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George Mander
Allender murdered in Monte Carlo
George Mander Allender was a local businessman of
note, and founder and managing director of the
Aylesbury Dairy Company, which in the late nineteenth
century had substantial holdings in the Christ's
Hospital area. He was in the business of farming, but
in a way well ahead of its time, and light years from
those traditional small-scale, family-run operations
then typical of the neighbourhood. His was an
enterprise on an industrial scale, one which would be
recognised by the big boys today, whether on the
Downlands of West Sussex, across those vast stretches
of East Anglia – or as epitomised by our old friend
Brian Aldridge, the man everyone loves to hate in The
Archers.
But in a savage murder that shocked Britain and
France, Allender was 'brutally assassinated', as the
press put it, while on holiday in Monte Carlo in late
1893. We will tell the whole, horrible story shortly,
but first of all a paragraph or two to sketch in the
detail of that formidable operation known as the
Aylesbury Dairy Company.
Allender, who was the godson of James Mander and
nephew of William Allender (both of whom were partners
in Mander and Allender, a Liverpool hatter's firm),
had come to live at Stammerham (as the Christ's
Hospital area was then known) from Roehampton in 1884,
and it was here that the Sussex-based element of his
enterprise was based. The business started off
as the Southern Counties Dairy Farm Association, and
it was under this name that the Stammerham Estate was
purchased from Henry Padwick. The name change took
place the following year, and Allender had invested
£20,000, and held 23,000 shares in the company. Its
head office was in Bayswater.
The choice of location was important, as the farms
owned by the company (such as Weston's Farm) were able
to take advantage of the nearby rail link to London
and elsewhere. There was a special siding at
Stammerham dedicated to the Aylesbury Dairy Company,
with supporting warehouses, and to give some idea of
the scale of its operation, in 1885 some 1,000 sheep
were transported to market. Interestingly, loads of
manure from London's many horse-drawn cabs were also
sent down by rail to Stammerham, and this smelly cargo
did much to promote the growth of the farms' mangolds
and cabbages.
Allender was a council member of the Royal
Agricultural Society, and his ideas on arable and
dairy farming were 'well known'. His business was held
to be a model of its kind, and he employed all the
latest techniques and machinery – haymakers and the
like. One witness testified to 'the magnificent sight
of five of Wood's well known mowing machines, each
with a pair of horses putting down a 30 acre piece of
seed hay'. Again the wheat crops on Sharpenhurst Hill
were 'excellent', as was the quality of the estate's
pigs, horses, sheep and cattle. In short, the business
was run by commercial men who understood the meaning
of the word 'profit', and gave the markets just what
they wanted - and at the right price. All this must
have represented something of a threat to the more
traditional, dyed-in-the-wool local farmers, who were
unlikely to have had the financial clout and acumen of
their sizeable neighbour.
But in due course that threat did evaporate, as in
1891-2 the land was sold on again, this time to
Christ's Hospital, and it was here, of course, that
the great school we know today was built. But the
business of the Aylesbury Dairy Company continued
elsewhere (presumably in Buckinghamshire), and
Allender kept in touch with people in Horsham, where
he was well known. In the spring of 1893 he had stayed
with his close friend Phillip Chasemore, and on the
very day of Allender's death, on 29 December 1893,
Chasemore had received a letter inviting him to the
Mediterranean for a fortnight's holiday. But it was
not to be.
Allender was a man who knew how to enjoy himself. He
was much liked in Monte Carlo 'because of his kindly
good nature and cordial bearing', and had been staying
at the Metropole Hotel since November. He spent a good
deal of time in the Casino, and also enjoyed long
walks; this was to be his undoing.
On the Friday afternoon he set off along a mountain
road between La Turbie and Roquebrune, intending to
walk to Menton by the Corniche road. The alarm was
sounded when he did not return, and on Saturday
evening, after a search, his body was found under
Harma Bridge, about half way between La Turbie and
Menton. It was very bruised, and he had been subjected
to a savage attack. It seems as if he had been leaning
over a rail by the side of the bridge, eating a
biscuit, when he was assaulted from behind. His
injuries had been caused by a 'stiletto' knife and
probably a heavy stone, and make grim reading. The
knife had been driven through his right eye into the
brain, and again into the base of his skull – so
forcefully that there was an exit wound in his throat.
Despite being strongly built, he was, after all, a 65
year old man, and would have stood no chance from a
surprise attack by two armed assailants.
The motive was clearly robbery, and his watch and
chain, together with a ring and purse, were stolen.
But the robbers missed the main prize, a bundle of
notes totalling 6,300 francs in his back trouser
pocket. It looks as if he had been targeted, as word
must have got out that he had been lucky at the gaming
tables, and no doubt he had been followed from the
hotel.
The police were able to identify two suspects almost
immediately: an Englishman and an American. Both had
been in the habit of frequenting the Casino, and the
former had often been seen in Allender's company.
Perhaps his friendly nature had got the better of him?
The family wanted to put up a £100 reward for
information, but the police refused to let them, as
they hoped to avoid publicity as far as possible; the
crime was, of course, terribly bad for business. But
as it was it caused 'an immense sensation' along the
Riviera, as well as a 'painful' one back in Horsham.
This part of the south of France was clearly
dangerous, and one commentator noted that robbery and
violence were distinct hazards along the stretch from
Nice to Menton. An incident was related whereby an old
man sitting looking out to sea on the Promenade des
Anglais at Nice, no less, had his throat cut, and
again a dead body had been found with stab wounds
close to Monte Carlo's Casino – but with little in the
way of press reports.
In the Allender case a schoolboy related how he had
seen men begging, and when refused a knife had been
wielded and a man stabbed - but whether or not these
were the murderers, an arrest was soon made. The
Englishman was captured by the Italian police at
Bordighera, just across the border, and no doubt the
American was tracked down before too long. Their names
were known, and it could only be a matter of time. As
the press reports coyly put it, the first letter of
the English suspect's name was 'B' and the American's
was 'W'.
As for George Allender, he is buried in the English
cemetery at Menton, apparently in full view of the
spot where he had been so brutally murdered. |
