Nominated BEST TRUE-CRIME PODCAST at The British Podcast Awards, 4th Best True Crime Podcast by The Week, The Telegraph's Top Five True-Crime Podcasts, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50 and iTunes Top 25.
32 Westbourne Terrace in Paddington, where Robina Bolton was murdered
Welcome to the Murder Mile UK True-Crime Podcast and audio guided walk of London's most infamous and often forgotten murder cases, all set within and beyond the West End.
EPISODE ONE HUNDRED AND EIGHTY-SEVEN:
12:45am on Saturday 14th January 1956, at the junction of Hertford Street and park Lane in Mayfair, 34-year-old sex-worker Robina Bolton known as Ruby was last seen alive. The next morning she was found murdered in Flat 7 at 32 Westbourne Terrace, a flat she shared with her husband Ernest. Ernest would claim he last saw Ruby alive as she entered a taxi with an unidentified man. Seven hours later, he would stumble across the body of his wife having been brutally murdered in her bed. As her pimp who was flat broke, the only other person with a key to the flat and a laughable alibi that she was due to meet a man no-one had seen who he knew only as ‘the bearded man’, as the Police’s chief suspect, Ernest was questioned on suspicion of her murder. But was this the truth, or a lie?
THE LOCATION
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The location is marked with a mustard raindrop in Paddington (above the park). To use the map, click it. If you want to see the other murder maps, access them by clicking here.
SOURCES: This case was researched using some of the sources below. https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/C4202810 https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/C10874384
MUSIC:
UNEDITED TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE: Welcome to Murder Mile. Today I’m standing on Westbourne Terrace in Paddington, W2; one street north of the stabbing of PC Jack Avery, three streets west of Alice William’s death, two streets east of the attack on Airman Stanley Thurman, and one street south of the curse of the castrated flasher - coming soon to Murder Mile. Since construction began on the station in in 1852, prostitution has always been part of Paddington’s seedier side. There’s not a single flat which hasn’t been used by sex-workers to service their clients. Only now, many brothels are rented out via Air B&B’s with the transactions taking place via an app’. So, as easily as you may order a McMuffin at a Mucky Doo’s; someone has ticked a blowie from a drop-down box, swiped right for a hand-shandy, clicked ‘yes’ for dogging, added a smiley for S&M where the safe word is ‘Gerald’, and God help anyone who mistakes the pint emoji for the poo. So I’m told. Back in the 1950s, Flat 7 at 32 Westbourne Terrace was a simple small fourth-floor lodging comprising of a single room with a bed, a sink, a sofa and a small kitchenette. Rented out to Ruby, a 35-year-old prostitute and Ernest her husband, this is where she’d have sex with several men each night for cash. Having driven her to and from the flat to a known pick-up point, at 12:45am on Saturday 14th January 1956, Ernest would claim he last saw Ruby alive as she entered a taxi with an unidentified man. Seven hours later, he would stumble across the body of his wife having been brutally murdered in her bed. As her pimp who was flat broke, the only other person with a key to the flat and a laughable alibi that she was due to meet a man no-one had seen who he knew only as ‘the bearded man’, as the Police’s chief suspect, Ernest was questioned on suspicion of her murder. But was this the truth, or a lie? My name is Michael, I am your tour guide, and this is Murder Mile. Episode 187: The Bearded Man – Part One of Two. The most startling detail of this case is the relationship between this husband and wife, this pimp and prostitute - Ruby & Ernest Bolton. It beggars’ belief why a couple, who had married out of love, would make such a seedy deal in which she sells her body to a slew of horny strangers to be pawed over and pumped until they came, as her spouse counts the cash and waits to drive her to her next customer… …but as odd as it may seem, it’s a lot more common than you would think. Ruby was born Robina Pattinson in the summer of 1920 in the city of Carlisle, just shy of the Scottish English border. We know little of her early life, as even to those who knew her, she spoke little about her past. Whether by abuse or abandonment, Ruby always seemed to be running from something. As a gorgeous girl with a cheeky face, short dark hair and bright red lips, whatever or whoever she was fleeing from was hidden by a personality which beamed warmth and love. Being well-liked, Ruby made her way in life by being sweet, polite and nice. And as a woman who would make a living off her looks – even when she was broke – she never went out without her hair coiffured and her nails painted. Receiving a basic education and living in a city thick with the dark sooty plumes of industry where (as a woman) her options were limited, by 25th June 1938, 18-year-old Ruby had moved 92 miles south to the seaside town of Blackpool, where she married a 41-year-old butcher called Richard Moore. Living in a little flat above his butcher’s shop on Rossett Avenue, they lived a simple life, but it lacked love. In early 1940, Ruby gave birth to a baby girl believed to have been called Jean, but even the prospect of a long life with loving family of her own couldn’t hold this little threesome together. As the German bombers of the second world war pummelled the surrounding cities of the north, Ruby became a prostitute. Why? We don’t know. But it’s easy to slip into the Victorian myth that all sex-workers were fallen women; whether drunks, druggies, the deranged and the destitute, of which some were, but others were not - like Ruby who was strong, independent and in control of her own life. The 1940s saw a huge upsurge in everyday women supplementing their meagre income (often half of what a man earned for the same job) through sex-work. For some women; the simple exchange of a meal, a few drinks and a hotel room for the night in return for sex wasn’t prostitution, but a bit of fun and while their husband was serving overseas. For many mothers, sex was noble sacrifice for some extra cash or ration stamps to feed their family when life was hard. And for some women, like Ruby, given a choice of a pittance washing crockery or a decent wage wanking off maybe ten men-a-night, at three minutes a time and earning more per hour than they could in a day? It wasn’t a hard decision. Prostitution gave them money, power, freedom and control in a world where they had none. Ruby was her own woman, who worked the hours she wanted; when, if and how she decided. And although it gave her a better standard of living - as it often did - it caused havoc with her home and family life. Whether her husband knew, colluded or was oblivious to her activities is unknown, but in 1946, after 8-years of marriage, Richard & Ruby separated when she was convicted of brothel keeping and child abandonment. On paper, it sounds abhorrent, but given that her crimes were recorded by religious zealots; ‘child abandonment’ was a common offence attributed to many working mothers, and any property could be classified as a brothel if two prostitutes and a maid were together in the same room, even if they weren’t soliciting for sex at the time of their arrest, but were simply having a cup of tea. Deemed by the courts as a bad mother, Ruby lost custody of her daughter and – again, as was her way – she ran away from her troubles and moved 240 miles south to London, where she met Ernest… …her husband, her pimp and the man who would be questioned on suspicion of her murder. To those who knew them, the relationship between Mr & Mrs Bolton seemed like any other. Raised and living in Lewisham, South London, 35-year-old Ernest Joseph Bolton earned a living as a driver, and having met Ruby just one year before, they had married at a registry office in May 1947. Being of similar age and out-look, they seemed well-suited, but their nuptials got off to a rocky start when their marriage was declared null-and-void, as Ruby was still married to Richard. Divorced, she re-married Ernest on the 21st June 1949, and they lived in the heart of Paddington’s red-light district. On paper, his job was as a driver who owned his own firm called Ruby Car Hire, but making his money as her pimp, it’s likely that this was how he hid their immoral earnings under the guise of a taxi firm. Between 1951 & 1956, Robina Bolton known as Ruby was convicted 22 times of soliciting, with Ernest fined £40 and 10 guineas in 1952 for managing a brothel. With each conviction, they moved to a one-roomed lodging, which was sparsely furnished with a sofa, a chair, a kitchenette, a bath and a bed. Unlike her ex, there was no denying that Ernest was a key part of Ruby’s life in the sex trade, as – for at least the last six or eight years – when she was having sex, he was never more than a street away. Little is known about Ernest or his ways; whether he was violent, coercive, passive or protective. As with prostitutes, there are many types of pimps; some are nothing more than aggressive bullies who drug, beat and abuse their girls into shadows of their former selves; some use the old ploy of love to coerce a fleet of lonely ladies into believing that it’s only him who loves them; to some it’s just a business, which they’ve set-up together, with the wife doing the sex and the husband as protection; and whereas some are passive underlings who do their wife’s bidding as a bodyguard and as a maid. How it was split between Ruby and Ernest may never be known, but as an independent woman – with a shared bank account, both their names on the flat’s contract and with her deciding how many hours she worked and which clients she saw – it’s possible that she set the rules and he did the driving. Myths aside, it’s easy to forget how strong some sex-workers are; many set their own routines, rates and rules; they exist among a network of women who defend each other better than any army; they have ethics and morals which would put almost every chief executive to shame, and – as professionals – they know how to satisfy a client and to ensure repeat business, as quickly and efficiently as possible. They handle drunks better than any bouncer; they haggle faster than any Wall Street trader and they know the law often better than those who police it. Many are in control of their lives… but sometimes – as we all do – their either want or need some protection. And who better than their own husband? It’s not always the case, but this is how it may have been for Ruby and Ernest. It was an odd set-up to the average eye, but it was not uncommon, and without each other… …it’s unlikely they may have lasted for as long as they had. Mr & Mrs Ruby & Ernest Bolton lived in a small rented flat on Porchester Place, a side street between Sussex Gardens and Edgware Road in Paddington. As a little piece of home where they ate and slept, no sex work ever occurred under this roof, as they kept both sides of their lives separate and distinct. As two-sides of the same coin for many years, they had their routine fine-tuned and running smoothly. Waking at 10am, their mornings to mid-afternoon was theirs to do with as they pleased. At 7pm, they ate dinner together in the home they shared. At 8pm, having dressed, they went to the flat; to change the sheets, freshen the air, empty the ash-trays, stock up on tea and milk (as everyone needs a brew); they popped the fire on to make it cosy, the lights on to keep it safe, and – when needed – she replenished the stash of erotic magazines she kept in the flat in case any client had ‘issues downstairs’. It was also a neat trick, as by letting him flick through some saucy photos, half of her job is done before she’s even got undressed. Aiming for a 15-minute turnaround per client, it’s all about efficiency. By 8:30pm, Ernest would drive Ruby to the corner of Hertford Street and Park Lane in Mayfair, a well-known pick-up spot for West End prostitutes in the shadow of some of London’s poshest hotels. As her pimp, he would either wait nearby, or would circle about watching out for any passing policemen. In her purse, she carried just enough for a cab home, condoms of several sizes and business cards with her phone number on - ‘Ambassador 2385’ - as well as the name ‘R Bolton, Plumber’, just in case any punter’s wife got suspicious. Having done his circuit, if she was already gone or he had seen her pick-up a punter, he would discretely follow the taxi back to the Paddington flat and wait till she was done. The routine was always the same; first he would park his car in Gloucester Terrace and wait for her to exit the flats by side door; second (when sex was taking place) she would leave the curtains ajar and the lights on so he knew when she was done; and third, if she was running late, he’d call the phone in the flat from a phone box on Calworth Street or Spring Street to check that everything was okay. Having driven her several times back and forth from Westbourne Terrace to Park Lane, and made £20 to £30 a night (roughly £500 to £800 today), they would usually finish-up by 2am, but – as did happen on occasions - some regular clients would pay to spend the night with Ruby, which was easy money. It may seem odd, but that’s how it had been for Ruby & Ernest for many years… …until things had started to go wrong. Friday 13th January 1956 was typical of the days leading up to her death. As with many couples when money was tight, tempers frayed over the smallest of things. That afternoon, Ruby & Ernest went to the Paddington branch of Midland Bank with a sense of dread. Their joint account had a balance of just 12 shillings and 3 pence, four cheques to the tune of £420 in today money were set to bounce and a loan of £12700 was increasing daily – in short, their debts would be repaid one way or another. Even the basics had become a struggle; the car tyres were bald, the tax was out, their cupboards were bare and having fled their flat in Porchester Place with the rent unpaid, two days after Christmas, they had moved into Flat 7 at 32 Westbourne Terrace; a small fourth-floor lodging barely 15 feet wide and deep; with a sink, a sofa, a bath and a bed, where every night Ruby would have sex with men for cash. No longer was their home-life and sex-work separate, as now it all took place under the same roof; his roof, as by the time he’d return home his still-warm bed, his now-soiled sheets and his forever-faithful wife were sullied by another man’s smell, having violated his bride, as he had waited patiently outside. After the bank, although broke, Ernest drove Ruby to a hairdresser on Edgware Road. This may seem like a luxury, but as a woman whose lifestyle depended on her looks, it was as vital as buying petrol. Having waited nearby, at 4:30pm, Ernest drove them back to the flat, where – as per usual – they changed the bed sheets, freshened the air, emptied the ash-tray, stocked up on tea and milk, and with the erotic magazines a little light, Ruby set aside £1, as she had a contact with a fresh stash or porn. With a few hours to spare, they popped on a small fire to make it cosy, a little light as the winter night drew in, and – according to Ernest – they ate a final meal of wild duck, roast potatoes and green beans (a posh meal for a broke couple which was gifted by an amorous client) as later verified by her autopsy. For almost four hours, Ruby & Ernest were alone in their little flat and not a single sound was heard by the neighbours through the wafer-thin walls. And having dressed, just shy of 8:30pm, they left. Her final night alive was just like any other. At 8:30pm, Ernest dropped Ruby off on the corner of Hertford Street and Park Lane in Mayfair as per usual; and as seen by the sex-workers who knew her well as a regular girl on this patch of the city. To keep himself busy, Ernest would either patrol the streets looking for police, visit a pals’, or do a circuit from Park Lane to Piccadilly - maybe as much as a distraction from the acts his wife was engaged in. By 8:40pm, as she had gone, he drove back to the flat and waited in his freezing car on the corner of Gloucester Terrace and Craven Road; within sight of the side-door, the open curtains and a single bulb shining bright, as inside, on his bed, a man he had never seen nor met rammed his cock inside his wife. With it being improper to disturb Ruby when she was ‘doing the business’, he never entered the room when she was working. And couldn’t, as he only had a key to the flat and not to the communal door. At 9:10pm, a little later than expected as her first customer of the night (a man unseen by Ernest) had issues getting Percy to perk, Ruby returned to the car, having made £4 (roughly £100 today). She was her usual self, she made no complaints, and the two drove back to Park Lane to pick up another punter. At 9:30pm, Ruby picked-up her second customer, the seedy little routine began again and although it’s unclear how much she earned, it varied from £3-£5 depending what things he wanted to do to her. At 10:15pm, she picked-up her third (a man only partially seen by Ernest), but having returned to the flat at 11pm, he saw that the lights were off and the curtains were drawn. With it not uncommon for Ruby to pick-up a man between clients (or as many prostitutes did, to pay taxi-drivers a little extra to turn a blind-eye so they could noshed-off a randy man in the dark of the back seat, saving time and money), Ernest waited 30 minutes, rang the bell but got no reply and returned to Park Lane by 11:40pm where he saw her. She was paid £5 (£125 today), although she never said where she’d been. At midnight, Ernest saw Ruby get into a taxi with a man he described only as ‘a little guy’ who was a bit quick and had paid her £2, making her night’s earnings as much as the average weekly wage. With their finances dire and the debtors circling, Ruby had two hours at best to claw in as much money as possible, and although this pick-up spot in the poshest part of Mayfair was surrounded by five-star hotels and exclusive casinos, she rarely bagged herself a rich man with oodles of cash to flash. But as a pretty and a pleasant girl, she could reply on her regulars… …some of whom who liked her, and loved her. According to Ernest, based on a brief chat he’d had with Ruby that night, at 12:20am, a client she had given her business card to had called ‘Ambassador 2385’ (knowing full well that R Bolton was not a plumber) and asked to stay with her until the morning, at a price more than she had earned that night. This would have been music to her ears, but having pre-agreed to spend the night with a regular from the West Country, she’d had to turn him down. Ernest didn’t hear the call, as he was waiting outside. At 12:30am, during their last-ever ten-minute drive from Westbourne Terrace to Park Lane, Ruby told Ernest “I’ve got somebody here all night… I’m sorry, but you’ll have to stay at a hotel”. Having agreed he would return to the flat at 6am - but only if the lights were on and the curtains were open - Ernest would later tell the police: “I asked her, ‘is it the bearded man’?”, a mysterious client she had spoken about just a few hours before, who he had never seen, met, nor never knew his name… …and she had said that it was. At 12:45am, on the corner of Hertford Street and Park Lane, Ernest dropped off his wife of eight years marriage, to pick-up a client for the purposes of sex. In his words “it was the last time I saw her alive”. Where Ernest went over the next 45 minutes is uncertain, as being a lone man in his own car who was used to keeping an eye-out for the police, it’s likely he trawled the unlit streets between Park Lane and Piccadilly. And had he passed his flat on Westbourne Terrace, he’d have seen the curtains ajar and a light on, until his wife and her client had finished their sex and nodded off to sleep, in his bed. Being too late to book in, and – given their finances – unable to afford a hotel room, he stayed at the home of his friends, Mr & Mrs Murden, a solicitor and his wife who lived on nearby Rainsford Street. They would later state; he was chatty, neat and (being tired) he slept on the sofa till just before dawn. The next morning at 5:45am, Ernest left Mr & Mrs Murden’s home and parked-up his car on Craven Street within sight of his flat’s window, as per usual. At 6am, as promised, with the curtains still closed and the light still off - as it was likely she had slept in - he rang the bell to his flat but he got no reply. As was their routine, at 6:15am, from the phone-box on Calworth Street, he phoned his flat, but she didn’t pick up. Taking a short walk to give her time to politely get her client to go, from a phone-box on Spring Street (all within 30-seconds of his flat) he phoned her once more, but again, he got no reply. Unconcerned for her welfare, he returned to Craven Terrace and in a local café, he had breakfast. An hour later, as witnessed by the tenant of Flat 6 who had heard the phone ringing through the wafer-thin walls for several minutes; hanging up, Ernest waited outside of the side-door of 32 Westbourne Terrace until a passing resident whose door-bell he had rung had opened the communal door. None of the tenants had heard any strange sounds that night, nothing had raised their suspicions, and as Ernest (the lodger of Flat 7) rose the stairs to the fourth floor, there were no signs of disturbance. With his own key, he opened his own door and he entered his own flat, which he shared with his wife. But instead of the room being light and warm with her there to greet him, it was cold, dark and silent. The room was as he had left it 13 hours earlier; no mess, no chaos and nothing out of place. Switching on the single bulb which hung from the ceiling, in the double-divan bed beside the window he saw the unmistakable figure of his wife. He called her name “Ruby?”, only she didn’t respond. He called again “Ruby?”, only she didn’t move. And being alone and motionless, with her facing the wall and the bed-sheets pulled down, he assumed she was asleep, until he saw something which made his soul shiver. Beyond the thick dark clumps of her matted brown hair, up the once-white wall by the head of their bed, lay the red spatter of dried blood, having had her skull caved in with a blunt heavy weapon. (End) As her pimp, husband and the last man to see her alive, what he did next would make him the police’s prime suspect. Having failed to check if she was even dead – as a man with a conviction for living off his wife’s immoral earnings – he went straight to the home of Mr Murden, his friend and his solicitor. After an hour of legal advice, at 9:22am, it was Mr Murden who called the police and not Ernest Bolton. The investigation was headed up by Detective Superintendent Joseph Kennedy, a veteran of West End homicides from Scotland Yard. To his eyes, the crime-scene was as clear-cut as any he had examined. With no forced entry, the victim had either known or trusted her attacker; being naked and in bed, he had assaulted her (possibly) as she slept; with no signs of rape or sexual assault, it was less likely to be a client; with the weapon missing, the murder was almost certainly premeditated; and having been beaten over the back of her head eight times with a blunt object, her killer had hatred for this woman. As for suspects in the murder of Robina Bolton, a sex-worker known as Ruby, the police had only one. A man whose fingerprints were found at the scene. A man whose car was seen loitering nearby in the hours prior. A man who was married to the victim, had prostituted her for money, and whose bank account was grossly in debt. And with her time of death established as between midnight and 2am, although he pleaded his innocence, Ernest had a 45-minute gap in his timeline, at exact that point. Having suggested that her killer was any number of her clients she had slept with that night, as is the clandestine nature of sex-work, none of them could be traced. With a shaky alibi, it was then that Ernest laid the blame on someone he had neither seen, heard nor could he name, as this mysterious unidentified client was only ever mentioned by his dead wife in-passing, and who he knew only… …as ‘the bearded man’. Part two concludes next week. The Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast has been researched using the original declassified police investigation files, court records, press reports and as many authentic sources as possible, which are freely available in the public domain, including eye-witness testimony, confessions, autopsy reports, first-hand accounts and independent investigation, where possible. But these documents are only as accurate as those recounting them and recording them, and are always incomplete or full of opinion rather than fact, therefore mistakes and misrepresentations can be made. As stated at the beginning of each episode (and as is clear by the way it is presented) Murder Mile UK True Crime Podcast is a 'dramatisation' of the events and not a documentary, therefore a certain amount of dramatic licence, selective characterisation and story-telling (within logical reason and based on extensive research) has been taken to create a fuller picture. It is not a full and complete representation of the case, the people or the investigation, and therefore should not be taken as such. It is also often (for the sake of clarity, speed and the drama) presented from a single person's perspective, usually (but not exclusively) the victim's, and therefore it will contain a certain level of bias and opinion to get across this single perspective, which may not be the overall opinion of those involved or associated. Murder Mile is just one possible retelling of each case. Murder Mile does not set out to cause any harm or distress to those involved, and those who listen to the podcast or read the transcripts provided should be aware that by accessing anything created by Murder Mile (or any source related to any each) that they may discover some details about a person, an incident or the police investigation itself, that they were unaware of.
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AuthorMichael J Buchanan-Dunne is a crime writer, podcaster of Murder Mile UK True Crime and creator of true-crime TV series. 
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