The Railway Murder That Shook Victorian Britain
After Dark: Myths, Misdeeds & the Paranormal
History Hit
4.6 • 1.2K Ratings
🗓️ 6 October 2025
⏱️ 46 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
It's 1864 and the height of industrialisation. The thrill of railway travel is shattered with the first murder that takes place on it.
Join Anthony and Maddy as they pick apart the murder of wealthy banker John Briggs, that takes them from a blood-stained first class carriage in London to a police chase to New York.
This episode was edited by Tom Delargy, and produced by Stuart Beckwith. Research by Phoebe Joyce. The senior producer is Charlotte Long.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hi, we're your host's Anthony Delaney and Maddie Pelling. |
| 0:03.7 | And if you would like After Dark myths, misdeeds and the paranormal, ad free and get early access, sign up to History Hit. |
| 0:11.1 | With a History Hit subscription, you can also watch hundreds of hours of original documentaries with top history presenters and enjoy a new release every week. |
| 0:20.7 | Sign up now by visiting historyhit.com forward slash subscribe. top history presenters and enjoy a new release every week. |
| 0:24.8 | Sign up now by visiting historyhit.com forward slash subscribe. |
| 0:34.5 | Hello and welcome to After Dark. |
| 0:43.3 | Blood on the floor of a railway carriage, a battered banker found dying beside the tracks and a city in shock. It was July 1864 and the promise of the railway, the great marvel of the industrial age, suddenly looked like a death trap. |
| 0:53.3 | Respectable passengers had believed themselves safe behind locked compartment doors. |
| 0:58.8 | Now, whispered Londoners, if Thomas Briggs could be attacked on his way home, who might be next? |
| 1:06.7 | The hunt for his killer would span oceans, leading Scotland Yard across the Atlantic in one of the first great manhunts of the Victorian age. |
| 1:16.5 | At its centre stood a young German tailor, Franz Muller, but was the case against him watertight? |
| 1:24.1 | Or did fear and prejudice tip the scales of justice? Over to Anthony to set the scene. |
| 1:35.7 | On a balmy summer's evening, in 1864, passengers sit on cushioned seats as their train rattles eastward from London's Fentert Street. |
| 1:46.7 | Carriages rock, wheels clatter, and in one compartment voices murmur softly, |
| 1:52.6 | lulled by the supposed safety of this marvel of travel. |
| 1:56.8 | Private boxes on steel rails, carrying respectable men home from the city. |
| 2:04.2 | Then there's a noise, barely perceptible, a dull thud, a muffled commotion from the next carriage. |
| 2:13.0 | For a moment, stomachs tighten, but the sound is swallowed by the roar of the train and the rhythm |
| 2:18.6 | smooths passengers back into passive compliance. The railway was progress, after all. A promise of |
| 2:26.1 | security and sophistication, but at Hackney the illusion shatters. The door to the neighbouring first-class |
| 2:33.2 | compartment is opened. Cushions are soaked in blood, |
| 2:36.8 | the woodwork smeared dark. Its passenger, banker Thomas Briggs, is missing. This is after dark, |
... |
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