Reg Christie’s Deep, Dark Secret Is Revealed Amid A Gruesome Discovery
A crime scene photograph of three of the bodies found at 10 Rillington Place on March 24, 1953.
Following Timothy Evans’ execution, relations between Reg and Ethel Christie began to grow strained, between his exaggerated complaints about sundry physical problems and her demands to move to a new flat arising from their racially motivated contempt for a Jamaican family that had moved in on the third floor. She also began to taunt him about the impotence that had troubled him since his adolescence, and before long, the conflict came to a head.
The eight confirmed victims of John Reginald Halliday Christie, all strangled at 10 Rillington Place, from left to right: Ruth Fuerst, 21; Muriel Eady, 32; Beryl Evans, 20; Geraldine Evans, 1; Ethel Christie, 54; Rita Nelson, 24; Kathleen Maloney, 26; Hectorina McLennan, 26.
A photograph of Reg Christie distributed by London police in the manhunt following the discovery of the bodies at 10 Rillington Place.
The skeleton of Ruth Fuerst
On December 14, 1952, Christie strangled his wife Ethel and hid her body beneath the floorboards in the parlor at 10 Rillington Place. Afterward, he forged a letter she had written to her sister, changing the date from the 10th to the 15th, sold her furniture, watch and wedding ring, sprinkled disinfectant throughout the house and garden, told the neighbors that Ethel had gone north to Sheffield to visit relatives, explained her lack of correspondence to her relatives by telling them that she had been too unwell to write and closed her bank account, forging her signature on the withdrawal form. He then went on to murder three prostitutes — Rita Nelson, 24, who was six months pregnant; Kathleen Maloney, 26, and Hectorina McLennan, also 26, who had briefly stayed in Christie’s flat while she and her boyfriend were seeking a more permanent living arrangement. All three were smothered into unconsciousness with gas from the stove, sexaully assaulted, strangled to death and sexually assaulted again afterward, as was the case with his first two victims, Ruth Fuerst and Muriel Eady.
Shortly thereafter, Christie vacated the flat and tried to sublet to a married couple, but as soon as the landlord found out, he nixed the arrangement. Though the couple were subsequently evicted and had forfeited their rent money to Christie in the process, they were actually very glad to be out, as they found the foul smell in the flat untenable.
Beresford Brown, the man who discovered a female corpse hidden in a papered-over cupboard at 10 Rillington Place and summoned the police.
Christie in police custody.
The stench was also noticed by the Christies’ former upstairs neighbor, Beresford Brown, the Jamaican man living upstairs with his wife and infant child. On March 24, 1953, Brown, having been given access to the kitchen in the wake of the new vacancies at the building, began some housekeeping, thinking that it would remove the odor. While looking for a space on the wall to hang a shelf on which to install a radio, he noticed that a section of the wall sounded hollow when he knocked it. Tearing away the wallpaper, he found a cupboard door that was shut tight. One of the corners had been broken off, so Brown peered through the opening with his flashlight, and saw a female corpse. Immediately, he summoned the police. Several officers, along with Chief Inspector Percy Law of Scotland Yard, the local coroner and a pathologist arrived. When the cupboard door was opened, they found the bodies of Hectorina McLennan, Rita Nelson and Kathleen Maloney. Noticing that some floorboards in the parlor had come loose, they removed those and found Ethel Christie. The next day, during a search of the garden, a human femur was being used as a post to prop up a wooden fence. The officers began to dig, and unearthed the bones of Ruth Fuerst and Muriel Eady.
By this time, Christie was living as a transient. On March, 20, 1953, he booked seven nights at a King’s Cross Rowton House, but left after four, as he had now become front page news. He continued to wander the streets, sleeping on park benches and concealing his receding hairline with a hat. Finally, he was apprehended along the Thames River after giving a false name to a policeman who recognized him. After his arrest, he confessed to the murders, including that of Beryl Evans. During the four-day trial, Christie pled insanity, making racist allegations of harassment and provocation on the part of the Browns. Naturally, this tactic failed, and he was convicted and put to the rope on July 15, 1953 at nine o’clock in the morning, at the same prison at which Timothy Evans had been executed and by the same hangman, Albert Pierrepoint. Just before the trap was sprung, Christie, his arms bound, complained that his nose itched.
“It won’t bother you for long,” quipped Pierrepoint.
The death warrant for John Reginald Halliday Christie.
Though the truth had come out, the story was far fom over…
Next, in Part III: The Redemption of Timothy John Evans
Click here to go to Part I: The Tragedy of the Evans Family