Visit to Taplow 9th Aug 2015 / Marsh Lane /The Pineapple

[caz]

Many thanks, Nats, for posting the photos.

Love,

Caz
X

[cobalt]

Since no one has a theory on how the killer arrived in the field

Yes, a massive problem for the prosecution case.

If the locus was the cornfield then everything to points to some sort of conspiracy: two persons involved at the very least. No one walks there in a sharp suit, carrying a gun and loads of ammo: they are dropped off in a car by someone else.

Either that or 'we picked up a man at Slough,' although few can easily believe this was a hitch hiker picked up in an act of human brotherhood in the fading August light. It must have been some kind of arranged meeting.

Whichever, we are surely looking at some kind of conspiracy.

[moste]

This doesn't work for me Moste.The cornfield was a place the couple visited often.
On August 27th The People quoted a farmer's wife Mrs Nellie Climo saying ,"I have told police about the car I saw here on Tuesday night.It was in the cornfield where I have seen it several times before ." The report continued : Police are considering the possibility that the man at the Pineapple Inn walked across country to nearby Marsh Lane and found Gpregsten's car parked in a cornfield.
if there were two men involved one could have been at the Pineapple Pub situated on Lake End Road , parallel to Marsh Lane with the cornfield sandwiched between the two roads and with an approach to the fields at the back.If someone was stationed at the Harvester pub across the road from the entrance to the Old Station Inn they could have rang the telephone box across the road from the Pineapple to give the gunman the signal to cross the field or the two men could have simply sat in the Harvester car park until they saw the couple leave and followed them there and then,dropping the gunman at the field.
Picking a man up in Slough would suggest me that the couple gave a lift to a random hitchhiker who turned into a monster who after leading them on a wild goose chase for five hours at gunpoint finally pulling the gun on them them killing Gregsten and raping and shooting to kill Valerie.If that was the case then the man was a nutcase with no motive other than to kill or maim someone surely?

Hi Natalie .Not necessarily, giving a lift to a random hitch hiker. The theory of a pick up in Slough, could be a more complex one. However first off, hope you enjoyed your visit, great snaps. If you traversed huntercombe lane south you will have negotiated the s-bend where the motor bike lad spotted the morris minor, supposedly before they arrived at the corn field. The link motorway road between the M4 and the A4 would not have been extant in '61, so if they had stopped for whatever reason in huntercombe lane, they were only a minute, two, at the most, from Valerie's home in Anthony way Cippenham. Always thought this to be possibly relevant, to what they were actually up to.
Just referencing Paul Foots third mention of the farmers wife Mrs Nellie Climo on paper back page 315, She maintained her husband had an altercation with Jean Justice, at there home, Foot heard from Mrs. Climo that Justice and Fox's car was parked in the same cornfield entrance to where the Morris had been parked the previous August.
I had forgotten this incident which goes some way to confirming Fox's story about leaving a beer bottle behind by the hedge by the entrance to the field, the field they had been taken to by Alphon ,a field unknown to anyone except the police, and at that time, a lone journalist in Slough!
Since no one has a theory on how the killer arrived in the field, your notion of an assisting second person being in communication from the Pineapple pub is interesting.

[Natalie Severn]

"They picked a man up in Slough"

This doesn't work for me Moste.The cornfield was a place the couple visited often.
On August 27th The People quoted a farmer's wife Mrs Nellie Climo saying ,"I have told police about the car I saw here on Tuesday night.It was in the cornfield where I have seen it several times before ." The report continued : Police are considering the possibility that the man at the Pineapple Inn walked across country to nearby Marsh Lane and found Gpregsten's car parked in a cornfield.
if there were two men involved one could have been at the Pineapple Pub situated on Lake End Road , parallel to Marsh Lane with the cornfield sandwiched between the two roads and with an approach to the fields at the back.If someone was stationed at the Harvester pub across the road from the entrance to the Old Station Inn they could have rang the telephone box across the road from the Pineapple to give the gunman the signal to cross the field or the two men could have simply sat in the Harvester car park until they saw the couple leave and followed them there and then,dropping the gunman at the field.
Picking a man up in Slough would suggest me that the couple gave a lift to a random hitchhiker who turned into a monster who after leading them on a wild goose chase for five hours at gunpoint finally pulling the gun on them them killing Gregsten and raping and shooting to kill Valerie.If that was the case then the man was a nutcase with no motive other than to kill or maim someone surely?

[moste]

Fair enough, Nick, but I don't understand why a visit to the cornfield should have prompted Goodman to say what he did. Seems odd to me.

Graham

A possibly explanation may be that ,having arrived there ,and taken in the surroundings, you know, a kind of experiencing a feel for the place, the remoteness, quite solitude, of a field in a farmland setting at dusk.Then to associate all this with Ms.Storie's fantastic sequence of events, beginning here. He may well have decided right there and then, to adopt as fact "They picked a man up in Slough"

[Graham]

Goodman was basing his decision on faulty information anyway, if Foot took him to the entrance shown in his book and claimed that is where the abduction took place.

Fair enough, Nick, but I don't understand why a visit to the cornfield should have prompted Goodman to say what he did. Seems odd to me.

Graham

[NickB]

did Foot reveal just why, after one look at the cornfield, Lord Goodman concluded that the prosecution case was nonsense?

Goodman was basing his decision on faulty information anyway, if Foot took him to the entrance shown in his book and claimed that is where the abduction took place.

[Natalie Severn]

What I noticed yesterday was that at the side of the Pineapple Pub is Ashford Lane which I did not go down but will do next time I go. Looking at it on Google maps you can see that from it you get a panoramic view across the fields of Dorney Reach.It strikes me that if the gunman had been dropped off at the Pineapple pub while Mr X sat and watched from the Harvester pub opposite the entrance to the Old Station Inn -both these being on the Bath Road -all Mr X had to do was ring the telephone box opposite The Pineapple Pub between 9.20-9.25 pm on August 22nd 1961 where the gunman would be waiting for the call to alert him that the couple were leaving the Old Taplow Inn [according to Mrs Lanz landlady at the Station Inn they left around 9.20 pm].The gunman would then cross Lake End Road -main road in picture - and along Ashford Lane adjacent to the pub and walk the short distance across the fields to where the car was parked in the Dorney cornfield.Ashford Land begins where the white car is parked on same side as The Pineapple pub on left of picture and alongside other parked cars in the pub car park and leads up to the Dorney fields.It is between the pub and the next houses to it.

[Graham]

Hi Nick,

did Foot reveal just why, after one look at the cornfield, Lord Goodman concluded that the prosecution case was nonsense? Seems a bit strange to me.

I wish O'Neill was back at Aston Villa....I was aware that he has an interest in true crime in particular the A6 Case.

Graham

[Sherlock Houses]

Natalie's photos of Taplow/Dorney

Thanks Natalie for uploading those photos, some great shots there.

[NickB]

A couple of other pilgrims to the cornfield ...

Lord Goodman went there with Foot: “Goodman begged me to show him the field where the tragedy started. I agreed. He drove me there, chatting gaily. He took one look at the field, concluded immediately (and correctly) that the prosecution case had been ‘nonsense’ and drove me back.”

Martin O’Neill is a believer in Hanratty’s innocence - or at least he was in 2001. After becoming manager at Wycombe he took his two young daughters to the cornfield.

[Natalie Severn]

I rather fancied lunch at The Pineapple, but I couldn't get on the car-park or anywhere near the place

Graham

Yes Graham---I had a delicious lunch there today but like you had difficulty parking.It seems to be very popular!

[Graham]

The second time I made the trek, I went by car...wasn't going to be caught out twice. I rather fancied lunch at The Pineapple, but I couldn't get on the car-park or anywhere near the place - maybe there was a big 'do' on. It's quite a nice part of the world, though. Dorney Court these days is big on things like wedding-receptions - in even fairly recent times it was a private dwelling.

Graham

[Natalie Severn]

These pix may be of interest to you Graham , Nick, Moste ,Ed , SH and of course Julie and Caz and Dupplin M if you are looking in and all our other friends who drop in on this site from time to time.Two more pix: one is a view across the Bath Road of The Harvester Pub from what would have been the entrance/exit of the Old Station Inn now a BMW Car Sales place. The other pic is of Taplow Station reaching it from the Bath Road up a slight hill on foot and at the side of the Railway Arch.

[Natalie Severn]

Very nice pix, Nats, but please tell me: did you do your tour on foot or did you drive?

I've already said that on my first visit to Taplow, I parked near to Taplow Station and did the tour (A4, Old Station Inn site, A4 again, Marsh Lane all the way down to Dorney Court, and back again. I was too knackered to return via Hunterscombe Lane) on foot on a stinking hot summer day, and it nearly saw me off. If you're walking the route, Nats, it's plenty far!

And also please tell me: did you stand where The Old Station Inn once was, and if so could you see the entrance to the corn-field, as your playwright pal claimed he could? Moste made the valid suggestion that perhaps your friend was referring to The Pineapple. Did you check that out?

Purely out of possibly very limited interest, I had some customers in Slough, mostly on the Industrial Estate, including one whose premises were in the building shown on the opening credits of 'The Office', a show I detested.

Graham

Hi Graham,
I went by car but I stopped at Taplow Station and walked over towards the Shell Garage.I didn't go down the Approach Road to do this but from the other side of the railway tracks you reach from Bath Road direct -they are doing a lot of building work there but the station is running normally. It was then that I saw The Shell Garage/BMW car sales room and opposite that the Harvester pub-just a few minutes from the station with bus stops dotted along the Bath Road running from Slough to Maidenhead.Then I noticed the first turning into Marsh Lane is not far at all from the pub-about one third of a mile but the next tuning,Lake End Road where the Pineapple is is further on and Huntercombe Lane South further on again and I noticed these from the car and went down each of them.
You are quite right -it would not have been possible to see the cornfield from the Old Station Inn-no way- but from the Beer Garden at the back of the Pineapple Pub yes---you can see field after field and the Marsh Lane Cornfield is quite nearby and reached along Court Lane or Marsh Lane today.And I agree that if you went say to the Pineapple pub from the Old Station Inn site that would have been plenty far so I didn't attempt that walk no!