Ada Williams

Ada Chard-Williams (B? - March 6, 1900)cite book
last =Haydn
first =
authorlink =
coauthors =Joseph Haydn, Benjamin Vincent
title =Haydn's Dictionary of Dates and Universal Information Relating to All Ages and Nations
publisher =G. P. Putnam's Sons
date =1906
location =Original from the University of Michigan
pages =page 494
url =http://books.google.com/books?id=tXUMAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA494&dq=%22Ada+Chard-Williams%22&client=firefox-a
doi =
id = ] cite book
last =Block
first =
authorlink =
coauthors =Brian P. Block, John Hostettler
title =Hanging in the Balance: A History of the Abolition of Capital Punishment in Britain
publisher =Waterside Press
date =1997
location =
pages =page 78
url =http://books.google.com/books?id=wlonYyuDZS4C&pg=PA77&dq=%22Ada+Chard-Williams%22&client=firefox-a&sig=E0GkwukQCNItdMdAXejzxQeR9Qg#PPA78,M1
doi =
id = ISBN 1872870473 ] was a baby farmer, who, aged 24, was convicted of strangling to death 21-month-old Selina Jones in Barnes in London in September 1899.

Florence Jones, a young unmarried mother, had read an advert in the local newspaper which offered to find homes for unwanted children. She agreed to pay £5 to a Mrs Hewetson (Ada Chard Williams) but could only give her £3 on the day. Being an honest woman, she went back later with the balance and found that Mrs Hewetson and Selina had vanished.

Florence reported the matter to the police. Williams wrote a letter to the police denying the crime but in effect admitting she was a baby farmer who bought and sold babies for profit. The police soon discovered that Mrs Hewetson was Williams. However, they had no body with which to prove there had been a murder, at least not until Selina's corpse was washed up on the bank of the Thames at Battersea.

Like Amelia Dyer, Chard Williams had her own "signature" way of tying up bodies she wished to dispose of, using a knot called a Fisherman’s bend and which was a crucial piece of evidence at her trial at the Old Bailey on 16 and 17 February 1900. She was hanged in the yard of Newgate prison on 6 March 1900, the last woman to be hanged there.Fact|date=June 2008

She was suspected of killing other children although no proceedings were brought.

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