PART TWO: 1912

No new fires – always excepting the usual chimney fires and stray cigar butts. No new fires in January, February, and well into March. It seemed Mr. Bradshaw was innocent – or maybe he was just trying to quit.

March 11, 1912

FIRE BUG IN WINNIPEG CAUSES DEATH OF SEVEN Now was it just a coincidence or is there a connection when the very next night…..?

March 12

FIRE DESTROYS BELL WAREHOUSE In a blaze which menaced the wholesale district of the city and caused some damage to the Nelson Jam Factory, the warehouse was totally destroyed. The losses were covered by insurance.

March 15

NELSON FIRE BUG MAY HAVE RESUMED OPERATIONS: Alan Block Scene of Outbreak The blaze was started outside the wall of the building and under the sidewalk on Ward St.

March 18

FIRE BUG TRIES TO BURN WHOLESALE WAREHOUSE Suspicion that the fire in the Griffin Block Monday night was the work of an incendiary became more certain when a blaze was set at the rear of the Brackman-Ker warehouse soon after midnight this morning.

It was last summer all over again. The smoldering ashes of fear burst into flame once more – burning all the hotter from a dread of what might come next.

March 29

FIRE BUG DESTROYS LOCAL LUMBER MILL
Yale Columbia Buildings Are Wiped Out.
Losses Reach High Figure …..$75,000 damage. Sixty men put out of work. A crowd of 500 gathered to watch and help save nearby businesses. 100,000 board feet of finished lumber burned to ashes.

The renewed arson spurred local businesses to contribute an extra $1,000 to the reward – bringing the total to $1,500 (over $30,000 in today’s money) – enough to attract the interest of Seattle private detective Jim Forte who soon joined forces with amateur sleuth Roy Scott, an Australian. The pair was quickly persuaded that Bradshaw was the culprit and decided to befriend him in the hopes that he would give himself away. Touring the various locations and listening to his detailed descriptions of the fires, as well as his rants against the Chinese and their suspicions became certainties. The problem, however, was the absence of any hard evidence. Then…..

April 13

THREE BLAZES FIRE BUG’S WORK Three fires, one of which gutted The Old Curiosity Shop, were started early yesterday morning by the fire bug, believed by the police to be John Bradshaw.

April 14

JOHN BRADSHAW UNDER ARREST The man under arrest, Bradshaw, was held by the police on suspicion after the series on incendiary fires last summer. He is now in jail awaiting a hearing.

It is not clear why the police decided to charge Bradshaw at this point. The evidence against him was not much better than the previous fall. But the pressure to arrest somebody, anybody, must have been enormous. And perhaps the two detectives, determined to collect the reward before Bradshaw was caught by someone else, persuaded them to act.

Whatever the reason, it was Forte to lead the charge in presenting the Crown’s case at the hearing. Unfortunately for him, however, Magistrate Irvine found his evidence unconvincing. Forte testified that he and Scott saw Bradshaw go into the alley behind the scene of the first of the three fires at 9:00 pm. When Irving pointed out that the rear entrance to The Madden Hotel and Saloon was also up the same alley he was forced to admit that they had not looked for Bradshaw there. Nor did the judge find Bradshaw’s knowledge of the fires particularly damning, declaring “it was the kind of knowledge any reasonably intelligent reader of the Nelson Daily News might have gained.”

As for the testimony that seven year old Emma Svoboda had sold seven candles to a man several days before the fire and that a subsequent search of Bradshaw’s room turned up only three, Irvine dismissed out of hand after it came out that Emma had been unable to pick Bradshaw out of a police line-up.

The final nail was driven into the Crown’s coffin when it was discovered that Bradshaw had been sitting down to breakfast with Forte and Scott at the time the alarm was given for the night’s third fire. And so, after a scathing summation of the evidence, which the judge described as “a series of unconnected and pointless speculations,” Bradshaw was given his unconditional discharge. He declined to accept the police’s advise to leave town, although Forte and Scott were never heard from again.

Nearly two months passed. The arson attacked stopped again, although Bradshaw remained in Nelson, staying at The Klondyke Hotel. No light has ever been shed on the circumstances of his stay – whether he had a job or what his fellow townsmen thought of him. Was he considered a wronged innocent, or a crafty and unsavoury criminal?

June 12th

BRADSHAW AGAIN ON ARSON CHARGE
Matchbox And Candle Found
Arrested for the third time, John Bradshaw was last night lodged in the provincial jail where he is held on suspicion of having started a brush fire last evening on the Granite Road, a few miles from the city.

Ironically, the man believed to have been responsible for almost twenty arsons involving the destruction of Nelson’s brewery, the Hall Mines smelter, two lumber yards and sundry warehouses was now charged with setting fire to an outbuilding on a farm belonging to a Mr. and Mrs. Nock about a thirty minutes walk outside of town – two tiny fires that were spotted and put out by neighbours within a few minutes. Was this the work of the infamous Nelson fire bug? Oh how the mighty have fallen!

Nonetheless, Bradshaw now faced two charges – attempted arson and setting a fire in such a way as to cause an arson – which carried a maximum sentence of 14 years in jail. A preliminary hearing determined that there was enough evidence to proceed and he was committed to trial on June 18th. He was held in provincial jail until his trial at the Fall Assizes which began on October 22 presided over by Mr. Justice Gregory.

The Crown’s case was presented by counsel C.R. Hamilton and the defense was undertaken by attorney Fred C. Moffatt. Between them they agreed to a number of points which they established as ‘common ground.’

1. There was a fire discovered in a shed at the Nock farm just before, or after, eight o’clock pm on Tuesday, June 10th and shortly after that, a second fire near some brush.
2. A Mr. William Billington produced a candle which he said he found burning at the site, extinguished, and retrieved after a search the next day.
3. A reasonable walking pace will get a man from the Nock farm to downtown Nelson in twenty minutes

The Crown’s first witness was Mrs. Nock who testified that she was at the top of her garden watching the men put out the fire and then turned and saw a man coming through her raspberry canes. She identified the man as the accused. She said he told her he was looking for a way out of the raspberry patch. When she indicated the direction of the fire, he volunteered to fetch the Fire Warden and asked directions to Nelson. As he was leaving he pulled out a large silver watch (which was later established to be similar to one found in Bradshaw’s room). He then declared that he would like to help with the fire but had to be in Nelson by 8:30.

Mrs. Nock also testified that the light was good, Bradshaw had on a brown suit and a belt with red stripes and was wearing a strong perfume (later detected on clothes found in Bradshaw’s room). She ended by describing his eyes. They were “soft and swimming and kind of moist. Very soft with long lashes. Limpid eyes.”

In refuting Mrs. Nock’s evidence, the defense was able to establish that Bradshaw was seen in town later that night wearing a completely different suit with a plain leather belt. No brown suit or red striped belt was ever discovered – which Hamilton admitted was a “troublesome contradiction.” Also Bradshaw’s perfume was sold regularly at Poole’s Drug Store.

Next to testify was Mr. Billington who produced a candle and some matches which he found at the scene. The matches were established as the same kind as sold to Bradshaw by W. A. Thurman, a cigar merchant. On the other hand, the defense got Billington to admit that he had not taken the candle with him the night of the fire but found it after a search next day. He said he had not realized its importance until speaking with Police Constable Donald McLeod back in Nelson.
McLeod, a distinguished member and much decorated with a long record in Scotland before he came to Nelson, was the Crown’s strongest witness. Interestingly, his testimony would not be admissible today. On the stand he declared that “Once a week since the fires in March I went to the accused rooms.” Clearly searching, or even entering Bradshaw’s room without a warrant would now be illegal and any evidence obtained in that way, useless. Such was not the case in 1912.

Convinced that Bradshaw was their man, McLeod testified that he:

“found three candles in his room which I marked with a staple. One of them I also broke a small piece off in my haste when I heard someone out in the hall. Those candles remained in a dresser in Bradshaw’s room until at least late in May. It was the candle with the broken piece that Mr. Billington gave me the night of the fire.”

Lastly, there was the evidence of nine year old Norman Irving. Norman testified that at 7:15 he was driving to town with his father in their buggy down The Granite Road when he saw Bradshaw walking up it. He later picked Bradshaw out of a line-up – on his second try.

Such was the case against Bradshaw. As we have seen Moffatt was able to weaken Mrs. Nock’s identification of him because of the discrepancy about his suit. He also produced a number of witnesses tending to show Bradshaw in town possibly as late as 7:30 (Police Sergeant Ellis) and also between 8:15 and 8:20 (Starland Theatre ticket-taker Mrs. J.Y. Anderson and 14 year old patron Walter Hepple). There was also Dora Jordan who said that she was standing on the street between 8:00 and 10:00 and saw Bradshaw go into the movie theatre at 8:15 and come out after 9:30. But since she, by her own admission, had been standing on the street corner the entire time, her testimony was tainted by obvious assumptions about her character. Anyway, even within Bradshaw’s time frame, it would have been just possible for him to get to the Nock farm and back.

The question remains, of course, why would he do such a thing?

Taking the stand himself, Bradshaw declared that he had been in town the entire night, having been in Poole’s Drug Store at 7:30, returned to his room and at 8:15 entered the Starland Theatre and watched The Redman’s War – a western which he described accurately (although the prosecution established that he could have seen a later showing that same night). As for the candles in his room, he said he used them for reading, a fact which would have been verified by the chambermaid had she been available to testify (she was out of town).

After a two day trial, on October 22nd , the jury declared that it was unable to reach a verdict. Justice Gregory therefore ordered the selection of a new jury and a second trial. The evidence presented on this occasion was very similar to the first, with one exception. By this time the chambermaid had returned to town and testified that she had never seen any evidence of candles being used in Bradshaw’s room. Whether or not this was a decisive point, on October 29th the second jury returned a verdict of guilty – the foreman adding “believing that he did the act as the result of a mania for setting fires, no motive being shown in the evidence, we strongly commend him to the mercy of the court.”

In pronouncing sentence the next day Justice Gregory declared,

“I must say, I agree with your verdict, gentlemen, and your commendation does your hearts credit – but not your heads. Mr. Bradshaw is on trial for one arson and one arson only and any thought of ‘a mania for setting fires’ should not have entered into your deliberations. I therefore cannot take notice of your plea for mercy. However, the fires in question were so slight and caused so little damage that I will not in any case impose the maximum sentence. I therefore sentence you, John Bradshaw, to a term of three years in prison.”

John Bradshaw was taken away to a federal penitentiary on the west coast and was never seen in Nelson again.

Was John Bradshaw the Nelson Fire Bug? Did he receive a fair trial? Certainly, as Justice Gregory pointed out, he was not charged with nor convicted of setting any fires except the two insignificant ones at the Nock farm. But clearly the jury was convinced that the man they found guilty of setting those fires was the fire bug – and Gregory, despite his caveat, probably agreed.

Still, by the standards of today, it is clear that Bradshaw did not get a fair trial. Constable McLeod’s testimony was tainted to say the least. Not only would it be inadmissible but it has all the appearance of a frame-up – especially when placed alongside Billington’s ‘discovery’ of the marked candle the day after conferring with McLeod upon his return to Nelson on the night of the fire.
Of course, McLeod and Billington may have framed a guilty man. They knew he was the fire bug but were unable to prove it. Or perhaps Bradshaw was the fire bug of 1911 and the fires in 1912 were set by business owners looking to collect on insurance knowing the fire bug would be blamed…..

And then there’s this:

April 18, 1913

REWARD FOR CONVICTION OF JOHN BRADSHAW PAID Two hundred and fifty dollars was the prize which W. A. Thurman, the local cigar merchant, drew last summer when he handed John Bradshaw, who was later convicted on incendiarism, a box of matches, a voucher for this amount being received yesterday as part of the reward of $1500 offered by the provincial government for the arrest and conviction of the firebug. At the trial, Thurman testified that he sold Bradshaw a box of matches identical to those found at the scene of the fire. In addition, Mr. and Mrs. A.G. Nock received $500; Constable McLeod $250; William Billington, $250; Norman Irving $250.