James Curtis, a crime writer

In 2007 London Books republished The Gilt Kid, a book written by James Curtis in 1936. This was followed by two more of his books, They Drive By Night and There Ain’t No Justice which were republished in 2008 and 2014.

During the 1930s James Curtis became popular for his gritty novels of the London underworld. The reviewers praised his use of slang, his hardboiled style and the refusal to romanticise his protagonist. He was later compared with Patrick Hamilton and American crime writers such as David Goodis and James T. Farrell.

There are more than a thousand words and phrases attributed to Curtis by lexicographer, Eric Partridge, in his ‘Dictionary of Slang’. For example the expression, ‘Gordon Bennett’ was used in his 1937 novel, You’re In the Racket Too. James Curtis was writing about working class life twenty years before the ‘Angry Young Men’ of the 50s.

Two of his books were made into films and Curtis wrote both the screenplays. They Drive By Night (1938) starring Emyln Williams was directed by Arthur Woods. Woods was an established director who made 26 films. When Alfred Hitchcock left the studio for America, Woods was scheduled to take over from him, but he was killed in WWII. The whole of the film is available on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-KpJzFl8BM

The second film, There Ain’t No Justice, was made in 1939. The leading role of a young boxer was played by Jimmy Hanley who becomes involved with a crooked promoter. The champion boxer, ‘Bombardier Billy Wells’ plays an unaccredited role in the film. The director was Pen Tennyson, the great-grandson of Lord Tennyson. He made three films in two years, but like Woods, he too was killed in the War.

There are two short clips of the film on YouTube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KBRsJGebPJ8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8SR3dztkIw

Geoffrey Basil Maiden

James Curtis was the pen name of Geoffrey Basil Maiden. He was born on 4 July 1907 at Sturry in Kent, the youngest of the five children of Joseph (Joe) Maiden and his wife Bertha Laura von Fabricius. His parents had run a hotel in Delhi for about ten years when his mother came back to England for Geoffrey’s birth. She stayed for 18 months before returning to India. In 1912 they sold the hotel and the family settled in Hertfordshire, where they acquired the Aldenham Lodge Hotel. Joe Maiden also bought the Foley Arms Hotel in Great Malvern which he ran until the late 1930s. Geoffrey followed his two elder brothers as a border at the Kings School in Canterbury. It was probably here that he developed his dislike for the Maiden surname after being teased about it.

After leaving school Geoffrey spent a year in France rather than going to university. Back in London he got a job in the Reuters News Agency at the London Stock Exchange. But in 1932, he was in court, pleading guilty to stealing £460 of jewellery (today worth about £26,000), from his friend Mrs Magdalen Blanche Gillilan. She was a member of the very wealthy Curzon family and had just been granted a divorce. A detective said that Maiden was short of money, and had taken the jewellery when he’d been left alone in Magdalen’s flat for an hour and half. He’d travelled straight to France and sold it. Geoffrey was sentenced to six months hard labour and his experience of jail provided background material for some of his books.

Geoffrey went to Spain during the Civil War and then taught English in Barcelona for a short time before returning to London. He was outraged by the social inequality he witnessed in England and this led to his commitment to left-wing politics. He was a member of the Communist party for a short period.

Geoffrey Maiden (Nicolette Edwards)

A handsome and charismatic man, he socialised with bohemian artists and writers in London. During a visit to a bookshop in Chelsea he met Shirley Finlayson (born Finklestein), the daughter of a jeweller. She became pregnant and they were married on 2 September 1936 at the Chelsea Register Office. At the time he was working as a screenwriter at Pinewood Studios. The same year his first novel, The Gilt Kid, was published under the pen name ‘James Curtis’. He wrote four other novels in the 30s which received praise from the critics and sold well.

In 1939 Geoffrey volunteered for the British Army before War was declared and was posted to France as part of the British Expeditionary Force. He later served in Burma where he attained the rank of major in the Intelligence Corps. Much of his time was spent with Lord Mountbatten screenwriting the film Burma Victory. 

 

Still from Burma Victory (1946), where Geoffrey appears in a cameo role and detonates a stick of dynamite

His daughter Nicolette (Nicky) was born while he was abroad. But the enforced separation during the war hastened the break-up of the marriage and there was no further contact between Geoffrey and Shirley after her parents split up.

When Geoffrey returned to civilian life, his literary career ground to a halt as his drinking and gambling escalated. Nicky told us that her father worked as a night porter at some of the big London hotels, including Brown’s and the Dorchester. This meant he was able to carry out his research at The British Library during daytime hours. Geoffrey published his sixth and last novel, Look Long Upon a Monkey, in 1956. The title forms part of a longer quote by the poet William Congreve.

From 1959 Geoffrey lived alone in a bed-sit at 179 Kilburn Park Road for several years. Nicky said:

He was completely unmaterialistic and saw possessions as unnecessary. His sense of outrage about social injustice was always with him to some extent. He developed an obsessive interest in the IRA and spent his days frequenting Irish pubs in North London where he was very generous buying drinks for his pals.

179 Kilburn Park Road, today

When Nicky was a teenager she got her father’s address from his sister Naomi, a private secretary with a flat in Chelsea. Naomi supported Geoffrey both emotionally and financially through his difficult times. Nicky wrote to her father and arranged to meet, which they did periodically for some time after. Geoffrey took her on daunting cultural tours of London and she was always sent home with a second hand copy of a classic book from a shop in Tottenham Court Road. Every year he sent a Christmas card and wrote to her on her birthday. 

By 1973 he moved to 122 Gloucester Road for a brief period. The following year his address was Flat 4, 73 Rochester Place, Camden Road. But Geoffrey had developed late onset diabetes and was unwell. Sadly, he suffered a heart attack while in a local chemist shop, and died in the ambulance on the way to the Royal Free Hospital on 26 August 1977. Nicky and her husband Brian Edwards were the only mourners at his funeral in St Pancras cemetery in East Finchley. His death was not reported in the national newspapers.

We leave the last words to Nicky who said:

He was an intelligent, intellectual man frustrated by leading a mundane life. I am so glad he hasn’t been forgotten and that the re-launch of his books has created new interest in his life, which became very sad, particularly after his sister died.

We are very grateful to London Books and particularly to Nicolette Edwards, for help with this story of a pioneering novelist of the underworld.

Theft due to Influenza!

In January 1892, Joseph Hall who lived in Birchington Road, Kilburn, appeared at the Middlesex Magistrate Sessions. He’d been on remand since the previous October when the jury, after a hearing that lasted five hours, was unable to agree a verdict. Hall had been charged with stealing £5 from his employers, the Grand Junction Waterworks Company. He had worked as a rate collector for nine years, at a ‘large salary’ during which time he spent every Friday at the Ealing office.

Mr Atlas, the chief collector at Ealing, had noticed money had been going missing for some time, so he decided to mark some sovereigns and leave them in the till. He went out for a few minutes and when he returned, found five of the marked sovereigns had gone. He asked Joseph if anyone had come into the office and Joseph said no, no one had. Mr Atlas called a detective who searched Joseph and found the sovereigns and a £5 note in his pocket. Joseph changed his story, saying he now remembered giving change for a £5 note. He had taken coins from Mr Atlas’s till, but forgotten to put the note into the drawer.

In court, Joseph didn’t deny taking the money, but his unusual defence was that after recently suffering a severe bout of influenza he had become forgetful. He even produced two doctors who gave evidence to support this idea. Mr Littler, the magistrate in his summing up, said that if this was the result of influenza, it was a most dangerous disease! This time, the jury found Joseph Hall guilty but recommended him for mercy. He was sentenced to three months hard labour and £25 costs, with an extra month to be added to his sentence if he didn’t pay.

Two weeks later newspapers carried reports that Joseph had committed suicide in Holloway Goal. But the next day they said this was a mistake, he was alive and well and serving his sentence in Wormwood Scrubs!

Joseph Kennedy Hall was born in Islington in 1856, the son of a Parliamentary Association clerk. In the 1881 census Joseph was living with his parents at 89 Windsor Road Islington, and working as a clerk for a colonial broker. In 1887 he married Ella Margaret Alice Elliott at St Mary’s Church in Kilburn. When their daughter was born the following year, they were at 11 Kingsley Road, Brondesbury. By 1891 they had moved to 27 West End Lane and later to Birchington Road.

When Joseph came out of prison they lived for many years with Ella’s parents at 160 Belsize Road. Her father, James William Elliott, was a Professor of Music who composed hymns, anthems and two operettas. Arthur Sullivan invited him to be the editor of ‘Church Hymns’.  James was also a collector of nursery rhymes and in 1870 he published, ‘Mother Goose’s Nursery Rhymes and Nursery Songs Set to Music.’ He was the organist at All Saints, St. John’s Wood and then St. Mark’s, in Hamil­ton Square.

Joseph Hall died in 1908. His widow, Ella and her three children were living at 2 Linacre Mansions, Willesden Green at the time of the 1911 census. She and one of her daughters were working from home as writers for a benevolent society. Her elder brother Edward Elliott who lived with her, was a clerk at the office of the same society.

Influenza Epidemics

The reason Joseph Hall gave in court for his ‘forgetfulness’ was probably because he knew about the influenza epidemic which had started in 1889 and spread throughout the world. This is also why he was able to produce two doctors to give evidence in his defence. Influenza had arrived in London at the end of 1889 and this was followed by a second and then a third wave which hit London in 1892. 

Lots of patent medicines were advertised, some more lethal than others!

Godfrey's Amonium Inhaler, 1890's advert

The Illustrated Police News of 20 February 1892 reported a new form of influenza from Hungary. People suffered a very high fever and terrible stomach cramps. They became frenzied, struck out at people, and even tried to throw themselves out of windows.

The paper then told the tragic story of Charles Evans, a 22 years old architect who shared an apartment in Kensington Court Place. Suffering from influenza, he had woken up at 2 am shouting, ‘I am Mad, Mad’. Evans tore his nightdress to pieces and had a terrible fight with his friend. Evans said, ‘I shall have the strength of a madman in a few minutes. I do not want to hurt you, but I am afraid I shall.’

Front page, Illustrated Police News, 20 February 1892

His friend Campbell Moore ran to get help, but when he returned he found that Charles had thrown himself out of the window. On being taken to hospital, it was found that his spine was broken and he died shortly afterwards. On the 19 February, the inquest jury returned a verdict of suicide during temporary insanity.

Various strains of influenza have spread across the world. The worst was the so called ‘Spanish Flu’ epidemic of 1918 which killed huge numbers of troops as they returned from War. This pandemic killed more people than any other disease outbreak in history. Contemporary accounts believed that 21 million people died across the world, but more recent estimates suggest that it was much higher, between 50 and 100 million deaths.

It had started in what just looked like a mild spring fever, but then the number and severity of infections rose quickly and some people died within hours. It attacked young adults and the symptoms were so unusual that it was misdiagnosed as cholera or typhoid. The original site of the virus is unknown, but is now thought to be America. It probably came from a variant of a bird virus and the later 1957 and 1968 epidemics were found to have links to an avian strain.