Contrasts between Eighteenth, Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries—Margaret Catchpole—Tawell—Crippen—Portraits and the Press—Charlesworth Case—Bloodhounds—Police Dogs—Circumstantial Detection.
Contrasts between Eighteenth, Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries—Margaret Catchpole—Tawell—Crippen—Portraits and the Press—Charlesworth Case—Bloodhounds—Police Dogs—Circumstantial Detection.
In the days of the stage-coach a fugitive had a better chance of escaping than in the present age of steam power on land and sea. For then, slow as were the ways of escape, the ways of advertising the crime were slower still, and once on board a ship a runaway was comparatively safe from arrest.
The story of Margaret Catchpole, which has now become almost classic, may be cited as a good illustration of the way in which the pursuers were handicapped, when the fugitive had had a few hours’ start.
It was in 1797 that Margaret Catchpole, a servant-maid at Ipswich, stole a horse from the stable of her master, in order to join her lover, and disguised as a lad rode all the way to London in eight and a half hours, with only a single stop at Marks Tey, in Essex.
A few hours later the horse was missed, and handbills describing it and offering a reward for the capture of the thief were hurriedly printed and sent out of Ipswich by every vehicle that left the town.
Two men were also despatched in pursuit along the London road, but being falsely directed were about to turn off in the direction of Maldon, when theychanced to meet a man who had seen Margaret riding to London. But for this chance meeting Margaret would probably have escaped capture.
As it was, the pursuers reached London the following day and Margaret was arrested just as she had concluded a sale of the horse with a dealer.
She was tried at the Bury Assizes and sentenced to death, but through the influence of her former master the sentence was commuted to a term of imprisonment.
Three years later her lover, Laud, who was a smuggler, assisted her to escape from Ipswich gaol, and again handbills for her arrest were issued. She was captured on the beach while in the act of embarking in Laud’s boat, and Laud himself was killed in the fight. For the second time she was sentenced to death, and was once more reprieved, her sentence now being transportation to Botany Bay. There she married, and died many years later.
The introduction of the railway did not materially change the relative position of pursuer and pursued; for although the fugitive could travel more rapidly than before, and thus when chance favoured him could get to the coast and on board a ship about to sail, he had against him the more speedy notification of the crime in all directions, which was also rendered possible by the railway.
It was not until a means of communication infinitely more rapid than the steam engine had been discovered, that the balance turned decisively against the man endeavouring to elude the grasp of the law.
It is strange to reflect that it was not until it had been employed in the capture of a criminal that it wasrecognised in how many directions the electric telegraph might be of service to mankind.
Prior to that time the invention had been little better than a failure from a commercial point of view, for, although the railway companies had some time before this realised the advantages of the new system of communication, the Government had refused to have anything to say to it.
It was thus little short of a revelation to the public when, in 1845, the news was made known that a suspected murderer had been arrested through the agency of the telegraph.
A woman had been brutally murdered not far from Slough, and a neighbour, who had heard her screams, rushed to the spot with a lighted candle in her hand just in time to see a man in Quaker garb hurrying away.
This man, John Tawell by name, a former member of the Society of Friends, succeeded in escaping unchallenged to the station and in catching a train to London, and had it been two years earlier would probably have managed to get out of England; for news still travelled slowly in those times, and the train service to London was very infrequent.
But the police bethought them of the telegraph, which had not long been established on the Great Western Railway, and a description of the wanted man was sent over the wires to London. Although Tawell had had a good start, the message arrived long before him, and detectives were awaiting the arrival of the train at Paddington. He was followed from the station to the Bank, and from there to aneating-house, where he had a meal, and finally to a lodging-house in Cannon Street, where he meant to pass the night. Here, much to his amazement, he was quietly arrested. His trial followed in due course, and he was convicted and executed.
WAR PLAN SENT BY WIRELESS TELEGRAPHY
By kind permission of Mr. Thorne-Baker and “The Daily Mirror”
There were several points of scientific interest in his trial, which are described on another page.
Last year, sixty-five years after the sensational capture of Tawell, the attention of the whole world was rivetted upon an Atlantic steamer on its way from Antwerp to Canada.
It had on board a man and a woman, who disguised as a Quebec merchant and his son, were expecting to reach Canada without detection. For a week previously search had been made for them in every corner of Europe, and once on board a ship sailing from a foreign port they might reasonably have anticipated that they were safe.
But their portraits had been so widely circulated by the newspapers that their faces were familiar wherever English papers were read, and the ship was only a few miles on its journey when their disguise was penetrated by the captain.
The vessel was fitted with a wireless installation, and now for the first time since its invention wireless telegraphy played the leading part in the capture of fugitives from the land.
The police in London were thus immediately acquainted with the whereabouts of the wanted pair, and an officer was sent off by a swifter steamer to greet them on their reaching Canada. Day by day, with almost feverish excitement, the progress of theMontroseacross the ocean was followed, and the chief topic of public interest was the race between the police officer on one steamer and the fugitives upon the other.
The inspector won easily, and was ready waiting to arrest Crippen and his companion at the first approach of theMontroseto the Canadian shore.
The trial that followed had many features of scientific interest to which reference is made in another place.
The recent advances in the methods of telegraphing a facsimile of a specimen of handwriting or a sketch, or of reproducing a photograph at a distance have greatly increased the difficulties of criminals escaping detection, and the telectrograph, as it is termed, will prove a powerful weapon in the hands of the detective.
The selenium machines of Professor Korn were employed by theDaily Mirrorin transmitting the portraits of the chief actors in the Steinheil case, and one of these photographs, which was received in London while the Court was still sitting in Paris, is shown in the accompanying picture.
A still more practical telectrograph is that invented by Mr. Thorne Baker, which weighs only about twenty-four pounds. This has been simplified to such an extent that the photograph may be printed upon a flexible plate with a backing of lead foil, and by attaching this to the transmitting cylinder the thousands of minute points which go to make up the image will be exactly reproduced upon a receiving cylinder at the other end of a telephone wire.
The instrument may also be used with wirelessinstallations for the transmission of simple pictures or diagrams, and by its means it would be easy for a ship at sea to send or receive portraits of an individual under suspicion.
PHOTO SENT BY TELEGRAPH FROM PARIS
By kind permission of “The Daily Mirror”
The accompanying illustrations, which are reproduced here by the permission of Mr. Thorne Baker and theDaily Mirror, show a portrait of King Edward VII and an outline war map which were thus transmitted by “wireless” telegraphy.
Mr. Thorne Baker states that the use of his instrument renders “tapping” impossible, since by merely making a slight alteration in the speed of running the machines, in accordance with a signal arranged beforehand, the pictures would be so distorted as to be unrecognisable.
As an early instance of the use made by the police of a portrait in identifying a suspected individual the case of Arden, who was executed for murder at the beginning of last century, may be mentioned.
Arden had given a drawing of himself to a youth, and this was handed to the police who were thus able to identify the accused in London a month later.
The general use of photography in the press has frequently come to the aid of the police, and instances of photographs of a wanted individual being employed for this purpose will occur to everyone. At any police station may now be seen reproductions of photographs of missing individuals, and these being circulated all over the world, reduce to a small compass the limits within which a suspect may go without detection.
Reference may be made to two recent cases by wayof illustration. A nurse had kidnapped a child and all traces of her whereabouts were lost for some days. Her portrait was published in all the leading papers, and being seen by the proprietor of an hotel in the Midlands was recognised as that of one of his guests.
Acting on this information a police inspector suddenly accosted the suspected woman and addressed her in her real name, and she, taken off her guard, answered his remarks naturally, and was at once arrested.
In January of 1908, Miss Violet Charlesworth succeeded in filling pages of every English paper by suddenly vanishing from her creditors, under circumstances intended to suggest that she had been killed. She arranged a motor-car “accident” upon the cliffs at Penmaenbach, and ostensibly was flung through the glass screen of the car into the sea.
As no trace of the body could be found it was soon suspected that there had been no accident, and that before long the victim would come to life again. Her portraits were published in hundreds of papers, and were posted at police stations all over the United Kingdom, and amateur detectives by the score endeavoured to discover her whereabouts.
She was recognised from the portraits in half a dozen parts of the country at the same time, but it was not until a fortnight later that she was positively identified at Oban.
The anti-climax of the farce was reached, when, a few days later, she paid a visit to the London office of her solicitor, and was attended from the stationby a string of motor-cars each containing the special representative of a London paper.
PORTRAIT SENT BY WIRELESS TELEGRAPHY
By kind permission of Mr. Thorne-Baker and “The Daily Mirror”
Two years later she was found guilty of having defrauded a poor landlady of a large sum of money at the time when everyone had accepted her great “expectations” at her own valuation.
There have been frequent failures in the use of bloodhounds to detect a criminal, but this must be attributed, in part at all events, to the circumstance that the dogs have often not been employed until every other means has failed.
In the Luard case, for instance, in 1908, bloodhounds were set upon the track of the supposed assailant of the murdered woman, but the trial was not made immediately after the discovery of the crime. The scent had become faint, and it was therefore not surprising that the dogs, after starting hotly upon the trail, soon lost it again.
The writer is indebted to Major Richardson for the accompanying photograph of his trained bloodhound, “Pathan,” and for his kind permission to quote the graphic description of actual man hunts from his fascinating book upon the subject.[1]
“On one occasion, when searching for the body of a woman, I used two collies and a bloodhound. It was summer, and the police, after patrolling the entire countryside, had narrowed the search down to a mountain covered with a dense wood and undergrowth of rhododendron bushes. It happened in mid-summer, and the day was very hot. The colliesworked industriously for almost two hours, keeping well ahead, but after that time they began to flag, and soon refused to leave my heel. The bloodhound, on the contrary, continued persistently to search ahead of me all through the hottest part of the day, until the woman’s body was found on the top of the mountain.
“As further illustrating the persistency of the bloodhound when on the trail, I may mention the case of a murder to which I was called in to assist the police in Scotland. As I and my hounds were in England at the time, it was seventeen hours after the murder when we reached the scene. Not only this, but severe frost had intervened during the night, rendering the ground very unfavourable for scenting purposes. The murder had taken place in a town, but evidences were found that the criminal had been at a certain spot outside the town on the cliffs where he had discarded certain belongings.
“I took my hounds to this spot and laid them on the trail, first giving them the scent from the discarded articles. They went clear away for some distance, and leaving the main road crossed some fields through a wood to a cottage. Here they seemed to be at fault, and ran about whimpering. On inquiry at the cottage it appeared that a man had shortly after the murder called there for some water.
“Feeling the hounds were right so far I cast them round about in hopes of their picking up the trail again. After working persistently for a little time one of them, ‘Solferino,’ opened to a line beyond the wood, and went off at a steady rate followed by theother hound, ‘Waterloo,’ who also found the line himself. They held to this for a while until checked by a main road.
MAJOR RICHARDSON’S MAN-TRACKER “PATHAN”
By kind permission of Major Richardson
“The murderer had evidently walked along the road some distance, until, perhaps, scared by a pedestrian or vehicle, and he then evidently took to the fields again.
“Although checked by the road, where the trail became obliterated, the hounds, nothing daunted, kept steadily onwards, casting all the time on each side, until they found it again in the fields. By steadily working in this manner they led us for four miles, partly across country, and partly on the road, to a populous town, and to the vicinity of a railway station. Here the trail was completely obliterated, and it was evident that by this time the murderer had got clear away, probably by train, and was not hiding in the neighbourhood.
“The chief constable testified to the excellent work of the hounds on this occasion, and there is not the slightest doubt, that had this town been supplied with a bloodhound which could have been put on the trail immediately on the discovery of the murder, the murderer would have been quite easily run to earth.”
In Moscow a bloodhound is systematically used by the police to discover stolen property, and some of his “finds” have been recorded in all the European papers. In the early part of March of last year this police dog, “Tref,” recovered a number of bank-notes and a quantity of silver plate that had been taken from the house of a Moscow gentleman.
“Tref,” having been put upon the scent, followed thetrail through several streets until he came to a night-shelter. Here he made for a coat that belonged to a house-painter, and in the pockets of this were found the missing notes. He then left the shelter and followed the trail to the shop of a dealer in old silver, and here the stolen plate was discovered.
In addition to their occasional use as detectives, dogs are now being systematically employed as scouts to accompany the police on their rounds and to aid in the capture of evil-doers.
The Paris dogs, which are specially trained for the police by Mademoiselle Arlette Clary, are cross-bred hounds described as “wolf-shepherd hounds,” and “brindled mastiff bulls.” They are powerful beasts weighing upwards of twelve stone, and can easily overthrow and master a man.
When attacking, they at once make for the right arm, so as to guard against a pistol bullet, and they are also trained to refuse food except from the hands of those they know, so as to safeguard them against poisoning. As a proof of their efficiency, Mademoiselle Clary informed the writer that one of her police dogs had captured nine apaches in one night.
Last year a demonstration was given in London before the most eminent representatives of the Metropolitan police force, the apache being represented by a man thickly padded to protect him from the teeth of the dogs. When the man attempted to escape over a screen representing a wall the great hound, “Max,” promptly caught him and dragged him down again, as is shown in the accompanying photograph which is here reproduced by permission of Mdlle.Clary and theDaily Mirror. The dog also easily cleared this wall, which was 8 ft. 10 in. high, in one bound, and captured a “padded apache” as he climbed down on the other side.
FRENCH POLICE DOG
By kind permission of Mdlle. Clary and “The Daily Mirror”
Police dogs trained on these lines have for some time past been used to assist the police in Glasgow, and within the last few months Nottingham has strengthened its police force by the addition of dogs.
The dogs used in this country are powerful cross-bred animals of the Airedale terrier type, specially reared and trained by Major Richardson. The first dog used for the purpose in this country was given to the Berkshire Constabulary, and its duties are to accompany a policeman on his rounds at Windsor, to protect him from attack, and, if necessary, to capture escaping criminals.
From two to three months are required to train the dogs for this purpose.
In what may be described as circumstantial detection a very faint clue has sometimes resulted in the discovery of a criminal. One of the most striking examples of the kind was seen in 1864, when a gentleman named Briggs was murdered on the North London railway, for the sake of his watch and money.
The murderer succeeded in escaping without having been noticed by anyone, and the crime would probably have made another in the long list of unsolved mysteries, but for several slips that were made by him.
He had changed hats with his victim and his soft felt hat, which was found upon Mr. Briggs, was one of the chief factors in his subsequent identification.
Hats of this particular shape, by the way, werefor many years afterwards popularly known as “Müllers.”
The watch and chain of the murdered man were soon traced to the shop of a London jeweller, who stated that he had given another watch and chain in exchange for them. He remembered the man and was able to give a description of his appearance, although he had no knowledge of his name or whereabouts.
At this point all further signs of the trail were lost, for all efforts to discover the jeweller’s customer proved fruitless.
Some time afterwards, however, a man called at Scotland Yard with a jeweller’s small cardboard box, which, he said, a man who had recently been lodging at his house had given to his little girl. On this box was stamped the jeweller’s name, which, ominously enough, was “Death,” and this man was the very jeweller to whom Mr. Briggs’ watch had been taken.
Thanks to this clue Müller was tracked first to Liverpool and then to New York, where he was arrested and extradited.
At the trial the changed hat found upon the victim helped to prove his identity with the murderer, and he was convicted and hanged at Newgate.
No more extraordinary instance of a single circumstance leading to the detection of a criminal can be offered than in what was known as the “Yarmouth Murder.”
On September 23rd, 1900, a woman was found lying dead upon the beach at Yarmouth, and from theappearance of the body she had evidently been strangled. On her fingers were some rings, but with the exception of the laundry mark upon her clothes, there was no clue by which she could possibly be identified. She had been staying for some days in lodgings in the town, and was known to her landlady as Mrs. Hood. While she was there letters bearing a Woolwich postmark had come addressed to her by that name. Only a day or two before her death she had had her photograph taken upon the beach.
All investigation to discover who the woman really was or to trace her murderer proved unavailing, and at the coroner’s inquest a verdict was brought in of wilful murder against some person unknown.
Subsequently it was discovered that the laundry mark upon the dead woman’s clothes, 599, was that put by a laundry upon the clothes sent to them from a particular house in Bexley Heath. Further inquiry showed that a woman named Bennett had formerly lived there, and she was identified as the original of the photograph that had been taken at Yarmouth.
This led, early in November, to the arrest of the dead woman’s husband, Bennett, who was a workman in Woolwich Arsenal, and he was committed for trial on the charge of murder. He denied all knowledge of the crime, and asserted that he had never been to Yarmouth. This was disproved, however, by collateral evidence, and many facts were brought forward connecting the prisoner with the murder.
The motive alleged for the crime was that Bennett might be free to marry another woman. The dateof the wedding had been fixed, and it was shown that his behaviour after the night of the murder pointed to his having a knowledge of his wife’s death. So convincing was the whole of the circumstantial evidence, that after a short deliberation the jury brought in a verdict of “Guilty,” and Bennett was executed.
PERSONAL IDENTIFICATION
McKeever’s Experiment on Fallibility of Eye-witnesses—Gorse Hall Murder—Cases of Mistaken Identity—Gun-flash Recognition—Self-deception—Tichborne Case.
McKeever’s Experiment on Fallibility of Eye-witnesses—Gorse Hall Murder—Cases of Mistaken Identity—Gun-flash Recognition—Self-deception—Tichborne Case.
The untrustworthiness of the eye-witness as to detail was recently demonstrated by Professor McKeever at the Kansas State College in the following manner.[2]He asked twenty-five students at the college to witness a short drama, and immediately afterwards to write a detailed description of the characters and incidents.
This little drama, which was supposed to take place in one of the class-rooms, ran as follows:—
Jones, a tall man, wearing a hat and a black mask over his eyes, nose and mouth, and dressed in a grey rain-coat rushed in carrying a salt bag half full of nails in his left hand and a small wrench in his right hand. Across his left cheek was a streak of red paint.When just inside the door he turned and pointing the wrench at some pursuers, shouted “Stand back, or I’ll shoot.” He then ran across the room, fell on his knees, and dropped the bag, saying, “There it is, take it”; after which he got up and rushed from the room.Smith dashed into the room after Jones, crying “Give it up, you scoundrel,” and picked up the bag which Jones had dropped. White, short andstout, dressed in a blue serge coat and cap, and carrying a revolver with its cylinder removed, came in last. He called out to Smith, “Take it from Eddie, he won’t hurt you!” He then went out after Jones but before Smith.The professor pretending to be alarmed jumped up from his chair and exclaimed, “Men, what are you up to here?”These were the actual facts, and the manner in which the accounts of the twenty-five witnesses disagreed may be shown by a few examples of the different particulars described:—Jones’ appearance: (1) Black coat, light mask. (2) Red mask, cheeks painted red. (3) Black coat, mouth painted red. (4) Carried pistol. (5) Cheeks more than natural redness; club in his hand; dark suit. (6) Dark suit. (7) Black clothes. (8) Red mask on; black clothes. (9) Hatless.Smith’s appearance: (1) Wore a grey suit. (2) Six-footer. (3) Dark grey suit. (4) Bareheaded. (5) Blue suit.White’s appearance: (1) Dark suit and raincoat. (2) Bareheaded. (3) Hardly noticed him (nearly everyone said this).Smith’s conduct: (1) Carried pistol and snapped it several times. (2) Came in last; went out second; said “Get out of here.” (3) Carried pistol, snapped it several times, and cried “Stop or I’ll shoot,” aiming at Jones. (4) Dropped umbrella on floor. (5) Came in last, stayed behind; yelled “Catch that man!”Professor’s conduct: (1) Said: “What’s all this?” (2) Said: “What does all this mean?” (3) Said: “Here.” (4) Said: “Hullo, what’s going on here”? (5) Said: “Who are these men?”
Jones, a tall man, wearing a hat and a black mask over his eyes, nose and mouth, and dressed in a grey rain-coat rushed in carrying a salt bag half full of nails in his left hand and a small wrench in his right hand. Across his left cheek was a streak of red paint.
When just inside the door he turned and pointing the wrench at some pursuers, shouted “Stand back, or I’ll shoot.” He then ran across the room, fell on his knees, and dropped the bag, saying, “There it is, take it”; after which he got up and rushed from the room.
Smith dashed into the room after Jones, crying “Give it up, you scoundrel,” and picked up the bag which Jones had dropped. White, short andstout, dressed in a blue serge coat and cap, and carrying a revolver with its cylinder removed, came in last. He called out to Smith, “Take it from Eddie, he won’t hurt you!” He then went out after Jones but before Smith.
The professor pretending to be alarmed jumped up from his chair and exclaimed, “Men, what are you up to here?”
These were the actual facts, and the manner in which the accounts of the twenty-five witnesses disagreed may be shown by a few examples of the different particulars described:—
Jones’ appearance: (1) Black coat, light mask. (2) Red mask, cheeks painted red. (3) Black coat, mouth painted red. (4) Carried pistol. (5) Cheeks more than natural redness; club in his hand; dark suit. (6) Dark suit. (7) Black clothes. (8) Red mask on; black clothes. (9) Hatless.
Smith’s appearance: (1) Wore a grey suit. (2) Six-footer. (3) Dark grey suit. (4) Bareheaded. (5) Blue suit.
White’s appearance: (1) Dark suit and raincoat. (2) Bareheaded. (3) Hardly noticed him (nearly everyone said this).
Smith’s conduct: (1) Carried pistol and snapped it several times. (2) Came in last; went out second; said “Get out of here.” (3) Carried pistol, snapped it several times, and cried “Stop or I’ll shoot,” aiming at Jones. (4) Dropped umbrella on floor. (5) Came in last, stayed behind; yelled “Catch that man!”
Professor’s conduct: (1) Said: “What’s all this?” (2) Said: “What does all this mean?” (3) Said: “Here.” (4) Said: “Hullo, what’s going on here”? (5) Said: “Who are these men?”
These discrepancies illustrate how difficult it is for the eye and ear to record accurately the impressions received in a rapid succession of events, one of which may focus the attention to such an extent that events simultaneously occurring are only imperfectly or partially observed.
The fallibility of identification by eye-witnesses was strikingly demonstrated at the trial of Benjamin Bates and John Green at the Old Bailey in 1776, on the charge of burglary.
The house of James Penleage had been broken into, and plate to the value of four or five hundred pounds had been stolen.
Mrs. Penleage swore that four men had entered her bedroom, one of whom carried a dark lantern; that two of these men came, one on each side of the bed, and held pistols to her head, and that of these men of whom she had a perfect view, she recognised one as Green and the other as Bates.
Her husband testified as to the house having been entered, and as to his loss, but stated that as he was near-sighted he would not swear to the men, though he believed Bates had presented a pistol to his head.
Evidence was also given by a servant and by another woman, and notwithstanding the good character given to the prisoners by a number of witnesses, the jury brought in a verdict of “Guilty.”
The newspapers of the day called attention to theinconclusive evidence of identification, and as a result the prisoners were respited from month to month.
At last another man, who was executed in the country, confessed that he had also been the author of this burglary at the house of Penleage, and that the two men who had been convicted had had nothing to do with it. In consequence of this Bates and Green received a free pardon, but not until they had been in prison for many months.
A contemporary comment upon this trial richly warrants quotation:—“On this occasion Britons have cause to triumph in theLiberty of the Press. If newspapers had not been printed in this country, the lives of two honest men would have been sacrificed to the rigour of the laws, yet no party concerned have been the least to blame. The ways of Providence are mysterious; casual circumstances frequently produce great effects; and a life may be saved or lost by an accident apparently beneath the notice of a common observer.”
Another very curious instance of mistaken identity was that brought out in a trial for robbery in 1784. A barrister had been attacked and robbed in broad daylight, and he positively swore that he had recognised two men named Wood and Brown as his assailants. Fortunately for them the prisoners were able to prove an alibi, which showed beyond all doubt that they were far from the spot at the time, and they were accordingly acquitted. Subsequently the real robbers were discovered and found in possession of the missing property. In this case there was a man of trainedobservation, being absolutely certain of the identity of two men, who had never been near the place.
The case of the Perreaus, related in a subsequent page, was another example of the kind. The two brothers, who were twins, were so exactly alike that a money scrivener who had drawn up bonds by order of one or the other of them hesitated to fix upon either. At last, when pressed to make a positive declaration, he fixed upon Daniel as the brother who had come to him in connection with the forged bond.
In 1797 a mistake as to identity resulted in the death of two men. Martin Church, a bookseller, and James Mackley, a printer, were tried that year at the Old Bailey on the charge of murdering Sydney Fryer, at the back of Islington workhouse. Miss Anne Fryer, who was with her cousin at the time he was attacked, swore positively that the two prisoners were the assailants.
Some years later Burton Wood, who was executed at Kennington Common, and Timmins, who was hanged at Reading, confessed separately that they had done the deed for which the other men had suffered.
In modern times the case of Adolph Beck, who was twice wrongfully convicted through his unfortunate resemblance to another man is notorious, and has been the subject of a special report.
The most recent and strangest instances of wrong identification arose out of the mysterious crime which became known as the “Gorse Hall” murder.
In November, 1909, Mr. Storrs, a wealthy mill-owner, who lived at Gorse Hall, in a lonely district in Cheshire, was attacked by a man who had forcedhis way into the house. A desperate struggle followed, in the course of which Mr. Storrs was repeatedly stabbed with a knife and fatally wounded. His assailant also attempted to shoot him with a revolver, but this was snatched from him by Mrs. Storrs.
A relation of Mr. Storrs, named Howard, who was an ex-soldier, was arrested and charged with the murder. At the trial that took place at the Chester Assizes in March, 1910, he was positively identified by the widow of the murdered man, who swore that she recognised him by “the look in his eyes.” He was also identified by some of the servants at the Hall as the assailant of Mr. Storrs.
Fortunately Howard was able to prove conclusively that he was somewhere else at the time of the murder.
Some time later, another ex-soldier named Mark Wilde was arrested upon the same charge, and once more evidence of identification was given by the same witnesses as in the previous trial, though they were now less positive in their assertions.
The two men, Howard and Wilde, bore a singular resemblance to each other, and evidence was given that at the time of the murder Wilde was dressed in dark clothes, dark cap and muffler, which was the description of the clothes of Mr. Storrs’ assailant given by witnesses at the first trial.
Stains upon the prisoner’s clothing were identified as human blood by the serum test. The revolver which Mrs. Storrs had snatched from the murderer was also identified as having belonged to Wilde, for it was recognised by two ex-soldiers who had, theyalleged, frequently seen it in his hands, by its broken spring and marks upon its barrel.
For the defence, however, witnesses were called to prove that the revolver taken from the murderer was not identical with that of Wilde, and that the blood upon his clothes was the result of a fight he had had upon the night of the crime.
No motive could be alleged, and the jury distrusting the evidence of identification, found the prisoner “Not guilty.”
The murder was thus unique in the fact that two innocent men were in succession identified as the assailant and acquitted.
With regard to the amount of light needed for the recognition of a person, curious scientific evidence has been given in trials, and several cases are on record where witnesses have claimed to identify a person by a momentary flash. A notable instance of this kind was seen at the trial of Joseph Brook for burglary at the York Assizes in 1813.
The prisoner, it was alleged, had broken into the house of a farmer named Strickland at Kirk Heaton.
Anne Armitage, a niece of the farmer, deposed that he had struck upon the stone floor with something she took for a sword to intimidate her, that it produced a flash, and gave a light by which she could see his face. She swore that she had seen enough by the momentary flash to recognise him again. She had also heard his voice, and knew it again when she heard it later, and thought she could undertake to say that it was the voice of the accused man.
The prisoner set up an alibi, and the jury, althoughas they stated subsequently, not believing in this alibi, returned a verdict of “Not guilty.”
The question of the possibility of a person firing a gun or pistol being identified by the light of the flash was submitted to a committee of scientific men in Paris, in 1809, and their conclusion was that such identification was not possible.
On the other hand, the evidence in a case that was tried shortly afterwards in France indicated that under favourable conditions the face of the person who had fired a gun might be recognised. A man had fired at another at night, and a woman who was near at the time, swore at the trial that the flash had plainly shown her the face of the assailant. Similar evidence was also given by the man who had been wounded.
Experiments to determine this point were made by Desgranges, at Lyons, and from the results of these he concluded that there was a possibility of such identification at a short distance from the flash of the gun, provided that the night was very dark and that there was no other source of light to interfere with the gun-flash; but that if the flash was very pronounced, or much smoke was produced it was not possible to recognise the person firing the gun.
Juries have always been reluctant to convict a prisoner upon evidence of this kind. For instance, at the trial of a man named White at Croydon in 1839, the prisoner was accused of firing at a gentleman while he was driving home in an open trap, and his intended victim, who was shot in the elbow, swore positively that the flash of the gun showed so clearly the featuresof his assailant that he was absolutely certain that he was the prisoner. The defendant denied the charge and, notwithstanding the positive statement of the principal witness, was acquitted.
There are other instances, however, where convictions have resulted from such momentary glimpses. Thus, at the trial of some highwaymen in 1799, which is quoted by Paris and Fonblanque (1823), it was stated by a Bow Street officer that he, together with some of his companions, had been fired at by the prisoners upon a dark night, upon Hounslow Heath. He swore that the flash of the pistol enabled him to see that one of the assailants, a man named Haines, who had come up to the side of the coach, was riding upon a dark brown horse which had certain peculiarities about its head and shoulders, and that the rider was wearing a rough brown coat. Afterwards, said the witness, he had seen the same horse in a stable in Long Acre, in London, and had recognised it as the one upon which the man was riding by its curious square head and thick shoulders. The jury believed the evidence of this witness, and the prisoner was convicted.
A case within the experience of a former Recorder of Birmingham (Hill) is mentioned in Wills’Circumstantial Evidence. A man was committed for trial at the Assizes at Derby, in 1840, on the charge of shooting at a young woman.
She was prepared to swear that she had recognised him by the momentary flash of the gun.
Experiments were made to determine to what extent reliance could be placed upon such identification,and the conclusion drawn from these was that “all stories of recognition from the flash of a gun or pistol must be founded on a fallacy.”
In addition to these, several instances, collected from different sources, are referred to in Taylor’sMedical Jurisprudence, where the general conclusion is drawn that occasionally it may be possible to identify an assailant in this way.
From the same source comes the amusing story of a man who swore that he recognised an assailant who attacked him in the dark, by the flash produced by a blow upon his eye! The absurdity of the claim is self-evident, for the “flashes” due to a blow do not emit light, and can therefore never cause any external object to be visible.
A curious factor influencing the value of evidence of personal identification is the readiness with which credulous humanity will accept any story however improbable. But for this the notorious Tichborne case, which dragged on for years, would have been settled in a few days. It is difficult now, recalling the facts, to understand how anyone could have believed in the identity of the butcher, Arthur Orton, with the missing heir to the estates, Roger Tichborne. The latter was of a slim build, while the claimant was a couple of inches taller and weighed twenty-five stones. The real Roger had had the education of a gentleman, while the claimant could neither write nor speak correctly.
Yet, notwithstanding the enormous dissimilarity in appearance and manners of the two men, the mother of Roger Tichborne recognised Orton as the son whomshe and everyone else had believed to have been drowned when the ship was wrecked. When he came to England to see her he had thought it prudent to feign illness. Lady Tichborne, therefore, went to see him, and he got on the bed, and turned his face to the wall. His adopted mother, however, recognised him by his “ears so like his uncle’s.”
This must have been an instance of self-deception, for there was evidence that the lobes of the ears of the two men were absolutely different.
It was this recognition, however, that encouraged Orton to persevere with his claim to the estates, and assisted in aiding the recollection of other people, who swore that he was Roger.
SYSTEMS OF IDENTIFICATION
Photography—Anthropometry—Finger-prints and their Uses.
Photography—Anthropometry—Finger-prints and their Uses.
The discovery of photography was welcomed by the police authorities of civilised countries as affording a certain means of registering criminals for subsequent identification. But the promise that the photographic method held out was not fulfilled; for with the accumulation of photographs there was a corresponding increase in the difficulties and uncertainties attending the identification of the originals.
Apart from difficulties due to the effects of the changes produced by time or by intentional disguise, it was no light task to search through many thousands of prints to see whether a particular individual had been photographed ten years previously, and physical weariness of the searchers must frequently have set an obstacle in the way of the identification.
On the other hand, it is a matter of common knowledge, that two photographs of the same person, taken under different conditions of lighting or with different lenses may readily be thought to be the portraits of two distinct individuals, or that a photograph of one person may unduly emphasise a momentary expression differing from the normal one, with the result that the portrait may be mistaken for a likeness of someone else. These considerations fully explain the numerous instances of mistaken identification,some of which are cited below, where the police based their recognition upon old photographs.
Prior to the introduction of the anthropometric and finger-print systems, the insufficiency of the photographic records kept by the police in this country for the identification of criminals was repeatedly proved. The advisability of introducing the French anthropometric system into England was raised in Parliament on several occasions in 1887 and 1888, but each time the Home Secretary defended the system of photographic registration as being sufficiently satisfactory, while he considered it doubtful whether the French system would be any better.
A sufficient answer to this official defence was afforded by the number of cases of mistaken recognition from photographs, that shortly afterwards were brought before both Houses of Parliament.
In 1888, the Lord Chief Justice (Coleridge) mentioned an instance that had come under his notice at the Gloucester Assizes. After a man had been convicted of some small offence police evidence was given that the prisoner was a man who had been convicted before. This was subsequently proved to be a mistake.
Again, in July, 1889, after the conviction of a prisoner, evidence was given by a warder that the man was one who had been sentenced to seven years’ penal servitude and seven years’ police supervision.
It was found afterwards, however, that this man had been previously convicted in 1882 and therefore could not possibly have been the person alleged. The remarkable feature about this mistake was that bothmen had been under the police control at the same time.
The failure to identify a criminal from the photographic records had a tragic result in 1888, when a man named Jackson was given a light sentence as a first offender. Although he had been previously convicted of numerous crimes, and was at the time “wanted” by the police for housebreaking and other offences he escaped recognition, and was able to take advantage of the lenient treatment he received by murdering a warder in the prison at Manchester.
In 1894 a Special Committee was appointed to examine and report upon the different systems of identifying criminals, and they recommended that the anthropometric system was the most satisfactory for preliminary classification, but that for further grouping the finger-print method gave the best results. Accordingly a system including both methods was adopted in this country and was in use until 1901, when, as is mentioned below, the present system of finger-print identification was introduced.
The success of M. Bertillon’s system in France speedily led to its adoption in other countries. Early in 1892 it was introduced into India, and within six years upwards of a quarter of a million of classified cards had been collected.
The chief difficulty was found to be in the classification of the measurements for reference, and a committee was accordingly appointed by the Indian Government to report upon the system. Their report stated that the finger-print method was preferable to the anthropometric system in simplicity, rapidity and certainty.
Since that time (June, 1897) the finger-print method has been in use in India for the identification of criminals.
The system of identification by bodily measurements, which has now come to be known asbertillonage, was first introduced as a method of police registration in Paris in 1882. During the first year of its employment it detected forty-nine criminals giving false names, while in the following year the number rose to 241.
In 1889 M. Bertillon stated that there had not been a single case of mistaken identity since the system had been introduced, and that in the previous year 31,849 prisoners had been measured in Paris, 615 of whom were in this way recognised as former convicts, while fourteen were subsequently recognised in prison. Of the latter, ten had never previously been examined, so that the failures were only four in 32,000, or one in 8,000.
The system, as described by M. Bertillon himself in a pamphlet onThe Identification of the Criminal Classes, consists in taking the measurements of the body structure of each individual. Although such measurements might be indefinitely extended, the number is usually restricted to twelve, including the height, length and width of the head, length of the middle finger, of the foot, etc.
These measurements are rapidly taken with standard instruments by a special staff, and are recorded upon a card upon which are pasted full face and profile photographs of the prisoner.
The data obtained enable the photographs to be classified into different groups of short, medium,and tall men, and these, again, may be subdivided into groups of short, medium, and long heads, while further subdivisions are afforded by the width of the head, width of the arms outstretched at an angle of the body and so on. The colour of the eyes affords the means for a further subdivision, while special birthmarks or peculiarities differentiate the individuals still further.
In this way alone, M. Bertillon claims that 100,000 persons can be classified into groups of ten each, the portraits in which would offer no difficulty in examination.
M. Bertillon undoubtedly puts the position too favourably here, in assuming division into equal groups; for out of his hypothetical 100,000 individuals, seventy-five per cent. might conceivably be tall men, and seventy-five per cent. of these, again have long heads, so that the final groups would in some cases have no representatives, while in the other groups there might be 1,000 individuals.
In recording the colour of the eyes a special table is used, the scale of which is based upon the intensity of the pigment of the iris. A number corresponding to one of the following groups is then assigned:—(1) Iris, azure blue, with areola pale but free from yellow pigment; (2) Iris blue or slate, with light yellow areola; (3) Same shade, with larger areola approaching orange; (4) Iris, greenish reflection; hazel areola; (5) Same shade with dark hazel areola; (6) Hazel distributed over surface of iris; (7) Eye entirely hazel.
When first the system was introduced into Parisit was a common practice for the old offenders to change their names and try to escape identification, but, according to M. Bertillon, after a few years this was only done by those who had been away from Paris for a long period, or had some very special reason for attempting to slip through the examination unrecognised.
A similar method is employed in the United States Army for recognising deserters. Each man on joining is measured, and an outline figure card showing the measurements of the front and back surfaces, which are divided into areas by means of dotted lines, is filed in the Medical Department of the War Office. When a man deserts or is dismissed his card is placed in a separate file, and the new cards of recruits are compared with those in this particular file.
A special register, ruled into columns corresponding to the areas on the cards, and giving the measurements and any peculiarities such as scars, tattoo marks, etc., is used to facilitate the search, and when, on reference to this, there appears to be a probability of a recruit being identical with a deserter, the original card is used for the comparison.
During the first five months after the system was instituted (1891) sixty-two men were suspected of concealing their identity, and in sixty-one of these cases the suspicion was justified and the identity acknowledged.
A drawback of the Bertillon system of identification is that much depends upon the accuracy of the person who takes the measurements, and that, therefore, a permissible error must be admitted. In theUnited States Army an error of one inch in either direction is allowed, for the recorded height. In addition to this, some degree of natural variation will take place in the course of years, and due allowance must also be made for this influence upon the measurements.
Striking as has been the success of M. Bertillon’s system of anthropometrical measurements as a means of identification, it has been altogether surpassed in certainty by the methods of recording the impressions of the fingers. From time to time in the past use has been made of a finger or thumb impression as a seal or to give a personal mark of authenticity to a document. One of the earliest examples extant of the use of the manual seal is to be seen on one of the Assyrian clay tablets in the British Museum.
This is imprinted in cuneiform characters, and contains a notice of the sale of a field, which concludes with the imprint of a finger nail, and the statement that this had been made by the seller of the field as his nail mark.
Similar imprints of nails are to be seen upon Chinese coins, as has been pointed out by Sir Francis Galton, and a tradition has it that they were first put there as a compliment to an early Chinese Empress who had accidentally pressed her finger nail into the wax model of a coin that had been submitted for her approval. The ancient Egyptians caused criminals to seal their confessions with finger nails.
There are also numerous instances in which impressions of finger-tips are found upon documents, but these do not seem to have been put there with anyidea of identification, but rather to have been of the nature of a ceremonial observance comparable with the legal survival of putting a finger upon the seal of a document, and delivering it as “my act and deed.”
The first attempt by Europeans to make use of the characteristic ridges of the fingers to record the identity of individuals appears to have been that of Sir William Herschel, who introduced a method officially into Bengal.
His system arose out of the difficulty of checking forgeries by the natives in India, and his having made two of them record their finger impressions upon contracts, so that he might be able to frighten them should they subsequently deny their signatures.
This was in 1858, and the device proved so unexpectedly successful that for several years Sir William Herschel made a study of the use of finger-prints in identification, and finally found them so satisfactory that, in 1877, he gave instructions for their systematic use in the Hooghly.
A description of the advantages that were thereby reaped is given inNature(1880, Vol. XXIII, 23). The frequent attempts previously made by the natives to deny their own signatures were completely frustrated, and documents thus stamped with a finger-print could not afterwards be disputed.
The use of finger-prints was also invaluable as a means of preventing the fraudulent claims of pensions by persons who were not entitled to them.
Then as the system was found to work so well in these cases it was introduced into the prisons, each new-comer being made to sign the register with thefinger. The official visitors had thus the means of satisfying themselves as to the identity of each inmate of the prison.
Although Sir William Herschel tried to obtain permission to extend the use of the finger-print identification still further, his attempts did not meet with success.
About the same time that Sir William Herschel published the account of his system a suggestion was made to register the Chinese in California by a similar process, but nothing was done in the matter.
There have also been occasional applications of the method to prevent forgery, as, for instance, in 1882 in the payment orders signed by Mr. Thomson of the American Geological Survey, upon which, as a safeguard, he made the imprint of his own finger.
It is to Sir William Herschel, however, that the credit is due of having established the first modern systematic process of registration of individuals by means of finger impressions.
According to Dr. Faulds, the Chinese from time immemorial have caused their convicted criminals to make impressions of their finger-tips as a record, but he gives no details of their system of classifying the prints, if such exists.
The curious markings upon which are based these systems of identification are not confined to the human race, but are also shown by monkeys and to a less pronounced extent by other animals.
The pattern upon the surface of the skin upon the palms of the hand and soles of the feet is formed by the arrangement of what is known as the papillaryridges. It is readily recorded by carefully coating the finger-tips with a fine layer of printing or ordinary ink and pressing them upon paper so as to leave an imprint of the markings upon the finger.
The uses of these ridges is to assist the delicacy of touch, and also to excrete perspiration through the minute pores with which they are covered.
The effect of rough work upon the ridges is to increase their height, and eventually they may become covered up by the horny accretions known as callosities. On the other hand, the ridges upon the palms of people who do very little manual labour are much less apparent, and when the skin is thin are very low. Hence, in the hands of bedridden invalids there is only a slight development of the ridges.
Several circumstances may lead to a temporary obliteration of the ridges, such as, for instance, the constant puncturing of the skin by the head of a needle in sewing, and the imprint of the forefinger of a tailor will therefore often present a very characteristic mottled appearance.
More permanent alterations are produced by cuts or by wounds that have healed and left a white scar. An instance of this is seen in D in the plate (p. 66), which represents a print of the left-hand thumb of the present writer. Running across the ridges, and breaking their continuity is a line which marks the place where twenty years ago the slip of a knife nearly severed a piece from the thumb. The effect of this cut has been to add a fresh feature of identity to those furnished by the original ridges, without interfering with the identification of the latter.
In the case of jagged cuts or of scars formed in the healing of an ulcer the ridges may be so distorted as to be practically indistinguishable in that place, or they may even be entirely obliterated. Old age has also an obliterating effect upon the ridges, so much so that the finger-prints of an old man frequently exhibit transverse white markings, indicating signs of the surface disintegration of the skin.
A most important point in the application of finger-prints to the identification of the individual is the persistence of the main details throughout life, since otherwise much of the value of the method would be lost. The observations made by Sir William Herschel in India showed that after the lapse of twenty years there was so little change in the finger-prints of a large number of persons that they could still readily be identified in this way.
Sir Francis Galton has also proved the persistence of the general peculiarities in the prints for periods of over thirty years. He points out that an exact correspondence as to the minutiæ is not always to be expected, since what appears to be a ridge in one print may be really the result of imperfect printing of an enclosure. Apart from possible imperfections in the method, there is also a possibility of variation due to the effect of age rendering the ridges less continuous.
In one of the examples given by him finger-prints were taken of a child of two and a half in 1877, and again thirteen years later. Between two of the prints there were forty-two points of resemblance and only one point of difference. This was a small forkedridge which appeared in the print of the baby, but had been filled up in the print from the boy. This instance is mentioned as unique, for in every other case examined by Sir Francis Galton, comparing prints of the boy with the man, and the man with the old man there was perfect correspondence between the selected points. He therefore concludes that “we are justified in inferring that between birth and death there is absolutely no change in, say, 699 out of 700 of the numerous characteristics in the markings of the same person such as can be impressed by them whenever it is desirable to do so.”
An interesting series of photographs was recently exhibited by the Chief Commissioner of the Police. These included the portraits of three men who so closely resembled one another that they would readily have been mistaken for one another in photographs. Their finger-prints, however, were quite distinct.
So persistent are these distinctive markings that they last as long as the skin itself, and may be clearly seen upon the fingers of Egyptian mummies.
However much the general dimensions of the pattern of the prints may be changed by the advance of age or the effect of disease, the number of the pattern will still remain. To use the apt illustration of Sir Francis Galton, the changes to be expected are comparable with those seen in a piece of lace. The material may be stretched in one or the other direction or shrunken to half its former dimensions, but the individual loops and knots may be identified with those in the original fabric.
As is the case with all the other measurementsof the human body alterations will occur in the size of the markings; for the pattern as a whole increases with the growth of the finger, but this growth does not affect the arrangement of the loops and ridges that make up the markings upon the skin.
In no other way than a study of the finger-prints is it possible to find over a thousand points of comparison upon which to establish the identity of an individual.
In estimating the value of finger-prints as evidence of identity, Sir Francis Galton found that out of 1,000 thumb-prints the collection could be classified into 100 groups each containing prints with a more or less close resemblance to one another. He further found that on the average it was impossible to put great reliance upon the general resemblance between two given prints as a proof that they were produced by the same finger, though obvious difference was a proof that they were produced by different fingers.
But on studying the minutiæ of the patterns, and calculating the chances that the print of a single finger should agree in all particulars with the print of another finger, he concluded that it was as one is to about sixty-four millions; so that the chance of two persons giving similar prints from a single finger would be less than one in four. If the comparisons were extended to two fingers the improbability of agreement in all details would be squared, “reaching a figure altogether beyond the range of imagination.”
The general conclusion drawn from these numerical results was that even after making all allowance forambiguities and for possible alterations caused by accident or disease, a complete, or nearly complete, agreement between two prints of one finger and infinitely more so between two or more fingers, afforded evidence, which did not stand in need of corroboration, that the prints were derived from the fingers of one and the same person.
In finger-prints, therefore, we have the only means of proving the identity of an individual beyond all question.
In the prehistoric flint-holes at Brandon, in Suffolk, there was found some years ago a pick made from the horn of an extinct elk. This had been used by some flint-digger of the stone age to hew out of the chalk the rough flints which were subsequently made into scrapers and arrow-heads. Upon the dark handle of this instrument were the finger-prints in chalk of the workman, who, thousands of years ago, flung it down for the last time.
It is strange to reflect that in these perishable impressions he had left a far more permanent record of his identity than he could have done by any other conceivable means.
A striking feature in the scriptural account of the death of Jezebel is that her body was devoured by the dogs, which left nothing but the skull and the palms of her hands and soles of her feet, so that no man might say “this is Jezebel.” Yet, as Sir Francis Galton pointed out, it was upon those parts that the dogs had spared that Jezebel carried the only certain proofs of her identity.
The question of heredity in finger-prints is notonly interesting but might also conceivably be a point of some importance in a criminal trial.
Dr. Faulds concluded that heredity played a great part in the particular form of the markings. “The dominancy of heredity in these patterns is sometimes very striking. I have found unique patterns in a parent repeated with marvellous accuracy in his child.”
He suggested that there might thus possibly be an Orton type of pattern and a Tichborne type, to one or other of which experts might have referred the finger impressions of the claimant in the celebrated case.
While there is unquestionably a general tendency for a particular type of finger-prints to be inherited just as any other bodily peculiarities are liable to be passed on from the parents to the children, there is by no means that definite relationship that Dr. Faulds hoped to establish.
The observations made by Sir Francis Galton upon this point, and the mathematical considerations based upon them render it impossible to doubt that the average resemblance between the finger-prints of two brothers or of a brother and sister is greater than in those of two persons selected at random.
The general similarities in the finger-prints in rows A and B in the plate (p. 66), which are those of two sisters, are obvious.
The case of twins is particularly interesting, for it is well known that when of the same sex they frequently show remarkable physical and mental resemblances or the reverse. Here, too, it was found bySir Francis Galton that the finger-prints exhibited a strong tendency to similarity, although in no case were the resemblances so close that the prints of one twin could be mistaken for those of the other.
For instance, the resemblance may lie in the pattern being made up of loops or whorls in both, but the smaller details, such as the number of the ridges or their minute peculiarities (e.g., dividing and then reuniting to form a small island), will not be shared.
The results of other observations tended to show that the influence of the mother upon the type of finger-print is more pronounced than that of the father.
The existence of racial peculiarities in finger-prints, which Dr. Faulds believed that he had discovered in the case of the Japanese, has not been borne out by the experience of others.
The observations of Sir Francis Galton upon numbers of prints representative of pure English, pure Welsh, Hebrew and Negro proved unquestionably that there was no pattern peculiar to any of these races.
The only suggestion of any difference was that the width of the ridges appeared to be more uniform and their direction more parallel in the finger-prints of negroes than in those of the other races.
The same conclusions were drawn from the observations upon the finger-prints of different classes of individuals, those of art students being compared with those of science students, of field labourers, and of idiots. In each instance it was possible to match the type of patterns in one class with those in any of the others. The patterns of the finger-impressionof a statesman, for instance, could be matched by those of an idiot.
The first attempt to classify the various patterns formed by the ridges was that of Purkenje, a doctor of medicine who, in 1823, delivered a thesis upon the subject at the University of Breslau.
He concluded that all the varieties of curves might be grouped under nine main heads or standard types, which he described as follows:—
(1)Transverse curves.(2)Central longitudinal stria.(3)Oblique stria.(4)Oblique sinus.(5)Almond.(6)Spiral.(7)Ellipse or elliptical whorl.(8)Circleorcircular whorl; and (9)Double whorl.
The differences between these different types are best shown by diagrams, and the accompanying figure, reproduced by permission of Sir Francis Galton, represents the cores of the nine standard patterns.
This classification, resting as it does upon merely superficial appearances, does not afford a certain means of separating the types, since factors, such as the depth of printing, the size of the patterns, and the prominence of secondary details may have an undue influence in the placing of a particular print in one or the other group.
After numerous futile attempts to make use of Purkenje’s system, Sir Francis Galton discarded it in favour of a system in which the triangular space or spaces found in the majority of finger impressions was made the basis of classification. Starting upon the two divergent ridges from these spaces an outline was then drawn as far as it could be traced, the courseof each ridge being followed with minute fidelity. In this way a series of sharply-defined outline figures were obtained.
THE STANDARD PATTERNS OF PURKENJE
CORES OF THE ABOVE PATTERNS