DIGGING FOR A BODY.
CRIME OR A. SILLY lIOAX MY'STERY OF A SPINNEY. SUGGESTIONS IN A LETTER. The Derbyshire county police, who have been digging in the Fox Cover spinney, near Ashby-de-la-Zoueh, for the body of a man said to have been murdered eight or nine years ago, have been forced to stop work by the lack of explicit information. The person who gave the police the information is in Cnriada. He apparently knows the district well, and he told them to ‘‘look between the brook and the little wood on the left of the ham.” Since this direction, considered from the usual approach, might include the whole of the. spinney as it was eight years ago—a rough triangle about 150 yards long and about 50 yards broad —or might only indicate some clump of trees cut down. Tt is difficult to decide which patch of ground should he searched. The police, therefore, after. fruitless two days’ digging a few weeks ago, in the spot understood to he the place, took a number of photographs and prepared a plan to go with the' request that tlit* in former should mark the spot where the body ought to be found. If the latter is able’ to identify the place further developments may lie looked for.
The spinney was barely cleared four years or more ago, and nowbears little resemblance to itself in 1915 or 1910. One small patch of willow, in which the police have been digging, is the thickest bit of woodland in sight. A barn, however, provides a fixed point. It stands near the apex at the bottom of the triangle a lew yards clear of' the spinney, and is a part of Short Hazel Karin, a building higher up Blood’s Ilill across the fields. MYSTERY WOVEN BAKEELY BY IMAM OUR. Eight or nine years ago the people who farmed Short Hazels’ kept pigs at the spinney barn, but at times the son of the house slept there. The family is now scattered and it is not expected to be able to help in explaining the affair. The country police sav they have no record whatever of any disappearance which can he made to lit with the, Canadian information, and the vie tim, presumably must have been a stranger.
The whole story as it has been told (says an English paper) is a. good example of a mystery woven large by rumour. If is not unnat urn| that the police should wish to keep their information private, but' bad they published the text of: the letter a 1 the first opportunity they would hayc avoided the rumours of whose publication they now complain. No official disclosure lias been made, and knowledge of the terms of the letter is no more than hearsay, although no doubt credible up to a point. Various versions of the information given are current. One quotes the letter as saying that a man who was passing by the barn stopped and entered for shelter. Another man who happened to be present observed that he had money, murdered him, buried the body, and disappeared.
TWO MURDERS J Another version of the letter is that two men were murdered and dial “the second body was thrown into the water.” The nearest water is the stream running through the long edge of die spinney, hut it is of no depth or width. One could scarcely even sail a paper boat on it. Whatever he the terms of the letter, the county police arc only looking for one body. About eight years ago the body of an unknown man was found in jhe district quite exposed and/ aimve ground. A shot gun was found by his side, and the .jury returned an open verdict, But this discovery was not made within reasonable distance of the corpse, and in all probability has nothing to do with the story. There is a third theory that the writer of the letter is a woman, and again the evidence is secondhand and based only mi hand-writ-ing. There is another possible explanation. At times a person abroad, wishing himself or herself at home, confesses to knowledge of some such crime aul is‘brought to England as an informer or witness. Sometimes the plan succeeds' and sometimes not. The-county police are aware of the possibility of this trick, and they declare that they are determined t" bring nobody from Canada on a wild-goose chase.
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Manawatu Herald, Volume XLVI, Issue 2750, 26 June 1924, Page 4
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738DIGGING FOR A BODY. Manawatu Herald, Volume XLVI, Issue 2750, 26 June 1924, Page 4
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