The Epsom Riot occurred when about 400 Canadian soldiers rioted and attacked the police station at Epsom, England on June 17 1919 resulting in the death of Station-Sergeant Green, a British police officer, who died of his injuries the following day.[1]
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In the summer of 1919, World War I had been over for over half a year, but many of the British Empire's soldiers still had not been sent home. Unhappy at the delay in being returned to Canada, the men of some Canadian regiments stationed at Woodcote Camp on Epsom Downs became increasingly restive. Two of their number, Privates MacDonald and Veinotte, were arrested after a fight in 'The Rifleman' public house in Epsom on Derby Day. On June 17 1919, about 20 of their friends gathered outside the police station in Ashley Road demanding their release, while sending word back to other soldiers at the camp to come down to the town to assist them. About 400 Canadian soldiers gathered; in time, they attacked the police station, intending to release MacDonald and Veinotte. Thereafter, the 400 soldiers ran riot through Epsom, breaking windows and destroying property in a trail of destruction more than a mile and a half long.[2]
When the rioters stormed the police station, it was defended by 16 police officers armed with wooden truncheons. During the ensuing fighting 11 policemen were injured, and Sergeant Thomas Green, aged 51, was fatally wounded when he was hit on the head with an iron bar. He died in Epsom Hospital the next day without having regained consciousness.[2]
Epsom detectives arrested Allan McMaster, 30, a former blacksmith, whom they believed to be the rioters' leader. However, the Canadian soldiers refused to identify him. Despite this, McMaster and seven other soldiers were put on trial at Guildford in July, accused of rioting and manslaughter. The accused were: James Connors,19, private, 13th Canadian Highlanders; Robert Alexander McAllan, 45, C.A.M.C.; Allan McMaster, 30, private, 3rd Canadians; Alphonse Masse, 27, C.A.M.C.; Gervase Porier, 24 C.A.M.C.; Herbert Tait, 29, gunner, 11th Division Canadians; Frank Harold Wilkie, 21, private, 102nd Battalion Canadians and David Verex, 32, private, Canadian Forestry Corps.[3] The prosecution, which included Cecil Whiteley KC, presented a case which was so ineffectual that the four accused were quickly acquitted of manslaughter, and were found guilty only of rioting. They were sentenced to 12 months imprisonment. Within weeks they were pardoned by the Prince of Wales and returned to Canada.[2]
Back in Canada, McMaster confessed to the murder of Sergeant Green in 1929, and was detained by the Canadian police, but he was released after Scotland Yard said he had been legally dealt with by the Guildford court in relation to Green's death. This left the case officially unsolved.
Since the events of 1919 there have been allegations of a high-level political 'cover-up'. In the 1990s a former Scotland Yard police officer, Edward Shortland, alleged that the killer was protected from execution for fear that his execution would destabilise a forthcoming Royal visit to North America.
"Only orders from the very top could possibly have enabled such complicity," Shortland stated. "As the Prince of Wales was about to set off on his visit to Canada, long prison sentences and perhaps several hangings of Canadian soldiers would have been a public relations disaster." Shortland claimed that complicit in the plot were Prime Minister Lloyd George, Winston Churchill, the prosecution, and even the trial judge. The farce, he says, was completed when the police officer in charge of the investigation was given an official commendation, even though he never brought the murderer to justice.[2][4]
In June 2009, Chris Grayling, MP for Epsom, unveiled a plaque in memory of Sergeant Green, who died exactly 90 years earlier. At the unveiling, Grayling said, "I suspect that few people living in Epsom now know about what was clearly a significant moment in the town's past, as well as a tragedy for Sergeant Green's family. It is absolutely right that, ninety years on, we mark the event in this way." [5]
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