User Reviews

There are certain incidents that get hidden in history due to other incidents. When the Mississippi River steamboat Sultana blew up on April 26, 1865, killing 1,700 returning soldiers it was the worst ship disaster in American history (actually worse than either the Titanic, the Lusitania, the General Slocum, or the Eastland). But it blew up the day John Wilkes Booth was killed by Federal troops in Bowling Green, Virginia, and also on the day that Confederate General Joseph Johnston surrendered his sizable army in North Carolina to Union General William T. Sherman. Most Americans were aware of Booth's death and Johnston's surrender, and not the grizzly disaster near Memphis.

Similarly the still unsolved murder of vaudeville performer Thomas Anderson (a.k.a. "Weldon Atherston") in an empty apartment flat in the Battersea section of London in July 1910 is only discussed by criminal historians. You see, it was hidden by another event - more a bit later about that ironic twist.

Weldon Atherston was a trained actor in the worst sense of the word. From what I have read of him, his heyday would have been 1882 - 1893 or something like that, with his posturing and pompous declamation style. Although some still got away with this if their talent was good enough (William Terris, Richard Mansfield, Sir Henry Irving, Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree) Atherston was not in that category. By the time the tragedy occurred he did occasional vaudeville "recitations" of story - length poems like " Twas Christmas Day in the Workhouse".

Although married, he had not been a great husband, and he had four children with his wife (two of whom were sons). In 1899 he set up a relationship with an actress named Elizabeth Earle who was much younger than him. Ms Earle lived in a flat in the Battersea district of London. As the first decade of the 20th Century preceded Elizabeth realized (very maturely) that she was better as a teacher of acting than a professional, and started making a living that way. But Atherston could not see that he was a relic - he kept insisting on treading the boards when he could. And slowly he found he was in less and less demand.

The results were more arguments between Ms Earle and Atherston. Not only was he jealous of her business success, he was accusing her of having affairs. Finally, Ms Earle broke with him - she had enough of this drone. Somehow Atherston managed to make peace to his two sons and be put up by them. The two brothers (Frederick and William) even met Elizabeth, and (of course it would happen), Frederick and Elizabeth clicked together. Not that they became lovers, but they actually became friends. This apparently did not sit well with Atherston.

On Wednesday, July 13, 1910 Frederick was visiting Elizabeth to see the results of some painting in her home. While examining it, Frederick and Elizabeth heard gunshots from next door. Frederick went into the flat (which connected to Elizabeth's by the garden), and found the body of a man in the darkened flat. They sent for a constable, and one came who soon found that the dead man was Atherston. Ironically, due to the bloody condition of Atherston's corpse, Frederick hadn't recognized his father.

Subsequently other witnesses on the street saw a man jumping over a back wall into the street and fleeing. Who he was has never been discovered. In fact, despite some intense investigation, the murderer of Thomas Weldon Atherston remains unknown nearly a century later. The best general guess is that Atherston had crept into that flat to spy on Elizabeth and Frederick, but he stumbled on a burglar who shot him and fled. The criminal historian Jonathan Goodman, in an essay in his book ACTS OF MURDER, wonders if it was William Anderson (Fred's brother) in a scheme with Fred and Elizabeth. But we really do not know.

Now why is this curious mystery forgotten? Well we have to go back to 1907 for an ironic twist. Atherston agreed to work as a scab entertainer in a vaudeville house during a strike. Another person on that night's roster of performers was one Belle Elmore, a semi-professional singer of rather questionable voice. Belle and Atherston were both badly received by the audience. Belle Elmore was the stage name of Mrs. Cora Crippen, wife of Dr. Hawley Harvey "Peter" Crippen, and (again by coincidence) Atherston's murder occurred the week that Cora's remains were found in the basement of her home at Hilldrop Crescent by Inspector Walter Dew. The chase to catch Crippen (which was the biggest crime of that period) hid Atherston's demise from most people's memory.