July 17, 2025 • 11 mins
In 1868, 19-year-old railway porter Thomas Wells shot and killed Dover Priory stationmaster Edward Walshe after a disciplinary dispute. Wells showed little remorse and offered no resistance during his arrest. He was tried, found guilty, and became the first person executed privately under the new Capital Punishment Act.
I originally created this episode in 2020, but have now enhanced it with additional information
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🙏 Thank You!
Your support means the world to me and helps keep Prash’s Murder Map alive. I truly appreciate it!
Music:
"Long Note Three" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Epidemic Sound - Blood Lines
I originally created this episode in 2020, but have now enhanced it with additional information
Subscribe to my YouTube channel for video versions of the podcast:
📺 youtube.com/@prashsmurdermap
💡 Support me on Patreon to get ad-free audio episodes
https://www.patreon.com/prashsmurdermap
💰 Make a one-off contribution
Every little bit helps! If you'd like to make a one-time donation, you can do so via PayPal here: https://www.paypal.me/prashsmurdermap
🎧 Listen to my new podcast Curious Britain
Explore the mysteries, folklore, and forgotten stories of Britain. Listen now: https://linktr.ee/curiousbritainpodcast
🙏 Thank You!
Your support means the world to me and helps keep Prash’s Murder Map alive. I truly appreciate it!
Music:
"Long Note Three" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Epidemic Sound - Blood Lines
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
In the eighteen hundreds. The job of a station master
was hard work, but was rewarded with social respect and
a station house to live in so they wouldn't have
to walk or cycle for miles to and from work
each morning. But their proximity to the railway and the
responsibility of the role meant they worked long hours and
(00:23):
rarely enjoyed time off their mines, a network of train
routes and memorized timetables, and the days measured by the
rhythmic clacking and chugging of the trains coming and going
from the station. Fifty eight year old Edward Dolphus Walsh
was one such station master, who managed the Dover Priory
(00:46):
station of the London, Chatham and Dover Railway, known as
the ELSDR. The station, which opened in eighteen sixty one,
had been built on land belonging to the Archbishop of
Canterbury and still exists today. Edward Walsh had been married
to his wife Hannah for nearly thirty years and had
(01:08):
one grown up daughter. He was known to be even
tempered and fair when dealing with his staff, but had
high standards and ran a tight ship. But recently Walsh's
patience had been tested by carriage cleaner and railway porter
Thomas Wells, who had been working at Dover Priory Station
(01:30):
for eighteen months. Thomas Wells was nineteen years old and
the elder son of a fish salesman. He spent much
of his spare time and even some of his working hours,
engrossed in crime novels, penny fiction, and the illustrated police news,
gorping at the sensational descriptions of robberies, assaults, and ghastly murders.
(01:57):
Some were real, like the Tales of Highwaymen and the
Wild Boys of London, a group of juvenile criminals who
terrorized the streets of the Capitol, while others were imagined,
like Sweeney Todd, the demon barber of Fleet Street. Little
did Thomas Wells know that his own actions would soon
(02:17):
be immortalized in one of his favorite true crime publications.
Thomas Wells had been heard more than once referring to
station master Edward Walsh as the old bastard. Walsh kept
a close eye on young Wells, frequently picking up on
(02:37):
his shoddy conduct. Aware of his tenuous position, Welles had
once told a colleague that if mister Walsh ever fired him,
he would have his revenge, but his idleness was the
least of it. He had recently been seen firing a
pistol while on duty. Due to the seriousness of shooting
(02:59):
a weapon on railway premises, Walsh had reported the matter
to his own superior, the senior superintendent at Dover, Henry Cox,
at eleven am on Saturday tewond of May eighteen sixty eight.
Henry Cox personally admonished Thomas Wells, who flatny denied shooting
(03:21):
the gun. Cox advised the bothersome employee to apologize to Walsh,
telling him that if he did so, no further action
would be taken, but if he refused to make amends,
the matter would be escalated to the district superintendent. Cox
gave Wells ten minutes to think it over, then joined
(03:44):
Walsh in his office, sitting down next to him at
his desk. Exactly ten minutes later, Thomas Wells walked into
Walsh's office as agreed, but when Cox asked him if
he had anything to say, fully expecting a heartfelt apology,
the nineteen year old remained silent and surly, walking out
(04:07):
again without saying a word. Three minutes later, he returned.
By this time both men had stood up to inspect
a railway timetable. Walsh was facing the door and jumped
back in surprise when Wells burst back into the room
brandishing a rifle. He spoke not a word as he
(04:31):
lifted the weapon and with an air of undisturbed calmness,
shot Walsh in the face, killing him instantly. The bullet
flew right through his head, lodging in the mantelpiece behind,
still carrying blood, hair and skin from the victim's scalp.
As if entirely unaware of the gravity of his actions,
(04:53):
Wells simply walked away. Cox was stunned by the sudden,
merciless attack, and it was a few moments before he
was able to find his voice and call for assistance.
Two railway laborers came running into the office to assist
and called the police and a doctor, although it was
(05:13):
tragically too late for the medic to be of any help.
When the police arrived, they found Wells hiding in an
empty carriage, but were greeted not with a violent fury
they expected, but with quiet compliance. Wells handed over the
rifle willingly and walked to the police station in silence,
(05:36):
not even attempting to claim innocence. When his mother heard
of his arrest, she collapsed and was cared for by relatives.
Wells's brother, two sisters, and girlfriend visited him while awaiting trial,
but were surprised to find that he seemed more interested
in getting something to eat than morning the life he
(05:57):
had taken, or fretting over the consequences. The magistrates court
was crowded with people who knew and respected the murdered
station master. When Thomas Wells was escorted into the room
in handcuffs, he looked around as if scanning for faces
he might know. An insanity defense was presented, as it
(06:22):
transpired that Wells had fallen off a train a few
weeks before the murder and had landed on his head.
His family testified that he shouted and swore at the
slightest provocation, and had once thrown his mother out of
her bed in the middle of the night, But as
no medical advice had been sought after his accident, and
nobody else other than his family thought there was anything
(06:45):
wrong with him, the defense plea was ignored and he
was found guilty and sentenced to hang on Thursday, sixth
of August. The murderous railway porter's family came to his
cell at Maston Jail to say their final farewells, their
sobs of grief contrasting strangely with Wells's placid demeanor. Before
(07:10):
his execution, he wrote a letter to the station master's wife, Hannah,
asking for forgiveness. On the evening of Wednesday, twelfth of August,
Wells was marched to the condemned cell, which lay just
behind the scaffold the cell doorg, just six paces away
from the drop, a nightmarish apparition which remained out of
(07:33):
sight to the prisoner until the last moment, but which
haunted their dreams and waking moments in their final days.
At five am on Thursday thirteenth of August eighteen sixty eight,
Wells dressed in his railway porter's uniform and received a
visit from the prison chaplain, who administered the holy sacrament
(08:00):
am he was led out onto the scaffold. His final
words were two lines from a simple hymn he had
learnt while in prison, which were ignominiously muffled as the
cat was drawn over his head. A moment later, executioners
Cowcraft and Smith drew the bolt to end the short
(08:21):
but eventful life of nineteen year old Thomas Wells, although
due to a miscalculation on the length of the rope,
the convict struggled for two full minutes, his chest heaving
fiercely and his hands visibly twitching, before he finally fell still.
A black flag was raised to indicate that the execution
(08:44):
had taken place, and the body was suspended for one
hour as per official protocol, before being cut down within
twenty four hours. A coroner's inquest was carried out to
formally confirm the death, and a certificate of execution was
posted on the gates of the jail. Wells is remembered
(09:08):
as the first person to be executed in private inside
a prison. As under the new Capital Punishment Act, public
executions were no longer held in front of a crowd.
After the hanging, the Home Office recommended that all future
executions should take place on a Monday at eight o'clock
in the morning on the Monday immediately following the third
(09:31):
Sunday after the prisoner was condemned. As well as the
black flag, the new rules required the bell of the
prison or local parish church to be told to mark
the perpetrator's passing. Wells was buried in the Maidstone Prison
cemetery and was soon joined by Alexander Arthur Mackay, who
(09:53):
coincidentally was also nineteen years old and charged with murder
after a brutal attack on his employer, Missus Grossmith in
Artillery Passage, London, a case I covered in a previous
Penny Dreadful's episode. I'll leave the link in the description
as a footnote to the shooting of station Master Walsh.
(10:15):
Some members of the public speculated that Thomas Wells had
been influenced by the graphic illustrated Police News, a copy
of which was found in his pocket after he was arrested.
Whether reading stories of murder and mayhem encouraged the young
man to commit the crime, or whether he was always
(10:36):
destined to become a killer is something we will never know.
Thank you for listening to this episode of Pressure's Murder Map.
If you'd like to support the show, please like, subscribe,
and leave a comment or review. My wife and I
have also set up a new podcast called Curious Britain,
(10:57):
available on all major podcasts platforms. In the show, we
explore the myths, legends and mysteries of the British isles,
from ancient stone circles to cryptids and ghost stories, uncovering
the quirky tales that shape Britain's cultural heritage. If that
sounds interesting to you, then we'd appreciate you trying it
(11:19):
and letting us know what you think. I'll leave a
link in the show notes, but don't worry, I'll still
be releasing true crime episodes here on Pressure's murder Map.
Thank you for your support, and I'll see you again
soon
In the eighteen hundreds. The job of a station master
was hard work, but was rewarded with social respect and
a station house to live in so they wouldn't have
to walk or cycle for miles to and from work
each morning. But their proximity to the railway and the
responsibility of the role meant they worked long hours and
(00:23):
rarely enjoyed time off their mines, a network of train
routes and memorized timetables, and the days measured by the
rhythmic clacking and chugging of the trains coming and going
from the station. Fifty eight year old Edward Dolphus Walsh
was one such station master, who managed the Dover Priory
(00:46):
station of the London, Chatham and Dover Railway, known as
the ELSDR. The station, which opened in eighteen sixty one,
had been built on land belonging to the Archbishop of
Canterbury and still exists today. Edward Walsh had been married
to his wife Hannah for nearly thirty years and had
(01:08):
one grown up daughter. He was known to be even
tempered and fair when dealing with his staff, but had
high standards and ran a tight ship. But recently Walsh's
patience had been tested by carriage cleaner and railway porter
Thomas Wells, who had been working at Dover Priory Station
(01:30):
for eighteen months. Thomas Wells was nineteen years old and
the elder son of a fish salesman. He spent much
of his spare time and even some of his working hours,
engrossed in crime novels, penny fiction, and the illustrated police news,
gorping at the sensational descriptions of robberies, assaults, and ghastly murders.
(01:57):
Some were real, like the Tales of Highwaymen and the
Wild Boys of London, a group of juvenile criminals who
terrorized the streets of the Capitol, while others were imagined,
like Sweeney Todd, the demon barber of Fleet Street. Little
did Thomas Wells know that his own actions would soon
(02:17):
be immortalized in one of his favorite true crime publications.
Thomas Wells had been heard more than once referring to
station master Edward Walsh as the old bastard. Walsh kept
a close eye on young Wells, frequently picking up on
(02:37):
his shoddy conduct. Aware of his tenuous position, Welles had
once told a colleague that if mister Walsh ever fired him,
he would have his revenge, but his idleness was the
least of it. He had recently been seen firing a
pistol while on duty. Due to the seriousness of shooting
(02:59):
a weapon on railway premises, Walsh had reported the matter
to his own superior, the senior superintendent at Dover, Henry Cox,
at eleven am on Saturday tewond of May eighteen sixty eight.
Henry Cox personally admonished Thomas Wells, who flatny denied shooting
(03:21):
the gun. Cox advised the bothersome employee to apologize to Walsh,
telling him that if he did so, no further action
would be taken, but if he refused to make amends,
the matter would be escalated to the district superintendent. Cox
gave Wells ten minutes to think it over, then joined
(03:44):
Walsh in his office, sitting down next to him at
his desk. Exactly ten minutes later, Thomas Wells walked into
Walsh's office as agreed, but when Cox asked him if
he had anything to say, fully expecting a heartfelt apology,
the nineteen year old remained silent and surly, walking out
(04:07):
again without saying a word. Three minutes later, he returned.
By this time both men had stood up to inspect
a railway timetable. Walsh was facing the door and jumped
back in surprise when Wells burst back into the room
brandishing a rifle. He spoke not a word as he
(04:31):
lifted the weapon and with an air of undisturbed calmness,
shot Walsh in the face, killing him instantly. The bullet
flew right through his head, lodging in the mantelpiece behind,
still carrying blood, hair and skin from the victim's scalp.
As if entirely unaware of the gravity of his actions,
(04:53):
Wells simply walked away. Cox was stunned by the sudden,
merciless attack, and it was a few moments before he
was able to find his voice and call for assistance.
Two railway laborers came running into the office to assist
and called the police and a doctor, although it was
(05:13):
tragically too late for the medic to be of any help.
When the police arrived, they found Wells hiding in an
empty carriage, but were greeted not with a violent fury
they expected, but with quiet compliance. Wells handed over the
rifle willingly and walked to the police station in silence,
(05:36):
not even attempting to claim innocence. When his mother heard
of his arrest, she collapsed and was cared for by relatives.
Wells's brother, two sisters, and girlfriend visited him while awaiting trial,
but were surprised to find that he seemed more interested
in getting something to eat than morning the life he
(05:57):
had taken, or fretting over the consequences. The magistrates court
was crowded with people who knew and respected the murdered
station master. When Thomas Wells was escorted into the room
in handcuffs, he looked around as if scanning for faces
he might know. An insanity defense was presented, as it
(06:22):
transpired that Wells had fallen off a train a few
weeks before the murder and had landed on his head.
His family testified that he shouted and swore at the
slightest provocation, and had once thrown his mother out of
her bed in the middle of the night, But as
no medical advice had been sought after his accident, and
nobody else other than his family thought there was anything
(06:45):
wrong with him, the defense plea was ignored and he
was found guilty and sentenced to hang on Thursday, sixth
of August. The murderous railway porter's family came to his
cell at Maston Jail to say their final farewells, their
sobs of grief contrasting strangely with Wells's placid demeanor. Before
(07:10):
his execution, he wrote a letter to the station master's wife, Hannah,
asking for forgiveness. On the evening of Wednesday, twelfth of August,
Wells was marched to the condemned cell, which lay just
behind the scaffold the cell doorg, just six paces away
from the drop, a nightmarish apparition which remained out of
(07:33):
sight to the prisoner until the last moment, but which
haunted their dreams and waking moments in their final days.
At five am on Thursday thirteenth of August eighteen sixty eight,
Wells dressed in his railway porter's uniform and received a
visit from the prison chaplain, who administered the holy sacrament
(08:00):
am he was led out onto the scaffold. His final
words were two lines from a simple hymn he had
learnt while in prison, which were ignominiously muffled as the
cat was drawn over his head. A moment later, executioners
Cowcraft and Smith drew the bolt to end the short
(08:21):
but eventful life of nineteen year old Thomas Wells, although
due to a miscalculation on the length of the rope,
the convict struggled for two full minutes, his chest heaving
fiercely and his hands visibly twitching, before he finally fell still.
A black flag was raised to indicate that the execution
(08:44):
had taken place, and the body was suspended for one
hour as per official protocol, before being cut down within
twenty four hours. A coroner's inquest was carried out to
formally confirm the death, and a certificate of execution was
posted on the gates of the jail. Wells is remembered
(09:08):
as the first person to be executed in private inside
a prison. As under the new Capital Punishment Act, public
executions were no longer held in front of a crowd.
After the hanging, the Home Office recommended that all future
executions should take place on a Monday at eight o'clock
in the morning on the Monday immediately following the third
(09:31):
Sunday after the prisoner was condemned. As well as the
black flag, the new rules required the bell of the
prison or local parish church to be told to mark
the perpetrator's passing. Wells was buried in the Maidstone Prison
cemetery and was soon joined by Alexander Arthur Mackay, who
(09:53):
coincidentally was also nineteen years old and charged with murder
after a brutal attack on his employer, Missus Grossmith in
Artillery Passage, London, a case I covered in a previous
Penny Dreadful's episode. I'll leave the link in the description
as a footnote to the shooting of station Master Walsh.
(10:15):
Some members of the public speculated that Thomas Wells had
been influenced by the graphic illustrated Police News, a copy
of which was found in his pocket after he was arrested.
Whether reading stories of murder and mayhem encouraged the young
man to commit the crime, or whether he was always
(10:36):
destined to become a killer is something we will never know.
Thank you for listening to this episode of Pressure's Murder Map.
If you'd like to support the show, please like, subscribe,
and leave a comment or review. My wife and I
have also set up a new podcast called Curious Britain,
(10:57):
available on all major podcasts platforms. In the show, we
explore the myths, legends and mysteries of the British isles,
from ancient stone circles to cryptids and ghost stories, uncovering
the quirky tales that shape Britain's cultural heritage. If that
sounds interesting to you, then we'd appreciate you trying it
(11:19):
and letting us know what you think. I'll leave a
link in the show notes, but don't worry, I'll still
be releasing true crime episodes here on Pressure's murder Map.
Thank you for your support, and I'll see you again
soon
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