Death Ended Three Romances

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 280, 26 November 1938, Page 9 (Supplement)

Death Ended Three Romances

NESTLING under the side of a hill in the quiet little village of St. Cross, in Suffolk, is a little red ivy-clad house fitted with new furniture and new crockery— —a perfect home for a honeymoon couple.

'lliat is what it was to have been— tho dream home of 27-year-old Mary Calver, lx? 110 of the village of Wortwell.

September 25 should have been the happiest in Mary's life. She was to have been married at the centuries-old villages church and afterwards led across the threshold of her new homo by her .'M year-old bridegroom, John Reynolds, of llolniersfield, the neighbouring village.

Instead, she sat in her parents' home, heartbroken. Tears clouded her eyes as she looked at tlio wedding dress 6he will never wear for, 011 the eve of the wedding, she found her sweetheart lying dead in a stream three feet deep near his home.

Tho whole district was shocked and mystified by the tragedy. Everyone knew and liked John Reynolds. He was one of tlio quietest and most hard-working men iti his village, and he was deeply in love with Mary Calver.

Everyone looked forward to the wedding, which was regarded as the perfect ending to a village wooing. Many were to be at the reception in the village hall, specially booked for the occasion. It. was to have been the wedding of the year.

Pathetic among the gifts lying in Miss Caber's home was the uncut wedding cake given to the couple by Sir Guy and Lady Jfambling, of Yoxford, by whom Mips Calver was employed.

Miss Calver last saw her sweetheart alivo when she kissed him good-night. "Don't forget. Sec you at two to-morrow," he reminded her as they parted.

When ho failed to keep the tryst, Miss ("alver, alarmed, organised a search, and tragically, she was'the one to find 11 i 111.

8110 saw his bicycle lying against a haystack, and, running down the slope, cried out when she saw her sweetheart dead in the stream.

"We are completely mystified by my, brother's death," Mr. Edward Reynolds told a reporter. "My brother was devoted to Mary. They had known each other eight years, and she was 'the only girl in the world' for John. "He had saved for the wedding, and had done so well that he had enough to pay for the home and to epare. "He and Mary chose their furniture at Norwich two days ago. They spent yesterday arranging their home, and it is one that any man would 'be proud to give his bride." This is the second tragedy Miss Calver has had to face within the last few weeks. Only a fortnight ago her sister, to whom fdie was devoted, died, and there was a funeral in the family instead of a wedding. Miss Calver's wedding was postponed. "My daughter is heartbroken and too ill to be seen. She cannot eat or sleep," Mr. John Calver said. "The double Mow has 'been too much for her."

By pure coincidence, a similar case, with the exception that suicidal intentions were obviQus, was reported from Coventry the same day. 1 William Eric Temple, aged 29, only ! a short time before he should have stood before the altar in Coventry i Cathedral, was found hanging in a i shed at Downham Market, Norfolk, about 100 miles away. His bride-to-be was Miss Bessie Bal--1 dock, also of Coventry. ; Another day-before-marrtag© tragedy, ' this time far more terrible in its con--1 sequences than either of the other two events, was reported from Ireland that • same fateful September day. While guests were arriving for their wedding, crippled William McClintock, aged 28, and his fiancee, a Devon girl, Aged 22, were shot dead at the mansion near Londonderry which has been the home of the McClintock family since the seventeenth century. Shortly afterwards McClintock'B mother was found dead at the bottom of the garden with a bullet wound.

Scene of the triple tragedy was Dunmore House, home of Lieutenant-Colonel R. L. McClintock, formerly of the Royal Engineers, overlooking the peaceful village of Carrigan.

An ex-Army officer, William McClintock had been paralysed since a steeplechasing fall two years ago. He was wheeled about in an invalid chair. He had been wheeled on to the lawn when Colonel McClintock and the nuree who attended liis son heard a shot.

Running out of the house, they found the young man dead in his chair. They carried him into the house. Hysterically his fiancee, Miss Helen McWorth, followed them to the bedroom. She screamed when she was told her sweetheart was dead. Sobbing, she ran from the room.

The house was in a turmoil. Horrified guests then heard another shot. They rushed to William McClintock's bedroom and found the girl dead. She had returned to the room and shot herself across her lover's "body.