Murder Revealed in Dream

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 822, 16 November 1929, Page 18

Murder Revealed in Dream

Farmer s Family Arrested for 10-Year-Old Crime . . . Village Sherlock Holmes’s Persistent Investigation . . . (FKg[WSX?uTE secret or a ten-year-old ■ 1 crime, which reads like a novel by Zola, has just been revealed, j Ten years d-39, who had a small farm at Grunow. near Frankfort-in-the-Oder. disappeared. 11 is neighbours, who knew that there was constant quarrelling between him and his wife and three sons, believed that they had murdered him. Although the family brought actions ; for slander against several persons, j the rumour persisted.

■ I In 1923 a box containing parts at ■ a human skull was found floating on the waters of a lake in tile district, and the report went through the ' ( countryside that the remains were l those of the farmer. Freidrich DeirekThe Berlin police intervened and Frau Deirckert and her sons were arj rested. A long examination of the , i four, however, and a thorough search of their farm, produced uo evidence of their guilt, and they were released. Dug at Dead of Night During these ten years a village ' wheelwright has persistently searched j for the body ot the vanished farmer. Recently he declared he had a dream in which the farmer appeared to him | and indicated that his body was buried in a certain spot on his own farm. He says that he saw the vision on i three different occasions, and was so ; much impressed that one evening he began to dig at the spot indicated. At. a depth of about, four feet he found hones, and further excavations : made by the police have now revealed j a human skeleton. Tlie earth around it was carefully examined, and in it was found an oldfashioned silver watch. The local watchmaker recognised it as the watch which he had once repaired for Freidrich Deirckert. Once more the wife and three sons have been arrested. The sons were brought to the edge of the hole in which llie skeleton was found, but none of them showed any sign of emotion. They declared that they did not know how their father had met his death, or how it came about that he was buried on his own farm. At last one of them, Paul Deirckert, who is now 37, broke down. He confessed that he killed his father in defending his mother when | she was attacked by him and her life | was in danger. | After the murder he and his mother I buried the body.