MURDERS AND MYSTERIES PEOPLE AND PLOTS. A Buckinghamshire, Bedfordshire and Northamptonshire Miscellany

Softcover. A book of true tales roaming around three counties and covers three centuries. Among the murders are the tale of the man betrayed by his own dog at Bierton in 1773; and the brutal slaying of a Haddenham nurseryman in 1828. The public hanging of his slayers attracted a crowd of 4000 in Aylesbury Market Square in 1830. Murder, mystery and plot all come together in the sad tale of the killing of the little princes in the Tower. A plot encompassed their murder, but was Richard, Duke of Gloucester, really the wicked uncle? That mystery remains to this day. There is no mystery about Gayhurst's involvement in the Gunpowder Plot. The Lord of the Manor, Everard Digby was hung, drawn and quartered for it. Mystery of a different kind surrounds Florence Nightingale. Did she fall in love with her first cousin when she was 17? Might she have gone to Canada as wife to John Smithurst, Rector of the Parish of Elora in Ontario, instead of to heroic fame in the Crimea as the Lady with the Lamp? A generation ago the Great Train Robbery put this part of the county on the map. The plot succeeded in robbing the Mail Train just outside Linslade of more than two and a half million pounds. But wholesale arrests led to a sensational trial in Aylesbury High Court. As to people, here are tales of personalities as diverse as you could wish. The 60 varied photographs were specially taken for this book by Norman Kent. Illus. + Map, Bibliog. and Index. 157pp. trade size softcover. From the library of true-crime writer, Wilfred Gregg, with his personal b/plate. Vg+