Fanny Adams Fanny Adams ( 1859 - 1867 ) was a young girl brutally murdered by a solicitor 's clerk named Frederick Baker in the town of Alton , Hampshire , England . The expression `` Sweet Fanny Adams '' refers to her and has come , through British naval slang , to mean `` nothing at all '' . Crime On 24 August 1867 at about 1 : 30pm Fanny 's mother Harriet Adams let Fanny and her friend Millie Warner , both 8 years old , and Fanny 's sister Lizzie aged 7 , go up Tanhouse Lane towards Flood Meadow . In the lane they met Frederick Baker , a 24-year-old solicitor 's clerk . Baker offered Millie and Lizzie a three halfpence to go and spend , and offered Fanny a halfpenny to accompany him towards Shalden . She took the coin but refused to go . He carried her into a hop field , out of sight of the other girls . At about 5pm Millie and Lizzie returned home . Neighbour Mrs Gardiner asked them where Fanny was and they told her what happened . Mrs Gardiner told Mrs Adams and they went up the lane where they came upon Baker coming back . They questioned him , he said he gave the girls money for sweets , but that was all . His respectability meant the women let him go on his way . At about 7pm Fanny was still missing and neighbours went searching . They found Fanny 's body in the hop field , horribly butchered . Her head and legs had been severed and her eyes put out . Her torso had been emptied and her organs scattered . It would take several days for all of her remains to be found . Mrs Adams ran to The Butts field where her husband bricklayer George Adams was playing cricket . She told him what had happened then collapsed . Adams got his shotgun from home and set to find the perpetrator , but neighbours stopped him . That evening Police Superintendent William Cheyney arrested Baker at his work at the offices of solicitor William Clement in the High Street , and led him through an angry mob to the police station . There was blood on his shirt and trousers , which he could not explain , but protested his innocence . He was searched and had two small blood-stained knives on him . Witnesses put Baker in the area , and returning to his office at about 3pm then going out again . Baker 's workmate , fellow clerk Maurice Biddle reported that when drinking in the Swan that evening Baker had said he might leave town . When Biddle said he might have trouble getting another job , Baker said , chillingly with hindsight , `` I could go as a butcher '' . On the 26th the police found Baker 's diary in his office . It contained a damning entry , 24th August , Saturday — killed a young girl . It was fine and hot . On Tuesday the 27th , Deputy County Coroner Robert Harfield held an inquest . Painter William Walker had found a stone with blood , long hair and flesh ; Police surgeon Dr Louis Leslie had carried out a post mortem and concluded death was by a blow to the head and the stone was the murder weapon . Baker said nothing , except that he was innocent . The jury returned a verdict of willful murder . On the 29th the local magistrates committed Baker for trial at the Winchester County Assizes . The police had difficulty protecting him from the mob . At his trial on the 5th of December , the defence contested Millie Warner 's identification of Baker , and claimed the knives found were too small for the crime anyway . They also argued insanity , Baker 's father had been violent , a cousin had been in asylums , his sister had died of a brain fever , and he himself had attempted suicide after a love affair . Justice Mellor invited the jury to consider a verdict of not responsible by reason of insanity , but they returned a guilty verdict after just 15 minutes . On the 24th of December , Christmas eve , Baker was hanged outside Winchester Gaol . The crime had become notorious and a crowd of 5000 attended the execution . Before his death Baker wrote to the Adamses expressing his sorrow for what he had done `` in an unguarded hour '' and seeking their forgiveness . Baker 's execution was the last to take place at Winchester . Fanny was buried in Alton cemetery . Her grave is still there today . The headstone reads , Sacred to the memory of Fanny Adams aged 8 years and 4 months who was cruelly murdered August 24th , 1867 . Fear not them which kill the body , but rather fear Him who is able to kill both body and soul in hell . Matthew 10 v 28 . This stone was erected by voluntary subscription . Phrase In 1869 new rations of tinned mutton were introduced for British seamen . They were unimpressed by it , and decided it must be the butchered remains of Fanny Adams . The way her body had been strewn over a wide area presumably encouraged speculation that parts of her had been found at the Royal Navy victualling yard in Deptford , which was a large facility including stores , bakery , and abbatoir . `` Fanny Adams '' became slang for mutton or stew and then for anything worthless , from which comes the current usage of `` Sweet Fanny Adams '' for `` nothing at all '' ( often shortened to `` Sweet F. A. '' ) , or with similar meaning as a euphemism for `` fuck all '' . The large tins the mutton came in were reused as mess tins . Mess tins or cooking pots are still known as Fannys . See also Look up Fanny Adams in Wiktionary , the free dictionary . Sweet Fanny Adams , 1974 album by Sweet References Fanny Adams page at the Curtis Museum in Alton Names page at the Royal Navy web site Why Do We Say ... ? , Nigel Rees , 1987 , ISBN 0-7137-1944-3 . External links Fanny Adams ' headstone at findagrave.com Execution of Frederick Baker , the Alton Murderer , ballad in Curiosities of Street Literature by Charles Hindley ( London 1871 ) , at the University of Virginia Library Execution of Frederick Baker , song at the Digital Tradition Mirror Tanhouse Lane at streetmap.co . uk Categories : 1859 births | 1867 deaths | Murdered English children | Slang 