Dorothea Waddingham | |
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Born | Dorothy Nancie Merelina Allan Chandler 21 June 1899 Nottingham, England |
Died | 16 April 1936 HM Prison Birmingham, England | (aged 36)
Cause of death | Execution by hanging |
Nationality | British |
Occupation | Nursing home matron |
Criminal status | Executed |
Children | 5 |
Conviction(s) | Murder |
Criminal penalty | Death by hanging |
Dorothea Nancy Waddingham (21 June 1899 – 16 April 1936) was an English nursing home matron who was convicted of murder.
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10 Nurses That Are Serial Killers
Transcription
10 Serial-Killing Nurses. Number 10, Jane Toppan. Jane Toppan was a nurse who began her training at Cambridge Hospital. During her residency, Toppan would perform experiments on her patients with the aid of morphine and atrophine. Toppan used different dosages of the two drugs to see the effect that it has on her patient's nervous system. However, Toppan's patients weren't her only victims. In 1901, Toppan moved in with Alden Davis after his wife, who Toppan had murdered, passed away. Just weeks later, Davis and his two daughters were dead. Eventually, a toxicology exam was ordered for Davis' youngest daughter, and the report proved that her death was a result of poisoning. In 1902, Toppan confessed to 31 murders, she was eventually committed to the Taunton Insane Hospital for life. Number 9, Kristen Gilbert. Kristen Gilbert became a nurse at the VAMC in Northampton, in 1989. During her time there, nurses began to notice that an unusual amount of patients died in Gilbert's presence. Initially, the nurses joked about the coincidences calling her the "Angel of Death." Eventually, the other nurses began to become more and more suspicious. The nurses voiced their concerns and an investigation ensued. It was discovered that Gilbert induced cardiac arrest in her patients by injecting them with a large dose of epinephrine and would then respond to the emergency. Gilbert was convicted of three first-degree murders, one second-degree murder, and two attempted murders and sentenced to life in prison. Number 8, Lainz Angels of Death. Maria Gruber, Irene Leidolf, Stephanija Mayker and Waltraud Wagner, were a group of nurses who murdered as many as 200 people from 1983 to 1989. Wagner was the first of the group to discover how much she enjoyed killing. After she took her first patient's life in 1983, with a morphine overdose, she recruited the three other nurses to help her murder weak patients. The group would perform their kills by having one person hold the victims head and pinch their nose, while another would pour water into the victim's lungs until they drowned. Eventually, the group was caught after a Doctor heard them bragging about their latest victim. They ended up confessing to 49 murders, although many people believe they were responsible for many more deaths. Wagner and Leidolf both received life sentences while Mayer and Gruber received 15 and 20 years. However, by 2008, all four had been released from prison for good behavior. Number 7, Benjamin Geen. From December 2003 to February 2004, an unusually high number of patients in the UK's Horton General Hospital were suffering from difficulty breathing. Suspicion fell on nurse Benjamin Geen after it was noted that not only did all the incidents of respiratory arrest take place while he was on duty, but that he also seemed to get a thrill out of the excitement of patients being resuscitated. Geen was eventually found guilty of killing two patients and causing serious harm to 15 others by administering an overdose of either muscle relaxants or unprescribed painkillers. When he was taken in by police, he was found to be in possession of a fatal dose of muscle relaxant. He was sentenced to 17 life sentences for his crimes. Number 6, Stephan Letter. Stephan Letter worked as a nurse in a hospital that catered mostly to the elderly population. During his time at the hospital, there were a number of suspicious deaths that occurred when he was working. Eventually, foul play was suspected and the bodies of 40 patients were exhumed to determine the cause of death. Letter became the main suspect after vials of lysethenon were found in his apartment. Letter eventually confessed to killing 29 patients, although it is believed that he could have killed upwards of 80. The former nurse ended up receiving life in prison in 2006. The slew of murders that Letter committed has actually been considered the worst killing spree in Germany since WWII. Number 5, Beverley Allitt. Beverley Allitt worked as a nurse at the children's ward at Grantham and Kesteven Hospital. During a 59-day period, Allitt attacked thirteen children and killed four of them. The other nurses working at the hospital began to become suspicious after they noticed that there was a high number of cardiac arrests that were occurring in the children's ward. The police were brought in and it was soon discovered that Allitt was the only nurse who was working during every attack. Allitt pleaded not guilty but ended up being convicted of 4 counts of murder, 11 counts of attempted murder, and 11 counts of causing grievous bodily harm. Allitt received thirteen life sentences for her heinous crimes. Number 4, Dorothea Waddingham. Although Dorothea Waddingham was not a medically trained nurse, she did run a nursing home near Nottingham, England, which qualifies her for this list. Around 1935, Waddingham took in a woman named Mrs. Baguley and her daughter Ada, into her nursing home so she could care for them. While Ada and her mother resided in the nursing home, Ada wrote up a new will that left everything to Waddingham. Later that same year, both Ada and her mother passed away. No suspicions were raised about the two deaths until a man called Dr. Cyril Banks ordered a post-mortem on the bodies. It was soon discovered that both Ada and her mother had died of morphine poisoning. Waddingham was hanged for her crimes on April 16, 1936. Number 3, Genene Anne Jones. Genene Anne Jones was working at the Bexar County Hospital when it was discovered that a suspicious amount of children were dying under her watchful eye. But instead of reporting the incidents to the police, the hospital quietly let her go. The nurse then took up a position at a pediatric clinic in Kerrville, Texas. It was at this hospital that Jones was finally brought to justice for her crimes. Investigators discovered that Jones would use different drugs to induce medical crises in her patients. Jones would then come to the rescue of her patients in order to receive praise for her hard work. Jones was sentenced to 99 years and then 60 years in prison for two murders, although it is believed that she probably committed upwards of 60. She is scheduled for release in 2017, due to overcrowding. Number 2, Efren Saldivar. Efren Saldivar worked as a respiratory therapist when he killed upwards of 50 people. Saldivar would perform his murderous deeds by injecting his patients with a paralytic drug that would either lead to respiratory failure or cardiac arrest. Saldivar managed to continue his murders for quite a while due to his choice of victims. Saldivar would only kill patients that were close to death, this made it nearly impossible to determine if there were a rise in patient deaths when Saldivar was working. On March 13, 1998, Saldivar confessed to 50 murders but later retracted his statement. He was eventually convicted of six counts of murder and received 6 consecutive life sentences. Number 1, Daniela Poggiali. Former nurse Daniela Poggiali made headlines everywhere after she posted a selfie of herself with a corpse. This led to an even more horrifying realization that Poggiali was suspected of drip-feeding her patients with potassium chloride in order to kill them. Prosecutors believe that Poggiali may have killed as many as 93 patients and maybe even three in a single day. If this is proved to be true, it would make Poggiali the most prolific serial killer nurse in the world. It has also been reported that Poggiali would steal cash and belongings from her victims. The former nurse is currently in jail where she has received multiple proposals and a lot of fan mail.
Life
Dorothea Waddingham was born Dorothy Nancie Merelina Allan Chandler, with her parents marrying a year after her birth – Waddingham being her father's surname. Dorothea was born on a farm near Nottingham. She has been referred to as "Nurse" Waddingham because the two murders she was accused and convicted of were committed in a nursing home she ran near Nottingham in England. However, she was not a qualified nurse and the only medical training she received was as a ward-maid at an infirmary near Burton-on-Trent. In 1925, under the name of Dorothea Nancy Waddingham, she married Thomas Willoughby Leech. He was twice her age and dying of cancer. During their marriage, she served two prison terms for fraud and for theft.[1] The couple had three children. Leech died in 1933, at which time Waddingham was seeing another man named Ronald Joseph Sullivan. Sullivan had fought in World War I and had been awarded the Military Medal for gallantry and also served in Ireland after the war.[2] Although they never married, they had two children.[3] Whilst living with Sullivan, she began to take in elderly and infirm patients and turned her home at 32 Devon Drive, Nottingham into a nursing home.
Activities
Mrs. Blagg, the Honorary Secretary of the County Nursing Association, approved of Waddingham's work and arranged for Mrs. Louisa Baguley, who was 88, and her daughter Ada, who had multiple sclerosis or "creeping paralysis" as it was known at the time, to become patients. In February 1935, another patient named Mrs. Kemp died from an illness that required large dosages of morphine and a quantity of the drug remained on the premises of Waddingham's nursing home after her death.
Ada Baguley had made a will leaving her estate of £1,600 in trust for her mother after her death with the rest to be divided between two cousins, Lawrence Baguley and Fred Gilbert, after her mother died. Ada had been informed that it was likely that she would precede her mothers' death. However, this will was destroyed by Ada in May 1935, and a new will drawn up that left all the money to Dorothea Waddingham and Ronald Sullivan when Ada and her mother both died (in recompense for the nurse's care of them). The elderly Mrs. Baguley died in the second week of May.
Ada lasted through the spring and summer of 1935. On September 10, 1935, Ada received a visit from a family friend, Alice Briggs, who spent an afternoon cheering her up. Briggs told Waddingham that she would have Ada over for tea at her home in a couple of days. The next day, Sullivan advised H. H. Mansfield that his patient Ada was in a coma. Mansfield came and found Ada dead. As this was expected, the doctor was not suspicious, and after gaining further details from Waddingham, he filled out a death certificate stating Ada died of cardiovascular degeneration.
Ada had left instructions to be cremated, and if the cremation had gone through it is probable that Waddingham could not have been proved guilty of Ada's death. However, for a body to be cremated, two doctors were required to sign the death certificate, which could only be done after the family of the deceased was notified. Ada had noted in her will a request not to notify her relatives, and Waddingham said there were no relatives, which was a lie.
The man in charge of cremations was Cyril Banks, who was also the Medical Officer for Health for Nottingham. Banks had never thought highly of Waddingham's so-called "nursing home" and knew there was no State Registered Nurse on the staff as there should have been. He became suspicious at the note from Ada Baguley that authorised cremation[4] and ordered a post-mortem. The post-mortem found no traces of anything connected to Ada's physical conditions that could have immediately caused death. This led to an analysis of the organs of the deceased by W. W. Taylor, Senior Assistant to the Nottingham Analyst, who found considerable traces of morphine (over three grains) in her stomach, liver, kidneys, and heart.
Suspicions were now raised about the death of Mrs. Baguley and an exhumation was ordered by the Home Office. This was supervised by Dr. Roche Lynch, who found that Luisa Baguley had also died of morphine poisoning. This led to the arrest of Waddingham and Sullivan for the two murders.[5]
Trial
Waddingham's trial started on 4 February 1936 before Justice Rayner Goddard.[6] Her barrister was Mr. Eales,[7] with the prosecution by Norman Birkett (a rarity, for Birkett normally handled criminal defence). Birkett brought out much damaging testimony, including how Ada Baguley's last meal was heavy and rich for a woman in her condition: Waddingham admitted that she gave Ada pork, baked potatoes, kidney beans, and two portions of fruit pie. It was suggested as an effort to disguise the cause of death and showed a lack of concern for the patient's welfare.[8] The result was that Waddingham was convicted of using morphine to poison Mrs. Baguley and Ada. The purported motive behind the murders was to gain the Baguleys' estate. It was also revealed that Waddingham claimed that Dr. Mansfield gave her surplus morphine tablets for Ada Baguley, which that doctor denied.[9] In trial, Sullivan was discharged for insufficient evidence, although the so-called note from Ada Baguley regarding cremation was written by him.[10]
Waddingham was found guilty on 27 February. Despite a recommendation of mercy due to her being a mother of several young children, she was hanged on 16 April 1936, having confessed to the crime shortly before her execution.[11] Her execution was carried out at Winson Green Prison and her hangman was Thomas Pierrepoint, assisted by his nephew Albert Pierrepoint.
Waddingham was a mother of five and was still breastfeeding her 3-month old baby at the time of her execution. 10,000 people gathered outside the gaol to demonstrate against the execution, chanting "Stop this mother murder!".[11] The protests were led by the prominent abolitionist Violet Van der Elst.
The fiancé of Ada Baguley committed suicide after her death.[11]
Popular culture
The execution is dramatised in the 2005 film Pierrepoint, in which Waddingham is played by Elizabeth Hopley. Although the film shows Timothy Spall as Albert Pierrepoint carrying out the execution, in fact the hangman was Thomas Pierrepoint (Albert's uncle); Albert acted as his uncle's assistant. Further, the execution took place at Birmingham's Winson Green prison, not Holloway Prison in London as is implied in the film.[12] The film is also incorrect in that it depicts the execution taking place during the war years.
The case itself is also featured on the Investigation Discovery program Deadly Women, appearing as the second of three cases in the tenth-season episode "Cash In".
Her case was examined in Murder, Mystery and My Family in 2019. A judge concluded that her conviction should be upheld.
The case was dramatised in the episode 'Nurse Waddingham' in the 1949-51 Radio Series Secrets of Scotland Yard.[13]
References
- ^ Rowland, pp. 138–139.
- ^ Wilson and Pitman, p. 534; Rowland, p. 140.
- ^ There is some confusion about the parentage of the children. Wilson and Pitman say that Leech was the father of some children (pp. 533–534) while Rowland said she only bore Sullivan children (p. 149).
- ^ Wilson and Pitman, pp. 534–535.
- ^ A Famous Nottingham Murder by Stephen Morris
- ^ Real Crime[permanent dead link]
- ^ Rowland, p. 148.
- ^ O'Donnell, p. 91.
- ^ Wilson and Pitman, p. 535.
- ^ Wilson and Pitman, p. 534.
- ^ a b c National archives
- ^ Fielding, Steve. Pierrepoint: A family of Executioners. p. 148.
- ^ "Nurse Waddingham 'Secrets of Scotland Yard'". Fourble, Secrets of Scotland Yard. Retrieved 29 March 2023.
Bibliography
- O'Donnell, Bernard Should Women Hang? (London: W.H.Allan, 1956) (pp. 88–92: "Women's Murder Weapon" is about poison used by several women poisoners, the first being Waddingham; there is also a photo of her in the book).
- Rowland, John Poisoner In The Dock: Twelve Studies in Poisoning (New York: Archer House – Arco Books, 1960) (pp. 137–157: "Morphine" is about Dorothea Waddingham).
- Wilson, Colin and Pitman, Pat Encyclopedia of Murder (New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1961, 1962) (pp. 533–535: "Waddingham, Dorothea Nancy"
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