Crime Immemorial

On the evening of January 31st, 1890, fifteen-year-old Amelia Jeffs, affectionately known as “Millie,” a day-school pupil who had left school about a year prior, was sent on a simple errand by her parents, Charles Albert Jeffs and Mary Annie Chamberlain. Living at 38 West Road, West Ham, East London, the family tasked Amelia with buying a fish supper from a shop on Church Street, roughly a quarter of a mile away.

Clutching threepence, Amelia left home around six-thirty p.m., as the winter evening settled over the quiet borough. She was seen by another local girl, Elizabeth Harner, near West Ham Church, carrying her basket and reportedly heading toward the shop. A schoolboy, Alfred George Gardner, also spotted her dawdling alone near some empty houses, but he noted no one else in the vicinity. Tragically, Amelia never reached the fish shop and failed to return home.

As hours passed with no sign of Amelia, her parents grew increasingly anxious. Charles Jeffs reported her disappearance to the West Ham police station that same night, and a search was promptly initiated. Handbills and posters bearing Amelia’s likeness were distributed across the neighborhood, displayed in shop windows and local homes, as the community rallied to find the missing girl. For nearly two weeks, her fate remained a mystery, with the police and public alike at a loss to explain her vanishing.

On February 14th, 1890, the search came to a horrifying end. Two police officers were inspecting a row of newly built, unoccupied terraced houses at 126 Portway, just a hundred yards from Amelia’s home. In a bedroom cupboard on the upper floor of the property, they discovered Amelia’s partially decomposed body. She had been raped and strangled, her own scarf used as the murder weapon. The state of her boots, which were clean, suggested she had been let into the house through the front door by someone with a key, rather than entering through the muddy rear, a detail that would later prove significant. The scene bore further clues: the dusty floor of a nearby room showed imprints of Amelia’s boots, indicating she had been alive in the house for some time before her death.

The discovery sent the press into a frenzy, with newspapers dubbing the case the “West Ham Mystery” or “West Ham Outrage.” The Illustrated Police News and The Penny Illustrated Paper published detailed accounts, some accompanied by sketches of the crime scene and Amelia’s coffin, amplifying public horror. The murder was likened to the infamous Jack the Ripper killings, though the modus operandi and victim profile differed significantly. The brutality of the crime, coupled with its occurrence in a supposedly peaceful area, deeply shocked Londoners, and the case became a focal point of Victorian true crime fascination.

The police, led by figures like Robert Anderson, Assistant Commissioner of Scotland Yard’s Detective Department, launched an energetic investigation. Anderson personally visited the crime scene, underscoring the case’s gravity. Suspicion quickly fell on Joseph Roberts, a local builder who had constructed the Portway terrace houses, and his father, Samuel Roberts, the night watchman for the site. Joseph had access to the keys of the properties, though Samuel claimed to have lost the key to number 126, a statement that raised eyebrows. At the inquest, held at the King’s Head tavern in West Ham Lane, both men gave contradictory and weak testimonies, fueling speculation. Joseph insisted Amelia had been killed elsewhere, but the clean state of her boots contradicted his claim, suggesting she was let in by someone with a key.

An ash stick with a silver band, bearing the initials of a man who had mysteriously left for Australia three days after Amelia’s disappearance, was found in the house, adding another layer of intrigue. However, this lead, like many others, failed to yield conclusive evidence. The police also explored Amelia’s personal life, with jurors at the inquest probing whether she had connections to anyone associated with the empty houses. Amelia’s mother, Mary, testified that her daughter had once pointed out Samuel Roberts, calling him “old Daddy Watchman,” but denied any negative remarks about him. Despite intense scrutiny, no definitive evidence linked the Roberts family—or anyone else—to the crime, and no arrests were made.

The inquest, opened by Coroner C. Lewis on February 17th, 1890, at the King’s Head, was a public spectacle. Charles Jeffs, visibly distraught, recounted his daughter’s movements, while Mary Jeffs noted that Amelia’s clothing was largely intact, save for a torn collar on her ulster, suggesting a struggle. The coroner described the crime as “dastardly, ferocious, and abhorrent,” urging the jury to spare no effort in seeking justice. Public sentiment was equally intense, with thousands attending Amelia’s funeral on February 19th at All Saints Church, West Ham. The mayor of West Ham, Alderman Frederick Smith, offered a £100 reward for information leading to the killer’s capture, and an anonymous donor funded the funeral, reflecting the community’s grief and outrage.

Amelia’s murder was not an isolated incident. Between 1881 and 1899, at least seven young girls and adolescents disappeared in West Ham, including Mary Seward (1881) and Eliza Carter (1882), both of whom vanished without a trace from the same street as Amelia. Some, like Amelia and Bertha Russ (1899), were found murdered in empty houses, while others, like Annie West, Eliza Skinner, and Mary Voller, were discovered in ditches, either dead or nearly so. Historian Dr. Jan Bondeson, in his book Rivals of the Ripper, argues that Joseph Roberts was likely responsible for these crimes, citing his access to the properties and suspicious behavior. However, critics note that the West Ham Vanishings predated the Ripper murders and differed in method, suggesting multiple perpetrators or even human trafficking rings, as child abductions for slavery or prostitution were not uncommon in Victorian London.

Despite the police’s efforts, Amelia Jeffs’ murder remained unsolved. In his 1891 report, Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Edward Bradford noted that the case was the only “capital crime unaccounted for” in 1890, with evidence against the prime suspect deemed insufficient. The discovery of the missing keys to 126 Portway in May 1890, reported by The Illustrated Police News, offered little clarity, and public suspicion lingered on the Roberts family, though no charges were filed. The house at 126 Portway remains standing today, a macabre landmark in West Ham’s history.