Patrick Mahon was born in Liverpool in 1890 to Irish parents and appeared to be a respectable young man, working as a bookkeeper and marrying a woman named Jesse. But shortly after his wedding in 1911, he stole £123 from his employer and fled to the Isle of Man with another woman. He escaped with a caution after showing remorse, and his wife forgave him. He was dismissed from his next job after stealing £60 and spent 12 months in prison.
Jesse forgave him again, and the couple moved to Wiltshire, where they had two children. Mahon developed a gambling habit and was arrested for attacking a young girl with a hammer during a robbery attempt, for which he received a five-year prison sentence. After his release in April 1919, his wife secured him a job as a salesman, and the family settled in Richmond. In 1923, while working in Moorgate, he met 37-year-old Emily Beilby Kaye, introducing himself under the false name “Derek Patterson.
” Within three months, Emily discovered she was pregnant, which delighted her. Mahon bought her an engagement ring, and Emily told friends she would soon marry and emigrate to South Africa with her fiancé. On April 5, 1924, Emily wrote to her sister about plans to stay at a bungalow near Eastbourne. She had withdrawn £404 from her savings and given most of it to her fiancé.
She traveled to Eastbourne on April 7, and the couple stayed at a hotel before moving into a rented bungalow known as Officer’s House in an area called the Crumbles, which Mahon had leased under the alias “Mr. Waller. ” Emily wrote to a friend on April 14 about their travel plans, and she was never heard from again. Mahon had invited another woman, Ethel Duncan, to join him for Easter.
When she arrived on April 18, she noticed a bandage on his wrist, which he explained away as a sprain. They spent three days together, dining lavishly and walking along the seafront. After she returned to London on Easter Monday, Mahon went back to the bungalow. Jesse Mahon, suspicious of her husband’s frequent business trips, hired a private investigator.
On May 1, she found a left luggage ticket from Waterloo station in his coat pocket. The investigator retrieved a locked Gladstone bag, and police found bloodstained cloth inside. After the blood was confirmed as human, detectives waited at the station. Mahon was arrested on May 2 when he collected the bag.
Inside, police found a Cook’s knife and female clothing covered in grease, blood, and disinfectant, along with a canvas bag bearing the initials “EBK. ” When questioned, Mahon claimed he carried meat for his pet dogs in the bag, but Inspector Savage responded that the blood was human and the explanation did not satisfy him. After hours of questioning, Mahon said, “I presume you know everything. I’ll be honest with you.
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He claimed that on April 15, Emily urged him to write to friends about their planned move to South Africa. When he refused, she became angry and threw an axe at him, missing. They fought and fell over a chair, and Emily hit her head on the coal scuttle. He said he tried to resuscitate her and only realized toward daybreak he should have sought medical help, then decided to dispose of the body.
He stated that on April 18 he severed her head and legs, stored her body in a trunk, and spent Easter weekend with Ethel Duncan. Later, he burned the head, feet, and legs in the fireplace, swept the charred remains into a dustpan, and cut other body parts into very small pieces before scattering them. When police and pathologist Sir Bernard Spilsbury arrived at the bungalow, they found what Spilsbury described as the most horrifying scene he had ever witnessed. Investigators recovered a rusty, greasy tenon saw with flesh still attached, bloodstained clothing, a saucer containing solid human fat, and a saucepan with boiled flesh in the fireplace.
The vendor contained nearly 900 tiny burnt pieces of bone, and a hat box held 37 pieces of boiled human muscle, bone, and flesh, including a scapula, vertebrae, and humerus. Four packages remained in the trunk that Ethel Duncan had been told contained rare books belonging to a friend. The head was never found, though pieces of jawbone and teeth were later recovered from a nearby trash pile. Spilsbury determined Emily had been in the early stages of pregnancy at the time of her death.
An inquest was held at the bungalow, and Mahon was charged with murder. The trial began at the Lewes Assizes on July 15, 1924. The prosecution alleged Mahon had begun the relationship specifically to steal Emily’s savings, and evidence showed he had received four payments totaling £100. The prosecution argued he had encouraged Emily to tell friends about the South Africa plan so her silence would not raise concerns, and he had purchased a chef’s knife and tenon saw on April 12, three days before her death, although he later claimed he bought them on April 17.
Spilsbury rejected the defense’s claim of accidental death. He stated the severe bruises on Emily’s shoulder suggested she had been struck with an axe handle, and no walls, doors, or frames in the house showed signs of being struck by an axe as Mahon had claimed. On July 17, Mahon testified in his own defense, insisting the death was an accident during an argument, but acknowledged buying the knife and saw to cut up the body, despite receipts contradicting his timeline. The jury deliberated for only 45 minutes before finding Mahon guilty.
He was sentenced to death. An appeal was filed in August 1924, arguing the judge had given erroneous instructions, but it was denied by the Lord Chief Justice. That summer, entrepreneurs turned the bungalow into a macabre tourist attraction, charging a shilling per person for guided tours. The business was briefly closed due to local opposition but reopened with higher admission prices as crowds grew.
On September 5, 1924, Patrick Herbert Mahon was executed at Wandsworth Prison. He never confessed to the crime and protested his innocence to the end.