The Peasenhall Mystery
Rose Harsent, twenty-three, a servant at Providence House. She was six months pregnant.
Rose Harsent, a twenty-three year old servant who was six months pregnant, was found dead at Providence House in Peasenhall, Suffolk, in June 1902. William Gardiner was tried twice; both juries split eleven to one, in opposite directions. Nobody was ever convicted.
What is not in dispute.
On the morning of 1 June 1902 Rose Harsent was found dead on the kitchen floor of Providence House, where she worked. Her throat had been cut and an attempt had been made to burn the body.
William Gardiner, a churchwarden and foreman at the local drill works, was charged. He and Rose had been the subject of village talk about an earlier incident, which a chapel inquiry had dismissed.
He was tried twice. The first jury could not agree, dividing eleven to one. The second could not agree either, dividing eleven to one the other way.
A nolle prosequi was entered and Gardiner was released. No one else was ever charged.
Where the record stops.
Whether Gardiner was the man. Two juries heard substantially the same evidence and split almost evenly in opposite directions, which is as clear a statement as the record makes that the case against him was arguable and not conclusive.
What this page is, and is not.
No one was ever convicted of this. What is written above is the part of the record that is not in dispute. Where something is argued over, this page says it is argued over and does not pick a side. No real person is accused here of anything a court did not find, and no confession is invented for anybody.
- Providence House is not a reconstruction. It is an original crime set in this world, with an invented killer. Every real person at your table is innocent of the murder in the game.
- The victim is a person, not a prop. Rose Harsent, twenty-three, a servant at Providence House. She was six months pregnant.
- We publish the rules we work to. How we treat real cases sets out the six things this catalogue will not do, including the two cases that were dropped for failing them.
If you think we have crossed a line, the policy page is the standard to hold us to, and the email address is on it.
Providence House
Because two juries could not agree, and the game asks a third.
Six to twelve people at your table, hosted from a TV and your guests' phones. The evidence arrives a piece at a time and nobody sees the whole of it until the last act. Read the full case file, including the content note for this one.