Policeman's murder is still veiled in mystery

It was no exaggeration. On the night of February 23, 1884, Acting Sergeant William Smith was stoned to death in circumstances that remain unclear to this day.

Three local men were quickly arrested. Two were convicted and sentenced to death, but only one hanged - still protesting that the guilty man was getting away with murder as he mounted the gallows. Gossip, rumours and indignation swept the district as the clamour grew over the flimsiness of the evidence that was sending a man to the gibbet.

Sgt Smith, the victim, was, by all accounts, universally liked in the Gaunless Valley. He was originally a shoemaker from Stokesley, but had been in the Durham force for 16 years. He served his early years at Barnard Castle and Egglestone, and had spent eight years stationed at Woodlands.

Two months before the fateful night, he had been promoted to acting sergeant and given the Butterknowle beat, which included policing the pubs. Closing time on Saturdays was 10pm, and on the night in question Sgt Smith was patrolling to ensure landlords were abiding by their licences.

It was a dark, moonless night. "It was raining fast," said one witness. Sgt Smith had just checked the Diamond Inn, on the main street in Butterknowle, where the day's pigeon shooting competition had just wound up. He then proceeded down the steep bank towards the Stag's Head in The Slack. On the side of the road stood the engine house of the abandoned Diamond Colliery, its huge pitheap overshadowing it. There he met his end.

"The distinctive features of the place where poor Sgt Smith met his doom must remind the spectator of the favourite murder scenes of the modern sensational novel writer," reported a newspaper.

"A wild country is the dreary expanse known as Cockfield Fell. As the visitor emerges from Cockfield village, a stupendous panoramic picture is opened up before him. The fell is in two huge parts, and at the bottom of the declivitous sides is a rivulet, taking a serpentine course far into the distance.

"Clouds of white steam shoot continuously from occasional colliery chimneys; gaunt pit-shaft gear stands out conspicuously from the face of the valley; and the flame-emitting, conical-capped coke ovens of the Butterknowle Colliery Company add their quota to the singularity of the scene."

The village was alerted to the murder when Dr John Jamieson Middleton, physician and surgeon of Woodlands, was returning home with his assistant George Bowker Gorrick. Mr Gorrick was slightly ahead as they toiled up the bank, and was startled when, in the shadow of the old engine house, he stumbled upon a sobbing man.

"The poor polliss," sobbed the man. "He is killed." Then he fled.

Mr Gorrick called Dr Middleton and, a few yards further up they came across Sgt Smith. Bricks and stones were strewn across the road, and Sgt Smith was barely breathing. One report said a piece of his skull came away in Dr Middleton's hand and one of his eyes was hanging from its socket.

Hearing movement on the pitheap, Dr Middleton looked up. In the bright light of one of the coke ovens, he claimed he saw three distinct silhouettes. He went towards them, calling for help. Instead, he too was stoned, receiving "a staggering blow" to the chest. He turned and ran to the top of the bank screaming: "Murder!"

Despite the weather, there were many people out that night, and a small group helped Dr Middleton and Mr Gorrick load Sgt Smith on to a door. They bore him back to his house near the Diamond Inn where, in the presence of his wife and with his six children still sleeping, he expired. He was 40.

Police from Cockfield, Staindrop and Barnard Castle were quickly on the scene. Among the stones, teeth and blood, they found a pearl button, and within hours made three arrests.

Joseph Lowson, 25, and his brother-in-law William Siddle, 25, were found in bed together at Lands. Lowson had a speck of blood on his cheek and a pearl button missing from his shirt. Siddle was widely known to have been heavily fined the previous year for drunkenly attacking Sgt Smith at Woodlands Gala.

The two were charged with murder, and Lowson allegedly whimpered: "Is he dead?"

The third was Joseph Hodgson, 20, of Dent Gate, Langleydale. His clothes lay before the fire, various parts of them having been washed.

All three were miners. All had been drinking most of the day in the Diamond.

"There ought to be few difficulties in running the criminals to earth," said the Darlington and Stockton Times.

"Butterknowle is not London; the means of escape from justice are few. Several arrests have been made but, unless the police are tolerably certain that they have caught the bastards, there ought to be no hesitation whatever in placing every house in the entire district under strict surveillance."

An inquest was held at the Royal Oak, just up the road from the Diamond Inn. The three men were committed for trial for murder at Durham Assizes - "I mean to say that man's telled nowt but lees," shouted Siddle as he was led away - and the body was released for burial.

The funeral was held a week after the murder. Thousands watched the procession, a quarter-of-a-mile long, wind its way from Sgt Smith's house up to St John's Church, in Lynesack. At its head was the Woodlands Band, playing the funeral march; then came 82 policeman taking turns to carry the coffin. They were followed by Sgt Smith's 70-year-old father, struggling along, while his mother, wife and children rode in a carriage. Sgt Smith's headstone can still be seen in the churchyard. He was buried with his daughter, Elizabeth Jane, who died two years earlier.

The trial began on May 1 before Judge Sir Henry Hawkins with the three prisoners in the dock.

"Lowson is by far the most repulsive looking man of the three," reported a newspaper. "This morning he was dressed in a dirty brown tweed suit, his black hair was cut close and his small menacing eyes were dull and heavy. Siddle, on the other hand, although bearing physical signs of having laboured hard, has by no means an unintelligent expression of features. Hodgson is a tall silly-looking sort of lad who, when in drink, would readily come under the influence of evil companions."

The court heard that at 9.50pm on the night in question the prisoners had "smurted", "snittered" or "sneatted" with Sgt Smith outside the Diamond Inn - the newspapers had trouble with the local dialect word for a verbal confrontation.

It was alleged that Siddle, who had previous argued with the policeman, had been "fresh with liquor" and had been overheard to say: "If he follows us down I will lace him...let's go back and rib the polliss."

The county analyst, William Stock of Darlington, confirmed that blood on Lowson's coat bore the "strongest possible resemblance" to human blood - although it could have come from a pig. In his defence, Lowson called witnesses who had seen him that day cradling his young daughter who had a split lip.

Mr Stock also confirmed that the pearl button could have been ripped from Lowson's shirt, but the defence pointed out that it was the commonest kind of button on the market.

Then the medical men took the stand. Dr Middleton's evidence began to fall apart when he identified the prisoners from the silhouettes he had seen in the light of the coke oven. But, pointed out the defence, no ovens were visible from the banked road.

Dr Middleton and Mr Gorrick had been drinking. They had started at 3.30pm in Bishop Auckland and had arrived on the 8.10pm train at Cockfield Station. They had nipped into the Stags Head for a snifter but, despite having had five beers and a couple of whiskies, they claimed they were sober when they staggered up the bank at 10pm.

The defence called witnesses from the Stag's Head who begged to differ, because they had seen the medical men boxing and sparring with each other on the tables in the bar.

The jury deliberated for two hours. To a packed courthouse, with hundreds outside on the street, they announced that Hodgson was innocent and Siddle and Lowson were guilty.

Mr Justice Hawkins donned the black cap and passed sentence: "William Siddle and Joseph Lowson, you have been convicted of the crime of wilful murder. It was a cruel, cold-blooded, cowardly murder. Without one single moment's hesitation or warning you struck down your poor victim and hurried him to his end without any provocation.

"The sentence upon you is that each of you be taken from the place where you now stand to the place from whence you came, and from thence to a lawful place of execution, and that there you, each of you, be hanged by the neck till you are dead. And may the Lord have mercy on your souls."

Siddle and Lowson erupted, blaspheming in the dock. As he was led away, Siddle shouted to his friends: "They have sworn away my life lads; the thundering bloody liars and bastards."

The Northern Echo reported that his vile oaths caused a "sensation" in court. But the drama was only just beginning.

* Continued next week.

Published: 02/10/2002

Echo Memories, The Northern Echo, Priestgate, Darlington DL1 1NF, e-mail chris.lloyd@nne.co.uk or telephone (01325) 505062.