Murder of Muriel Drinkwater

The murder of Muriel Drinkwater (Welsh: Llofruddiaeth Muriel Drinkwater)[2] is an unsolved 1946 child murder case from Wales. Drinkwater, a 12-year-old schoolgirl, was raped and shot in the woods in Penllergaer, Swansea. The case, which became known as the Little Red Riding Hood murder, is one of the oldest active cold cases in the United Kingdom.[3] In 2008, a DNA profile of the suspect was extracted from her clothes, possibly the oldest sample in the world to be successfully extracted in a murder investigation.[4] In 2019, the DNA was used to rule out notorious Welsh murderer Harold Jones as a suspect.[5]

Muriel Drinkwater
Born
Muriel Joan Drinkwater

19 July 1933[1]
Carmarthen, Carmarthenshire, Wales
Died27 June 1946 (aged 12)
Penllergaer, Swansea, Wales
Cause of deathgunshot and head injury
Body discovered28 June 1946
Parent(s)Percival and Margaret Drinkwater

Murder and investigation

Muriel Joan Drinkwater was the youngest of four daughters born to John Percival and Margaret (née Morgans) Drinkwater.[6] On 27 June 1946, she took the school bus home from Gowerton Grammar School. She was last seen at 2:30 p.m., singing as she headed for the one-mile walk to her family's home, Tyle-Du Farm. The path she walked home on curved in and out of the woods; her mother saw her walking home along the path and go into the woods, but not come out again. The last person who reported seeing her was Hubert Hoyles, then 13, who passed her on the path returning from her family farm, where he had gone to buy eggs. Her mother later went to the village to look for her when she did not return home; more than a dozen men from the area began a search.

The next day, Drinkwater's body was found in the woods by a police inspector. She had been raped, shot twice in the chest, and beaten in the head. Two days later, police found one of the murder weapons, a World War I-era Colt .45.[7][4] Glamorgan police, assisted by the 169th Bomb Disposal Unit, used a metal detector to search for a second weapon suspected to have been used, but never located it.[8]

Detectives from Scotland Yard came to Swansea to assist in the investigation of the murder.[9] The police visited every house within 150 square miles, and interviewed 20,000 men in Swansea and neighbouring Aberdare and Carmarthenshire.[7]

More than 3,000 mourners attended Drinkwater's funeral on 2 July. She was buried at St David's Church in Penllergaer.[7][4]

A description of a person of interest was circulated; he was described as approximately 30 years old, with "thick fluffy hair and wearing brown corduroy trousers and a light brown sports jacket."[4]

Police also circulated photos of the American army issue gun; notably, perspex had been used to modernise the original wooden stocks next to the grip. It was believed a similar weapon had been used in the murder of a cinema manager in Bristol. In August, the police appealed to the United States public for assistance, as many Americans had been stationed in Penllergaer during the (then recent) Second World War and there was a possibility one of the servicemen had sold the weapon.[4]

DNA discovery

In 2003, detectives re-opened the case in the hope of finding DNA evidence on the gun, but were not successful as too many people had handled the gun. It was believed the victim's clothes had been lost.

In 2008, a team of retired detectives investigating cold cases found Drinkwater's clothes in storage. Her blue coat, underwear and school uniform had been wrapped in a paper bag and stored. On the back of the coat, a no-longer-visible semen stain was circled with yellow crayon.[7] Scientists successfully retrieved a DNA profile from the stain on the coat. A familial DNA profile was extracted using a technique called Y-STR, but no match was found in the national DNA database.[10] Hubert Hoyles, who saw Drinkwater after buying eggs at her parents' farm, was cleared by the DNA evidence. He stated he had long been suspected by some locals of being the murderer and was happy to clear his name.

Sheila Martin, Harold Jones and Ronnie Harries

In 2009, Welsh police began reinvestigating any link with the murder of 11-year-old Sheila Martin, who was raped and strangled 250 miles away in Sun Hill Wood, Fawkham Green, Kent, on 7 July 1946, ten days after Drinkwater's murder. Both girls were murdered in woods within a half mile of their homes. South Wales Police detectives requested the original case file from Kent Police to determine if there was a connection.[11][12]

For more than a decade, Welsh true crime author Neil Milkins has theorised that notorious child murderer Harold Jones (1906–1971) was responsible for the murders of both Sheila Martin and Muriel Drinkwater.[12] However, in 2019, South Wales Police stated that forensic tests on the DNA "categorically confirm that Jones was not responsible for the murder of Muriel Drinkwater."[13][5]

In 2020, the BBC One documentary Dark Land: Hunting the Killers suggested that Ronnie Harries could be the murderer. Harries was hanged in 1954 for the double murder of John and Phoebe Harries.[14] There is evidence that Harries was employed by Muriel Drinkwater's father, John, at the time of her death.[15][16]

Public access

In 2010, the Lord Chancellor's Advisory Council on National Records and Archives closed off public access to the case, acting at the behest of Scotland Yard.[17] The public can no longer access the Drinkwater files by Freedom of Information Act requests or in person at the archives office in Kew. The reason given for sealing the files was that it could help the police catch the perpetrator.[7]

See also

References
  1. 1939 England and Wales Register
  2. "Marwolaeth merch yn parhau'n ddirgelwch" (in Welsh). BBC Cymru Fyw. 2 May 2019. Retrieved 3 May 2019.
  3. O'Neill, Sean (24 March 2009). "The Muriel Drinkwater case: can they crack the coldest murder case?". The Times. Retrieved 3 May 2019.
  4. Gabriel, Clare (5 November 2008). "Mystery of 1946 murder in woods". BBC News. Retrieved 17 September 2016.
  5. Bevan, Nathan (1 May 2019). "Groundbreaking DNA test rules out childkiller in unsolved murder". Wales Online. Retrieved 3 May 2019.
  6. Turner, Robin (6 November 2008). "Hunt on for 80-year-old Swansea killer". Wales Online. Retrieved 17 September 2016.
  7. Turner, Robin (31 March 2010). "Secrecy over 1940 murder as DNA offers new leads". Wales Online. Retrieved 17 September 2016.
  8. McConnell, Ed (17 October 2018). "The unsolved murder of a 12-year-old brutally abused and killed". Wales Online. Retrieved 20 October 2018.
  9. "Serial Slaying of Pretty Women Has New Scotland Yard Confused". The Montreal Gazette. Associated Press. 29 July 1946. Retrieved 17 September 2016.
  10. "DNA breakthrough on 1946 murder". BBC News. 4 November 2008. Retrieved 17 September 2016.
  11. O'Neill, Sean (23 March 2009). "Detectives link Muriel Drinkwater and Sheila Martin murders". The Times. Retrieved 3 July 2018.
  12. McConnell, Ed (20 January 2018). "'I know who killed girl in woods in 1946'". Kent Online. Retrieved 3 July 2018.
  13. Rees, Gwyneth; Davies, Jordan (1 May 2019). "Who killed 'Little Red Riding Hood'?". BBC. Retrieved 3 May 2019.
  14. "The chilling tale of a man who bludgeoned his relatives to death with a hammer and paid the ultimate price". Wales Online. 29 December 2017. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  15. "The unsolved murder of 12-year-old Muriel Drinkwater and the new suspect identified". Wales Online. 7 November 2020. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  16. "Dark Land: Hunting the Killers". BBC. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  17. "Muriel Drinkwater murder file is declared secret at request of police". The Times. 30 March 2010. Retrieved 3 May 2019.
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