Murder!!

Reporting was very different in the past, the following descriptions and especially the interviewing of a six year old on the evening of the murder would never be allowed today.

In 1900 Sheriff Taylor, a well-known local farmer, murdered his wife and daughter (a girl three years of age) by blowing out their brains, he then turned the gun on himself inflicting such injuries that he was not expected to live. The Taylors occupied Washdyke house, a residence at the corner of Washdyke Lane on the Freiston Road. Taylor had built the house for himself in about 1898 and moved there with his family from Toot Lane. There were four children aged 6, 5 and 3 years and an 18 month old and it was the third of these who, together with her mother, came by such a sad end. Taylor was a parish constable and up to a year before was a member of the Skirbeck Parish Council, he was 30 years of age. Mrs Marshall, the mother of Mrs Taylor made the gruesome discovery when she visited Washdyke House. In the pantry lay the bodies of her daughter and the little girl, the child's head was completely emptied of brains and the skull was blown to pieces, the mother's head was also partly blown off and the brains of the victims and portions of their skulls were scattered in every direction while the place swam with blood. On the floor of the kitchen adjoining lay Taylor himself with a gun at his side. He had evidently, after shooting his wife and daughter, turned the weapon on himself for this face was blown partly away. Mrs Marshall at once raised the alarm and the police arrived, also very soon upon the scene were Doctors Arthur and Reginald Tuxford. The bodies of the victims were moved to an outhouse and everything possible was done forTaylor who was left in charge of the district nurse . Although so terribly injured it was strange to say conscious and sensitive to pain. He had held his head back to reach the trigger of the gun, the muzzle coming under his chin, and the charge completely carried away the lower part of his face, but the shot had missed his brain. His recovering from the injury was , however, from the first seen to be hopeless. Taylor was met going home on the afternoon at about 4 o'clock by William Russell, a roadman employed in Skirbeck and he said Taylor appeared to be the worst for drink. Further enquiries showed that Taylor attended Boston market and returned home at about 4 o'clock and after milking the cows went in the house to tea. A boy named Yates in the yard heard angry words pass between Taylor and his wife. Mrs Taylor went into the yard and sent Yates to fetch her mother who lives a short distance down the lane. At 5 o'clock a neighbour called Crawford, who heard the shots fired, saw two of Taylors children running down the yard to meet their grandmother. On entering the house, Mrs Taylor and their three year old were, as stated above, found lying dead in the pantry and Taylor was lying in a pool of blood on the kitchen floor. Mrs Taylor's youngest child aged about 18 months was discovered seated in a high chair at the table where it was a witness to the tragedy, the infant was uninjured. When spoken to on Wednesday night respecting the tragedy, the little boy Taylor, age 6, said " I wanted some lemon drink and mum went into the dairy to get it. Father put some wadding in his gun and shot her and she fell with their head in the milk pail. Little Clara was sitting in a chair at the table, and Father blew her out of the chair into the pantry, I did laugh when Daddy blew the chair in the other room. Little Clara fell against Mam's head. When Daddy shot himself he made so much noise I began to cry and I ran out of the house because I was frightened. Sheriff Taylor died about 9 o'clock in the evening and a portion of his jaw and teeth were discovered in the kitchen firegrate the next morning.

Marriage, death and murder.

In August 1653 an Act of Parliament ordained that Banns of Marriage should be published three times on three seperate Sundays in the church or, if the parties desired, it in the Market Place on three market days, between the hours of eleven and two.

It was in January 1654 that the first banns of marriage were published in Boston Market Place, although before that marriages had been solemnised before a magistrate. The banns of marriage were published in Boston between 150 couples in 1656, 48 proclaimed in the church and 102 in the Market Place.
1657 saw 104 in the Market Place and 31 in church and in 1658 the Market Place 108 and the church 52.
The last recorded proclamation in the Market Place was on 1st. July 1659. It is also recorded that banns were published in Boston Market Place between parties residing at a considerable distance from the town - Spalding, Horncastle, Louth, Leicester and Warwick.

The Church and Market Place, Boston.

 

Here are a few more intriguing entries on Boston's records.

1672. William Pawmer died distracted in prison.
1676. Orlin Bradley drowned in the church well.
1681. Thomas Brown slain by a beer cart.
1770. Robert Harrold of Friskney, killed in a fray. (see below)
1737. Patrick Gregory, a mariner, killed by a fall from the south west pinnacle of the steeple.
1748. Richard Everett, a joiner, deposited in a tomb in his own garden in a coffin made by himself.

The Oxford Magazine for July 1770 recorded that, "Last Wednesday ended the assizes at Lincoln, when James Kearney, a private dragoon in Bland's regiment, received sentence of death, for the wilful murder of Robert Harrold, of Friikney, in that county. The murder was perpetrated at Boston. He was executed last Thursday, and afterwards his body was delivered to the surgeons for dissection."

News clips

OLD NEWS CLIPPINGS (mainly New Zealand) ABOUT BOSTON

New Zealand Tablet, 15 December 1882

Bay Of Plenty Times, 18 October 1897

Ashburton Guardian, 4 October 1918

Star , 11 August 1905,

Hawera & Normanby Star, 10 November 1914

Star , 22 July 1898

Murdered by a Soldier

From a 1774 edition of the Oxford magazine.

They write from Boston in Lincolnshire, that a few days ago a murder was committed by a private dragoon in Bland's regiment, quartered there, on the body of one Friskney.—The parties appeared very sociable, and had spent a great part of the day and night together at a public house: towards morning the deceased went to bed in the soldier's room, where the latter soon followed; and immediately on his entrance into the chamber, drew a bayonet and stabbed his companion in a most inhuman manner, in several parts of his body, then with the club end beat him very cruelly on the head, and supposing him dead, left him weltering in blood on the floor.—He then attempted the door of the landlady's room (its feared for the fame purpose) which resisted his strongest efforts; but the noise he made alarmed the family, who soon discovered the murder, and had him properly secured: he was soon after conveyed to Lincoln Castle, guarded by constables, and two of the military : when enquiries were made as to what could induce him to such a great act of cruelty, the only answer he would return was, "He thirsted for blood, and if in his favour he would have more."—The poor unhappy victim survived but a few hours and the Coroner's Inquest returned their verdict, Wilful Murder; and his corpse was conveyed to the grave, attended by a distressed widow and several children.

Human remains

In April 1900 human remains were found in a sack in Boston and were about to be sent away for disposal before they were discovered.
The scene of their discovery was the Railway Goods Yard where they had been sent to be forwarded on in the ordinary course of business by a rag and bone man. A railway employee, who knew something about the human skeleton, noticed a bone protruding from the sack and realised it was the forearm and hand of a girl!! He told James Carr, a carter who was unloading in the yard and Carr took possession of the bone and hurried up to the Police Station

The Railway Goods Yard at Boston.

The police were soon upon the scene, with them came the Medical Officer and the Sanitary Inspector and others officially concerned (as at this time it looked very serious) but after a while it was proved there had not been any murder or tragedy.
Enquiries showed they were broken up skeletons from the sale of the late Dr. Snaith in Pump Square and their recovery at least rescued them from a fate that would seem incredible to us today.
There were several skulls - the number was variously given as three and five - and the bones of an adult’s and a young female’s skeletons. They were all contained in the sack, and their destination, along with a truck load of animal bones, was a factory at Newark that crushed bones and turned them into manure!!
It seems the skulls and skeletons were “cleared out” at Dr. Snaith’s sale as a job lot, they were taken to a rag and bone yard by a man named Blades and received in the normal way without too much attention being paid to them. Their man was loading iron when the bones were brought in and were passed as ordinary commercial animal bones.
The human fragments were eventually decently interred under the directions of the Medical Officer.