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In 1907, a traveling entertainment duo, Herbert Smith and Lottie Roberts, found themselves arrested under suspicion of causing the death of a newborn baby boy from Grimsby. Smith, an escapologist and conjurer influenced by Houdini, met Roberts while she worked in a café in Shrewsbury. Together, they toured the country performing Smith’s music hall act called “Leo Selwyn the Handcuff Prince,” with Roberts as his assistant. The couple had known each other for about 18 months when they agreed to take in a baby belonging to a teenage mother named Lily Kitching, who paid them £11 to adopt her child, believing he would be placed in a loving home.
What initially appeared as an isolated and tragic case concealed a darker truth — the arrest of Smith and Roberts exposed a widespread baby trafficking network across Britain. The story first came to light during Richard Tisdale’s archival research nearly a decade ago. It traced back to November 1906, when Roberts gave birth to a daughter named Jessie in Swansea but prioritized their careers over motherhood. They advertised in newspapers to find homes for babies, initially placing Jessie with a family near Neath. The positive responses to the adoption ads soon revealed a lucrative business model for the couple: they posted advertisements nationwide, posing as prospective adoptive parents in search of infants.
Teenage parents and families with illegitimate children responded to these ads, willing to pay sizable sums, sometimes up to £15 (roughly £2,300 today), for the promise of a better life for their babies. Instead of providing such a future, Smith and Roberts handed these children over to so-called baby farmers—institutions or individuals who cared for babies in exchange for small weekly payments but often subjected the children to neglect and sometimes death. Using false identities and addresses, the couple avoided responsibility when payments failed to reach the caregivers, resulting, in some cases, in babies being abandoned on streets or sent to workhouses.
The case of Lily Kitching’s son, born out of wedlock and handed over to a woman calling herself Mrs Baker after responding to one such advertisement, raised suspicions when Mrs. Baker subsequently asked for more money. Mrs. Kitching’s mother discovered the Liverpool address given was just a letter drop and informed the police. This led Sergeant Moore to a sweet shop on Scotland Road in Liverpool, where Smith and Roberts were found living in an upstairs flat. Their arrest uncovered a systematic trafficking operation spanning multiple cities, including Leeds, Chester, Worcester, and Bath. During their trial at Liverpool Crown Court, the missing Grimsby baby was found alive. Smith and Roberts were convicted of fraudulently obtaining over £150 and sentenced respectively to 15 and 8 months in prison for trafficking at least 15 babies, though authorities believed many more were involved.
Following their imprisonment, the couple attempted to revive their entertainment act but struggled due to their tarnished reputation. Smith, potentially accompanied by Roberts, eventually moved abroad, performing in Canada, New Zealand, and Australia. Meanwhile, the Grimsby baby was discovered in the care of a baby farmer in Lincoln
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