Sydney: 1892 — A Clogged Drain?

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On Oct. 11, 1892, drainer James Hanoney was digging in the soft earth to clear an underground drain in the backyard of a house in Macdonaldtown, a suburb of Sydney, when he found the cause for the blockage. Two bundles of foul-smelling clothing. Baby clothing. He removed the offending material and found the decomposing remains of two babies inside the clothing. He called the police immediately, and they uncovered the putrefying corpses of another five infants in various parts of the backyard.

Through tenancy records, detectives traced the previous tenants of the cottage, 50-year-old John Makin and 47-year-old Sarah Makin, to a house in nearby Redfern where they uncovered the buried remains of more babies.

When police eventually tracked the Makins down to their new family home in nearby Chippendale, they found more dead babies buried in the backyard, bringing the grisly tally to 12.

The entire Makin family — Sarah, John and their four daughters Florence, 17, Clarice, 16, Blanche, 14, and Daisy, 11 — were placed under arrest. John and Sarah Makin were charged with murder.

The Makins' trial was held in the Sydney Supreme Court, and the courthouse was packed to overflowing each day with huge crowds waiting outside constantly being updated by runners on the progress in the courtroom. The defense told the court that the Makin family were professional child minders who looked after babies for a weekly fee until the mother came to take the child away, or until they found suitable parents for babies up for adoption.

In some cases the Makins arranged for a mother to visit her baby after it had been found a new home and loving parents, the defense said.

The prosecution told a different story. The Makin family had found it easier and much more profitable to murder the babies and keep on collecting a weekly contribution from the mother, who was prevented, through deception, from seeing the baby.

The first witness was Amber Murray who, as an 18-year-old, had given birth to an illegitimate son, Horace, in March 1892. Unable to care for the child by herself she offered him up for adoption in an advertisement in the Sydney Morning Herald, which said in part that she was seeking a kind and loving mother to adopt her baby boy. In the same ad she added that she was prepared to pay a weekly premium for the child's support.

She received a reply from a married couple in the working class suburb of Redfern in Sydney. They said that they would love to take the child on for a premium of 10 shillings per week.

Amber Murray called at the address the following day and met John and Sarah Makin and two of their daughters, all of whom fell in love with little Horace on the spot and couldn't wait to take him into their home and give him love and attention, especially since they claimed to have lost a little boy of their own.

Amber Murray didn't find it unusual that there were five or six other babies in the house because the Makins explained they were just minding them for friends for a short time. His mother left little Horace with the Makins after they had made a deal that she would pay the money each week on the proviso that she be able to visit little Horace from time to time. It was agreed.

It was the last time she ever saw her baby alive.