Listen to the witnesses in the recording or read their statements below.
Cover of The Dagenham Murder book
The original memorial in Dagenham Parish Churchyard (LBBD Archives at Valence House)
The memorial in Dagenham Parish Churchyard restored in 1996
Voice acknowledgments: Bill Bailey, Geoff Canton, Gillian Whitlock, Jack Stillwell, John Blake, Kathryn Abnett, Lee Shelden, Linda Rhodes, Mark Watson, Rick Sweetman, Simon Vernon-Penrose
Sergeant Parsons
I’m Sergeant William Parsons. I live at Dagenham police station with my wife Maria and baby daughter. I supervise six constables. The Met has only been in Dagenham for six years. Many locals don’t want us. To them, we’re another layer of authority sent to keep them in their place.
At nine o’clock in the evening on the 29th of June, the constables assembled in the yard before starting night patrol. I then went with George Clark to the Four Wantz, where his beat began.
Every so often during the night, I ride around (I’m the only one with a horse, by the way), meeting the men at certain times and places to check how they’re doing. That night, I met Clark shortly after one o’clock, close to the Four Wantz. But at 6 o’clock in the morning, the end of his shift, he didn’t report back to the station.
Luke White
My name’s Luke White and I work on a farm. I live in Oxlow Lane, near The Four Wantz. I was working late on the evening of the 29th of June, loading a wagon with potatoes.
At half-past ten, I was on my way home along Tanyard Lane when I met Clark walking the other way. He was singing a hymn to himself. He asked me what sort of day I’d had. I answered “A very long one”. He said he had a religious tract for me, and looked through his pockets but couldn’t find it.
I had to be up early, so I asked him to call me up between 3 and 4 o’clock and he said he would. But you know, I never saw him again after that.
William Page
My name is William Page and I’m 12 years old. My father, Ralph Page, is the farmer at Thorntons Farm in Rush Green, near Eastbrookend. The police came on Friday evening, July 3rd, four days after George Clark went missing. They dragged the pond in our farmyard with a long pole in case his body might be in there. They didn’t find anything, so my mother told me and my brother to take them to a field where our other pond is.
PC Kimpton went ahead and he found a truncheon lying in the ditch near a hedge. It was in a real state, all cut about. While the others were looking at it, I carried on and saw a policeman’s cutlass stuck in the hedge. I took it out and showed it to the police. It was all smeared with blood and muck. I walked back to where I’d found the cutlass. There was a terrible smell. Then I saw Clark’s body amongst the corn.
He was lying on his back, his legs crossed. His right hand was tightly clutching a sheaf of corn. PC Butfoy went up to the body and called out, “Here he lies!” The other one, Kimpton, just stared and didn’t move or say anything. Butfoy jeered, “You are a pretty cow-hearted sort of policeman”.
The others came running over from the next field. One of them, Jonas Stevens, when he saw the body, cried “Oh my God!” raised his hat and then completely fainted away.
Sergeant Parsons
Sergeant Parsons again. The first thing I asked myself was, has Clark been attacked and robbed? I ordered one of the constables to search his pockets. Clark’s silver watch was still there, along with four half-crowns, four shillings and a halfpenny, so robbery clearly wasn’t the motive.
Joseph Colin
I’m Joseph Collin, the medical man called to examine Clark’s body. I saw a large opening in the skull, six or eight inches wide. Anyone with a wound like that could only have lived three or four minutes.
Bits of skull were embedded in the ground and had to be dug out with a knife. There was also a deep wound in the throat and another one under his right ear, coming out on the other side of the neck. I saw deep cuts to the fingers of his left hand, as if he tried to protect his face.