IN Northwich town, there was a street called Church Street. It stretched from the Bullring to Crum Hill crossing Crown Street, roughly where Chesterway’s start is now. 

In 1894 that area was described as a slum. Along Church Street at number 26 could be found a provision shop and boarding house, this was the scene of a truly evil deed.

The shop tenants were Mr and Mrs Deakin. Margaret Percival Deakin ran the small shop and boarding house. Her husband James Deakin worked for Brunner Mond at Winnington Works, one of the tenants was Elizabeth Heald, known as Betsy who was described as an old lady. She was 50! 

Northwich Guardian:

Church Street in 1892

The sleeping arrangements were somewhat strange. 
The Deakins lived and slept in the parlour behind the shop on a sofa and chairs, while Betsy slept in the same room on a mattress. 

Margaret and Betsy were drinking partners and enjoyed a drink; they also quarrelled a lot. 

Betsy was a charwoman, and her brother Thomas Heald lived nearby at 12 Crown Street where he was a greengrocer. 

One of the tenants, Elizabeth Thomas later said that Margaret Deakin was not jealous of Betsy but accused her of being a tell-tale. 

She said that Margaret had told her that Betsy was a ‘bad un’ and tells her husband everything. She also said that Margaret had seen Betsy and her husband getting up to no good together. Margaret had been married three times. 

On Friday, January 26, 1894, Mr Deakin got up and made a cup of tea for his wife and Betsy and before going to work made them another cup. He then set off to walk to Winnington. 

One of the tenants came down for some coal and saw what looked like a pile of covers on Betsy’s mattress. She asked where Betsy was and was told that she had gone to Leftwich to see Mary Ann Plumb, a friend. 

An hour later, Margaret saw the tenant again who was on the way to Winnington Works with her own husband’s lunch, and she handed her the basket containing James Deakin’s lunch to take as well. 

James Deakin arrived home at 6.30pm from work, and the front door was locked with no key in it. Entering through the rear door, he found that the parlour door was locked. He forced it open and went in. Soon after he returned to one of the tenants in the kitchen, Phoebe Smith, he was pale and shaking and asked her to return to the parlour with him. 

Betsy’s bed was partly uncovered, he pulled off the cover to see that her throat had been cut, almost decapitating her head and a second cut had nearly reached her mouth. Her hand was lying loosely with a knife lying in it. 

The police were called, and PC Hunt arrived and inspected the body. It was left in a way to suggest suicide, but this was soon disregarded. 

As well as the cuts to the throat and face, there were others across the body. The bed was soaked in blood as was the wall around it.

The Cheshire Police circulated details to other forces. As a result, a sergeant from Northwich joined a Manchester officer, and they conducted a search finding Margaret Deakin in Gregson Street, Deansgate. 

She was taken to the local police station, and a female officer searched her finding bloodstains on her skirt, shirt, the shirt cuffs and a key in her possession that was the house key, was also bloodstained. 

Margaret was conveyed back to Northwich by train. 
She went before the police court and was remanded in custody to Knutsford Prison to await a hearing at Northwich magistrate’s court. 

Additional evidence was given disclosing other times where the defendant had assaulted Betsy. 

Mary Newall was the offender’s daughter and lived at 134 Greenall Road, Witton; she said that she last saw her mother on January 26 at the shop’s parlour door. She did not enter, but her mother Margaret Deakin handed her ulster (Victorian daytime overcoat with cape and sleeves) to her and walked off. 

Northwich Guardian:

The defendant was spotted with blood on her clothes as she passed through the stile between John Street (pictured here in the 1960s) and Church Walk

Eliza Philbin of 9 John Street was called as a witness and said that she saw the defendant passing through the stile between John Street and Church Walk and saw blood on her. Other witnesses were called, and she was committed to Chester Assize Court. The jury found her guilty of murder but recommended her to mercy due to her advancing years, 64, and the limited life expectancy at that advanced age. 

However, the sentence for murder was hanging, the judge handed it down and returned her to Knutsford Prison to await the death sentence.

Hanging a woman and one of advancing years was repugnant to many, and an appeal was made to the only person who could commute it, the Home Secretary. The governor of Knutsford prison received a letter from the Home Secretary commuting the death sentence to penal servitude for life.
In 1901 she was in Aylesbury Prison in Buckinghamshire, and she died in September, 1905, at St Marylebone, London, at which time she will have been at Holloway Prison – she was aged 76.