Reader Story
Author Alison Bruce explains how her research into crime and punishment sheds some fascinating light on the lives and legacies of our black-sheep ancestors. By Gail Dixon
Author Alison Bruce tells us what her research reveals about the lives and legacies of our criminal ancestors
Acrime novel is the ultimate puzzle,” says prolific author Alison Bruce. “The plot eventually reveals who has done it and how, but it is always the question of ‘why’ that fascinates me.”
Born in Croydon, South London, Alison has been fascinated with literature since her teens, when she enjoyed classic English crime fiction and its hard-boiled US counterpart. Her own books are both popular and critically acclaimed. She has been shortlisted twice for the Crime Writers’ Association ‘Dagger in the Library’ award, and now lives in Fordham, a village near Cambridge. Every one of her nine modern crime novels is based in the city, which provides a great deal of inspiration.
Historic real-life crime is another of Alison’s interests, and one of her first published works was Billington: Victorian Executioner (The History Press, 2009). This centres on the life of James Billington (1847–1901), who held the post of chief executioner of Great Britain and Ireland from 1891 until he died.
He was born into a family of labourers and worked as a Sunday-school teacher, pub entertainer and barber before pursuing a very different career. “Billington was very focused in his determination to become an executioner. He must have felt that it benefited society and justice, although his reasons could have been more personal. His three sons William, John and Thomas followed in his footsteps, and between them the four men executed 235 people.
“I don’t think it was a case of ‘I’m doing what my dad did’, more a calling to do things that were in the same profession. I believe that people have a predisposition to certain careers because of what they’ve been given by birth. It’s innate, and
I can see it in so many families.”
Research In The Archives
Researching the cases that led to the executions gave Alison fascinating insight into criminal behaviour and motivation. “I spent a lot of time studying Victorian murders at The National Archives in Kew, and thought that I would discover more cases where an innocent person had been executed.
“I was surprised to conclude that usually they identified the right person, although that didn’t convince me that capital
I spent a lot of time studying Victorian murders at The National Archives
punishment was justified. The arrest was usually swift, as were the trial and verdict. Between judgment and execution there were three Sundays but never more than a month, which didn’t give much time to appeal.”
Many of us find criminal ancestors in our tree, and Alison believes that it’s important not to feel as though your family is tarred with the same brush.
“High numbers of people broke the law due to searing poverty and desperation, rather than a natural propensity for criminal behaviour,” she says. “Poverty was on a level unimaginable to us today, and people were stealing to feed their children.”
The Demon Drink
Alison has identified another major contributing factor. “Alcohol has always played a huge part in British crime. In many cases crimes were committed when people drank, had an argument and then killed someone. When I was researching the life of Billington, I read about Rev D Grenville Lewis, the prison chaplain of Shepton Mallet Gaol. He took a sabbatical, and went to visit prisons in America and Europe. He asked the governor of Saint-Gilles in Brussels whether a high proportion of prisoners were in gaol due to alcohol-related crime, because that was often the case in Britain. The answer that the chaplain received was, ‘Only the Englishmen.’
“That anecdote amazed me. Other nationalities were drinking, but we were drinking and committing crime. If this societal problem still exists today, then we need to do something about it.”
Alison has also noticed that the aftershock of historic crimes can be so great that it still affects relations in the present day. “While researching Billington I discovered a deeply tragic example – the horrifying murder of five-year-old Edith Jeal.”
Edith lived with her family in the Brighton suburb of Kempton. On 10 December 1891, she accompanied her older brother Bertie as he ran some errands for their father. They collected firewood and chestnuts which Bertie put in a cap and gave to Edith. He went into a shop, and told her to wait for him outside. However, when Bertie returned he discovered that she had vanished.
Edith’s body was found in a shed on a cricket field nearby, with the chestnuts scattered around. The young girl had been abducted, sexually assaulted and murdered. A man called George Henry Wood was seen loitering in the area where the abduction took place, trying to accost children. He was also witnessed close to where her body was found, although he insisted that he had been at the circus that day. Wood was arrested, convicted and executed by James Billington.
“There are relatives of Edith and Bertie alive today, and I have a quote from one of them that is so telling. He states, ‘Bertie was hugely traumatised by Edith’s death, and it affected the way he brought up his children and the way they brought up their children. It still affects the family now, more than 100 years on.’ ”
Alison’s belief in a ‘genetic predisposition’ can be seen in her own family. As a child, she was told of family connections to Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832), who was one of Britain’s most influential philosophers and a keen advocate of penal reform. “He was way ahead of his times in his theories on life, crime, prisons and women.”
Visionary Reformer
Bentham spent years advocating reform of the criminal justice system, in particular prisons. In the 18th century, gaols were violent and filthy places where men, women and children were crammed together in degrading situations. There was no fresh
water or sewage disposal, food rations were poor, and gaolers were mostly unpaid and corrupt. Only those prisoners who could afford to pay a fee survived well.
‘Gaol fever’ ripped through Britain’s prisons in the 18th century. This was another term for typhus, which was spread by lice and flea bites. In 1726, an epidemic broke out in Newgate Prison and killed 83 prisoners – more than half of its inmates.
Bentham favoured a prison design that he dubbed the ‘panopticon’. This had a rotunda that inmates would exercise or work around, while being watched by a guard in a central tower. Although it was largely unpopular in his day, Bentham’s panopticon influenced later prison design. London’s Pentonville Prison was built in 1842 and was the first in Britain to have wings radiating from a central hall, while the panopticon design was used in prisons around the world.
The physical conditions in Victorian prisons were a vast improvement on those of earlier times. However, inmates of many institutions were forced to carry out monotonous tasks in total silence, which led to an increase in insanity and suicide.
It’s no wonder that Alison is keen to boost literacy levels among prisoners today. “I visit prisons to talk about my novels, and carry out workshops in their libraries. There is a surprising level of illiteracy among the prison population today, and this needs to be addressed.
A Shared Interest In Crime
“It’s intriguing to see how interests in law, penal reform and human rights have filtered down through my family,” she adds. “I have relatives who are involved in criminal justice, the police, the Ministry of Defence and women’s rights – my grandmother Violet Caroline Bentham (née Brown) was an ardent campaigner for the emancipation of women, and would stand on a soap box on the corner of Hyde Park declaring her views.”
Alison’s career choice as a crime writer also dovetails with the notion of genetic disposition. “I’ve always been interested in people’s motivations, and there’s nothing more serious than committing murder. Finding and understanding people who have the psychology for committing crime is compelling. What has led them to such an extreme point? Perhaps they’ve always had a flaw in their personality, or they’re volatile and a situation builds to a crescendo that tips them over the edge.
“My novels often spark from fragments of ideas like ‘someone hiding in the loft’, or ‘killing off a serious character people have grown to like’, then I draw the ideas together,” she reveals. “How about poisoning someone with potato shoots because they’re toxic? The plot goes through a moulding process while I develop the characters.
“I’m fascinated by the science underpinning crime. Murder fiction is where psychology meets forensics. Rather than specialise in one, I can dabble in both to my heart’s content.”
Cambridge offers a rich source of locations and characters as well. “The city dates back to pre-Roman times, so it has layer upon layer of history. It’s also ultra-modern. We have genetic engineering, medical trials and artificial intelligence. They can sit alongside a person who is studying Roman culture and carrying out excavations.”
In 2020, Alison was awarded a first-class BSc (Hons) in crime and investigation from Anglia Ruskin University, after studying such topics as crime-scene investigation, policing practice, mass-fatality incidents, pathology and forensic archaeology. She is also working on the UK’s largest police professionalism contract, which will deliver a policing degree to seven forces.
While her expert knowledge of crime provides her work with authenticity and detail, it’s the psychology of characters past and present that still intrigues her the most. “It’s understanding people that I’m interested in.”