Peaky Blinders: Ruby Shelby, Connie Barwell and the Cursed Sapphire – Den of Geek

After Graces death, Tommy went with Johnny Dogs and baby Charles in a wagon to the Black Mountains. There, he sought the advice of gypsy matriarch Madame Boswell. He told her he was giving the sapphire away and asked whether or not she would take it. His wife was wearing it on the night she was shot, he told the wise woman, and he blamed himself. You want me to tell you this jewel is cursed and then her death wont be all your fault? she asked. If I believed in priests, Tommy said, I would confess and ask for forgiveness, but all I have is you, Madame Boswell. She said that the sapphire was indeed cursed, she could feel the curse burning through her hand. Tommy left the stone with her, and she shouted after him that from now on, he would be blessed with good fortune.

Its a great scene that, at the time, was marked by ambiguity. Was Madame Boswell lying to land herself a valuable jewel, or did she really feel the stones curse? Did Tommy truly believe in the curse, or did he just need an explanation for Graces murder that absolved him of guilt? In season six, that ambiguity was replaced with certainty. The sapphire was indeed cursed, Esme Shelby-Lee tells Tommy. Madame Boswell (renamed Barwell here, perhaps to avoid insult to the real-life Boswell gypsy tribe) gave it to her daughter Evadne, who put it around the neck of her seven-year-old daughter Connie, who immediately started coughing and was dead before morning.

The sapphire was thrown into the river and Evadne duly cursed Tommy Shelby, that if he should ever have a daughter, she would also die at that age. Her childs grave was marked by a cross bearing the inscription: Connie Barwell, seven years old, died of a cursed stone not forgotten, and then in red, what looks like the words Vengeance will come.

In season six, episode three Gold, vengeance did come. Tommys seven-year-old daughter Ruby died of tuberculosis, after hearing voices, seeing visions and speaking the Romani words for the devil. Ruby died from a curse laid in retaliation for Tommy having passed on an already-cursed sapphire to the Barwell family. Evadne Barwell (still listed under the familys original name of Boswell on IMDb), is credited as appearing in the next two episodes of season six, played by actor Gwynne McElveen.

If viewers chose to, they could dismiss all this talk of curses and jewels, and simply believe that Grace was shot by a foe, and that Ruby and Connie both died of TB and the sapphire had nothing to do with any of it. Tommy felt guilt over Graces death and needed something to blame that wasnt himself, so he seized on the idea of the cursed stone as an explanation. Tommys mind almost says as much when he had a vision of Grace holding the sapphire in season five and she gave voice to his greatest fear: It wasnt the blue stone, Tommy, it was you.

None of that dull rationalism though, would be very Peaky Blinders. This is a drama that believes in gypsy superstition, so why shouldnt we believe it too? The stone was cursed, and that curse killed Grace, Connie and indirectly, Ruby.

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Peaky Blinders: Ruby Shelby, Connie Barwell and the Cursed Sapphire - Den of Geek