Strange Notations From a Laborious Life

 A week or so ago I began reading a book called “Missing You”, by a journalist called Justine Ford. Her book is a series of stories about investigations into the identities of human bodies and remains which have been found over the years. Most of the human remains detailed in the book have never been identified.

 One particular case involved a set of adult male human remains found in Sloane’s Paddock in Beechworth in 1977. After a grass fire had swept through the field, the farmer who owned it found a complete human skeleton, obviously quite old, which had lain undisturbed in the undergrowth for what appeared to be many decades.

 The local police, some years from having access to such forensic tools as DNA profiling, were unable to ascertain who’s remains they were and the poor unfortunate was laid to rest in an unknown paupers grave, to all intents and purposes lost to the world. But of course time moves on and so does technology and soon the nameless corpse eventually came to the notice of the constabulary yet again.

 A few years ago a special task force was set up by the Victoria Police to investigate cold cases and try to run down the identities of the substantial number of skeletons in their care which remain known only to God.  Task Force Belier soon set it’s sights on the man found in Sloane’s Paddock.

 Two possible suspects were found in the missing persons files. Long term missing who matched the profile of the skeleton concerned or were at least close enough for the police to be convinced that one of them had to be the name to match the remains. Relatives were tracked down, DNA obtained and the police, much to their surprise, were disappointed to find their leads come to nothing. Neither man was the skeleton of Sloane’s Paddock. They were back to square one.

 After finishing the book I never thought too much more of it and lent it to my mother as she is an avid reader of true crime stories and I knew it would interest her. Little did I know how much!

 She read the aforementioned story of the man found in Beechworth and remembered through family folklore that my father’s uncle, Harry Sumner, had been a patient at the May Day Hills Asylum in Beechworth and had gone missing from there sometime in the 1940’s. It was apparently assumed at the time that he had fallen down one of the many mine-shafts which dot the town and it’s surrounds and it seems no one but his family was particularly concerned. Thus was the fate of those incarcerated in such facilities in those days. Out of site out of mind it seems.

 My mother is a very inquisitive soul and she remembered the body being found in 1977 and the heartache it caused for Harry’s surviving sibling’s because they strongly believed it to be him. Who else could it be? But lacking the means to find out for sure, the matter was let slide and the fate of Harry Sumner remains a mystery. Until now perhaps.

 Mother soon found the author of the book, Ms Ford, on Facebook and she in turn passed on the information about Harry’s disappearance to Detective Rippon, formerly of the now disbanded Task Force Belier who it seems is still passionate about the case and was immediately in contact with my family in order to obtain DNA which is vital in determining the identity of the remains. This is where we hit a snag.

 Mitochondrial DNA which is required for analysis in this case is only passed through the female family line, thus my father and all of his children and siblings and nieces and nephews are ineligible as my grandfather would not have passed the requisite molecules down the line to us in order for a match to be obtained in this case. Harry had no children nor did his sister Ethel leaving only one other sister, Mary, someone who was somewhat of a mystery, even to my father, as the hope of the family. Finding relatives of Mary Sumner could have presented a problem.

 We knew she had married a fellow called Dale and resided in Mansfield and had daughters which ticked all the boxes we required but was there any living relatives alive from Mary’s line who could provide DNA?

 The detective in charge of the case did a quick check of those named Dale who live around Mansfield and came back with so many possibilities that he handed responsibility to my father and a few phone calls later had the name of someone who may have been able to help.

 I also have an account with Ancestry.com and following a trail through that site soon had found someone I could reasonably assume was the person I needed to talk to. A few emails later and I have found a relative who should be able to provide DNA consistent with that of Harry Sumner and the very pugnacious detective will no doubt soon be able to find out if indeed Harry Sumner is the man who was found in Sloane’s Paddock many years ago.

 Families have invisible bonds that can never be broken. Over the last few days I have swapped correspondence with cousins I never knew I had before yesterday. All of us have a common purpose. To lay to rest a man we never knew. To give him a proper burial which he deserves. To ease the souls of his siblings who fretted over the illness and disappearance of their much loved brother for decades after he was gone. As a family, it’s the least we can do.

 The identified man in the pauper’s grave in Beechworth may not be Harry Sumner but we will soon know one way or another. But we have done our best and no one can ask for more.

 Have a nice day.