MovieChat Forums > Berkeley Square (1998) Discussion > Did anyone suspect Bertie? (SPOILERS)

Did anyone suspect Bertie? (SPOILERS)

posted 14 years ago by Hezzer_Wezzer
9 replies | jump to latest

SPOILERS

Until we found out what really happened to Bertie's baby brother (Nanny Simmons and the laudanum) did anyone think that he might have killed him and possible his baby sister prior to that?

Although an adorable child, I couldn't help but think that he could play a good Damien Omen type character which is what got me suspecting him.

Also, it made me wonder what did happen to his baby sister. Was it just SIDS or some illness or was it Nanny Simmons and the laudanum again? If the latter, why did she not run away when that baby died? Or was it just because there were two babies dead on her watch?

[–] Mademoiselle_Lemon 14 years ago

I didn't suspect him for an instant - but then I haven't seen any of the "Damien: Omen" films. I'm pretty sure his baby sister died because of Nanny Simmons and the laudanum. As you suggested, she probably ran away only after Bertie's brother died because there were "two babies dead on her watch", something that's harder to explain away than one. I believe Nanny Simmons even said something to that effect to Hannah after Charlie was found dead.

~A storm is brewing, brewing like a pot of angry tea~

[–] rockergirl1964 14 years ago

Yes I did suspect him a little.

[–] egonzinc 14 years ago

I think they want you to suspect Bertie.
But in the end it was a case of Nanny Simmons abusing the medication to keep the baby quiet. By her reaction after Charlie's death I think she just knew that it was her fault and that she would get blamed for BOTH deaths.
I enjoyed this miniseries EXCEPT for the child swapping part of the plot.
It was just too far fetched on too many fronts.
I also did not like the end as it is very much up in the air. Maybe they had a part 2 planned or ran out of money! But overall it was a well acted and beautiful to look at Edwardian soap opera.
Victoria Smurfit was maybe too nice looking for her character. She looked stunningly beautiful at all times in this series.

[–] sweetdustyrose 13 years ago

I just saw this mini-series and quite dissapointed it did not get a second season or more episodes. I really would love to have seen it end properly.

I would go back and forth between Simmons and Bertie. I feel Nanny Simmons didn't want to face having another child dying under her care but then its possible she gave him too much medicine since she had been drinking. Bertie seemed odd at times and then how he elaborately told that lie to the police made me feel he could've. Then again he may have not wanted to loose Hannah. Well, we can only imagine now....

If anyone wants to see Ned Jones he's over at Teranova now. (Haven't seen it yet)

[–] greenegg 13 years ago

I knew it was Nanny Simmons from the first, though they clearly used Bertie as a red herring. Laudanum-related deaths among children happened far more often than were recorded, though infant mortality was still pretty high at that point in history. Nanny Simmons herself overused laudanum; she was a strange woman.

It certainly was a shame the series did not receive another season.

Put puppy mills out of business: never buy dogs from pet shops!

[–] Suzume-san 13 years ago

It never occurred to any of us at the time that we were intended to suspect Bertie; there were plenty of warning hints in the script about Nanny Simmons and her use of laudanum to keep babies quiet.

This was not deliberate murder, of course, it was poor childcare, laziness and ignorance. There's an appalling story from the same period, goes like this -

A gentleman was sitting on a bench in Kensington Gardens, and happened to overhear the conversation of two nannies with their baby charges in prams. This was what one of them said -

"You know how the dentist puts you to sleep with gas? You can do that. When she's fretty and won't sleep, I just hold her little face up to the unlit gas pipe, and she goes off like a dream."

The gentleman was so horrified by this that he followed the nanny home, rang the bell and asked to speak to the lady of the house. When she heard his story she screamed and burst into tears; it appeared that she had already had one baby die of a mysterious ailment, and the second was showing the same symptoms. The wretched nanny had no idea that the laughing gas used by the dentist and coal gas used for lighting were not the same thing. She was poisoning the babies through sheer ignorance.

[–] ilahilda 11 years ago

I just saw volume 2 of the series, and I am glad to know Bertie did not accidentally kill his baby brother. I originally thought it was SIDS too. I plan to borrow volume 3 from the library. It is too bad a second season was not produced.

[–] SaliceMcD 9 years ago

After learning about the laudanum death(s), *I* thought Bertie was being dosed with something as well! Did anyone else not think he looked very sickly?? I mean no offense to the actor, but . . .

[–] FeeCJ (133) 5 years ago

I never suspected Bertie only because he was portrayed as loving little Charlotte so much he always went to her mementos to look at them fondly. But who knows!

Yes, it was probably Evil Nanny. No reason she'd have not been up to the same tricks with a previous crying child as she was with Charlie.

It seems she reacted with panic, because one dead child when even upper class children died in infancy at alarming rates, might be understood in that time, but a second would be curtains for her. No investigation about Charlotte was ever referenced to hint at anything.

Her death was accepted without question.

But then a second child at the hands of the Evil Nanny. Oopsie.