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

[Natalie Severn]

Graham yes perhaps Andy and I could make a preliminary visit this Summer and join you and Moste and others in the Autumn when your knee is better .I used to go almost as far as Bedford along a route that used to be considered a panoramic drive in the 1970's .I expect when you write a large book like Woffinden's on the case there are always a few things missing or not quite exact .Hope knee heals well, Norma

[Natalie Severn]

Great pix Nick-gives you a flavour.

[NickB]

Brooke said in parliament that it was a “mile-and-a-half from the public house to the cornfield”. I presume he is talking about the distance by road.

[NickB]

The location is identified here:

http://www.maidenhead.net/history/old-stn.html

[moste]

The location is identified here:
http://www.maidenhead.net/history/old-stn.html

Yes, this is the site I had visited before. Also I had on my pc prior to it crashing, a local Taplow gazette, with a historic article on a 6 pub, pub crawl starting in the village and ending up on the A4 Bath road. where the two pubs, 'The Dumb Bell " and 'The Old Station Inn' were almost across the street from each other .'The Dumb Bell' is now called 'Harvester' but got its original name from the fact that you could hear the old station platform bell ringing when ever a train approached.So apparently there is a connection with the old station closing and being moved approximately 1/4 mile east to its new location, and the opening and subsequent naming of the new pub across the road in the middle of the 19th century ( Interesting piece of trivia, I thought)
In the Film with the wonderful Dame Margaret Rutherford, "Murder she said,"Taplow was in fact the location, but although I had read the Old Station Inn was used in the making, I couldn't detect as much from watching ,although the opening and closing scenes show a beautiful old stone built farm house which I found using Google Earth just west a hundred yards from our pub, turning left into a very easy to miss, Amerden Lane, then through the railway tunnel and its on your immediate right . Hasn't changed since '61 hardly.
The problem with the location of the 'Old station Inn as a 'look out point, isn't so much that its in a hollow or dip , its the railway embankment .You would need to walk the three hundred yards east, and through the old Great Western road bridge to emerge on the south side of the railway, and the now available view toward the Marsh road fields.

[moste]

Of course I don't mean 'now' available view ,because of the trees and shrubbery, but the 30' embankment is no longer an obstacle.

[Natalie Severn]

Hi Nick ,Graham and Moste.A few points I want to clarify .I contacted Colin Burden who responded today with a very pleasant email confirming that what I remembered about what he had told me a few years back was correct about his acting colleague and himself visiting the Old Station Inn and I quote :
Michael and I did indeed visit the pub in 1995 and I sat in the rear area from which you could see the corner of the cornfield but probably not the actual spot where the Morris Minor would have been parked. [Sunday 17th May]

I didn't ask Colin if he had binoculars or not that day and I note he doesn't say whether you could see a car going down Marsh Lane or not-just that you could see the corner of the cornfield from the rear area of the pub.

Btw I am sure everybody knows that there was an interesting siting at about 2.30 pm on 22nd August 1961 in Marsh Lane of a man with receding dark brown or black hair brushed straight back and dark eyes and a sallow complexion wearing a dark suit- in Marsh Lane -are intriguing .The man ,according to neighbours , resembled the photofit which Valerie Storie helped to compose.He was seen carrying a white carrier bag rolled up at the top at about 2.30 pm on Tuesday 22nd August by Mr and Mrs Cobb of Marsh Lane and by Mr Newell their neighbour who had seen the man two or three times before when he wore a red coloured garment under his jacket the first time and a similar red coloured garment under his coat the second time .Neither the Cobbs or Newell were ever asked to attend an identity parade.
referring to a post I wrote a few weeks back I can't yet find the reference to the handprint but finger prints were shown to be on the windows of the Morris Minor yet the photographs of them were never shown at court.We don't know whose they were or on whose instructions twelve photographs were withheld .
Norma

[Graham]

Hi Nats,

subject to a return visit (after 20-odd years) to Taplow, I really do think that Mr Burden is either (a) totally mistaken or (b) looking at the wrong cornfield. Checking again on Google Earth, as I did today, and scrolling along the Bath Road then down Marsh Lane, there are simply too many buildings in the way, plus the distance even if the ground were perfectly flat is too far for the naked human eye to pick out any proper detail.

The sightings of a man walking along Marsh Lane who 'resembled' Alphon who in turn 'resembled' Sydney Tafler the actor strike me as being extremely suspect.

I think I'm correct in saying that it was only after Alphon's features were shown in the press and possibly on TV that these sightings were reported. Michael Sherrard was very wary about people who 'wanted to get in on the act', reference the left-luggage office assistants at Lime Street Station. I do think that the good people of Marsh Lane may well have fallen into this category, especially Mr Fogerty-Waul whose claim that he gave Alphon, or a man resembling Alphon, a lift from Slough dog-track to a hotel in Slough, and then later saw the same man leaning out of a window in Brighton is to me totally ridiculous - it's all in Paul Foot's book, and I get the impression that even Foot felt this to be rather far-fetched.

And why shouldn't people walk down Marsh Lane? I did, and nobody reported me to the police...as far as I know.

The memory can easily be jogged by a photo or two, reference the Rhyl 'witnesses'.

Graham

[simon]

My first visit to this forum for years ! - amazing how the debate continues. The people involved, all those decades ago, could never have begun to imagine..

The Sidney Tafler lookalike sighting is what first fascinated me, having myself noticed (in a newspaper photo) Alphon's resemblence to the actor before ever reading (years later, in Foot's book) the witness's account. But I have to agree, now, that perhaps Fogerty-Waul was bending the truth a little. 'Getting in on the act' certainly a possibility.

[moste]

First try at posting an image... Taplow, location of old station Inn. Note GWR railway bridge over A4. Embankment, approximately 28 feet high, running at acute angle behind car dealership and shell station, where old pub was, obliterating any view towards Dorney Reach.

[Graham]

First try at posting an image... Taplow, location of old station Inn. Note GWR railway bridge over A4. Embankment, approximately 28 feet high, running at acute angle behind car dealership and shell station, where old pub was, obliterating any view towards Dorney Reach.

Sorry, Mr Moste - no image. Same as you I've sometimes had problems uploading an attachment - it seems slightly hit-and-miss. Try again, worth seeing if you can do it.

Graham

[moste]

(Can't copy and paste an url for google earth photo. )Original photo circa 1870 of Taplow railway station which after major renovations became the Old station inn.
notice roofing over stairway to platform at the top of the embankment.

[Graham]

Hi Moste,

I'm just trying to see if I can upload a photo from Google Earth.

Graham

And the answer is that I can! Wow!

As far as I can make out the site of the Old Station Inn is just to the right of where it says 'Taplow', just off the road going north to south (Station Road, I assume), and just above the railway tracks up on their embankment. As you very correctly point out, this embankment is very much in the way of a direct view from where the Old Station Inn used to be to...well...anywhere to the south. No way in the world can the cornfield be seen from there. If you follow the north to south road under the railway tracks you will come to the main A4 Bath Road, and if you cross that you will be on Marsh Lane heading south towards the cornfield. What surprised me, as it's getting on for 20 years since I was in the vicinity, is how far from the Bath Road the Old Station Inn was actually located.

Hoping I've got this right!

Graham

[Graham]

Flushed with confidence, I will now re-post a photo of The Old Station Inn first posted by JiMarilyn on Post #494 on the 'A6 Murder' thread. Acknowledgements to him.

I would guess by the parked vehicles that this photo was taken maybe in the 1950's or 1960's. The embankment would, I think, be to the very left of the photo, i.e., the camera was to the north-east of the Inn.

Graham

[Sherlock Houses]

Hi Moste,

I'm just trying to see if I can upload a photo from Google Earth.

Graham

And the answer is that I can! Wow!

As far as I can make out the site of the Old Station Inn is just to the right of where it says 'Taplow', just off the road going north to south (Station Road, I assume), and just above the railway tracks up on their embankment. As you very correctly point out, this embankment is very much in the way of a direct view from where the Old Station Inn used to be to...well...anywhere to the south. No way in the world can the cornfield be seen from there. If you follow the north to south road under the railway tracks you will come to the main A4 Bath Road, and if you cross that you will be on Marsh Lane heading south towards the cornfield. What surprised me, as it's getting on for 20 years since I was in the vicinity, is how far from the Bath Road the Old Station Inn was actually located.

Hoping I've got this right!

Graham

Hi Graham, it looks like you and I have been two busy bees on Google Earth today with reference to Moste's recent posts about the Old Station Inn in Taplow.
I grabbed hold of that little yellow man [near the top right hand corner of the G.E. page] and dragged him onto the Bath Road and travelled up and down it until I came across the Shell Petrol Station that Moste mentioned. The Shell Petrol Station is indeed on the site where the Old Station Inn stood. I myself hadn't realised that the Old Station Inn was actually on the Bath Road. After some Google Mapping I discovered that if you turn right out of the Shell station and travel about half a mile down the Bath Road you come to Marsh Lane located on the right hand side of the road.

From the Shell Station you can see the GWR Railway Bridge that Moste also mentioned.
For clarification purposes I have attached a G.E. image below which shows this.
Hope this helps.

I do agree that you wouldn't be able to see the infamous cornfield from the Old Station Inn.