Aristocrat Constance Marten said she “feels responsible” for the death of her baby daughter who may have died when she fell asleep on top of her, she told the Old Bailey.
The 36-year-old is accused with partner Mark Gordon, 49, of the manslaughter of their new-born baby, who died after they went on the run from police and social services.
Marten says Victoria died within days of being born, and insists they did not – as alleged – take the baby camping for weeks on the freezing cold South Downs.
“She was our pride and joy”, she told jurors on Friday.
“I had four kids. I know how to look after children. Our primary concern was Victoria.
“I do feel responsible for falling asleep on her if that’s what happened.
“I’m not sure because the autopsy was inconclusive but I do feel responsible for her.”
On Thursday, Marten told the court she “feels guilty” over the death, but insisted she and Gordon had done “nothing but show her love”.
She told the court on Thursday how she had baby Victoria in her coat and found her lifeless when she woke up.
The couple disappeared in late December 2022, when Marten was heavily pregnant, and she gave birth in a rented cottage on Christmas Eve.
They travelled across the country in the midst of a nationwide manhunt, taking taxis between different towns and cities in a bid to stay “off grid”.
Marten said her four other children with Gordon had been taken away into care, and she did not want the same fate for Victoria, her fifth baby.
They abandoned their car after it burst into flames near Bolton, Greater Manchester last January 5 and were finally arrested in Brighton last February 27.
She told jurors on Friday how they kept the baby’s body with them after the death, only leaving her in their tent on two occasions when they went to scavenge for food.
Marten described how they rummaged through bins in search of scraps of food, and Gordon became “anorexically” thin and unwell.
“I realised we could not live like this. It was not sustainable. We were sharing one piece of bread out of the bin”, she said, of the day when they were ultimately caught.
“It was not sustainable so I said to Mark we are just going to have to try to get some money out.
“I said ‘Baby, you are not in a good state, neither am I. We have got to get some food, get blood sugar up and figure out what we are going to do.
“My blood sugar was very low. Mark was hobbling with a stick. He had ripped the end of one of his toes off. It was getting infected. He was in a bad way.”
The couple had bought glasses and caps to disguise themselves, and narrowly escaped getting caught in Brighton when they visited the seafront to eat sandwiches – while carrying baby Victoria’s body.
“We had walked to Brighton once with her body and went to the beach two-and-a-half weeks before being arrested”, she said
“Someone noticed us on the beach, police cars started coming to the beach. We, by hook or by crook, got back to the park undetected. We stopped going out.Mark got extremely thin.”
Asked about the ultimate conclusion of the manhunt, Marten said: “I don’t think I was really thinking to be honest. We were in a heightened state of grief andfear. I kept toying with handing myself in.”
She refused to speak to police after she was arrested, and said she was terrified of “being on trial, the press”.
“I just think there had been so much media presence that the truth would not be accepted and they would make us out to be awful people and I was not prepared to tell them what happened”, she said, adding that she ultimately opened up to police once Victoria’s body had been found in a disused shed.
“When they told me they found the body, there was no point in saying no comment because they had found her”, she said.
The defendants, of no fixed address, deny manslaughter by gross negligence, perverting the course of justice, concealing the birth of a child, child cruelty and causing or allowing the death of a child.
