Uploaded November 2025 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Jerome Caminada was a very well known Inspector in Manchester during the Victorian era. He is often cited as being the real life Sherlock Holmes. One of his solved cases is known as the “Manchester Cab Mystery” from February 1889, where a prominent businessman, John Fletcher, died in a cab under suspicious circumstances.
Caminada identified an 18-year-old named Charles/Charlie Parton as the suspect, on the basis of forensic evidence (chloral hydrate found in Fletcher’s stomach), witness testimony of Parton pouring a vial into Fletcher’s drink, and theft of the victim’s watch and chain matching Parton’s subsequent possession. It also seemed that Fletcher was not the only one to have met the teenager poisoner!
But who was this 18 year old suspect, and why were wealthier or older men spotted with him in the seedy backstreet pubs of old Manchester?
Join Tom and I as we walk the Manchester streets almost years after these events, and see what has changed or stayed the sane.
Jerome Caminada was a very well known Inspector in Manchester during the Victorian era. He is often cited as being the real life Sherlock Holmes. One of his solved cases is known as the “Manchester Cab Mystery” from February 1889, where a prominent businessman, John Fletcher, died in a cab under suspicious circumstances.
Caminada identified an 18-year-old named Charles/Charlie Parton as the suspect, on the basis of forensic evidence (chloral hydrate found in Fletcher’s stomach), witness testimony of Parton pouring a vial into Fletcher’s drink, and theft of the victim’s watch and chain matching Parton’s subsequent possession. It also seemed that Fletcher was not the only one to have met the teenager poisoner!
But who was this 18 year old suspect, and why were wealthier or older men spotted with him in the seedy backstreet pubs of old Manchester?
Join Tom and I as we walk the Manchester streets almost years after these events, and see what has changed or stayed the sane.
