John Henry Starkey

A coachman and habitual criminal, with a string of convictions under a number of aliases, convicted of the murder of his wife. He married her at the beginning of the year but within weeks had started seeing another woman. On 4th April she taxed him about the affair which angered him so much that he attacked her, her screams waking up the neighbours. At Sam next morning, he went to work and told a friend that he feared his wife had committed suicide. By 9am the body had been discovered, with the head almost severed. Starkey was arrested and although there were blood stains on his clothes he claimed he was innocent and that their lodger had killed his wife. He later confessed before he was hanged by Williiam Marwood.  The execution took place in Leicester on the 31st July 1877.  He was twenty eight when he died.