DOUBLE SUICIDE

Taranaki Daily News, 23 February 1935, Page 9

DOUBLE SUICIDE

GIRLS LEAP TO DEATH JUMP FROM AEROPLANE R.A.F. DISASTER’S SEQUEL BOTH ENGAGED TO PILOTS SISTERS’ CLASPED HANDS By Telegraph—Press Assn.—Copyright Rec. 7 p.m. . London, Feb. 21, Clasped hand in hand, two women, both about 25 years of age, fell from an aeroplane as it passed over Upminster and, still embraced, crashed to earth into a cabbage field. A workman saw something hurtling from the plane and, remembering the Hillman air liner’s lost gold, rushed to the spot and foUnd the mutilated bodies of the pair. The machine was a Hillman plane flying on the normal morning service to Paris. About an hour after the fall the pilot noticed the door open and the two passengers missing. He signalled to Croydon and the plane returned to Romford. The dead women were the only passengers. The bodies Were lying face downwards a few yards from a public footpath running across the Springfield estate. Both were well dressed and they wore fur coats. Their feet were without shoes, while their stockings were a mass of holes and resembled netting. The bodies made a hole in the ground a foot deep. They probably fell 1500 feet. A hat, glove and wristlet watch, bearing the initials “J. du 8.,” were found nearby. Letters in the handbag - identified the victims as Jane and Elizabeth Du Bois, aged respectively 20 and 23. They are the daughters of the United States Consul at Naples, Mr. Coert Du Bois, who was well known in the Diplomatic Corps. They bought up all the seats in the plane saying that they wanted to fly to Paris. Spectators declare that the falling bodies appeared like sheets of paper. The watch on one of the girls was still going when they were found. The pilot informed the police that the girls were agitated before their departure, but he thought this was due to anticipation of crossing the Channel on a windy day. He did not notice anything wrong until he heard the door banging over the Channel. An examination of the door proved that the lock had not broken. HOLIDAY AT NAPLES. The girls left Naples on Saturday for a holiday at the Ritz Hotel. The manager said that-they seemed happy when they arrived but during the past two days they were rather hysterical and cried a lot. They were very attached to each other. The girls were miserable following the crash of the R.A.F. flying-boat K 3595 at Messina, having become very attached to two of her officers. Premeditation of suicide is Shown by the booking of the other four seats, fictitious names being used, and the asking of the pilot to close the door between him and the saloon. One shoe was found in the plane. The Daily Express says the police opened two letters that the Du Bois girls had left in the plane. Each was of two pages. One was addressed to the father and the other to the mother of the girls. The first letter included the following: “We heard about the Messina crash at Paris. It is terrible about Charlie.” This was a reference to John Charles Forbes. “The girls have always been inseparable,” adds the Daily Express. “They went to a western revue on Wednesday and returned in better spirits.” Mr. Kirton regards himself as the unluckiest aviator in Britain, as he was piloting the Hillman plane when the gold dropped, yet in neither case was he blameworthy. “One of the girls 'complained of draught,” he says, “and asked me to close the door between the pilot’s cockpit and the cabin and to cover up the two windows let into the connecting door. I could not understand why they asked me to cover up the windows, but I was not suspicious. The girls must have jumped as I climbed through bumps, as if it had happened in calmer air I would probably have felt the loss of weight on the controls.” ENGAGEMENT TO OFFICERS. Inquiries at Naples indicate that Miss Jane Du Bois, who was a blonde, was engaged to Flying-Officer John Forbes, and that Miss Elizabeth Du Bois, who was a brunette, was engaged to FlightLieutenant Beatty, both of whom were killed In the Messina crash. The girls saw much of the officers during the latters’ enforced stay at Naples and said farewell the night before the officers departed. The girls left by air liner for London and a few hours later the airmen crashed. They apparently decided to seek death in the same manner as befel their sweethearts. Mr. Kirton wonders how the girls opened the door of the aeroplane in view of the terrific wind pressure. They must have thrown themselves out six minutes after the departure of the plane, which was 10 minutes over the Channel before Mr. Kirton, who looked into the cabin in order to reassure them after a thunderstorm, found to his amazement that they had disappeared. One of the last acts of the Du Bois sisters, says the Daily Mail, was to go but of London in a taxicab and distribute money to unemployed outside a labour exchange. An unemployed clerk says: "The elder sister had a bag of site ver and gave us each two half-crowns, saying, ‘This is from Lieutenant Forbes.’ None of us understood what she meant.” The sisters kept their presence at London a secret from the American consulate, although they were friendly with the officers there. The parents of the sisters are going to London from Naples to-day. It is believed the girls were determined,to die on English Soil owing to their admiration for Flight-Lieutenant Beatty and FlyingOfficer Forbes.