Adolf Beck: The Wrong Man in Prison Quiz

Answer: Swindling her of her jewellry

Spinster Ottilie Meissonier was a language teacher. Some time before a man had made her acquaintance on that Victoria Street and after a pleasant conversation with this so called Lord Willoughby - he also mentioned an estate in Lincolnshire - she had invited him to tea for the next day.

The next day Miss Meissonier thought of good times ahead, such as an invitation to the French Riviera. Only her wardrobe wasn't good enough for that. So our Lordship wrote out a list and made out a cheque for £40 for the purchases needed. Then he took her wristwatch and some rings with him to buy stuff in the right size.

After Willoughby had left, Miss Meissonier noted the disappearance of a second watch. She hurried to her bank. The cheque was as real as the "Lord" who had written it.

She swore that Beck was Willoughby. Beck swore he wasn't but the police didn't believe him and arrested him.

Answer: He was a successful businessman

Beck was born in 1841 in Norway. He had started as a chemist, but the sea called and he found work as a clerk for a shipping broker in England. When he was about twenty-eight he moved to South America. He made quite a fortune there and went back to England some twenty years later in 1885. Then his luck started to run out. His investment in a Norwegian copper mine led him into debt.

Now, in 1895 he had debts he wasn't able to pay, including the bill for the hotel he lived in. Nevertheless he tried to dress as well as possible with a well trimmed moustache, a top hat and a frock coat.

Answer: No

Strangely not. The defence wanted to play that card - but the judge told them not to do so. As stated in the trial records:

"The question whether the prisoner was or was not the man convicted in 1877 was not admissible, upon the ground that it related to another and distinct issue, and one calculated to mislead the jury." The judge even thought that the knowledge of a earlier crime would harm the prisoner at the bar. (The judge did not reveal that he had tried the 1877 case himself and had his own very firm opinion of Adolf Beck).

So there Beck was, standing empty handed. His alibi for 1877 was worthless, and he hadn't not a single one for the present time ...

Answer: Seven years' penal servitude

The judge, Sir Forrest Fulton declared the evidence of identity as "absolutely overwhelming". He wouldn't budge from this opinion. So it meant prison with hard labour for Beck at Portland Prison on the isle of Portland - the very place where that "John Smith" had stayed years ago.

He was given "John Smith's" old prison number with the letter "W" added to it, which marked him as a repeat convict.

Answer: No

Beck tried and tried: but in vain, the case wasn't reopened.
He didn't even hear of one point that might have proven his innocence, something that was found out by an home office official after Beck had already spent two years in prison.
This man had studied the old prison files of "Smith" and found that "Smith" had claimed in 1879 to be a Jew. That was easy to prove: he was circumcised. Beck was checked for that detail: nothing removed there. The Home Office informed Judge Fulton. Judge Fulton agreed that "Smith" and Beck were different persons, but still thought him responsible for the new frauds.

No one outside the court was informed about this new development: neither Beck nor supporters like the journalist George Robert Sims and author Arthur Conan Doyle who campaigned for Beck.

Beck was paroled in 1901 for good behavior.

Answer: Swindling a woman of her possessions

What happened? In March 1904 a certain Pauline (or Paulina) Scott visited Scotland Yard and complained that someone calling himself Lord Willoughby had swindled her, she was missing a sovereign (a coin), a ring and a watch. A constable thought he knew the culprit: Adolf Beck.

He sat a trap: Ms. Scott confronted Beck on the street. He panicked and tried to run, but was caught at once. His attempt to escape was seen as an admission of guilt, and end of June 1904 he was again at Old Bailey, again he was recognized by some swindled women and convicted.

Answer: The real man was caught

Inspector Kane of the CID (Criminal Investigation Department) visited the police station in London's Tottenham Court road. There he was told the interesting story of a man who had swindled some actresses of some rings. The ladies' mistrust was aroused too soon and therefore he was enjoying the comforts of a police cell by now.

Kane knew about the Beck case. He had been at both trials. The ball started rolling: the available witnesses of the last Beck case identified "William Thomas" as the real swindler. Other witnesses from the 1895 case admitted their former mistake when confronted with the new man. A scar on the neck, mentioned by Ottilie Meissonier in 1895, was there to be seen.

The press created an uproar in favour of Beck and he was released on 19 July 1904. Beck also got a royal pardon for both convictions - that of 1895 and his new one - ten days after his release.

Answer: He looked exactly like Beck

He was neither John Smith - the name he had used while he was in prison - and he wasn't William Thomas either and of course he wasn't a lord.

Born some years before Beck, Wilhelm Meyer said that he had graduated from the University of Vienna. He told that he had been a surgeon to the king of Hawaii, invested in several businesses in the USA and set up a medical practice in Australia. When his legal resources failed he started to swindle credulous women in London. When Beck was arrested Meyer (I will call him now by his real name) prudently moved to the USA and returned only to his "work" in London when he thought Beck was free again. He confessed soon after his arrest.

There was some resemblance to Beck, but mainly due to a similar moustache and grey hair. There must have been a lot of elderly gentlemen looking like that in London in that period. Nobody would take them to be twins, not even brothers. How such a lot of witnesses could err is hard to imagine.

Answer: He lived to a ripe old age in Norway

Sadly Beck didn't enjoy his freedom for a long time, if he enjoyed it at all.
He was awarded £2,000 in compensation for wrongful imprisonment, but a public outcry - again with the help of journalist George Robert Sims - had the effect that the sum was raised to £5,000, which was quite a nice sum in these days.

Adolf Beck died on the 7 December 1909 from pleurisy and bronchitis, still living in England.

Answer: The Court of Criminal Appeal

This court gave prisoners at last the opportunity to fight their verdicts. (Previously there had been several different alleys for criminal appeals, but all bound by varying and rigid restrictions). In this way the case of this poor Norwegian made legal history. It also still serves as a warning to not rely mainly on eyewitnesses. They can err too easily.

In addition, stringent new procedures were introduced for identity parades.