When she was born in New York about 1873 (dates vary), she was called Kunigunde Mackomatzki (spellings vary) but, according to her Sister Theresa Hunn, she was known as Cora. Her father, Josef, was Russian Polish and her mother, Mary née Wolfe (b 1854), was German.
Cora’s sister, Theresa known as Tessie, was born about 1876. Their father died about 1875 so, if the dates are correct, her father may never have seen his younger daughter.
Her mother then married Frederick ‘Fritz’ Mersinger (spellings differ) in 1892 with whom she had several more children.
In the Statement that he gave to Chief Inspector Dew on 8th July 1910, Crippen claimed that he had met Belle Elmore (whose name was then Cora Turner) in New York in 1893 and at that time she was only 17 years of age and living under the protection of a man. Crippen said that he found her very attractive, that she told him she was going to run away from the man under whose protection she was living, and that rather than she should do that he married her in Jersey City in 1893.
Theresa Hunn (Cora’s sister) testified at Crippen’s Trial that the first time she saw Crippen was about 18 or 19 years ago when he came to my father’s house with her. She showed me a wedding card and introduced him to our parents as her husband. I see by the card that they married on September 1, 1892; they came to us soon after. My father lived then near Brunswick, Long Island. She went to New York and from there to Philadelphia; they had then been married a few months. She returned to New York and from there she came to our house. At that time I noticed a scar on her stomach; it was not all healed; it was fresh. I saw it again seven years ago and it was healed much better than the first time I saw it. It was between four or five inches long and about an inch wide. The flesh outside it was paler, more of a cream colour, than the centre scar.
Crippen revealed that, during the early part of their marriage, Cora had the ambition to be an opera singer and that he had paid for her singing lessons. However, after they came to London, she had realigned her sights to becoming a Music Hall performer and he was not very happy about that.
Crippen told Dew that, after they were married, they first of all went to live in St. Louis. He came to England for the first time before he married her and again about 12 years ago. She had not come with him. He came in April and she followed in August. Their first apartment was in South Crescent, just off Tottenham Court Road, which is now pulled down. He thought that they lived there just under a year. In 1905 they went to live at Hilldrop Crescent.
Mrs. Antonia Jackson (who had run a theatrical boarding house in Bath) signed a Witness Statement dated 23 September 1910 (not introduced into evidence) that Belle Elmore ‘La Belle American’ – as she knew her back in 1902 – had told her that she was married to an American. Later, she said that she had had an operation in which she had had her womb taken out, scraped and put back again.
Clearly, Cora was unable to have any children and nor did she have any desire to adopt. In fact, after the death of his first wife, Crippen had placed his son, Hawley Otto, in the care of his own parents, where he would remain.
Latterly, Cora had directed her energies to the role of Honorary Treasurer of the Music Hall Ladies’ Guild but she never realised her ambition of achieving any success in show business.
She was never seen alive again after having said ‘Goodnight’ to the Crippens’ friends Paul and Clara Martinetti, after a social evening at 39 Hilldrop Crescent that had ended in the early hours of 1st February 1910.
Chief Inspector Dew uncovered some but by no means all of her remains from their burial place underneath the cellar of 39 Hilldrop Crescent on 13th July 1910.
On 26 September 1910, a Coroner’s Inquest determined that the remains found buried in the cellar were Cora’s; and a Death Certificate was issued on the 1st October 1910. Her age was given as ‘about 34 years’ – although she may have been older.
Her remains were buried at Finchley Cemetery, courtesy of the Music Hall Ladies’ Guild, on the 10th October, 1910.
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