The further exploits of Dora

Two cases, 12 years apart, help build a picture of the jobs taken on by female detective Dora Ford

Last week, I looked at the life of female private detective Dora Ford. This week, I’m detailing two of the cases she worked on during her career, to illustrate the type of cases that female detectives undertook in the first decades of the 20th century.

The first case was one that Dora worked on in 1916. It appears that at this point, Dora had been engaged by Marshall and Snelgrove Limited, a shop on London’s Oxford Street. The store was trying to catch shoplifters, and Dora was part of its armoury to do so. She didn’t have to wait long to find a thief.

The Marshall and Snelgrove building on Oxford Street (later Debenhams)

This thief was Alice Irene Baton, 29. Alice was an American woman who had emigrated to Britain in around 1911. She was a mother, but her child was living in Romford, while Alice lived in Catford - the reasons for this are unclear. One day, Alice had gone shopping in London, dressed respectfully, but not all in items she had bought. Her hat, for example, she had previously stolen from Selfridges.

While perusing clothes in the gown department at Marshall and Snelgrove, Alice slipped a dress from a stand and quickly hid it under her coat. She then walked out of the store’s door, and went to a church nearby. She stood in the church porch, took the dress from under her coat, and put it into her bag.

What she didn’t realise is that Dora Ford had been undercover in the gown department, had seen Alice take the dress, and had followed her to the church. As Alice put the dress in her bag, Dora stopped her, and asked for the dress back.

“I have never done it before!” Alice insisted to Dora. “I am so tired of being poor - I saw a lot of ladies wearing nice things and I thought I would take one.”

Alice did not reckon with the keen eyes of Dora Ford.

12 years later, in the autumn of 1928, and Dora was now employed by one of London’s many private detective agencies. The agency had been commissioned by Courtaulds to investigate missing fabrics from its Bocking silk mill. Dora was asked to spy on two of the five people suspected of stealing silk from the mills, a married couple - Basil and Ethel Parmenter. Basil Parmenter worked as a metal machinist; he and his wife, who were in their early 30s, lived in Braintree with their nine year old son. It was suspected that a night watchman at the mills, together with another man who worked there as a lubricator, were stealing goods and passing them onto the Parmenters to sell.

Dora Ford immediately took lodgings next door to the Parmenters, and soon struck up a friendship with Ethel. As a result, she was regularly offered artificial silk fabrics by her new friend for discounted prices. Dora bought these, and at the Braintree Petty Sessions two months later, they became evidence in the case against the Parmenters and three other men.

Dora took on work that was seen as needing a female: working in a dress department of a store to catch female shoplifters; buying silks from a woman who had received stolen property. A man could not have worked undercover in amongst ladies’ dresses; he could not have established a friendship with Ethel Parmenter and got her trust. These two of Dora’s cases show why female detectives were seen as so valuable.