The attack on Swedish housewife Mrs Meike Dalal on Thursday, September 7th 1961

[OneRound]

I think I'm correct in saying that Mrs Galvez was in this country illegally, so therefore may have been rather pliable when it came to giving the kind of evidence that Acott wanted to hear.

Graham

Hi Graham - yes, and if it had been confirmed by Mrs Galvez that that had actually happened then Acott's credibility and that of the whole police investigation would have been significantly dented.

Best regards,

OneRound

[Graham]

Old Station Inn

I've just had a look at Google Earth and also Streetmap with regard to whether it's possible, as Nats claims, to see the entrance to the cornfield on Marsh Lane from the site of the now-demolished Old Station Inn. It isn't.

First, the distance as the crow flies is approx. 0.75 miles, a long way to see any detail with the naked eye.

Second, there are, and certainly were in 1961, many buildings between the Inn and the gate to the cornfield.

Third, as Moste points out, the old Inn was in a slight hollow.

I would politely suggest that the producer of the play mentioned by Nats not only applied some poetic licence, but also has a terrific imagination - as of course should be possessed by any theatrical producer. Nice idea for a play about Hanratty, but not I fear to be taken seriously.

I'm guessing that the old Inn was demolished in the late 1990's. I first visited the area in I think about 2000 and it wasn't there. In fact, the actual site took quite a bit of finding behind the Shell station.

If Mr Moste, who plainly knows the area, could comment, I'd be imterested.

Graham

PS: I'd have attached the Streetview maps, but for reasons I don't understand the 'Manage Attachments' feature on this Forum describes them as 'invalid documents' and won't upload them. Why's that, does anyone know?

[NickB]

However, if the statement was untrue, why did she make it and was it because she was pressured by Acott and crew into doing so?

Galves first statement on 6th September said Alphon “arrived at about 11.30 pm” and it made no mention of gloves.

“The only luggage he had was a small brown suitcase, almost an attaché case, and when I looked into his room to ask when he was leaving, it was open and contained very dirty clothing.”

The following week the police get a second statement in which she clarifies that she did not see Alphon arrive herself and adds a mention of gloves.

Like Nudds second statement, Galves second statement appears to be the result of the police homing in on Alphon. But it is not quite as simple as that, because in between the two was Nudds first statement which said he did see Alphon arrive at 11.30.

[Natalie Severn]

Galves first statement on 6th September said Alphon “arrived at about 11.30 pm” and it made no mention of gloves.

“The only luggage he had was a small brown suitcase, almost an attaché case, and when I looked into his room to ask when he was leaving, it was open and contained very dirty clothing.”

The following week the police get a second statement in which she clarifies that she did not see Alphon arrive herself and adds a mention of gloves.

Like Nudds second statement, Galves second statement appears to be the result of the police homing in on Alphon. But it is not quite as simple as that, because in between the two was Nudds first statement which said he did see Alphon arrive at 11.30.

Nudds made it up as he went along of course-according to what he thought the police might like to hear at any given time.

Juliana Galves first statement of 6th September was a composite statement from the Vienna Hotel to local police . Her second statement of 13th September 1961 to Acott carries another clue to the suspect hotel diary entry of 11.30 referred to by Roger Matthews as suspicious . Juliana Galves not only mentioned the Black gloves in that statement but also insisted that she had never been at the hotel desk at 11.30 and had a day off on that day [night of 22nd ] and didn't set eyes on Alphon until 11.45 am the following morning ,23rd which of course was the day Michael Gregsten was found dead and Valerie Storie was found severely injured.[Galves was not here illegally as I recollect ,but rather needed to extend her visa/work permit in the October].

[Natalie Severn]

Yes,Graham-am checking out my source .However I am almost certain it was not artistic license but checked out by Colin Burdon going with his colleague and sitting in a far corner of the lounge room at The Old Station Inn, Taplow and both men being surprised at being able to see the field. Norma.

[Graham]

When Paul Foot became interested in this case with his Private Eye articles and the publication of his book, I initially believed that Hanratty had genuinely been stitched up and that an innocent man was hanged. However, on subsequent readings of both Foot and Woffinden, it became clear to me that the police, in order to satisfy the ever-louder demands to find the A6 killer, actually tried to stitch-up Peter Alphon. He was under suspicion primarily because he had stayed, by his own freely-given admission, at the Vienna Hotal at the crucial time. That is, his involvement in the case was simply by coincidence. Unfortunately, Acott & Co had decided that Alphon was their man and, to put it simply, pressured Nudds and Galves into making statements that were acceptable to the police. Nudds was a well-known bad 'un, for all we know open to being lent on for misdemeanors that had nothing to do with the A6, and Mrs Galves was almost certainly in fear of being deported. The black gloves, the claimed brief presence of Alphon in Room 24, the apparent 'confusion' over the time of his arrival, all were police fictions put into the mouths of Nudds and Mrs Galves so that Alphon could be neatly moulded into the role of vicious murderer and rapist. And obviously, had Alphon not drawn the police's attention to the Vienna Hotel, the chances are that Hanratty would never have been caught.

I'm only repeating what has been known for a long time, but I do feel it's important to re-emphasize that Alphon was neither the A6 killer nor the attacker of Mrs Dalal. Unpleasant and peculiar though he was, he did come frighteningly close to being hanged, and then maybe today it would be his name connected with the execution of an innocent man.

Graham

[Graham]

Yes,Graham-am checking out my source .However I am almost certain it was not artistic license but checked out by Colin Burdon going with his colleague and sitting in a far corner of the lounge room at The Old Station Inn, Taplow and both men being surprised at being able to see the field. Norma.

Norma,

just enter 'Taplow Station' into Google Earth and you'll see what I mean.

Graham

[NickB]

Juliana Galves first statement of 6th September was a composite statement from the Vienna Hotel to local police.

As far as I am aware only the first paragraph, describing what happened on the Tuesday, is written as a composite. For example, “We told him we would save him the room ...”.

Her description of Alphon and the paragraph I quoted are written in the first person.

[Natalie Severn]

Bob Woffinden actually interviewed Juliana Galves long after the event and insists on including the black gloves as being what Juliana actually saw resting on top of dirty clothes in Alphon's suitcase. Woffinden not only draws compelling reference to her seeing such black gloves on top of the suitcase but explains in detail how Alphon had subsequently [unlike Hanratty] "adamantly refused to surrender his clothing or allowed it to be forensically tested" He also refers to what Alphon's mother had said about his habit of leaving a suitcase in a left luggage locker,which according to one of his confessions , was what he did with the clothes he wore when carrying out the murder and ,Woffinden adds ,where he assuredly deposited the women's gloves seen by Juliana Galves and referred to in her second statement, the dirty clothing she saw---and adds Woffinden where undoubtedly the blood stained clothing were deposited.Lets remember too that Peter Alphon was seen at Victoria Station on Wednesday 23rd August 1961 at about 4.50 pm.Alphon checked in at the Alexandra Court Hotel as F.Durrant of Horsham ,Sussex[!] Anita Sims the wife of the manager remembers him as having a cockney accent .This was between 5 and 6 pm on 23rd August 1961.

Nick do you happen to have available her statements of 6th and 13th September?

[Natalie Severn]

Graham,
I have looked at Google Earth at Taplow Station and remembering that the Old Station Inn was part of the original Taplow Station and not the later one of the 1870's what we are actually looking for is a spot well to the West [approx three quarters of a mile to the West and close to the railway line] .It therefore looks as though it might well have been possible to see the field off Marsh Lane/ Dorney Reach from a far window in the Old Station Inn -especially with a pair of small racing binoculars ---not forgetting that the area then was very isolated -no shell garage and no industrial buildings to block such a view .

[Natalie Severn]

Among the papers myself and William Beadle were given a few years back by a chap in motor cycle gear at the Whitechapel Society , were three pages of notes which appear to have been taken by Joe Gillbanks,the retired detective sergeant from Liverpool employed by Michael Sherrard, Hanratty's trial barrister to carry our further investigations for the trial . Gillbanks appears in the papers to be interviewing Hanratty on 12th December 1961 and asking him about his relationship with Charles France and his wife and their daughter Carol.Later Gillbanks moves on to specific questions about his relationship with France .He asks Hanratty whether France can drive-Hanratty says yes he can but that he wasn't a good driver in his opinion because he let him have a drive in his new Sunbeam Alpine Sports car and he crashed the gears .I can't get hold of these papers right now as they are in London but the really interesting bit is where Hanratty is pressed about any role France may have played apart from as an fence .Hanratty who appears quite protective of France in some ways says he felt sorry for him as France with his wife and three children , was desperately hard up and Hanratty had suggested France went out with him to Stanmore and they could do some burglary [France had done time some years before for stealing -I think it was lead off roofs and other bits and pieces ] -and was on the fringes of criminality in Soho. However the job with France which was in July'61 reveals France as someone who tended to make rather a habit of making things go pear shaped , as happened on this occasion when he apparently kept standing guard in the wrong place outside the house and even bungled things as they were being put in a chest and then into the car boot.When the three men-the third ,Harry,another Rehearsal Club doorman - much older than either France or Hanratty -drove an old rover for them to Ealing to see Donald Slack -also known as Donald Fisher who was bothered the cops might come back as he has been dealing in stolen goods and they had just been to quiz him about it.The goods from the Hanratty/France/Harry job appear to have been worth quite a bit and France was given Scotch and £30 cash.The money and scotch were more or less divided according to 'expertise' .
Hanratty also gave Charlotte France £15 on 21st August before leaving for Liverpool .This was for doing his washing which had included his shirts and handkerchiefs.

[Graham]

Alphon's Clothing

Indeed, Woffinden does give an extract from Acott's interview with Alphon, but according to Leonard Miller is not always precise, as follows, when Acott asks Alphon if he is storing any clothes other than those he's wearing:

Woffinden's Version

Alphon: Yes, but they're in hotels and pawnbrokers and I'm not telling you where they are.

Acott: I shall have every pawnbroker visited and I shall probably find them. Have you got any bags or cases:

Alphon: No

Miller's Version

Alphon: Yes but they're in hotels and pawnbrokers and I'm not telling you where they are.

Acott: I shall have every pawnbroker visited and I shall probably find them.

Alphon: All right, I've a pair of trousers in Thompson's on the Uxbridge Road.

Acott: Have you got any bags or cases?

Alphon: No


This if correct shows at least that Alphon was being reasonably cooperative with the police. I assume that Miller had access to the transcript of Acott's interview.

Alphon said that he came out of that interview 'utterly exhausted and defeated' (Daily Express 4 October 1961) but some time later Acott apparently stated that the interview was shorter and milder than Alphon claimed.

Graham

[NickB]

Nick do you happen to have available her statements of 6th and 13th September?

Only the 6th September statement which is as described. I think the second one might have been on the 12th, the day following the cartridge cases find.

It has been said (by Woffinden etc.) that the Old Station inn was used as a setting in a Miss Marple film starring Margaret Rutherford.

The film must have been ‘Murder She Said’. This includes some scenes in Taplow, shown here, but I cannot find any mention of the inn being featured.

The interesting thing is that this film was released in 1961!

[NickB]

This if correct ...

It is correct. You can freeze frame Woffinden's TV documentary and read the typewritten interview. I presume this is where Miller saw it.

[Graham]

Graham,
I have looked at Google Earth at Taplow Station and remembering that the Old Station Inn was part of the original Taplow Station and not the later one of the 1870's what we are actually looking for is a spot well to the West [approx three quarters of a mile to the West and close to the railway line] .It therefore looks as though it might well have been possible to see the field off Marsh Lane/ Dorney Reach from a far window in the Old Station Inn -especially with a pair of small racing binoculars ---not forgetting that the area then was very isolated -no shell garage and no industrial buildings to block such a view .

Nats,

I identified the site of the Old Station Inn when I visited the area by means of the car showroom which is right on the Bath Road. (Thinking about it, perhaps I filled the car at a petrol-station further east along the Bath Road, but not sure). The site of the Inn was well back from the road near the long lay-by you can see to the west on Google Earth.

If you're correct in saying that the true site of the Inn was 3/4 mile to the west of where I was looking, that that would make it even further from the entrance to the cornfield, in fact about doubling the distance. Only one way to resolve this - one of us will have to visit! It used to be easy for me before I retired, as I had customers in Slough, but just at the moment, 3 months into a total knee replacement, I don't fancy the drive! Maybe Mr Moste can help here.

I still think Colin Burden was using artistic licence and imagination.....

Graham