DOUBLE LIFE TRAGEDY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIX, Issue 15110, 28 September 1912, Page 2 (Supplement)

DOUBLE LIFE TRAGEDY.

GRIM CRIME AT EASTBOURNE. SISTERS AS RIVAL, WIVES. MURDER AND ARSON. [FROM om OWN" CORRESPONDENT.] London, August 21. As the result of an extraordinary crime at Eastbourne the drama of a double life has been revealed. Five persons are dead, and the circumstances are so remarkable that they would be inconceivable were they not established fact. The story is that of two sisters "married" to the same man. Each had children by him. The man, on Monday last, gathered both families under one roof, sought to exterminate them all and then cover up his crime by firing tho house. The murderer was Robert Hicks Man-ay. aged 32, ex-soldier. His real wife was Edith Murray, by whom he had one child, born a year ago. His other " wife" was Florence Murray, who had two children Stanley, aged three years, and Vera, aged one year and a-half. He kept separate establishments for the sistershouses at Kensington and Envs Road, Eastbourne, for Edith, and houses at Clapham and Meads, near Eastbourne, for Florence. The tragedy took place in the Enys Road house. Murray murdered Edith and her infant child and also Florence's two children. He shot Florence herself twice in the neck, but she escaped into the road, aud now lies in Eastbourne Hospital in a precarious condition. Murray then collected the bodies in one room, poured petrol over them, and set fire to th© house. Then ho committed suicide with a revolver shot. Thus five persons have perished out of the double family of six. The story of the crime can be briefly told. There was originally a family of four sisters named Paler. Edith and Florence lost touch with their family through their relationships with Murray. Murray lived with his " wife" Florence at Clapham. His wife Edith visited him frequently, and even made clothes for Florence's children. Relations between the sister-wives were friendly, though two separate establishments were maintained by the husband. fe A year ego Edith's child was torn, when Florence's younger child was just six months of age. Apparently at this stage the sisters became enemies. * Whether this is so or not will never probably be known, nor the vicissitudes of the two households. But on July 24 Murray and his wife Edith and her child went to live in a furnished house in one of the best parts of Eastbourne. They lived in peace until two days ago. On Sunday evening the wife Florence and her two children were taken to the house by Murray without tho wife Edith's knowledge. From the surviving sister's statement it would appear that, tho wife Edith and her child were murdered first and without Florence hearing the shots which killed them. The wife Florence was found wounded in the street in front of the burning house. She knew only that her children and her husband were dead. But Murray, in killing Iter children and seeking to kill her, was carrying out only tho second part of his plan. A Last Message. At 5.30 a.m. on Monday morning he appeared in Florence's room after walking through the house all night, as he often did when suffering from insomnia. He asked Florence if sho would like a cup of tea, and then without warning he shot her. She leapt,up and escaped. Murray carried all his victims to one room, set it on fire, and fell dead among his children and by his wife Edith's side. His last message was left in a flower-pol in the hall. lie had scribbled with a pencil the words : "Am absolutely ruined. Can stand no more. Have killed all dependent on me. Bury us together. God:, help me!"-

The Two Sisters. Another sister of the two women explains that Florence was the elder and that Murray lived with her first- of all. He then married Edith, the younger sister. The statement reads :— " I have a sister named Florence Elizabeth Paler, and another sister younger, named Edith Matilda. Florence Elizabeth, to my knowledge, was the mother of a child of which Robert Hicks Murray was the father. She was not married to him, but she lived with him at Marjorie Grove, Clapham Junction. " On September 28, 1910, at Broomwood Wesleyan Chapel, Clapham Common, Robert Hicks Murray married my sister Edith Matilda Paler, but she did not live with him long, and Florence went back and lived with him as his wife. My father, who was well known and respected' at Clapham Junction, row lives at Lee-on-. Solent, and only last week I received a letter from him asking me if I knew anything of his daughters Florence and Edith, and remarking that he supposed they had forgotten they had a father. "My mother died three years ago. I know that Florence was living with Murray before our mother's death, and that afterwards Edith went to live in the same house. Robert Hicks Murray was a man of good position, but 1" understood he had always been a black sheep. His mother lives somewhere near Regent's Park, and I know at one time he had plenty of money, for he was keeping two households going" " During a portion of the time since 1910 he has been maintaining a household with my sister Florence at Marjorie Grove, and ho has also had an establishment somewhere with my sister Edith. Where that was I never heard. I never knew that Murray was a captain of any regiment. When I saw him he was always in civilian clothes. I had no idea that they were at Eastbourne, but I received a telegram from that place which ran : ' Come at once. In trouble.Florence.' " [Wo learnt by cable that at the inquest the jury returned a verdict of murder and felo de se.]