POISON PEN PALS
Mystery of filthy and abusive letter writer in Olivia Colman movie Wicked Little Letters
Historian Emily Cockayne found there was an 'epidemic' of poison pen letters in the 1910s and 1920s
WHEN Edith Swan started receiving obscene letters calling her a “foxy-a***d old whore” who had cheated on her fiance, the country was shocked.
Other poisonous rantings landed on the doormats of the spinster’s neighbours, friends and public officials in the 1920s.
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Edith’s free-spirited neighbour Rose Gooding was the prime suspect — and she ended up being jailed twice.
But the letters kept on coming following her second imprisonment — and after Scotland Yard attempted to get to the bottom of the mystery, a female police officer discovered that mother-of-two Rose was the victim of a grave miscarriage of justice.
The police concluded Edith, from the sleepy West Sussex seaside town of Littlehampton, had sent the abusive messages to herself.
Now the story has been turned into sweary British comedy Wicked Little Letters, with Oscar-winner Olivia Colman playing Edith and Irish actress Jessie Buckley as Rose.
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The pair had great fun spouting four-lettered bile at each other on set. Olivia, 50, said: “They’ve taken these old-fashioned insults and made it even more ludicrous.
“I loved ‘f*** you up the nose holes’ and my character’s final one, where she drops the C-bomb.”
Trolling was a pastime long before social media began, according to historian Emily Cockayne, who found there was an “epidemic” of poison pen letters in the 1910s and 1920s.
And Edith was not the only one accused of sending malicious mail to themselves.
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On each other’s nerves
In one gruesome case, a woman left a skinned kitten on her own doorstep alongside a note in a bid to incriminate a female enemy.
But it was the Littlehampton letters which first captured Emily’s interest when the academic studied the lives of neighbours for Cheek By Jowl, her 2009 book on British social history.
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On first arriving in Western Road, in 1916, Rose was welcomed by Edith, who passed on a recipe for marrow chutney and happily shared the tiny backyard of their rented properties.
Both their homes were over-crowded, with Edith’s housing five people and Rose seven.
At some point they started to get on each other’s nerves — and in May 1920, 30-year-old Edith accused Rose, 29, of sending her a vile letter.
Around the same time a report was made to the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children falsely alleging that Rose had hurt one of her two children, who she shared with husband Bill.
The police refused to take action over the malicious mail, so Edith paid a sum equivalent to more than a year’s rent to the courts to sue Rose for libel.
The letters had been signed “RG” — which was enough for a jury to convict Rose, who spent more than two months in Portsmouth prison.
They’ve taken these old-fashioned insults and made it even more ludicrous
Olivia Colman
After she was freed, the cruel taunts restarted, but this time other citizens of Littlehampton found themselves being called “f***ing whores” or “bloody f***ing p*** country whores”.
The police were called in and Rose was brought to a criminal trial, where journalists pored over the salacious details.
A juror asked whether the handwriting had been analysed but was told this was not worthwhile — and Rose was jailed once more.
She spent a whole year away from her children, doing hard labour.
Yet while she was locked up, without access to either pen nor paper, the poisonous letters continued.
With pressure mounting, Director of Public Prosecutions Sir Archibald Bodkin had to act.
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He sent Inspector George Nicholls of Scotland Yard to Littlehampton in June 1921, where he interviewed suspects and “victim” Edith.
The detective noted that she had a “remarkable memory, especially for filthy phrases” and “struck me as being possibly wrong in the head”.
One of the letters was sent to her fiance Bert, a soldier serving in Iraq, claiming Edith was going to give birth to the child of a married police officer. The result seems to have been that the engagement ended.
Consuming obsession
And three postcards were sent to the hotel where Edith’s brother Ernest worked, accusing him of theft.
Why would she inflict such suffering on herself and her sibling?
Local WPC Gladys Moss, the first female police officer in Sussex, was ordered to spy on Edith from a nearby florist’s shed.
One day she spotted the suspect dropping a letter and managed to get hold of it.
Even though it contained filthy missives, the case against Edith was dismissed by a judge.
She was considered to be an upstanding member of the community in comparison to the even more impoverished Rose, whose sister Ruth had three children out of wedlock.
The Post Office Investigation Branch, who were called in to track Edith’s post, marked her stamps with secret ink and discovered they were ending up in the hands of victims.
Edith was sentenced to a year behind bars — the same sentence handed out to Rose.
Her motive is unclear to this day, but Emily, who wrote the book Indescribably Filthy about the case, says: “Rose is quite casual and has a girlish charm, while Edith is probably not liking her situation very much and fixates on this person.
“It could have been a consuming obsession.”
The historian admits to have become quite obsessed by the topic as well. She spent a dozen years researching similar cases for her most recent book, Penning Poison.
Rose is quite casual and has a girlish charm, while Edith is probably not liking her situation very much and fixates on this person
Emily Cockayne
In 1910 Annie Tugwell, from Sutton, South West London, was jailed for a year after trying to land a priest’s housekeeper in trouble by writing scurrilous letters.
But the most shocking case began in 1912 in Redhill, Surrey, when the remains of a skinned kitten were found outside the door of Ellen “Eliza” Woodman.
It was followed by death threats warning Eliza “I will blow you and your lot to blazes” and “I mean to blow your brains out”.
Muck stuck
Other victims included local police officers and business people.
Neighbour Mary Johnson was charged three times with sending threatening messages — and three times juries were convinced that she was guilty.
In total she was sentenced to 18 months’ jail between 1912 and 1914.
But after Eliza’s stories seemed inconsistent, investigators marked her stamps and discovered she was the one sending the indecent letters.
Eliza went to prison for 18 months, having failed to convince the court that she was insane.
Emily suspects boredom was the cause of Eliza and Mary’s feud.
She says: “These women are trying to live a more racy life.
“They often don’t realise they are scaring people and get caught up in their fantasy life.”
The author also points to difficult childhoods, with Eliza the youngest of 13 children and an overbearing father. It is possible that, among such a large brood, she was desperate for attention.
In the case of Rose Gooding, the taint of suspicion never left her, with many locals still looking down on her as an ex-con.
Emily says: “I got the impression that muck stuck and she wasn’t welcome. There were letters saying it wasn’t Edith — even when Edith was on trial.”
Edith was evicted from her home in 1934, ended up in a workhouse and died in 1959 from a heart attack.
A century later, those lessons from history have been forgotten by the current generation who post hurtful words. Today, though, the trolls hide anonymously online.
Emily says of the phenomenon: “It’s not a modern thing but the difference is that the letter is a physical object that is coming into your house and the sender knows where you live.
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“But if it comes into your house you don’t have to show it to anyone, and if it is online there is public shaming.”
- Wicked Little Letters is in cinemas from Friday.
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