Mexborough & Swinton Times – Saturday 28 November 1959

Acquitted On Murder Charge

But Young Wombwell Husband

Gets Five Years for Manslaughter

Strangled His Wife : ” Exposed to Formidable Provocation” Says Judge

When John Ellis, 24-year-old Wombwell miner, appeared before Mr. Justice Elwes at Sheffield Assizes, the jury were told by Mr. G. S. Waller, Q.C., prosecuting, that at 12.21 a.m. on June 27th the telephone rang at Wombwell Police Station.

A voice said: ” This is Mr. John Ellis, 81, Wombwell Main Row, Wombwell. Will you please come straight away? I have murdered my wife. It is opposite Wombwell Main Club. I’ll be at home.”

Ellis. an ex-Coldstream Guardsman, pleaded ” Not Guilty ” to murder of his 25 year-old wife, Grace Mary Ellis, on June 26th, He was represented by Mr. P. Stanley Price, Q.C., and Mr. H. C. Beaumont. For the Crown, Mr. Waller was assisted by Mr. G. F. Leslie.

The jury found Ellis guilty of “manslaughter ” and he was sentenced to five tears imprisonment.

I Have Strangled Her

Continuing his opening address. Waller said after the telephone message two police officers went to house and Ellis told them “I have strangled her.” They saw the body of a woman on the floor.

Mr Waller said the prosecution submitted the accused strangled her either intending to kill her or intending to do so serious arm.

He said the accused and his wife were married in December 1954. They had two young children. Some borrow five weeks before June 13 Mrs Ellis started going out with a man named Jack Caunt, a married man about 37. He had a car and she went out with him on a number of occasions and on about four of these occasions they had sexual intercourse.

On May 29 – birthday – they got to Barnsley and at a store she bought a suspender belt for which Jack Caunt paid. On June 13 the accused called on his mother-in-law, Mrs Uttley. He said would she go down to his wife, because she was wanting to go out again. She went and asked his daughter where she was going and why she was going out. She replied that she was fed up with staying in, and the accused said if a certain man came past there would be a murder.

Mrs Uttley saw a carving knife on the table and thought it better to remove it. Mrs Ellis did admit she had been going out with Mr Caunt. Mrs Uttley went away and took the knife with her.

Mr Waller said probably that same night the accused and his wife went to Jack Caunt’s house. Mrs. Caunt was there and there was a discussion between the four of them after which the accused said he did not want his wife back and he left.

Mrs. Ellis went to stay the night at a hotel In Barnsley, and the accused later went back to Mrs. Uttley’s house and said Grace did not want to come back with him and he was fed up. The next morning Mrs. Uttley went to their house and asked the accused if he would mend his ways. He said he would, and Mrs. Uttley went to see if she could find her daughter. Jack Caunt took her to the house where she was staying and brought them back.

“Mrs Utley will tell you the accused received his wife back with open arms” Mr. Waller told the jury.

Teased Him

According to a statement made by Ellis, said Mr Waller, his wife teased him every day and told him about Jack Caunt. She didn’t give him a chance to forget it. On June 26 they agreed to separate for a month. She met Jack Caunt in Barnsley and he went to his father’s shop at Darfield and said they had agreed to part for a month so she could decide whether she wanted “this fellow on me.” He said he loved his wife and asked if he could stay in a room of the shop.

That same night after a drink Ellis returned to his father’s and sat down to watch television. He caught sight of a photograph of his daughter and said “Our Carol’s photo. I’ll have to go home.” He got a lift with a man named Matthew.

Meanwhile, said Mr Waller, Jack Caunt had called at Wombwell Main Row, by appointment and spoke to Mrs Ellis and then went to a neighbour’s house. When he left it was about 11:30 p.m. and he made a detour to avoid seeing anybody and went into number 81 by the back door.

Mrs Ellis locked the door and put the light out. Within a short time there was a knock on the back door. Jack Caunt did do not know who it was but he went out of the front door and disappeared.

Vital Ten Minutes

Mr Waller said a neighbour, Thomas Chipchase, took a cup of tea on to his doorstep and he had a clear view down Wombwell Main Row. He saw the accused go into his own house. He then saw Mrs. Ellis go across to the toilets and the accused followed her. They went back to the house together. Ten or fifteen minutes later he saw the accused come out and go down the Row.

“The prosecution submit that during those 10 or 15 minutes the accused man had killed his wife,” said Mr. Waller. He went to a telephone box and tried to ring his brother, and then rang the police station. When the police arrived they saw Mrs. Ellis on the floor and there was a red weal round her throat. The accused was cautioned, and he said “I have done it myself, I had her over the table first. I use my hands first and then I the belt which her boyfriend bought her. He bought it for her birthday.” Ellis said he had thrown the belt on the fire.

In a statement made later, Ellis said “She didn’t respond freely to my affections … As we were walking I said ‘ This is where I took my driving lessons’. She said “this is where I used to go with Jackie, I said “What for? Driving lesson? She said no, the other lessons… My nerves got into a complete mess up. I couldn’t eat or sleep properly… I went to put my arms round. I tried to kiss her and she pushed me backwards and said “I don’t want you. I’ve decided to go with Jack.” My nerve snapped… When I came to I realise I did not only use my hands. I had also used a suspender belt which her lover bought her for her birthday.

Last Kiss

The statement added “I lifted her eyelids up and then I kissed her.”

Mr Waller said death was due to asphyxia caused by strangulation with a ligature which could have been a suspender belt.

Mrs Lily Uttley, of Hough Lane, Wombwell, said she told Ellis when he went to see her “You are the husband. Why can’t you do something yourself? In the end I went, and she said she was absolutely fed up. She said she couldn’t care less. She never had any money to do anything.”

Mrs Uttley added, “Jack said Grace and Jack Caunt were having an affair together. My daughter did admit going out with Jack Caunt and I told it was wrong, she had just got that fed up. They didn’t have a living as they ought to have had a want of money.”

When the killed said there would be a murder and she saw the carving knife on the table, she said, “if there’s any murders going to be done, there will be done over my dead body. I took the knife with me.” She said her son-in-law said he was going to have a divorce.

Cross-examined, Mrs Uttley said, “What Grace did she was driven to buy her own husband.” She agreed that she could have caused her husband to go to pieces.

Father of Three

Caunt in evidence, said he lived in Windmill Road, Wombwell. He was a 37 year old miner, and the father of three children, the eldest being 17. He said, “I knew Grace Alice. I knew thereby site, a long time. I had been out with her about five weeks previously. She had been out with me in my car. We usually went out alone and went riding around.”

He admitted having intercourse on about four occasions.

He said they went into Barnsley near her birthday. They went into a store and she brought something which she now knew was a suspender belt. Yet given her some money to get a birthday present, but didn’t know what it was. On one occasion, they all went to his house, and he explained everything.

“My wife didn’t know anything about it until then. I wanted to try and straighten everything out,” he said.

Ellie said he didn’t want his wife back and “My wife said she wasn’t going to divorce me,” Ellis then went out.

Describing what happened on the night of her death, Caunt said the lights were on when he went into the house. Mrs Ellis told him that her husband had left and how she was fixed for money. “At the end of the conversation, I heard a knocking at the back door. I ran out of the other door. I didn’t know who was knocking.”

Cross-examined, he agreed it was his main concern to leave as quickly as possible, without being seen. He formed the impression that the accused was very fond of his wife. Caunt said he wanted to square things up by getting a divorce. Her husband had left her because they had agreed on a month separation. Caunt agreed with counsel that there was a sofa in the room but denied having intercourse with her on that night. He added, “She took nothing off while I was with her.”

Mrs Muriel Lawcock of Wombwell Main Road, Wombwell, said Ellis went into her house and asked her husband if he knew his mate had been having an affair with his wife. She went with Mrs Ellis and Caunt into Barnsley when she bought the suspender belt.

In answer to the Judge, Mrs Lawcock said Mrs Ellis wanted to go into Barnsley to see about an electric washer.

Started to Cry

Frank Ellis, of Alexandra Terrace, Ardsley, said the accused was his son. “He came to my butcher shop at Darfield on June 26. He said he had not had anything to eat since the morning before. He told me they are separated for about a month until she decided which one she wanted. He said she had been having an affair with a fellow who had a Zephyr Zodiac car. I didn’t know his name. My son started to cry and said he thought the world of her and didn’t know what he was going to do.”

Mr Ellis said he suggested the song should stay in some spare room over the shop. “He had supper and turned round to see television. He saw a photograph of his little daughter, Caroll, and then said ‘I’ll have to go home.’ He was nearly crying. He picked up his coat and went.”

Cross-examined, Mr Ellis said the sum was very much in love with his wife was very fond of his children. “He has never been in any trouble at all,” he added.

Ronald Matthews of Wombwell, said he was driving from Ardsley to woman when he saw Ellis, whom he knew by sight, walking along the road. He gave him a lift and Ellis told him had been to his father’s because there had been trouble at home with his wife. “He was upset and talked about his children most of the time.”

Ellis told him he was going home to patch things up with his wife. She liked to go dancing and he was quite willing now to take her dancing. He was going home to make everything square.

Under cross-examination, Matthew said Ellis thought the car had something to do with his wife’s affair.

Sat on Doorstep

Thomas Chipchase, of Wombwell Main Road, Wombwell, a miner, said about two weeks earlier he saw the accused crying. He told him his wife had gone off with Jack  Caunt and he took Ellis to his house. On June 26, Ellis told a meeting like going to the club, because everyone was talking about his wife and Caunt. “About 11:40 p.m. he saw the accused go to his home.” About five minutes later he saw Mrs Ellis and then the accused go across to the toilet. They went back to the house, and he heard the door lock. ”About 10 minutes later, I saw Ellis come out and he went down Wombwell Main Road. He came back after two or three minutes and sat on the doorstep.

He agreed there was time for Ellis to have gone to a nearby telephone box. Cross-examined, Mr Chipchase said he was sure it was Mr and Mrs Ellis he had seen going to the toilet and not two other people.

Detective’s Evidence

Detective Sergeant Kenneth York said he was present when Ellis was seen by his father and brother. He heard Ellis say: “I’m glad I’ve done it. It’s not my mind.” He also said she drove into it, and that “she had it coming to her.”

Examined by Mr Price, Ellis said on oath: “I was very much in love with my wife. I love my two children very much.” His wife began to show no affection for him, but she told him she loved him too much to want another man. When his wife started to go out for five times a week he began to become suspicious. He was first told his wife and another man on June 13.

His wife admitted it was Jack Caunt. While out for a walk he told his wife “This is where I used to come from my driving lesson”, and she replied “Yes, I used to come to learning with Jack.” He said: “driving lessons?”, And she replied: “Other lessons.”

He said his wife used to tease and taunt him about Caunt. When he and his wife got ready to go for a walk she would talk about the suspender belt Caunt had bought for her birthday. He added: “She would say “it’s lovely.” Then there was a song which was a favourite of theirs “Venus, Goddess of Love”. She used to sing that and she knew it made me fed up and depressed. I used to stop her from singing it.” Finally they decided to part for a month, and it was arranged he should live at his father’s house.

On June 26, while at his father’s house is a picture of his little daughter Carol. “I could not keep away from my wife and children any longer,” he said. “I went straight out to make it up with my wife.” When he reached the house it was locked and in darkness. After a time his wife opened the door. His wife was straightening her frock down and brushing her hair back.

“As soon as I got in I tried to take my wife into my arms” he said, but she pushed me away. He tried to talk some sense into his wife, and also if Caunt had been. She said he had been with her mother. She told him: “If you are stopping I am going to Jackie.”

“Very Much in Love.”

He said: “As she passed in front of me I took hold of her throat. I just remember putting my hands round her neck and putting her over the table. When I got my senses back I had the suspender belt around her throat and my knee on one end and pulling the other. I can’t remember taking up the belt. I cannot remember finding it round her throat. It was the suspender belt which had caused the trouble and the one Caunt had bought her for her birthday. To the end I was very much in love with my wife. I did not desire her death at all.”

Cross-examined by Mr Waller he denied that he had said “She had it coming to her.” He tried to reason with his wife, and told her Caunt was no good to her. Caunt was older than her and had a wife. She told him: “I have finished with you.”

He said when he came to his senses he realised he had news the suspender belt and he threw it on the fire.

In his address to the jury, Mr Waller said the suspender belt was an object between hatred for Ellis, and representing a symbol of his wife’s association with Caunt.

In his final speech Mr Stanley Price urged the jury to bring in a manslaughter verdict, not because it was a merciful verdict, but because it was in accordance with the proper weighing up of evidence. Ellis had had burdens to bear he could not endure and had been driven beyond endurance.

In a summing up Mr Justice Elwes told the jury they were not there to try Caunt, and added: “my advice is not to waste your intelligence on Caunt.”

The jury found Ellis not guilty of “Murder” but guilty of “Manslaughter.”

Before being centred Ellis told the Court: “I am sorry I caused this trouble.”

Passing sentence of five years imprisonment the Judge said he entirely agreed with a manslaughter verdict, and told Ellis:

“I think you have been exposed to very formidable provocation, but manslaughter is always a very serious charge.”