Frederick Bailey Deeming 1890 Trial File

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Earlier this week I visited the Hull History Centre with a view to searching for a few loose ends that needed tying up.  Whilst there I thought I would search for one last time for the criminal papers that covered the trial of Frederick Bailey Deeming in Hull in 1890.  In the past I had unearthed a rather short one line snippet from the calendar of prisoners that stated that Deeming, under the alias of Harry Lawson was sent to Hull Prison for 9 months, however, a search of the actual papers pertaining to this period did not hold any information on Deeming/Lawson.

Despite this the search continued and for the past 5 years I have discovered that the case was covered in the Hull and Beverley press as well as some national publications.  The case also made it into the Hull Watch Committee’s Minutes book when at two meetings the Hull Corporation discussed financial compensation for the capture of Deeming.  These records alluded to the decision being made by the Finances Committee, but a search of their records turned up nothing.

This week for the final time I searched and found the Harry Lawson card, taking the unique number and handing it over.  Moments later I was presented with a large bound file, plus an even larger file.  The Harry Lawson material was a part of a bigger haul that was neither here, nor there, so I laid it all out and began searching.

After a short period of time I uncovered the files on Deeming/Lawson, and set about recording them, and putting them back into their own file in numerical order so that future researchers can find the material.  I was surprised at the amount of material inside.

There are in total around 77 pages of material, which includes,

Eyewitness testimonies on large A4 sheets,

Eyewitness recording papers on small A5 sheets,

Harry Lawson letter to Miss Matheson,

Harry Lawson letter to Reynoldsons Jewellers,

Reynoldsons Jewellers letter to Harry Lawson,

Telegrams between Hull and the following destinations, Southampton, London, Beverley, and Portsmouth on A5 sheets,

Harry Lawson’s defence statements,

Correspondence from police officials,

And much much more.

I have spent the week prepping the work and cataloguing it and still have much to do but as you can imagine this is a lovely haul with lots of new information about Frederick Bailey Deeming and his criminal lifestyle.

3 Responses to “Frederick Bailey Deeming 1890 Trial File”

  1. Jeff Bloomfieldj Says:

    Hi Mike,

    Sorry I have been rather lax visiting this website, but I have had some fammily tragedy recently (my mother died last month. So I was just noting this interesting batch of material on “Mad Fred”. I was curious - although I have doubts about it - if the Reynoldsons Jewelers either were still in opertion or if they had descendants, or existing legal papers with some solicitors about he whole incident.

  2. Jeff Bloomfield Says:

    Somehow the comment I wrote the other day hada mispelling of my name. I just wanted to know if Mike had tried to find any leads to the possible records of the Reynoldsons Jewelers.

  3. admin Says:

    He Jeff, thanks for visiting. I was aware of your mothers passing and my condolences are with you and yours.

    There are sadly no records of Reynoldsons left in Hull or the East Riding. I have found relatives but all they could offer was a photo album of the Reynoldson family. The files are quiet indepth and show the date that Deeming first visited the branch, what he bought, how much he paid, and the relationship they had. There are letters and telegrams between the two dating back to January 1890.

    I was made aware that Mr. Thomas Reynoldson visited London to get funds to finance the Hull Police’s visit to Monte Video. He secured the funds and the National Archives has copies of the correspondence which I have on order.

    I also have several pages from the Hull Watch Committee’s minutes of meetings 1890-1891 which cover the affair. Hope this helps.

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