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Barbara PInder's flat - Prince of Wales Mansions, 77 Prince of Wales Drive, Battersea @googlemaps2026 Sept2024
EPISODE THREE HUNDRED AND FORTY-THREE: On the Saturday the 27th of October 1984, 76-year-old widow Barbara Pinder was brutally murdered in her own flat on Prince of Wales Drive in Battersea by an unknown man with a lot of hatred for her. One year later, on Saturday 27th of October 1985, 86-year-old widow Henrietta Osbourne was also stabbed and attacked frenziedly in an attack which had similar hallmarks. It went unsolved for two years… then out of the blue, a petty burglar confessed to both murders. Evidence proved it was him, he confessed, he was convicted. But why did he confess, when he had got away with murder?
SOURCES: a selection sourced from various archives:
MUSIC:
UNEDITED TRANSCRIPT: Why would a serial killer confess to a sadistic spate of brutal murders? Find out on Murder Mile. Today, I’m standing on Prince of Wales Drive in Battersea, SW1; three streets east of Peter Bryan’s failed suicide bid having killed Nisha Sheth, two streets south of the first of the infamous taxi driver murders, and two streets west of the lost fingers of the tortured artist - coming soon to Murder Mile. Prince of Wales Drive is a very exclusive part of town. Consisting of five-and-six storey red-and-white brick mansions blocks stretching the road’s length, these multi-million pound serviced flats have stunning views overlooking Battersea Park and the River Thames, being strictly for those with money. Accessed by a secure communal door, this isn’t the kind of place you’d find fat dole-scrounging slob watching TOWIE in his pants scoffing chips from the bag. Oh no, here you’d find a rotund investment banker watching Downton Abbey in his diamond encrusted g-string as a butler feeds him beer-battered chips made by Gordon Ramsey from a Louis Vitton bag – it’s all a very different thing, indeed. And yet, a senseless and brutal murder in one of these exclusive flats, its exact number never reported, marked a sadistic killing spree by a psychopath who was clearly disturbed and dangerous, but it also helped to unmask a suspected serial killer who couldn’t help but confess to many, many murders. He was a killer who wanted to be caught – but why? My name is Michael, I am your tour guide, and this is Murder Mile. Episode 343: The Blabbermouth – Part 1 of 2. His first victim was an elderly widow by the name of Barbara Anne Pinder. Born on the 17th of July 1908, Barbara Anne Wilson (as she once was) was raised in the comfortable and calm splendour of the seaside parish of Selsey in Sussex, a place whose name means ‘Holy Island’. With her father being the town’s rector, they lived in The Rectory with her mother and two siblings, Helen & Wilfred, and being middle-class, they were educated at private schools, and had their every want catered for by a nurse, a maid and two servants. In 1921, when her father became the rector of nearby Cuckfield, the family moved into the vicarage, and this was where Barbara met her husband. Walter Archibald Pinder was born in Bishop’s Stortford and raised with all the benefits that money can buy. In June 1929, as a couple in their early 20s, they married at Cuckfield and had a son called Simon. By 1935, they were living in the poshest parts of West London, being Kensington and Chelsea, and for many years, her sister Helen lived with them at Rectory Chambers. With Walter being an aeronautical engineer he was often busy, especially as the war loomed large, but again, having two servants and a governess, this gave Barbara the rare chance – unlike many women of that era – to pursue a career. For many years, Barbara was an aeronautical journalist and the former editor of Flight magazine, but her true passion was music. In her youth, she had been the main understudy for the principal singers for Ivor Novello, one of Britain’s most popular entertainers in the first half of the 20th century, and as a professional pianist, she was instrumental in his hit West End play Perchance to Dream which played at London’s Hippodrome from 1945 to 1948, and as a heartfelt thank you, Ivor Novello gave her the original manuscript to the show’s biggest hit ‘We’ll Gather Lilacs’ – something she always cherished. On the 20th of March 1980, Walter died, and although this loss of her husband of 41 years could have broken her, described as “a widow of great charm and distinction who seemed young for her years”, she kept herself busy as a writer and an artist, she was active in the church, and liked a good long walk. By 1984, living alone, Barbara moved into a small self-contained flat on the third floor of Prince of Wales Mansions in Battersea; it was safe and secure as many of the occupants were elderly and well-off, and even though she was a petite 76-year-old lady who was immaculately-dressed and always had neatly coiffured hair, said to be “young at heart”, she had the drive and stamina to last beyond a 100. The day before had been unremarkable, she had received no odd phone calls or visitors, she wasn’t worried, and the only difference to every resident’s day was the workmen who trudged about the flats due to a recent fire which led to a partial collapse to the roof, hence the communal door was left open. No-one knows the exact time she was attacked on the morning of Saturday the 27th of October 1984, but as an early-bird and a creature of habit, she had failed to pick up her newspaper from the shop. With no witnesses, only the evidence can paint a picture of what had happened to Barbara Pinder. It’s unlikely that she knew her attacker, as being a private person, her door was rarely open to others. With no sign of any break-in, either he knocked (possibly posing as one of the many builders on site), but with her son, Simon, noting “she was wearing her walking shoes, she always took them off when she got home” leaving them on the mat by the door, it was more likely that someone had followed her in. Behind her locked door, although she was only tiny, with every ounce of her strength, she put up a brave fight to get this stranger out of her home, as with furniture knocked and crockery smashed as he tossed her like a ragdoll, but as Detective Superintendent Kemp stated “she didn’t stand a chance”. Towering over her, her attacker was large and powerfully built, as bruises proved that with one hand he strangled her, squeezing her windpipe and fracturing the bones in her throat, as with the other, he beat her about her face and skull with a hard (undetermined) blunt object, breaking her jaw, her teeth, fracturing her cheek bone, and although she was barely conscious, his attack was far from finished. As she lay, slumped and broken on the carpet, he repeatedly kicked her in the head as if it was a ball, as if she was a sport, which caused cuts, bruises, bleeding and brain damage. But this wasn’t the end. With her own knitting needle, he stabbed her in her neck to torture her and leaving it embedded, in a psychotic level of sadism which detectives later felt was a trademark of his killings. But even that was not the end, as with a knife, believed to be a 6-inch stiletto blade, he frenziedly stabbed her 45 times in the chest with a level of ferocity, the pathologist stated “most of her vital organs were in shreds”, as he had stabbed her heart, liver and stomach, as well as severing the breast bone and several ribs. The murder of 76-year-old widow Barbara Pinder was a massacre, and yet, it had no obvious motive; a stranger attack on a wealthy woman where nothing was stolen; her handbag lay open, £30 was left untouched, as were her antiques, pieces of jewellery, and the valuable manuscript by Ivor Novello. She was viciously attack, but hadn’t been sexually assaulted, and its unlikely she knew her attacker. The next day, Sunday 28th of October, Simon, Barbara’s son rang her as he always did. Getting no reply, he drove from Avon, found her door locked, and with the police breaking it down, inside, they found her mutilated body. Recalling the horror, Simon said of the scene “he must have been a madman”. With her brutal murder reported in detail in the local (and some national) newspapers, the barbarism of her injuries sickened and shocked the community, many demanded the reintroduction of the death penalty, and lead detective DS John Kemp stated “this is one of the most savage and senseless killings I have come across”, but it would prove impossible to solve without a single witness to her murder. Fingerprints were found at the scene but they didn’t match any known felon, the Police hadn’t a single suspect, and having taken 390 statements and interviewed 75 people, they were no clearer to a name or a motive “as it seems likely that it was someone who had come here to kill, not to steal or assault”. A service took place for Barbara at Chelsea Old Church on 6th of December 1984. At the inquest almost a year later, coroner, Dr Paul Knappman asked DS Kemp “is an arrest imminent?”, but he had to admit “not in the immediate future”. Detectives warned any pensioners living alone in Battersea to take all precautions and to not let any strangers into their homes, as they were sure he would attack again… …and almost exactly a year later, he did. Little is known about her early life, even her birth name or her hometown, but 86-year-old widow Henrietta Osbourne, known as ’Peggy’ was the epitome of this particular attacker’s perfect victim. Like Barbara, she was small, but being frail, partially-blind and almost totally deaf, she was housebound, she had few visitors beyond a social worker, and spent many hours a day sitting in an armchair, beside the fire, listening to her music played too loud, and again, this meant that there were no witnesses. Again, as with Barbara, she had received no strange visitors or calls prior, she wasn’t worried and living in the Lumley Flats, part of the Ebury Estate on Passmore Street in Chelsea – a mile north of Barbara’s - inside she felt safe and secure in a tastefully decorated, modestly wealthy flat, surrounded by others. Henrietta was quiet, unassuming and private, just an old frail lady whiling away her final years alive. Again, no-one knows exactly when she was attacked on Saturday 27th of October 1985, as the last time she was seen alive was at noon on her doorstep as she collected her milk, bread and papers. With no sign of a break in, it’s likely her door was accidentally left unlocked, hence why it was chosen. We also know she didn’t let anyone in, as being deaf she never heard the doorbell, and she was already in bed. Neighbours stated they heard a bang at around 2am, but thought nothing of it. The room was lightly ransacked; with a few pound notes scattered on the floor and ornaments and furniture knocked over (possibly as the attacker fled), but burglary seemed uncertain, as roughly £1000 in cash (£4000 today) was found in the flat, untouched, and yet, a 10-inch Japanese earthenware vase from the 1920s was stolen, and even though it was rare, it was only worth £50. But the killer may not have known that? What seemed strange was that the burglary of her sitting room was brief and chaotic, yet he spent an inordinate amount of time in her bedroom, torturing Henrietta, out of sadism, hatred, or maybe both? As before, with one hand, he strangled her, as with the other, possibly using his fist, he kept battering this helpless and disabled old lady until her face was bruised, bloody and a swollen pulp. Again, with her slumped to the ground and barely conscious, he repeatedly kicked her, and even stamped on her to the point where one of the vertebrae of her spine had cracked. But he still wasn’t finished with her. As he had with Barbara using a knitting needle, in a sadistic detail deliberately left out of the press to trap her killer, into her neck he had stabbed a ball point pen, and left it embedded within. Then, to terrorise and cause her immense pain, either a thin knife or a chopstick had been rammed between her eyelid and her eyeball – perhaps to make her tell him where he money was, or maybe just for fun? For minutes, or possibly hours, she endured a prolonged excruciating agony and terror, never knowing if he would let her live. But even that wasn’t the end. On her bed, he vaginally raped this 86-year-old widow, then turned her over and anally raped her. And while she was still face down and bleeding, he repeatedly stabbed her through both lungs so she couldn’t breathe or scream, and set fire to the bed. Her murder was yet another massacre of a frail old lady by a maniac, who vanished without a trace. At 8am the next morning, a neighbour noticed smoke coming from the ventilator grille above the front door of Henrietta’s flat, the caretaker called the fire brigade, and in her bedroom, her body was found; still smouldering after several hours, the lower half of her body – her legs, anus and genitals – were destroyed by fire, taking with it much of the evidence, but with multiple stab wounds to her chest and at least two of the weapons used to torture her still in her neck and face, detectives were called in. As before, the most sensational details of the case were reported by the press, some were deliberately left out (those only the killer would know), and with this being “potentially linked” by detectives to the murder of Barbara Pinder, the tabloid papers had dubbed him ‘The Saturday Night Slaughterer’. This investigation was headed-up by Detective Chief Superintendent Bill Carnie, but as before, it looked unlikely to be solved; as the murder weapon (a 6 inch knife) was missing, no-one was seen entering or leaving her flat, a set of fingerprints were found but never connected to a known felon, and even as a nationwide murder hunt was launched and the case garnered mainstream coverage, DCS Carnie stated “we are taking it very seriously the possibility that they could all be connected”… …as in the intervening weeks, four other women were attacked on neighbouring streets. Several elderly women on the Lillington Gardens estate had been beaten, stabbed and robbed, with random outbreaks of arson at several homes of lone women across the previous year. On the Sunday before Henrietta’s killing, an unnamed female pensioner was attacked on her doorstep by a stockily-built man in his 30s, who asked to be let in to “watch her television”. She escaped with just bruises. Yet, on Tuesday 30th of July 1985, on Warwick Way in Pimlico, Eileen McCarthy, a 60 year old cleaner was approached by a man – aged 35 to 40, 5 foot 10, straight black hair, stocky build, round face, wearing a white sleeveless denim jacket, a light blue shirt and a dark coat – at 5:45pm near the junction of Belgrave Road, with no premeditation and having never seen him before, in a swift and frenzied attack, he stabbed three times in the face. Not slashing, not cutting, but stabbing her with such ferocity, detectives described it as “plunging the knife in, and literally ripping it apart, until it broke the back of her skull”. She screamed, he fled, and taken to hospital, she slowly made a good recovery. At Westminster Coroner’s Court, Dr Paul Knapman declared that Henrietta’s murder was “particularly macabre… no motive is apparent and it is most disturbing that no one has been caught or convicted of this crime. It would have been far preferable if it had not had an inquest, but a murder trial instead”. And as the case stalled, the killings of Henrietta Osbourne and Barbara Pinder remained unsolved... …until a killer who wanted to be caught, confessed. But why? One year after Henrietta’s murder, on 30th of June 1986, Police in Pimlico arrested a man who’d broken into the flats of two elderly neighbours on nearby Page Street, and for no reason, set fire to their beds. 32-year-old David McKenzie had lived in London for years, but was born in 1954 in the Scottish city of Inverness, and raised in Dundee. Described as stocky and powerfully built, McKenzie’s education was limited, as being diagnosed aged 6 with a non-specific personality disorder, since 1976, he had been asking doctors “I want to be somewhere not in the community… in prison or a hospital”, as with no control over his actions, he told one psychiatrist about his sexual deviancy and his hatred of women. In his teens and twenties, he had worked in hotels and as a hospital porter, but unemployed at the time of his arrest, he was known as a prolific (if unskilled and unremarkable) burglar. For the last few years, McKenzie had lived at Dukes House, a council run tenement block on Vincent Road in Pimlico in the shadow of Big Ben and at the back of the houses where he had set fire to two old lady’s beds. He wasn’t a suspect in either killing, as being mentally unwell, his arrest resulted in him being put on a ‘hospital order’ (so instead of serving prison time, he’d be held at a psychiatric hospital) as he was deemed ‘a danger to the public’, as on 26th of June 1986 (three months before Henrietta’s killing), in his flat, this a self confessed paedophile indecently assaulted, raped and buggered a 14-year-old girl. Charged with rape, when later questioned about the fires, on the 16th of August 1986, McKenzie spent hours saying nothing, not even replying ‘no comment’ to the detectives questions, as the balding, 17 stone hulk sat there, staring. But it was as he was asked (possibly jokingly) “do you have anything else to say in your defence?”, that overpowered with the weight of guilt, he made a startling confession. He said “I want to tell you about the old lady”, and unaided, this blabbermouth confessed to Barbara Pinder’s murder and according to detectives “he revealed details only the killer could have known”. On the 29th of August 1986, David McKenzie was charged at Horseferry Road Magistrates Court, and while held on remand, again to the detectives he said “I want to tell you about the other old lady”. He confessed to the killing of Henrietta Osbourne, and on the 14th of November 1986, he was charged. A killer was caught, two murders were solved, the elderly women in Battersea and Pimlico were safe from a monster, and even though he never said why he did it, it concluded because he felt ashamed. In his interviews with the detectives, finally talking, the blabbermouth was open and frank about his heinous crimes, which he recounted unemotionally as if he was reading a set of instructions, yet his head hung low in shame and his eyes were etched in guilt. When asked, he couldn’t give any motive, and although his recollection was accurate and proved he was there, he had some glaring errors in his memory, but maybe this was caused by drink or drugs, fear or shame, or his limited mental capacity. But the paedophile, sadist and double-killer David McKenzie wouldn’t immediately go on trial, as being sent to Broadmoor Psychiatric Prison to be assessed, as a psychopathic paranoid schizophrenic, he wasn’t deemed mentally fit to plead for three years. His confession was worth its weight in gold, but as six psychiatrists gave differing opinions on whether he actually knew the difference between reality or fantasy, fact or fiction, as in his mind, all of the details blurred into one, even in his own retelling. While confessing to killing Henrietta, McKenzie said “I’ve spoken to my brother, Danny, and he asked me if I did it alone, I said ‘no’”. He then named his accomplice - a fellow burglar, a friend and an old flatmate – who was later arrested, but released without charge, as there was no evidence against him. In his statement, McKenzie said “I intended to steal, I never meant her any harm”, but as she opened the door to him, so he claimed “I pushed her back, put my hand over her face, at this time I had a knife in my hand”, and with his supposed accomplice “we argued about what to do with her… it was him, he took the knife out of my hand and hit the old lady with it. We started looking about the flat… then we both raped her”, although that evidence was all destroyed by fire. But was McKenzie a psychopath who only cared about himself and was hoping to reduce his charge by blaming his friend, or a fantasist who couldn’t tell the truth from a dream, and the facts about his heinous crimes were lost in his mind? On 12th of January 1990, the trial for both arson attacks, the 14-year-old’s rape and the murders of Barbara Pinder & Henrietta Osbourne began at the Old Bailey, before Judge Kenneth Richardson QC. With Robin Grey QC as his defence, McKenzie pleaded ‘guilty’ to arson and five counts of unlawful sex with a child, but ‘not guilty’ to both murders. Given his mental state, much of the evidence was based around whether he calculatedly killed both women, or whether he was not mentally responsible. In his opening statement, John Bevan QC said “the facts you are about to hear are, without exception, unpleasant and abhorrent. It’s a most distressing case. It is essential that you put emotion entirely to one side and steel yourself to consider the evidence coldly and dispassionately. There is no doubt that he is a strange person. Sometimes what he says may not be true. He has his own motives for making things up and telling lies. As the prosecution, we accept he has a personality disorder. He is suggestible, and imagines things to be true when they are not. That does not prevent him from being a murderer”. Whereas his defence counsel stated “there was not one shred of evidence besides the confession to link him to the killings”, but McKenzie himself was never in court, except to give his evidence, stating “I find it upsetting to be here. It makes me feel guilty”, so he stayed inside his cell at Brixton Prison. Hearing the evidence, a jury of seven women and five men found him ‘not guilty’ of the murders of Barbara Pinder and Henrietta Osbourne, but ‘guilty’ of manslaughter by diminished responsibility. Summing up, Judge Kenneth Richardson QC described McKenzie as “one of Britain’s most dangerous killers… you have been found guilty of two of the most appalling killings I can recall. I am quite certain you are a frighteningly dangerous man”. Sentenced on the 30th of March 1990, Judge Richardson said “You will remain at Rampton High Security Hospital until such time that it’s absolutely clear to those responsible for your care and release that you are no longer a danger to the public”. Held under Sections 37 and 41 of the Mental Health Act 1983, David McKenzie remains there today after 36 years. (False end) But those weren’t the only crimes he confessed to. Having told detectives about the two ‘old ladies’ he had murdered – being born and bred in Scotland, struggling with psychopathic schizophrenia, being a sadist, an arsonist, a rapist and a paedophile with a hatred of women – as he had with Barbara & Henrietta, before the detectives, once again, the blabbermouth began to speak. In a scattergun retelling, like his fractured memory was grasping at fragments of clues lost in the foggy mists of his mind, he confessed to a wealth of other unsolved murders, retelling them in full detail. He had murdered a 27-year-old man in Hertfordshire, a 79-year-old woman in Shropshire, an 11-year-old girl on Scottish border, a five year old girl in Edinburgh, and with two stabbings of victims who – like 60-year-old Eileen McCarthy, the cleaner who was randomly stabbed in the face in an unprovoked attack in Pimlico – had survived, a senior detective stated “he may, some day, give us the information we want to close the files on these dreadful events which have haunted so many people for so long”. Guilt can be a strange thing, as with two brutal unsolved murders, what began with a silent man sitting passively in an interrogation room, guilty of rape and arson but saying nothing, led detectives to a self-confessed serial killer and a series of unsolved murders across the UK, totalling ten or even twelve. Part two of two of The Blabbermouth 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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