendship ended in bitter animosity.
When Slater received his compensation, Conan Doyle felt it only proper that Slater repay him the £1,000 that the author had donated toward his legal fees. Slater, however, felt that the sum he was awarded for 18 years wrongful imprisonment was paltry and refused to pay.
Conan Doyle raged to Slater. “You are the most ungrateful as well as the most foolish person whom I have ever known.”
Slater survived another 21 years, only to find himself incarcerated again during the Second World War as an “enemy alien”.
He died in 1948, aged 76, never knowing who killed Marion Gilchrist.
To pre-order Conan Doyle For The Defence, published by Profile Books on June 26 at £16.99, call the Express Bookshop with your debit/ credit card details on 01872 562310. Alternatively, send a cheque/PO made payable to Express Bookshop to: Conan Doyle Offer, PO Box 200, Falmouth, Cornwall TR11 4WJ or order online at expressbookshop.co.uk. UK delivery is free.