Seven time nominated BEST BRITISH TRUE-CRIME PODCAST at the True Crime Awards, Independent Podcast Award and The British Podcast Awards, and voted 4th Best True-Crime Podcast by This Week, iTunes Top 25 Podcast, Podcast Magazine's Hot 50, The Telegraph's Top 5, Crime & Investigation Top 20 True-Crime Podcasts, also seen on BBC Radio, Sky News, The Guardian and TalkRadio's Podcast of the Week.
Hannah Tailford & Irene Lockwood
EPISODE THREE HUNDRED AND FORTY-EIGHT:
This is Part B of D of Undressing Jack the Stripper, an eight part series made in conjunction with the True Crime Enthusiast podcast. From the late 1950s to the mid-1960s, the bodies of eight sex-workers (Elizabeth Figg, Gwynneth Rees, Hannah Tailford, Irene Lockwood, Helen Barthelemy, Mary Fleming, Margaret McGowan and Bridget O’Hara) were found dumped in or near the River Thames in West London. Panic spread that a sadistic serial killer was on the loose who targeted young petite brunettes; stripped and strangled them, dumped each body within weeks and streets of each other. Yet with not a single witness to his crimes, even though several suspects have since been named, with no convictions, it’s a series of killing which remains a mystery to this day. After the success of their ten-part series, Psychopath: Two Side of Patrick MacKay, Mike at Murder Mile and Paul at the True Crime Enthusiast join forces once again to bring you an eight-part crossover series about one of Britain’s most infamous unsolved serial killing – Jack the Stripper. This episode is about Hannah Tailford & Irene Lockwood.
SOURCES: a selection sourced from various archives:
MUSIC:
UNEDITED TRANSCRIPT: (River sounds) Everybody loves a good villain, and by the 1960s, Jack the Stripper was synonymous as a sadistic serial-killer of sex-workers in West London. His first two, Elizabeth Figg and Gwynneth Rees would be listed as ‘unofficial’, as with Figg most likely murdered by a client, and Rees’s impossible to determine owing to her decomposition - but thought by police to have died by a botched abortion - like every killing listed as ‘unofficial’ or ‘official’, they only come to the surface when it suits a theory. They died four and a half years part, they didn’t know each other, they didn’t solicit in the same area, their injuries were inconsistent, their individual suspects were ruled out and unconnected, Figg was dumped against tree, Rees was buried in a rubbish tip, one was found after 5 hours, one after 40 days, and only one of these two victims of Jack the Stripper was naked - which is odd if that’s his trademark. All that connected them was they were sex-workers who died half a mile apart. With the press wholly disinterested, the detectives didn’t think these two murders were linked, but you can’t quell a rumour. Yet all that changed with Hannah Tailford and Irene Lockwood, the first two ‘official’ killings by Jack the Stripper; as both women were found naked, possibly strangled and drugged, and dumped in the same stretch of the River Thames, two months and a few 100 yards apart. But were they murdered? Created in collaboration with True Crime Enthusiast, across this joint eight-part series, Paul & I will rip apart 60 years worth of the myths, lies, misinformation and conspiracies of one of London’s greatest unsolved serial killings, to make you rethink what you know or have been told about Jack the Stripper. My name is Michael, I am your tour guide, and this is Murder Mile. Episode 348: Undressing Jack the Stripper – Part B of D. So, why did Jack the Stripper become fact, when the evidence was so flaky? Three reasons; we all love a good story, we hadn’t had a gripping series of killings since John Reginald Christie in 1953, and (with the assassination of John F Kennedy, the Cuban missile crisis, the Cold War, the threat of global nuclear annihilation and the Profumo affair) we needed a distraction from the horrors of the world. But ‘Jack the Stripper’ didn’t begin in 1960s West London. In 1922, in the impoverished dwellings of Moorgate, 9 miles east of Chiswick, a sinister pervert got his thrills by luring children as young as five into dark passages and convincing them to get naked. He never touched or assaulted them, he just wanted them to strip. 25-year-old James Drew was convicted of 26 cases and sentenced to 21 months. So, why have you never heard of this ‘Jack the Stripper’? Because it was reported accurately, without sensationalism, and nobody died. So, what about the other 1960s ‘Jack the Stripper’ in California; the masked bandit who terrorised the nightspots of San Diego, robbing the bars, and forcing any attractive redheads to undress. Auburn haired barmaid Geraldine Stoner so took his fancy that three times in four weeks he robbed Tommy’s bar, with the police noting “I imagine she’s getting a little tired of it”. He was a robber, a rapist, he was real and he was mystery, and yet, even though this ‘Jack the Stripper’ could conclusively be linked to his crimes, and was named before the West London stripper had moved onto his second ‘unofficial’ victim, as the story didn’t ignite the tabloid headlines, it was forgotten. So, what made the murders of Hannah Tailford and Irene Lockwood official ‘Jack the Stripper’ killings? Born on the 19th of August 1933 in Ponteland, Northumberland in the North-East of England, Hannah, known as ‘Terry’ was the youngest daughter of William & Anne Tailford, and like all eight of the women who would be known as the Hammersmith Nudes, her upbringing was abusive, troubled and lonely. In 1948, aged 15, as a troublemaker and a tearaway, convicted of stealing clothes for her boyfriend, she was sent to borstal in South Shields, again in South Norwood in London and Addiscombe in Surrey, two of which she absconded from. And although she tried to make an honest living as a waitress and a machinist, still in her teens, she was offered a job as a cleaner by an ex-army officer, but again, being used and abused by men, he made her wear a French maid’s outfit, while performing lurid sex acts. Unsurprisingly, being broke, unloved and depressed, Hannah had five convictions for theft and three for prostitution; she solicited in Bayswater, Queensway and Notting Hill; and according to Detective Chief Inspector Ben Devonald who headed the inquiry into her death, “she was prone to discard her clothing”, which could be why she was naked, although DCI Devonald never hid his dislike of Hannah. By the early 1960s, Hannah had mostly progressed from being a streetwalker who picks up clients in cars on the kerbs, to attending sex parties in fashionable Eaton Square hosted by a foreign diplomat. She appeared in pornographic films, possibly involving S&M and strangulation, and in her Victoria flat, Police found cameras, lighting equipment and a diary, which Detective Chief Superintendent John Du Rose (who later headed-up the hunt for the stripper) said “she’d evidently been taking compromising pictures of her clients with the idea of getting extra money from them” – similar to Irene Lockwood. And although, several of the Hammersmith Nudes had address books which were never found, in an era prior to the internet, mobile phones and for many even home phones, this was not uncommon. In 1956, aged 23, Hannah met Allan Lynch, known as ‘Jock’. They never married, they moved between bedsits, they argued, accrued debts, and although they had a daughter together named Linda, of the three other children she’d given birth to, two were formally adopted and in 1959, one she sold for £20 via an advert in the newspaper to a couple in Staffordshire – which sums up the tragedy of her life. By the time of her death, she was three months pregnant. Hannah Tailford was said to be the first ‘official’ murder by Jack the Stripper, but to accept her death as a serial-killing means to discredit a wealth of eye-witness testimony from very credible sources. In the last two weeks of her life, Hannah was seen four times near Charing Cross by Arnold & Elizabeth Downton who knew her and were friendly with her, they said, “two days before she was found, she said she was fed up. She said she had been roaming about all day long and felt like committing suicide”. She was depressed, moody, unpredictable and addicted to Drinamyl - a barbiturate known as ‘Purple Hearts’ used to treat anxiety, but it was withdrawn from use in 1978 as it frequently caused psychosis. Nine days before her body was found, on Friday 24th of January 1964, Allan Lynch last saw her alive at their home on Thurlby Road in West Norwood. Hannah cooked dinner, and before she left at 9:30pm, Allan said she turned to their two-year-old daughter, and said “how would you like a new mummy?”. It was odd, as she adored Linda, but he put it down to as an unusual blip in her spiralling mood. That night, he put Linda to bed, and with Hannah not back by morning, being annoyed, he was heard to say “the cow’s left me with the kid”, he searched for her in pubs and clubs, he spoke to Thomas Trice, a 69-year-old who had paid to take nude photos of Hannah who told him she was planning to marry someone called Don or Dennis, and in a pique of anger, Allan gave away all of her clothes and personal belongings, he then spent the next three days blind drunk, but she wasn’t dead, she was only missing. Over those nine days, several credible witnesses saw her; between Saturday 24th and Thursday 30th she was seen at several coffee stalls she regularly frequented in Pimlico, Charing Cross and Victoria, on Friday 31st Arnold & Elizabeth gave her five shillings and bought her a meal as she “looked miserable and had been crying”, and just after midnight on Saturday 1st February, 36 hours before her body was found, Frederick Townsend, a window cleaner saw her drinking coffee at a Charing Cross coffee stall and said “she was high as a kite”, and although being just 5 foot 2 and slim framed, this should have made her an easy target, Frederick said, “I’ve seen her in a temper, and she can really handle herself”. With it being bitterly cold, Hannah wore a dark blue coat, a flame red blouse, a black cardigan and skirt, black court shoes, a light blue pixie hat, a black leather handbag, and wore a watch and a plain wedding band. Reports state that a coat matching hers was found by Waterloo Bridge, with another wrapped around a police boat’s propellor, and although no suicide note was found, this is not unusual. On Sunday the 2nd of February 1964 around 1:15pm, two brothers, George & Douglas Capon who were competitive rowers at the London Corinthian Sailing Club, half a mile east of Duke’s Meadows, were bailing out a rescue launch on the foreshore near Hammersmith Bridge for the day’s sailing. The water was icy cold, it was high tide, and among the driftwood, detritus and even an old Christmas tree which had become trapped underneath the old pontoon, “we could see all of the body, except the head”. The autopsy was conducted by Dr Donald Teare at Hammersmith Mortuary. Cause of death, owing to river water in her lungs suggested that she had died by drowning, but with barbiturates in her system, it was uncertain to what extent she was alive when she entered the water. With no signs of assault or defensive wounds except an unspecified bruise to her lower jaw, although swabs found semen in her vagina and mouth, there was no evidence that she had been raped. Her body was naked, except for her stockings which crumpled around her ankles, but there were no marks to denote that she was stripped post-mortem, as blood often pools around the elasticated areas. And with no ring or watch marks, it’s likely they were removed hours before her death - suggesting suicide. Dr Teare stated “it is rare for someone planning to commit suicide to eat a large meal beforehand”, but with witnesses confirming her depression and drug abuse, a deranged mental state was possible. But equally, there were details which made less sense; several of her teeth were missing, she had a faint mark to her neck possibly by a ligature, a one and a half inch wound to the back of her right calf, and (most bafflingly of all) her own knickers were found stuffed in her mouth. But was this a murder? It was unclear. This could have been a suicide, it could have been an accident while on drugs, she may have died of natural causes having sex with a client who panicked and dumped her body, or as the ever insensitive DCI Ben Devonald who headed-up the investigation told the inquest, “Miss Tailford was a sexual pervert known to have attended orgies”, so perhaps she had died during sadomasochistic sex, hence a lack of rape, the knickers in her mouth and her body dumped while she was barely alive. All nearby houses, clubs and houseboats were searched, a foreign diplomat who ran kinky parties was questioned, but with no witnesses to her death or her last hours alive, the case came to a logical end. On the 24th of April 1964 at Hammersmith Coroner’s Court, the first ‘official’ victim of Jack the Stripper was listed as ‘drowned’, and with insufficient evidence for a murder, it was ruled as an ‘open verdict’. Unlike Elizabeth Figg & Gwynneth Rees, there were no suspects to hint at ‘foul play’; no known pimps or punters, and although the actions of Allan Lynch, her partner, were strange having given away her clothes before she was dead, he volunteered a statement, was questioned, and ruled out as a suspect. Yet one simple action, initiated by him, may have been the catalyst for many of the murder myths. On Tuesday the 4th of February, two days after her body was found, during his questioning at Lavender Hill police station, Allan (who was distraught) denied knowing she was a sex-worker (which makes sense, as just by admitting that, could result in him being charged with living off immoral earnings), but he told detectives about her blue leather diary, a freebie given away by Jack Swift the bookmakers, in which she kept the details of many male clients whose “professional careers she could have ruined”. There was no proof that she blackmailed anyone, no evidence that someone wanted her dead, there was only a possibility that she’d taken her life, but as that July and August 1963, half a year before her death, she was a witness in a high-profile court case alongside one of the later Hammersmith Nudes, this ignited the press’s interest who sought to lay the blame for her murder, when it was anything but. So, how does this unexplained death link to the second ‘official’ victim, Irene Lockwood? It’s already been established that the killer wasn’t after a young petite brunette, as half of the eight were in their early 20s and the rest were 30 or thereabouts. Tailford was a brunette, but Lockwood was dyed auburn, and although seven of the eight were 5 foot to 5 foot 3, some wore heels, others wore flats, and having picked them up in his car, it’s unlikely he got out a ruler and measured them. Like Gwenneth Rees; Hannah Tailford and Irene Lockwood were pregnant at the time of their deaths, and although death by illegal abortion was mooted, they were the last of the eight who were pregnant. There were several tenuous reasons why it was assumed (but not proven) that the deaths of Tailford and Lockwood were linked, and therefore were murders. Both were sex-workers who died two months and a few 100 yards apart, both were found naked, in the Thames with possible ligature marks. But what’s baffling is, of the eight so-called Hammersmith Nudes, these are the only two whose bodies were found in the River Thames, and yet, both of them were ‘open verdicts’ and listed as ‘drownings’. So, if it wasn’t a murder, how were these women stripped and strangled? Would a suicidal woman undress in the depths of a freezing winter and jump into an icy river? Yes, if she was high on drugs, chronically depressed and wanted to make sure that she died quickly. But one report did say that a coat similar to Hannah’s had wrapped around a police boat’s propellor, and she had a one and a half inch wound to the back of her right calf, “possibly caused by a boat’s propellor”. The River Thames looks calm and peaceful, but it’s not, it’s powerful and violent, with a tidal ranges of 25 feet, currents which reach speeds of 14 miles per hour, and with the dark silty waters beneath being thick with drift wood, sunken ships, old bridges, builder’s rubble and underwater obstacles from centuries of being a major port, the bodies which are pulled from the river rarely come out unscathed. Even bodies fished out of calmer waters like the Grand Union Canal at Westbourne Park, four miles north of the River Thames have perplexed the most experienced pathologist. In July 1942, the body of 43-year-old Lena Cunningham was found floating by the Wedlake Street footbridge; she was stripped naked, had ligature marks to her neck, odd bruises to her face and body, and thick cuts up her chest. Home Office Pathologist Sir Bernard Spilsbury, the father of forensic science ruled her death as a ‘wilful murder’, stating she had been stabbed, stripped and dumped in the canal. But a second post-mortem proved something very different; as a homeless drunk who slept in a bush, she had choked on her own vomit, fell into the canal and drowned, and across the day’s her body was submerged, the propellors of passing boats ripped the clothes from her body causing cuts to her legs and chest, ligatures to her neck, and the water’s turbulence resulting in punch-like bruises to her face - like Tailford & Lockwood. Both were heavy drinkers and users of ‘Purple Hearts’. None of the women were proven to have been sexually assaulted, even though, bafflingly the police suggested that bruises to their faces may have been caused by forced oral sex. And although it doesn’t explain why Hannah Tailford had her knickers stuffed in her mouth, Dr Donald Teare had seen it in a suicide before, “to muffle her own screams”. But hey, this is Jack the Stripper right? The cunning serial-killing genius. Maybe this was all part of his devious plan; to pay off the witnesses, to blame a slew of suspects, to never leave a fingerprint, to be seen by no-one, and to fool 100s of experienced detectives and pathologists over 7 years into believing that his first four murders looked like a failed sex attack, a botched abortion and two drownings… …or maybe, the press and the public had a lot more to do with this myth, than a lone stripper? Born on the 29th of September 1938 in Walkeringham, Nottinghamshire, Irene Charlotte Lockwood was the illegitimate child of Minnie Lockwood, and like so many women who turned to sex-work, her past was littered with stints in the care system, prison, abuse, assault, drugs, fear, and rarely any love. She moved to London in 1958 and lived in West Ealing, she had five convictions for soliciting, two for insulting behaviour, one for indecent behaviour, and frequented Kings Cross, Camden and Bayswater. Her life was unremarkable, until two details piqued the press’s interest, hinting at something sinister. Out of the flat at 16 Denbigh Road that Irene shared with her friend Maureen Gallagher, their pimps ‘Simon’ & ‘Ray’ forced them to work long hours satisfying unwashed clients, to feature in pornographic films, to earn a fraction of the money they earned, to pay an extortionate rent, to always be in debt to them, to pickpocket their punters, and – making both women a target – blackmailing their clients. As was suggested by Detective Chief Superintendent John Du Rose (who later headed up the hunt for Jack the Stripper), just like Hannah Tailford, Irene Lockwood “had evidently been taking compromising pictures of her clients with the idea of getting extra money”, but neither of the women ran the scams. Just as Gwynneth Rees lived in fear of her pimps, Irene was forced to do degrading things, as her life was expendable and nothing more. If she didn’t do as they ordered, she was beaten. If she argued, she was disfigured, making her money-making power worthless. And if she tried to flee the controlling restraints of her violent pimp, she would be disposed of – there was no love lost for a dead prostitute. This is where the press got interested in the case, and started connecting the invisible dots. A close friend of Irene Lockwood was 22-year-old redheaded sex-worker Vicky Pender, who on the 19th of March 1963, one year before Irene vanished, she was brutally murdered in her flat on Adolphus Road in Finsbury Park; she was found on her bed, semi-clad and strangled, with severe head wounds. Vicky, real name Veronica Walsh, was forced to blackmail married men using sexually compromising photographs, and for this, she (and not her pimps) was murdered by her client - Colin Welt Fisher, who was given a life sentence for her murder in December 1963, four months before Irene’s death. After his conviction, Irene & Maureen were in fear for their lives; over the Easter weekend of 1964, they fled their bedsit, that Sunday (29th March) Maureen slit her wrists in the ladies toilet at Bayswater tube station, and with her friend alive and hospitalised, Irene kept a low profile, but had to earn money so sold sex in a place she less frequently solicited, Chiswick… on the banks of the River Thames, half a mile and a few streets west from the bodies of Elizabeth Figg, Gwynneth Rees and Hannah Tailford. Last seen on Tuesday 7th of April 1964 at 8pm at Windmill pub on Chiswick High Road, her body was found the next day during low-tide, beached upon the mudflats of the Thames at Corney Reach, 300 yards south of Hannah Tailford’s body, and half a mile north of Elizabeth Figg and Gwynneth Rees. The autopsy by Home Office Pathologist, Dr Donald Teare stated; she was naked, but with no marks where the blood had pooled, her clothes were removed before death or shortly afterwards. And with no hint of violence, assault was ruled out. With water in her lungs, it was clear that she had drowned. Like Hannah Tailford, with a 6 to 8 inch wound to her right breast, this was caused by a propellor blade, which may have been why she was naked and had a faint ligature mark around her neck. And although semen was found in her vagina and mouth, so with no cuts or bruises, her rape seemed unlikely. Identified by her fingerprints and her tattoos, on the 8th of May 1964, an inquest at Ealing Coroner’s Court decreed her cause of death was ‘drowning’, with Detective Inspector Frank Ridge stating of this fourth murder by the serial killer Jack the Stripper, “there was absolutely no suspicion of foul play”. With nothing to link any of the victims, no primary suspects arrested, and the Press stating “victim no4 may be a suicide”, this was a closed case whose tortured myth was destined to be forgotten… …or it should have been, until a beehive of bullshit was kicked open by a sad and desperate man. 57 year old, Kenneth Archibald was a partially deaf caretaker at the Holland Park Tennis Club, who (to supplement his disability pension) was paid by Joe Cannon to let a illegal afterhours drinking den open at the club, which Irene Lockwood was said to frequent, as his business card was found in her flat. On the 27th of April 1964, three weeks after Irene’s body was found, having been charged with stealing hearing aids, Kenny got drunk, and at Notting Hill Police Station, he confessed to her murder, using the details of her last moments which had been recounted in the press. The newspapers were in fever pitch as “the Stripper killer has been caught”, but proven to be a “pathological liar”, he was acquitted. Archibald said outside of the Old Bailey, “it was silly to let my imagination run riot”, and Joe Cannon said “everybody knew that the miserable bastard was as innocent as a new born babe”. But then again, it’s not uncommon for anyone to twist these simple facts for the sake of fame, money or attention. For centuries, people have believed in rippers and strippers regardless of the evidence… …but 62 years before Jack the Stripper and 9 years after Jack the Ripper, a similar series of suspicious deaths on the River Thames, took place over a few weeks at Woolwich, Rotherhithe and Bermondsey. On Thursday 17th of June 1897, the Evening News wrote “seventeen bodies found in the River Thames in three weeks… the largest number known to have been found in that period”. One was described as “late 20s, 5 foot 4, a small and delicate brunette” who was “perfectly naked, except for a bangle… her left jaw was broken… injuries may have been caused by a propellor… and it is not a rare thing to discover bodies from which the clothing has been stripped by the action of the tide, or ships”. With no proof of robbery, rape or murder, and suicide a possibility, the coroner listed her as “drowned”. Another small brunette was found nearby at Mark Brown’s Wharf in Tower Bridge; her body was less decomposed, fully clothed and had all of her rings on her fingers. And by Temple Pier, the rotten body of a small brunette was found – not dissimilar to Hannah Tailford – trapped under a pontoon with the driftwood. She was naked except for her boots and (like Elizabeth Figg) her cause of death was unclear. One of the victims, a short brunette in their early 20s was a man; his nose was smashed, his ears, eyes, and several limbs were missing, he was naked, and the inquest ruled his death as ‘drowning’. But did the people and the press believe that a sadistic serial killer was on the loose? No. Why? The evidence. The same happened on the 29th of April 1921, when in Weybridge, a naked female was found with her hands missing. Then 10 miles away in Twickenham, that day, a female nude was found in the River Crane, her skull smashed. Were they connected? No. As nothing linked them but the date and nudity. On the 30th of September 1903, on London’s Embankment, the body of a female brunette was found naked except for her stockings and shoes, but with her throat cut, her demise was ruled as a murder. All of these deaths have been forgotten, all were listed accurately as suicides, accidents or murders, no lazy journalists or bored detectives attempted to link their tenuous details in the hope of making a name for themselves, as in the years following Jack the Ripper, the public were savvy to the press’ lies. Yet, Jack the Stripper was different, he was a myth, a lie and a conspiracy theory, but also a convenient distraction from the horrors of the 60s; strikes, wars, assassinations and risk of nuclear Armageddon. The first two killing were ‘unofficial’, the second two were listed as ‘drownings’, and with no suspects or evidence of a serial killer, Jack the Stripper only existed in the minds of the people and the press… …but all that was about to change. Undressing Jack the Stripper continues next week with Part C, the third part of my series, with the first and second parts of Paul’s series at the True Crime Enthusiast podcast out now. 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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