A Somerset man convicted of impregnating and then drowning his young niece met his end at Bristol. Frederick Morse lived with his parents and his niece Doris Brewer at Slough Green in 1933. The quarryman was 32-years-old while his niece was just 12.
When Doris was found to be pregnant on February 23, Morse was suspected of being the father – something he strenuously denied. The next day, young Doris’s body was found snagged on a tree in the River Rag, near Taunton.
Doris had drowned, but her body revealed no signs of a struggle. Morse was later seen in the village, soaking wet, soon after which he was arrested and questioned.
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The quarryman told police that he had gone to work as usual and arranged to meet Doris for lunch, when the pair went to the Bell Inn. Morse had two pints of beer and Doris had a lemonade, before Morse bought a bottle of rum and they walked to the river.
By then it was raining, so Morse told Doris to stay in a shed while he inspected his rabbit traps – when he returned later, Doris was no longer there, he claimed. Nonetheless, Morse was charged with murder on March 1.
He then made another statement, claiming that he and Doris had drunk the rum then made a suicide pact to drown themselves in the river. After jumping in, both changed their minds – Morse managed to escape, but was too exhausted to save Doris, he said.
Doris’s funeral was delayed while Sir Bernard Spilsbury and Dr Godfrey Carter conducted a post-mortem examination of the girl’s body.
Morse was tried at Somerset Assizes in Wells on June 7 and 8, when he rescinded his statement about the suicide pact. He referred Mr Justice Goddard back to his first statement, insisting that Doris had disappeared from the shed and he had not seen her since.
The prosecutor argued that, even if Morse had survived a suicide pact, he was guilty of Doris’s murder under a law which was not repealed until 1957. After deliberating for around one hour, the jury convicted him of the wilful murder of Doris Brewer.
The Central Somerset Gazette mentioned that “remarkable allegations against a Detective Inspector from Scotland Yard were made, but denied”. It added that “the hearing took a dramatic turn when the defending counsel asked the Judge to send the jury from the court while certain arguments were heard”.
Mr Justice Goddard passed the death sentence upon Morse, who was transferred to Bristol’s Horfield Prison – Somerset had no facility to conduct executions by 1933. The condemned man lodged an appeal against the decision, but this was rejected.
On July 25, executioner Thomas Pierrepoint carried out the sentence, giving Morse a 6’ 8” drop to account for the labourer’s “thick, muscular neck”. A crowd of around two hundred gathered outside the prison, surging forward when the official announcement of Morse’s death was posted on the wall.
“We, the undersigned, hereby declare that judgement of death was this day executed upon Fred Morse at His Majesty's Prison, in our presence,” it read, signed by prison governor F W Gwilliam and chaplain Ivor R Watkins.
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