Living in a House with a Famous Victorian Murder Mystery

I know I'm late with New Year wishes; but Happy New Year and I hope you had a lovely Christmas. I've started 2014 ready to get going on some new projects, but most of these are outside and everywhere is waterlogged, so I'm having to get involved in indoor tasks instead, like tidying up and clearing out old papers.  And it was when I started doing this the other day that I came across an old photo of the Priory, where I lived many years ago...

The Priory, in Balham, south London, is an old, gothic-style mansion that was divided into attractive apartments in the 1980s. I rented one here for a few months in my twenties, when I was in a sort of 'in-between' period of my life (I lived in north and west London, and here in south London for this brief time). Sadly Balham was a bit run down when I lived there and the Priory seemed a place that had been left over from an another era. It was built to look over its own grounds with green fields beyond. Entering into the Priory was also like being transported back to the Victorian age, because it had a grand entrance hall with a sweeping staircase and dim lighting.

It also had its very own Victorian ghost...

Charles Bravo; The Ghost at the Priory

This is because the Priory was the scene of a famous Victorian murder mystery that dominated the news and knocked other stories (including those about the Royal Family and the Prime Minister) off the front pages. The Victorians were gripped by it - according to the Coroner at the inquest 'half of London' lined the pavements outside to watch participants come and go. But the murder was never solved and it has taken different authors (such as Agatha Christie) and several TV programmes in the hundred years since to come up with various whodunnit theories.

The story is this; in 1876, Charles Bravo, a 30 year old gentleman who lived at the Priory, died in his bedroom of poisoning. The suspects included his new wife, Florence (they had only been married about four months), her ex-lover Dr Gully, Mrs Cox - the severe housekeeper who always wore black (and who Bravo was in the process of dismissing) and the ex-groom, Mr Griffiths (who had been recently sacked and was very bitter about it).  Charles Bravo died in bed after three days in agony without accusing any of them.

Florence

The police initially concluded suicide, but a few days later they decided it was murder. Some months after that, the inquest was held and all the intimate and unpleasant details of the private lives of Bravo and Florence were revealed to a shocked and fascinated public. Bravo was cruel, abusive and a bully and it was said that he had married Florence for her money; she was an heiress and the Priory was her house. Florence, meanwhile, was not a respectable woman (because she'd had this scandalous affair with Dr Gully).  

So; who was the murderer? Theories have included Florence, because marriage to Bravo had become intolerable, and Bravo himself, after accidentally dosing himself with laudanum for toothache, while he was actually trying to poison his wife (who had been ill after a miscarriage).  The evidence doesn't really point to Dr Gully, even though he would have known about poisons, or Mr Griffiths or Mrs Cox, although the latter could well have aided her mistress.

Mrs Cox is questioned at the inquest

So Charles Bravo would have been a troubled ghost. I used to wonder if part of my flat was his bedroom, but looking at an old layout of the Priory since I'm pretty sure now that it wasn't. I have to admit I never sensed a ghost in my time there at all. Have you ever sensed one? I never like to think of them, because usually they're people who've died in tragic or nasty circumstances. Certainly, the other residents have sensed the Priory's ghost over the years, and have reported noises, sightings and a strange atmosphere. 

Anyway, I knew that I'd be distracted from clearing out papers when I came across my old photos. Next I'm sorting through a box of mementos. Fatal. Will I ever get it all done?!

Further info: 'Death at the Priory' by James Ruddick & a docudrama 'A Most Mysterious Murder: The Case of Charles Bravo' by Julian Fellowes.