TRAGEDY AT POUND COTTAGE, WOOTTON WAWEN

In 1913 there was a love triangle murder/suicide in the Warwickshire village of Wootton Wawen

Pound Cottage in 2021 - home of carter Henry Chamberlain and his wife Clara in 1913 - the cart shed at the right.

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On Monday 3rd March 1913 Joseph Keyte was by the Wootton Wawen General Stores when seven year old George Chamberlain ran up to him, clutching his little brother in bloodstained hands. George asked where his father Henry Chambelain was but Joseph had no idea, George then told him that his mother Clara and Harry Tomes were lying shot in Pound Cottage. Samuel Keyte, Henry's employer, had now arrived and both Keytes went to the cottage to see for themselves. A truly ghastly spectacle awaited them. Tomes lay with one leg across Clara on a floor soaked in blood, and  the walls and ceiling of the washhouse were splattered with blood and brains.

The news spread throughought the village and PC Archer was quickly on the scene and found Tomes lying with the gun between his legs; on searching his pockets he found that Tomes was also carrying a cut-throat razor, another pair of shotgun cartridges, a knife and his pipe. The bodies were removed to Henley mortuary.

For many people the events were inexplicable. Both the Chamberlains and Tomeses were well-respected local families of long standing. But at the Inquest all was gradually revealed. Few people knew of or suspected any liaison between Clara and Harry, indeed there may not have been one. Harry’s parents seem to have been certain enough of it, but her husband Henry Chamberlain couldn’t believe it all, and completely broke down at the inquest. The only people who knew exactly what had happened were both dead.

Harry Tomes was forty years old, still single and still living at home. He worked as the village blacksmith in the forge (next to the Seymour Homes) and also travelled the district attending to the horses on the many farms roundabout. His parents were quietly terrified of him and would try not to antagonise him, particularly after he had been on the booze. Outside of the house Harry was quite well liked; he had a cheerful manner and happily chattered away to everyone in the small community.

Throughout the summer of 1912 he was particularly friendly with the Chamberlain family who lived in Pound Cottage near the Bulls Head. He got on well with Henry Chamberlain the carter for  Samuel Keyte the local builder, and was often found in the cottage with Henry and his wife, thirty two year old Clara, and their two little boys. By the end of the summer several people had noticed that Harry Tomes was visiting the Chamberlains’ cottage rather more often when Henry was out than when he was at home - Harry and Clara’s relationship was becoming more noticeable. On the Saturday before Christmas Harry's mother met them walking down the road holding hands. They broke their grip as she came close and she muttered to them that “It was neither nice nor wise” but the couple simply walked on saying not a word. The gossip in the village remained muted and Henry Chamberlain was still in the dark, but possibly Clara Chambelain had decided that their secret meetings must stop before Henry discovered them.

It was Harry Tomes’s forty first birthday on the 3rd of March 1913. He got up as usual at five and left for a job at Preston Hill Farm; he then returned to Wootton along the canal towpath and reached the Navigation Inn at nine thirty. Harry was a regular at the Navigation and he spent an hour or so talking with the landlord Albert Boswell who found him to be in a bright and chatty mood, slightly tipsy when he left, but by no means drunk. Back in the village Henry Chamberlain went off to work at ten thirty from Pound Cottage leaving Clara to get on with the washing in the wash house at the rear .

Harry Tomes left the Navigation and walked down Pennyford Lane to Field Farm. At eleven o’clock he found the farmer Mr Boulton, and asked to borrow his shotgun “As I want to shoot my dog; it has broken its leg and I want to put it out of its misery”. He strode off down the footpath towards the footbridge over the Alne. It appears he turned left off the footpath before reaching the village and made his way across the fields, passing unseen behind the buildings on the Stratford Road including his own home, and eventually reached the wash house at the back of Pound Cottage at eleven forty five.

Harry Tomes’ route from the Navigation Inn to Pound Cottage on his birthday in 1913

Wrenching open the back door of the wash house, his unexpected presence caused Clara to turn around and jump up. Little George in the front room was startled to hear someone swear loudly and suddenly in the washhouse; but it wasn’t his mother, and seconds later he heard two deafening bangs. Before she had even had time to raise her hands in defence Harry had fired straight at her face. The shot blasted right through her jaw, brain, and blew out the back of her skull. Harry sat down beside her body, put the muzzle of the gun below his right ear and pulled the trigger. The shot blew off the right side of his head. In the sudden silence George got off the sofa and went to see what had happened. He found his mother and Tomes lying on the floor and went to hug his mother, but as he put his hand beneath her head he realised there was blood pouring out of the massive wound. He grabbed his baby brother and ran into the street, where he found Joseph Keyte.