In June 1866, Ruth Burton, from county Wicklow in Ireland, was brought up at the Ipswich police court charged with having stolen a cheque for £2 4s. 3d. I told a version of this story live on West Bremer Radio.

That’s about $2,300 today so it was a fair amount. She was committed to stand trial in a criminal sitting of the Queensland supreme court. The real shock would come after the verdict.

Ruth had stolen the cheque off a work colleague called Julia Bannin. Ruth was a kitchen maid and Julia a servant at the Clarendon Hotel on Brisbane Street at the corner of East Street, Ipswich. The hotel’s not there anymore because it was burnt down 150 years ago. But back then the licensee was Mr. John Hooper who had previously run the Bush Inn at Fassifern. His wife Jane Hooper managed the staff, and it was she who wrote the cheque for Julia. Mrs. Hooper later ran the refreshment rooms at the Ipswich railway station. 

Ruth had only been working at the Clarendon for a week, and during that time she regularly used Julia’s room to wash and get dressed in. One time she looked inside an unlocked box, and in it was a glove, and under that was the cheque. Ruth took both, and with the cheque went down the road to the shop T.C. Bishop & Co where she bought a number of items which she paid for using the cheque and even got some change. The proprietor Mr. Bishop quizzed Ruth where she got the cheque from, which she said she got for wages at the Clarendon Hotel which was not true.

Meanwhile, Julia noticed her cheque missing, reported it to police, and the crime was promptly traced back to Ruth Burton.

And so on the 6th of August 1866, Ruth appeared in the supreme court criminal siting in Ipswich before the honourable James Cockle who was the first Chief Justice of Queensland, and a jury of twelve. The jury retired and returned in just ten minutes with a verdict of guilty. The chief justice sentenced Ruth to five weeks imprisonment in Brisbane Gaol.

But what’s interesting is that the jury’s guilty verdict came with a recommendation of mercy. The prosecuting police constables incredibly gave the accused very good character witness statements. His honour Justice Cockle, after taking some time for consideration of all this, even said that he was sorry to pass sentence. The term of imprisonment would have been a long one but for those recommendations.

You see, Ruth Burton was just seventeen years old. She was engaged to be married. Ruth almost certainly stole the glove to wear at her wedding. The shop she visited was a drapery store, and the material she bought would have been for her wedding dress.

This was a true Victorian tragedy. The wedding was of course postponed while the bride was in prison.

Six weeks after getting out of gaol, Ruth did get married. It was on the 18th of December 1866 at the Wesleyan Parsonage in Ipswich, by The Reverend William Hill who had just arrived in Ipswich after being a missionary in Tonga. Ruth’s patient husband was the twenty-nine year old Mr. William Parfitt. He was from Surrey in England, specifically the village of Woodmansterne which had been there since before the Domesday Book, so Mr. Parfitt was willing to wait. 

The Parfitts settled at Mount Brisbane over near Esk and had ten children. Sadly, three died before reaching adulthood and a daughter married a man with a penchant for gambling with loaded dice.

But other than that, the great wedding dress theft of 1866 had a very happy ending in which love triumphed.

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO A VERSION OF THIS STORY TOLD ON WEST BREMER RADIO.

Photo credits:
Cribb and Foote London Stores, Bell Street, Ipswich, 1850s-1860s – Whitehead Studios via Picture Ipswich.
Ipswich Railway Station, 1866 – Ipswich Historical Society via Flickr 2014.
James Cockle, the first Chief Justice of Queensland, 1863-1879 – State Library of Queensland.
Ipswich Courthouse c1860 – State Library of Queensland.