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Chief Inspector Walter Dew

Chief Inspector Walter Dew (1863-1947) gained a lasting reputation as a great detective following his work on the Crippen case; his discovery of human remains in Crippen's cellar; and his subsequent chase of Crippen and Le Neve across the Atlantic which resulted in their capture.

Surprisingly, Dew resigned from the Metropolitan Police on 5 November 1910, shortly after Crippen had been handed down the Death Sentence. He then became a private investigator and he also brought libel actions against nine newspapers that had berated him for his handling of the Crippen case. Most settled out of court but he won substantial damages from those who didn't.

Filson Young acknowledged Dew's contribution to The Trial of Hawley Harvey Crippen (1920).

Dew's autobiography I Caught Crippen was published in 1938 and Nicholas Connell wrote Walter Dew: The Man Who Caught Crippen (2005).

Walter Dew died in Worthing on 16 December 1947.

 

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