The Model Prison at Pentonville,
The Illustrated London News – Public domain
Autumn 1899, just weeks before the turn of a new century, saw two men released from Pentonville Prison on London’s Caledonian Road. Jailed seven years previously following an anarchist plot in Walsall, some continued to protest the men’s innocence – or at the least plead on their behalf of a harmless naivety.
Justice newspaper, a self-proclaimed ‘Organ of Social Democracy’, described the villains as young, enthusiastic and foolish. Betrayed by police and mouchards into actions which caused no serious results, they were convicted on no evidence other than that of their betrayers.
Their plotting came to nothing and, what’s more, was not directed against England or Englishmen but against foreign despotism. For a bombing campaign was planned across the European capitals for May 1st 1892, International Labour Day, with the intended explosive devices engineered surreptitiously in Walsall and the nearby workshops of industrial Victorian Birmingham.
At the Stafford Assises of April 1892, two of the Walsall anarchists were sentenced by Mr Justice Hawkins to ten years penal service for manufacturing bombs. At that time much unrest engulfed both home and the Continent. Men came from Italy, Switzerland, France and elsewhere with their anarchist propaganda and caught the ears of those smarting under wrong, or under a sense of supposed wrong, in England.
During the intervening years, the foolish dream of a return to a Golden Age by wrecking buildings and killing indiscriminately working men, women and children was no longer operand and it was safe to release the misguided men who were so blind to the signs of the times.
Moved from Portland Prison eight days previously, on the Saturday morning of the 16th September 1899, convicted anarchists Fred Charles and John Batolli were released on ticket of leave from Pentonville. A third man, a Frenchman called Cailes, would not be free until December. A man named Deakin had been sentenced to five years and two others had been acquitted by Justice Hawkins’ court.
A number of members of the Social Democratic Federation assembled outside the prison gates to welcome the released convicts. Attempts to organise a fund for the satisfactory future arrangement of the men by the London Socialists had, according to a sniffy report in the Scotsman newspaper, proved a complete failure.
Charles looked very ill and weak and during his incarceration spent a considerable time in the infirmary. A clerk, he was a native of Norwich and, being familiar with the French language, worked in Walsall as a foreign correspondent by a Mr Gates. Batolli, also known as Deognaviety, was an Italian and carried on business on Charlotte Street in the notorious London den of immigrants and anarchists called Soho.
At the time of Inspector Melville of Special Branch’s investigation, incriminating documents showing how an opera house could be destroyed had been found in the men’s possession. As had drawings of a bolt said be used in the production of bombs.
Back on Caledonian Road, both men enjoyed a substantial breakfast and then left with friends. A ‘welcome home’ was to be held at one of the West End Socialist clubs during the following week.
Documents were not all that had been attributed to the men. Other objects included plaster castings, some pieces of old metal, a small piece of time fuse and a sketch said to be of a bomb. An incendiary French pamphlet entitled ‘L’International’ was also found.
However, doubt surrounded the veracity of the investigation. L’International was closely connected to a notorious French agent provocateur called Coulon. As for this mysterious word ‘mouchard’, amongst school children it translates to ‘sneak’ but among the criminal classes is used as a pejorative term for a police informer.
Despite being prosecuted under the Explosive Act, eagle-eyed readers will notice the list of suspicious objects said to have been found in the Walsall anarchist’s possession includes no explosives.
At the time of the investigation, William Ditchfield was held at a police station for 12 hours without food and then interrogated by Inspector Melville and a Superintendant Taylor. Despite the aid of whiskey and cigars, Ditchfield said nothing to aid the investigation. The officers had better luck with another of the arrested, Deakin, a man of nervous temperament.
After being questioned, Deakin went back to his cell and brooded in the silence of the night. There, he conveniently overheard Charles and Ditchfield making confessions to the duty officers. It will be noted that in return for the application of his excellent ability to hear through prison walls, Deakin received a lighter sentence.
In cross-examination in the 1892 Assises trial, defence counsel Mr Thompson grilled Melville. The story that emerged in court suggested Victor Cailes had been sent to Walsall by Auguste Coulon with John Batolla later being dispatched to measure his progress.
The inspector conceded he did have some experience of Continental anarchy cases but had not been engaged in them beyond making enquiries abroad. As for foreign anarchists, he had been in the company of Coulon but not at Scotland Yard.
When pressed, Melville could not swear that he had never given Coulon anything to do for him but he did not remember having done so. Neither would Melville swear that he had not paid Coulon money, for, in the interest of the higher moral purpose achievable through informers, he paid money to lots of anarchists.
The suspicion being the prisoners in the dock were ensnared by Auguste Coulon, with the instigation of the whole endeavour being in close communion with Inspector Melville. Years later, on a cold September Saturday, although there was no pardon, the early release of the prisoners was a recognition that their convictions might be seen as unjust or politically motivated.
As for William Melville, his star continued to rise with, in 1903, his elevation to head a new intelligence section at the War Office. Originally called MO3, it is now known as MI5. Keep that in mind when viewing historical footage of picket line violence, Poll Tax riots or hearing of the alleged present-day activities of the ultra hard extreme far Right.
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