Murders that shook Lancaster and Morecambe decades ago

Here we take a look at historic murders in the district from the 1800s to the 1990s.

Dr Buck Ruxton

Perhaps the most well-known murder case in Lancaster was that of Dr Buck Ruxton.

Buck Ruxton was an Indian-born physician convicted and subsequently hanged for the September 1935 murders of his common-law wife, Isabella Ruxton (née Kerr), and the family housemaid, Mary Jane Rogerson, at his home in Lancaster.

The case became known as the "Bodies Under the Bridge" due to the location, near the Dumfriesshire town of Moffat in the Southern Uplands of Scotland, where the bodies were found.

The case was also called the "Jigsaw Murders" because of the painstaking efforts to re-assemble and identify the victims and determine the place of their murder.

Ruxton himself earned the title of "The Savage Surgeon" due to his occupation and the extensive mutilation he inflicted upon his victims' bodies.

The murders committed by Buck Ruxton would prove to be one of the United Kingdom's most publicised murder cases of the 1930s.

The case itself is primarily remembered for the innovative forensic techniques employed to identify the victims and to prove that their murders had been committed within the Ruxton household.

Florence Smalley

Local historian Peter Wade touched on the murder of Florence Smalley in his Morecambeology series written over the years.

He said: “Her death was overshadowed by the gruesome double murder in Lancaster by Dr Buck Ruxton, and to this day her mysterious death in Morecambe in September 1935 remains unsolved.

"Writing in The Visitor in January 1979, Terry Potter re-visited the crime, then still unsolved for over 40 years later. “Lancaster widow Mrs Smalley was last seen alive leaving Morecambe's Elms Hotel on the evening of September 29.

"Her body was discovered the following morning by 21 year old Archibald Shields as he removed wet sacks from a warehouse and garage behind Clark Street.

"These were rented by Ernest Brackey. Archibald Shields cycled to the Police Station at the corner of Euston Road and Kensington Road as soon as he found the body. "The Police Surgeon, James McFadzean found that Mrs Smalley had suffered crushing head injuries.

"At the inquest, Lancashire pathologist WE Cooke commented that the injuries were consistent with a vehicle reversing or moving slowly.

"Every bone in the skull was broken and the head had been wrapped in a sack.

"It was assumed that Mrs Smalley had been run over in some kind of accident and that her body was then moved and hidden in the stable yard. “An appeal was made for information – signs of blood were sought on roads, garages were visited and vehicles examined. “However, with little hard information and few signs of progress despite some 500 interviews, rumours about fresh clues, imminent announcements and connections with the Ruxton murders in Lancaster began to take over the inquiry. “The Smalleys were also pillars of Lancaster’s social circles. Her husband had been a respected ornithologist while her son Richard who worked in the town’s Surveyor’s Department was vice-captain at the Vale Rugby Club and an officer in the Territorial Division of the King’s Own Royal Regiment. “Closing the case, assistant deputy coroner, Geoffrey Wilson gave laceration of the brain as the cause of Mrs Smalley’s death.

"As to the larger question of whether her death was intended (murder) or accidental (manslaughter), Mr Wilson left us with an open verdict, so we may still ask Who Killed Florence Smalley?”

Reginald Field Riley

The murder of a seven-year-old boy in 1908 in the West End of Morecambe is unsolved.

Local historian Bob Fleetwood writes: “Seven-year-old Reginald Field Riley the son of Giles Henry Riley, a goods foreman at the Midland Railway Station, and his wife Clara Axon Riley was found brutally murdered on Tuesday July 7 1908.

"The Riley Family lived at 74 Westminster Road and Reginald had three older brothers, Harry, Ernest and Horace and an older sister Ina.

"Reginald who was a pupil of West End Council School was seen by Mrs Christiana Stevenson of 2 Scott Road before six o’clock running past her house, with his cap in his hand, heading towards some undeveloped land on the edge of the Regent Park Estate.”

A newspaper article at the time said in the Morecambe Visitor said: “The West End of Morecambe was thrown into a state of great excitement last evening by a rumour that spread like wildfire to the effect that a boy had been killed in a field, on the Park Estate.

“From enquiries made last evening a representative of the “Morecambe Visitor” ascertained that the boy went to school in the afternoon, and afterwards had his tea at home. He then went out as usual to play and about an hour afterwards found as stated.

“The police also investigated the matter, but up to late last night had not discovered the slightest clue as to how the sad tragedy occurred.

“From the peculiar nature of the wounds, foul play is suspected, although no one of a suspicious character had been seen in the neighbourhood.”

James Tidswell, a market gardener, was feeding his pigs.

When he went through a gap in the hedge after six o’clock to get water for them, he found the body of the young boy under the hedge.

After finding that Reginald was unresponsive and had blood on his temple and in his ear, he called two women who lived nearby in caravans to come and look after the body whilst he went for Doctor Hogarth and to inform the police.

PC Bellamy discovered that Reginald was dead, lying in a pool of blood and had his cap by his side.

He had two wounds, one in his temple and another in the nape of his neck.

The wound in the nape of the neck was just below the hair line was about half an inch long and about an inch and a quarter deep.

The vertebrae had been damaged and the spinal cord severed.

This was the cause of death and the weapon was either a sharp knife or chisel.

Nobody has ever been charged with Reginald’s murder.

ELIZABETH NELSON

In 1866, the Lancaster Guardian devoted many pages to the barbarous murder of Elizabeth Nelson '˜in defence of her chastity'.

The murder scene was in Green Lane, a quiet and overgrown lane in the parish of Scotforth, but now right at the heart of the campus of Lancaster University.

Elizabeth Nelson was 31 years-old and a domestic servant at Mr Whalley’s, Richmond House, in Slyne Road, Lancaster.

On Thursday evening, January 11, 1866, at about 5.30pm, when it was already dark, she left the house with a bonnet to deliver to a house in Middle Street and a mysterious letter addressed to a Mr Miller, which had arrived a few days earlier.

She got to Middle Street about 6.15pm but did not stay. She may have been seen by Mr Welch of Burrow House as he drove back from Lancaster in his cart. If so, he was the last person, other than her assailant, to see her alive.

It began to snow about 8pm that evening. A farm worker called Thomas Wilkinson was heading up Green Lane towards Hazelrigg next morning at 9am when he found a body lying partly covered in snow.

The body was taken to the Boot & Shoe Inn in Scotforth, and Sgt Harrison called on three local women to lay it out.

It was thought she had died of a fit, but it became apparent during the washing that she had been assaulted.

A post mortem examination revealed she had been strangled and raped, or sexually assaulted.

A Galgate silk-spinner returning home that Thursday evening heard a scream about 7.30pm, which probably gives the time of the murder.

It was conjectured that Elizabeth had met someone whom perhaps she knew, who had misdirected her up this quiet lane and assaulted her.

The letter addressed to George Miller was found near the body, still undelivered.

The unfortunate Elizabeth Nelson was buried at Aughton church. No-one has ever been convicted of her murder.

The Garage Murders

In 1997, Terry Clifton was jailed for murdering two mechanics in Morecambe.

The case sparked a nationwide manhunt, and Clifton evaded police before being captured.

A documentary about the case in Morecambe in 1997, aired in 2018.

The people of Morecambe and the surrounding area were left in shock after the brutal and senseless murder of two car dealers as they went about their job at a garage on White Lund in 1995.

Late in the evening of January 23 1995, the families of Antonio Marrocco – known as Tony – and Paul Sandham raised the alarm after the pair failed to return home from work at Tony’s garage on White Lund.

Arriving at TM Motors in Northgate at 1.30am, nothing could have prepared the police for the sight that faced tham when they opened the door. Inside, officers found the body of 49-year-old car dealer Tony. The Italian dad-of-one had been beaten to death with a wrench.

His colleague Paul’s body was found the following morning.

The 29-year-old – who had recently fought a cancer battle – had been stabbed 40 times and dumped in a field off Powder House Lane, a mile from the garage.

A police hunt was now on for a double killer who seemed to have murdered the men, both from Bolton-le-Sands, for just a few hundred pounds and Tony’s gold chain.

Thanks to an appearance on TV show Crimewatch, a lead emerged when a detective in Kent made a connection between the White Lund murders and a robbery in a Surrey jewellers.

He was identified as 24-year-old Terry Clifton, a Londoner by birth who had moved to Morecambe and attended Morecambe High.

On February 28 1995, four detectives turned up at a seventh floor flat in south London to question a girlfriend of Clifton’s.

They were greeted by Clifton himself – clutching a double-barrelled sawn-off shotgun.

The killer escaped by 
lowering himself over the balcony, dropping to the one below.

He then scaled 100ft down the block of flats, causing the press to dub him “Spiderman”.

He was eventually traced to a property in Erith, Kent, and was arrested without incident.

Even after his capture, Clifton continued to cause a scene, holding his own solicitor hostage for 21 hours at Lancaster Magistrates’ Court before police stormed the cell.

Clifton, now 26, was found guilty of both murders, and, ordered by the judge, it took nine prison officers to drag the struggling killer into court to be handed his life sentence.

Tony Marrocco’s widow Geraldine was in court to see Clifton jailed.

Paul Sandham’s widow Susan, however, had previously moved back to her home town of Scarborough to escape the memories.