Mary Ann Cotton gives birth in Durham jail cell exctly 150 years ago

“The career of its mother has been such as to throw considerable doubts upon the question of paternity. It is, however, supposed that the baby now but four days old is the child of Nattrass, the lodger, who was poisoned some months ago.”

This latest twist in this incredible story must have caused a sensation in south Durham. Since the summer of 1872, people had been agog as Mary Ann Cotton, 40, was arrested at her home in Front Street, West Auckland, on suspicion of poisoning her own sons, lovers and husbands – some said 21 in total.

Mary Ann Cotton's narrow three storey house is on the left and, below, as it looks today

On two occasions, the churchyard of St Helen’s Auckland had been dug up at dawn by “resurrectionists” searching for the bodies of those close to her who had mysteriously and suddenly died. Once their bodies had been located, an eminent toxicologist declared they had arsenic in them, which pointed to Mary Ann’s guilt, but her trial for murder could not go ahead before Christmas 1872 and she was pregnant with (about) her 13th child.

That child, a daughter, was born on January 7, 1873. Mary Ann named her Margaret Edith Quickmanning Cotton, but the space for the father’s details on the birth certificate was left blank – although the baby’s name gave a big clue.

“Quickmanning” refers to a man who is believed to have been the excise officer attached to West Auckland Brewery. He was newly arrived in the village in 1872. He was 29, so 10 years younger than Mary Ann, and a government professional with a good job – well, certainly when compared to the miners Mary Ann usually knocked about with – and it seems she had her eye on him.

Whether she ever had anything more on him is debatable, but she allowed village gossip to link her romantically with him, and amid the kerfuffle over her arrest and the exhumations, he disappeared without the authorities even getting a handle on his proper name. It is believed that he was Richard Quick Mann, although all contemporary documents refer to him, like Mary Ann, as “Quickmanning”.

It seems more likely that the father of the baby was, as the Echo speculated, Mary Ann’s lodger and lover, miner Joseph Nattrass. He had died at Mary Ann’s home on April 1, 1872 – eight months and one week before the baby’s birth, so Mary Ann could have been poisoning him, or at least planning to poison him, even as she made love to him.

There was a lot to gossip about…

In its report of the baby’s birth, the Echo on January 14, 1873, said that Bishop Auckland police had been “ferreting up evidence” which would presented to a court as soon as doctors said it was safe for Mrs Cotton to go in the dock.

“We believe we are warranted in saying that she will be charged with wilfully murdering her husband, Frederick Cotton, her lodger, Joe Nattrass, and the child, Robert Robson Cotton, in addition to the charge of murdering (her stepson) Charles E Cotton,” said the Echo.

To Mary Ann, baby Margaret offered hope – hope that the respectable Mr Quickmanning might return and find her a way out of her awful predicament, and hope because the authorities surely wouldn’t execute the mother of such a young child, would they?

Both hopes proved illusory. In fact, the arrival of baby Margaret cleared the way for the criminal proceedings against her to recommence.

The Echo concluded its report 150 years ago today by saying: “Nothing more will be heard until her recovery (from the birth) when the whole ghastly tale will be retold in court.”

READ MORE:

SENSATION AS MARY ANN COTTON ARRESTED

A WEEK AFTER HER ARREST, EVIDENCE MOUNTS AGAINST MARY ANN COTTON

EXHUMATIONS BEGIN IN MARY ANN COTTON MURDER CASE