Walter Tennant Gempton

Excerpt taken from document "Origin of Family Name" by Ted Richards

Walter murders his captain and is sent to Broadmoor

Walter Tennant Gempton (1870-1893) was the eldest son of Samuel and Ellen and was born in Caistor in 1870. He began his life by following in his father's footsteps as a fisherman.

The Times of May 15, 1889 reported that Walter Gempton was at sea on the smack Doncaster as cook, 250 miles from the Humber, he approached the captain, William Connelly from behind on deck an plunged a knife into the captain's neck. The captain died within 10 minutes the Times of May 16, 1889 reported to an inquest held at Grimsby Hospital. Arthur Turrell, second hand, identified the body of William Connelly aged 42 and described how the cook, Walter Tennant Gempton, aged 18, had stabbed the skipper with a clasp knife. His crew tried to staunch the bleeding with flour but the captain was dead within ten minutes. Gempton afterwards cried through the sky-light: "you crafty bugger, has that done for you? That was a bit of Jack the Ripper".

The prisoner affirmed that the deceased wanted to make off with the ship and all hands. Gempton, it was stated, suffered greatly from headaches and that he had had no provocation whatever. The jury returned a verdict of wilful murder against Gempton. On 18 March 1889, he was committed to Broadmoor Asyslum for the Criminally Insane. He died there in 1893. He was marked in the 1891 census as a fisherman and lunatic.

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Taken from the Grimsby Telegraph :-

In the latest in our Crimes that rocked Grimsby series, reporter Alex Thorpe explores a historic crime with a mysterious twist.

Whether found guilty or not guilty, defendants charged with a crime as serious as murder are often punished on the front covers of newspapers and broadcast on TV news bulletins around the country. But in July 1889, Walter Tennant Gempton, who was found guilty of murdering a man whose body was ashore on board a ship destined for Grimsby, was never brought into the dock of Lincoln Assizes. In fact the jury never saw him and the general public never heard of him again. Grimsby was well served by local and national newspapers at the time of the incident, but they were still destined to hear little of it.

On March 14, 1889, the sailing smack Doncaster - which belonged to the Grimsby Ice Company- returned to Grimsby with a gruesome cargo. Her skipper, William Connelly, lay in a makeshift shroud, on board. He had been dead for 3 days. His nephew, Walter Tennant Gempton, his hands tied behind his back, was led ashore. The police were called and he was taken to the Town Hall police cells.

A court was hastily convened and Gempton, charged with murder, was brought before them. The following day an inquest concluded that he had murdered Connelly and, within a matter of days, he was remanded in custody to Lincoln Assizes and charged.

But he was never seen again.

On July 20, 1889, a jury gathered in the courtroom and heard the indictment read. The judge, Mr Justice Hawkins, addressed them explaining that Walter Tennant Gempton, the 18 year old nephew of skipper William Connelly, was murdered at sea on March 11. " The prisoner was the cook and had been subject to fits " the judge said. " He never had any quarrel with skipper, but one day, he sprang upon the deceased man and inflicted a blow at the back of his neck. The man fell on deck and cried out immediately " I am stabbed"

" There was no doubt that Connelly had been stabbed so severely that, in the course of ten minutes, he was dead."

The judge added that Gempton made no attempt to escape or get rid of those persons who had taken charge of him, but he did say that the skipper had made up his mind to make away with the vessel and by that means had endangered the lives of all the persons on board. But in actual fact, there was no reason for stating this. Connelly was " a good seaman and good officer" and he was in no way guilty of the accusation. It was indeed , wholly without foundation. Nevertheless, the judge said the notion " seemed to have entered into the mind of the prisoner and had led him to inflict the wound which had caused the mans death."

From this point onwards, the judge ceased to deal with evidence and moved straight to directions. In a point of law, he said, a man who caused the death of another was guilty of wilful murder. All the jury had to consider was whether he had wilfully killed the man - and he took it that " on the present occassion they would have no difficulty in the matter." The verdict was a formality and the hearing was over. Throughout it , the dock had remained empty.

Despite the trials conclusion, one question remained - Who was Gempton?

Some say he was indistinguishable from the hundreds of lads who sailed out of Grimsby on the sailing smacks which made their owners and their skippers rich men. There was a strong possibility he was a local boy as Connelly, after all was his uncle.

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For the attention of Alex Thorpe.

Ref: Crimes that rocked Grimsby : Killer the jury never saw. Posted - April 07 2016.

Subject: Who was Walter Tennant Gempton?

Sir,

My name is Cliff Gempton and I was born in Brixham, in the South West of England in 1950. Whilst researching the history of our family I came across your article published in the Grimsby Telegraph. You asked who Walter Tennant Gempton was and I hope I can provide you with some of that information.

Our family have been linked to the Brixham fishing industry for many generations having been fishermen/owners of sailing trawlers in that port. At one stage , in the 1850's, Brixham was considered one of the largest fleets of sailing trawlers in the U.K. who plied their trade around the coasts of England and Ireland. It was inevitable that families would move to areas that supported their livelihood and fishing communities were set up in Hull, Grimsby and Lowestoft as they were closer to the abundant north sea fishing grounds.

W.T.G's grandfather - William Boone Gempton was born in Brixham in 1822 and was the brother of my g.g. grandfather Joseph Gempton. In 1846 he married Susan Tennant. By 1861, the census shows that he was living in Hull with his wife and 3 children ( Samuel, William & Thomas) and his occupation was shown as a Fisherman. In the 1871 census he was shown, at the age of 48, to be living at 124 Orwell Street and his occupation was a Smack Owner.

W.T.Gempton was born in 1870. He was the eldest of 6 children born to his father Samuel (1846 - 1921) and mother Ellen Clayburn (1850 - 1915). According to the 1871 census, W.T.G (at the age of 1) was shown living with his parents at 179 Kent Street , Grimsby. His father Samuel's occupation was shown as an unemployed fisherman. Ellen Clayburn's sister Catherine (1851 -1923) married William Conolly in 1882. At the time of his tragic death on 11/03/1889 he left 2 young children, Richard Sampson (1885 - 1942) and Benjamin Gurney (1888 - 1945).

Sailing smacks/trawlers were usually manned by a crew of 4 - Master, Mate, 2nd Hand and a "boy" apprentice that doubled up as the cook. Boys would leave school at the age of 12 to become apprenticed to a trawler owner. It is logical that this is what would have happened to Walter coming from a fishing family.

I have read that he was a "sickly" boy for most of his life and was prone to fits. At one stage he tried to strangle his mother before eventually murdering his uncle - William Conolly.

At the age of 21, he is listed in the 1891 census as a fisherman/lunatic being a patient of Broadmoor. He died on 25th July 1893 after a series of continuous epileptic fits from which he was unable to recover.

A reply to my email was printed in the letters section of the Grimsby Telegraph July 04 2016.