Frances “Fanny” Billing and Catherine Frary were known as “The Burnham Poisoners.”
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FULL TEXT: The town of Burnham Market, in Norfolk, and the vicinity for some miles around have for the last week been in the most dreadful state of excitement caused by the discovery of three diabolical murders, which have already been committed, and a plan laid for taking away the lives of several other people.
The circumstance that led to the discovery was as follows; — A woman
named Mary Taylor, the wife of Deter Taylor, a journeyman shoemaker,
was taken with a violent retching after dinner on Thursday, the 12th
instant, and though medical assistance was procured, she died at five
o’clock the same afternoon. Mr. Cremer, the surgeon, as soon as he saw
her, pronounced her to have been poisoned. An inquest was held on the
body on the following Saturday, when the jury after sitting till eleven
at night, adjourned the inquest till Monday, and then having no evidence
as to how the deceased came by
the arsenic which had been found in the stomach, returned a verdict to
the effect that she died by taking arsenic, but that it was unknown by what means it was administered.
There
were certain rumours that the husband of the deceased had been
connected with a married woman named Fanny Billing, who lived next door,
and this connexion seemed to have been a great cause of uneasiness
between Taylor and his wife, and
a week or two before the deceased had, it seems, taxed Billing with it,
and they had had a quarrel. It was also discovered that Billing had a
short time before bought three-pennyworth of arsenic of a druggist.
Some flour that was in Taylor house was also found to contain a
quantity of arsenic, and from this the deceased had made dumplings on
the day she died. These facts coming out, the magistrates thought proper
to hold a special
meeting on the Wednesday for the further investigation of the matter,
and Taylor and Billing were brought before them, examined, and remanded
for further examination. As Billing, however, was going away, a woman
living next door, named Mary, who was frequently in and out of Mrs.
Taylor’s, was heard to say to her, “Maw, hold your own, and they can’t
hurt us.” This led to further suspicion, and Frary was apprehended. It
was then recollected that Frary’s husband, and a child they kept, died
about a fortnight before very suddenly. Orders were then given to have
them disinterred; their stomachs were sent to Norwich to be analysed,
and they also were found to contain arsenic.
On Tuesday Billing was fully committed to take her trial for the murder at the forthcoming assizes. She is nearly 60
years old, has had 14 children, and nine are now alive. She has
confessed the whole, but says that Frary gave the poison to Mrs. Taylor.
She has also confessed
to other acts of the same kind with Frary, and that there were several
other persons they had marked out for their victims.
She had made an attempt to poison her husband
about the same time, but he did not take a sufficient quantity, and
recovered. Taylor is still remanded, and Frary has been taken speechless
since Tuesday, and cannot be recovered. The wife of her brother, who
lived at Burnham Overy, died about the same time suddenly, but has not
yet been taken up. Taylor says he was taken sick on the Thursday with
his wife, but that he threw up and got better. Mrs. [Catherine] Frary
was sent for to attend on Mrs. Taylor, and a witness by the name of
Rowley says, when he was in at Taylor’s to be shaved, he saw Frary, in
making her some gruel, put something into it from a paper on the point of a knife, white, almost like flour, so that
in all probability, to make assurance doubly sure, she poisoned also
her gruel. It was, too, the merest wonder in the world that the poisoned
flour (for it had not then been found to be poisoned) was not
taken to provide for the funeral – indeed this seems to have been
anticipated by the wretches, and then the whole family would have been
their victims; but the management was fortunately taken out of Frary’s
hands, and the flour providentially unused. Taylor has borne a good
character for many years until he got connected with this woman. His
wife was a very industrious person, and although they had no family they
lived very comfortably together. She was 47 years of age, and he is about the same.
[“Murder By Poisoning” (abridged from Norwich Mercury), Baldwin’s London Weekly Journal (London, England), Apr. 4, 1835]
Executed Aug. 10, 1835
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Executed Aug. 10, 1835
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VICTIMS
Died: Mrs. Taylor; Robert Frary; a child kept by the Frarys; the sister of Mrs. Frary’s husband.
Died: Mrs. Taylor; Robert Frary; a child kept by the Frarys; the sister of Mrs. Frary’s husband.
Survived: Mr. Billing; several other persons marked as
victims
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EXCERPT: The following executions have taken place in this city during the last twenty-two years: — … Frances Billing and Catherine Frary, of Burnham Westgate, for poisoning their husbands, on April 10th, 1835; Peter Taylor, also of the same place, was tried as an accomplice, but was discharged – he was, however, subsequently retaken, and executed on the 23rd of April, 1836;
EXCERPT: The following executions have taken place in this city during the last twenty-two years: — … Frances Billing and Catherine Frary, of Burnham Westgate, for poisoning their husbands, on April 10th, 1835; Peter Taylor, also of the same place, was tried as an accomplice, but was discharged – he was, however, subsequently retaken, and executed on the 23rd of April, 1836;
[History, Gazetteer, and Directory of Norfolk, and the City
and County of the ..., Sheffield, England, 1835, White,
Francis, & Co, p. 83]
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FULL TEXT: October 17, 1835 – This day the sentence of the
law was carried into execution upon the two women, Frances
Billing and Catherine Frarey, who were found guilty of having poisoned
Mary Taylor and Robert Frarey. Billing ascended the scaffold with the greatest
firmness, but Frarey was obliged to be supported from the jail to the platform,
and the two miserable wretches, the one 48, and the other 46 years of age, were
launched into eternity amidst an immense concourse of spectators, (20,000 or
30,000), above one-half of whom were women. [Norwich. (Eng.) paper.]
[H Niles, ed., Niles’ Weekly Register,
From March, 1835, to September, 1835, Vol. XLVIII. Or, Volume XII. Fourth
Series. Baltimore, 1835, p. 100]
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A full account of the case can be found in the following books:
A full account of the case can be found in the following books:
Maurice Morson, Norfolk Mayhem and
Murder: Classic Cases Revisited, Chapter 3, “The Burnham Poisoners,” (pp.
38-55), Barnsley, 2008, Pen & Sword Books Ltd, South Yorkshire
Neil Storey, Norfolk Murders, 2006, The History Press, Stroud, Gloucestershire.
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