Daniel and Nicholas Caffell: 22 June 1979-7 August 1985

[mike tesko]

If there had been a shooting accident how could such an accident out in the fields, ensure that Ralph, June, Sheila, and the children, would or could all be killed in a shooting accident?

Unlikely...

If Ralph himself had turned out to be the only victim of such a shooting accident in the surrounding fields of whf, who would benefit financially - Anthony Pargeter/ the Eaton family?

[mike tesko]

If there had been a shooting accident how could such an accident out in the fields, ensure that Ralph, June, Sheila, and the children, would or could all be killed in a shooting accident?

Unlikely...

If Ralph himself had turned out to be the only victim of such a shooting accident in the surrounding fields of whf, who would benefit financially - Anthony Pargeter/ the Eaton family?

As a result of the five deaths in the shooting incident at whf, and in the grand scheme of things, who actually turned out to be the financial beneficiaries in this case:-

Anthony Pargeter / the Eatons, and the Boutflours (all key prossecution witnesses)...

[killingeve]

If there had been a shooting accident how could such an accident out in the fields, ensure that Ralph, June, Sheila, and the children, would or could all be killed in a shooting accident?

Unlikely...

If Ralph himself had turned out to be the only victim of such a shooting accident in the surrounding fields of whf, who would benefit financially - Anthony Pargeter/ the Eaton family?

Neither I wouldn't have thought it would all go to June.  The norm for a married couple is a 'mirror' will.  The husband's estate goes to the wife if he should die first and vice-versa for the wife.  There's no inheritance tax between spouses. 

[killingeve]

So which two people could Ralph have been referring to:-

(1) - Anthony Pargeter and Ralph Neville?
(2) - Peter Eaton and his brother?
(3) - Bobby Boutflour, and his son, David?
(4) - father / son connected to court case, where Ralph sentenced son to prison, and threats were made against Ralphs life, which caused him to go on long term sick leave from his post as a magistrate...

In the context of NB being fearful of a threat to his life I think we can safely rule out 1, 2 and 3.

[maggie]

Hi Maggie

When I copied that excerpt I didn't actually read it I was just remembering the jist of it from Wilkes' book and scanned it quickly from Shaw's draft.  When Mike posted that NB hadn't brought them into the world I was wondering what he actually meant by it    I see now    Just goes to show how things get lost in translation   

When I read Wilkes' I thought did NB have a birth child somewhere or was he referring to SC's reunion with her birth mother?  Neither make sense really as if NB had brought a child into the world but for whatever reason(s) hadn't brought him/her up then I don't think he could really claim that he/she shouldn't feel ungrateful just simply because he brought him/her into the world!  If referring to SC's reunion this doesn't make sense either really as NB obviously didn't bring SC into the world!  But it maybe if he felt that close to SC, which by all accounts he did, then he may simply have forgotten or it was a slip of the tounge and he meant he had brought SC up and given so much emotionally and materially that he couldn't understand why she would want to have a reunion with her birth mother.  Could this have been the reason that June and NB appeared tearful etc towards the end as opposed to Steve's claims it was all about JB?  I have heard from a very reliable source that June was aware of the reunion and apparently it broke her heart.  So I assume NB was aware too.

Hi NN, the thought about the secret child was including the possibility that he also provided for that child, he certainly had the means to do it but I would guess that would have been brought out into the open at sometime since the killings.  I agree with you it is highly unlikely.
As regards Nevill, bringing SC or J into the the world, I do agree it could have been a slip of the tongue.  I mostly forget my two aren't natural children, it becomes unimportant in day to day life, where they came from in a well balanced relationship.
If it was connected to SC meeting her birth mum I suppose it is possible Nevill may have felt as heartbroken as June.  I believe this isn't or wasn't uncommon, it was often seen as ungrateful or disloyal or something.  It certainly must have added stress and pressure to Sheila's delicate and overloaded shoulders. 
I wouldn't be surprised if this at least contributed to Nevill's depressed mood as even if he understood SCs need he would  no doubt have been having to deal with June's 'heartbreak'  and the fear of another breakdown of her mental health.
Think it's a pity they lacked the necessary understanding to encourage her in her need instead of making her life even more difficult, all children give you grief at times, you just have to take it imo.

[Jane]

Hi NN, the thought about the secret child was including the possibility that he also provided for that child, he certainly had the means to do it but I would guess that would have been brought out into the open at sometime since the killings.  I agree with you it is highly unlikely.
As regards Nevill, bringing SC or J into the the world, I do agree it could have been a slip of the tongue.  I mostly forget my two aren't natural children, it becomes unimportant in day to day life, where they came from in a well balanced relationship.
If it was connected to SC meeting her birth mum I suppose it is possible Nevill may have felt as heartbroken as June.  I believe this isn't or wasn't uncommon, it was often seen as ungrateful or disloyal or something.  It certainly must have added stress and pressure to Sheila's delicate and overloaded shoulders. 
I wouldn't be surprised if this at least contributed to Nevill's depressed mood as even if he understood SCs need he would  no doubt have been having to deal with June's 'heartbreak'  and the fear of another breakdown of her mental health.
Think it's a pity they lacked the necessary understanding to encourage her in her need instead of making her life even more difficult, all children give you grief at times, you just have to take it imo.

Maggie, the day the judge cleared my adoption my father returned from work to find my mother had burned all the documentation concerning it. She explained that she had no intention of bringing me up and spending money on me just to have me decide to find my family at the time I should be starting to repay them!!!!! When I finally told her that I had indeed found out about my birth family she responded by with fury that I'd disobeyed her instructions that I was never to do that.

[maggie]

Maggie, the day the judge cleared my adoption my father returned from work to find my mother had burned all the documentation concerning it. She explained that she had no intention of bringing me up and spending money on me just to have me decide to find my family at the time I should be starting to repay them!!!!! When I finally told her that I had indeed found out about my birth family she responded by with fury that I'd disobeyed her instructions that I was never to do that.

Oh April, personally, I find your mother's behaviour bizarre on many occasions but this is particularly controlling and frankly unbalanced.  I would guess she had severe problems and you were the unluckiest babe in the world to get that particular damaged short straw. :)x

[Jane]

Oh April, personally, I find your mother's behaviour bizarre on many occasions but this is particularly controlling and frankly unbalanced.  I would guess she had severe problems and you were the unluckiest babe in the world to get that particular damaged short straw. :)x

Yeah, well I guess somebody had to, Maggie, and it would have been an awful lot worse for somebody as fragile as Sheila because my consolation is that there wasn't a child in the world who was capable of fulfilling her expectations of it. A child submissive enough to ben to her will would never have been strong enough to deal with the nitty gritty of every day occurances such as sorting out bills and dealing with authority figures.

[maggie]

Yeah, well I guess somebody had to, Maggie, and it would have been an awful lot worse for somebody as fragile as Sheila because my consolation is that there wasn't a child in the world who was capable of fulfilling her expectations of it. A child submissive enough to ben to her will would never have been strong enough to deal with the nitty gritty of every day occurances such as sorting out bills and dealing with authority figures.

I have no knowledge of how adoptions were handled at the time you were born.  I should think it was a much simpler procedure than even at the end of the 60s when I had some experience through work.  Your Mum must have been quite the actress to be able to adopt you.  No doubt April she would have treated her natural babies in the same way, only thing is if they inherited her genes they may have been as tough as her and given as good as they got.   

[killingeve]

Hi NN, the thought about the secret child was including the possibility that he also provided for that child, he certainly had the means to do it but I would guess that would have been brought out into the open at sometime since the killings.  I agree with you it is highly unlikely.
As regards Nevill, bringing SC or J into the the world, I do agree it could have been a slip of the tongue.  I mostly forget my two aren't natural children, it becomes unimportant in day to day life, where they came from in a well balanced relationship.
If it was connected to SC meeting her birth mum I suppose it is possible Nevill may have felt as heartbroken as June.  I believe this isn't or wasn't uncommon, it was often seen as ungrateful or disloyal or something.  It certainly must have added stress and pressure to Sheila's delicate and overloaded shoulders. 
I wouldn't be surprised if this at least contributed to Nevill's depressed mood as even if he understood SCs need he would  no doubt have been having to deal with June's 'heartbreak'  and the fear of another breakdown of her mental health.
Think it's a pity they lacked the necessary understanding to encourage her in her need instead of making her life even more difficult, all children give you grief at times, you just have to take it imo.

Hi Maggie

Yes but even if NB provided for a child financially he would not have played any role in the child's upbringing so I don't think he would be justified in thinking any child should be grateful simply because he brought them into the world and provided for them financially!  However I think it so unlikley that NB brought any children into the world that we are probably getting a bit carried away here 

I think the problem with these reunions is that the law at the time meant that any sort of reunion was simply not possible.  This changed in 1975/6.  I think anyone who hasn't been directly involved with 'closed' adoptions has difficulty understanding just how secret they were and the laws that surrounded them.  SC would have been 18/19 yoa when the law changed allowing adoptees access to their birth records.  Up until that point all concerned eg SC, June, NB and SC's birth family would never have conceived of a reunion.  It seems crazy to me that if you buy say a car from new and it later transpires that there's a manufacturing problem that the manufacturers will a) attempt to contact customers direct and/or b) place ads etc in national newspapers to alert customers to the problem(s) and encourage them to contact their dealer.  Yet with adoption policy/law we had a major change due to problems surrounding adoptees having a lack of identity and yet all those involved were just left to get on with it.  No contact the agency that arranged your adoption or your local social services dept etc.  So you end up with with the likes of SC very mentally fragile having this reunion with her birth mother with no professional support and probably getting tipped over the edge by it.  If the likes of Nicky Campbell found it tough and I know I did, even though it was an overall positive experience, then how much more difficult for SC?

Here's my link to Nicky's reunion with his birth parents:

http://jeremybamberforum.co.uk/index.php/topic,3974.msg164923.html#msg164923

Yet no one ever talks about the effect this would undoubtedly have had on SC's already fragile mental state only weeks before the murders.  The jury didn't hear about it.  SC's birth mother was never asked to provide a wit stat.  The only thing EP did was obtain copies of SC's letters sent to her birth mother for the CoA '02 hearing which I assume are held under PII?  Dr F was asked what effect it might have had on SC's mind and he said words to the effect he didn't know but that the parting may have been painful  Lol.

[Jane]

I have no knowledge of how adoptions were handled at the time you were born.  I should think it was a much simpler procedure than even at the end of the 60s when I had some experience through work.  Your Mum must have been quite the actress to be able to adopt you.  No doubt April she would have treated her natural babies in the same way, only thing is if they inherited her genes they may have been as tough as her and given as good as they got.   

Maggie, I was adopted at a time when illigitimate babies were available at ten a penny. Girls less so than boys. I wonder if that might say, that in general, there was the covert belief that girls were adopted to act, in later life, as cleaners/cooks/carers to aged parents out of gratitude for being kept out of orphanages, wheras boys, once raised would leave them to their own devices.

The National Adoption Society had its office in Baker Street, London and they sent out letters of introduction for the prospective adoptive mother to show to the birth mother. It was because of a hiccup in admin when two letters of introduction were sent out to different women, my mother being one of them and the child in question getting the luckiest break of her life, that my mother was promised the next girl baby to become available. Because of the circumstances there could have been no question of matching, the important thing was to provide this woman, already in her early 40s, with a baby girl. I don't think she needed to act, Maggie. There were more babies available than parents who wanted them. To fit the criteria as a parent all that was required was a good income and a spare room. My parents to be could provide both.

[maggie]

Hi Maggie

Yes but even if NB provided for a child financially he would not have played any role in the child's upbringing so I don't think he would be justified in thinking any child should be grateful simply because he brought them into the world and provided for them financially!  However I think it so unlikley that NB brought any children into the world that we are probably getting a bit carried away here 

I think the problem with these reunions is that the law at the time meant that any sort of reunion was simply not possible.  This changed in 1975/6.  I think anyone who hasn't been directly involved with 'closed' adoptions has difficulty understanding just how secret they were and the laws that surrounded them.  SC would have been 18/19 yoa when the law changed allowing adoptees access to their birth records.  Up until that point all concerned eg SC, June, NB and SC's birth family would never have conceived of a reunion.  It seems crazy to me that if you buy say a car from new and it later transpires that there's a manufacturing problem that the manufacturers will a) attempt to contact customers direct and/or b) place ads etc in national newspapers to alert customers to the problem(s) and encourage them to contact their dealer.  Yet with adoption policy/law we had a major change due to problems surrounding adoptees having a lack of identity and yet all those involved were just left to get on with it.  No contact the agency that arranged your adoption or your local social services dept etc.  So you end up with with the likes of SC very mentally fragile having this reunion with her birth mother with no professional support and probably getting tipped over the edge by it.  If the likes of Nicky Campbell found it tough and I know I did, even though it was an overall positive experience, then how much more difficult for SC?

Here's my link to Nicky's reunion with his birth parents:

http://jeremybamberforum.co.uk/index.php/topic,3974.msg164923.html#msg164923

Yet no one ever talks about the effect this would undoubtedly have had on SC's already fragile mental state only weeks before the murders.  The jury didn't hear about it.  SC's birth mother was never asked to provide a wit stat.  The only thing EP did was obtain copies of SC's letters sent to her birth mother for the CoA '02 hearing which I assume are held under PII?  Dr F was asked what effect it might have had on SC's mind and he said words to the effect he didn't know but that the parting may have been painful  Lol.

I don't disagree with anything you say NN.  My own experience was far closer to the closed adoption than the open proceedings of today.   We didn't have any support at all as BAAF disagreed strongly with inter racial adoptions and social services didn't contemplate any help and support.  However, in my eyes and some other tho not all of inter racial adoptive mothers, it was always an aim that their adopted children should be reunited with their natural mums at 18. We were all given the mothers address halfway across the world some in very remote villages and that was the end of it.  No other help and no more communication.  However many 18 year olds travelled back and sought out their natural families somehow and most were supported by their adoptive parents to do this.  It's all about attitude and the understanding that no one owns their children imo.
I also understand how traumatic these reunions can be with no counselling or professional support on either side.  I can understand how traumatic that would have been for Sheila and just how emotionally delicate she was.  I must say it's a pity maybe June didn't think more about what her daughter was going through and less about her own feelings imo.  but who am I to judge?

[Jane]

Hi Maggie

Yes but even if NB provided for a child financially he would not have played any role in the child's upbringing so I don't think he would be justified in thinking any child should be grateful simply because he brought them into the world and provided for them financially!  However I think it so unlikley that NB brought any children into the world that we are probably getting a bit carried away here 

I think the problem with these reunions is that the law at the time meant that any sort of reunion was simply not possible.  This changed in 1975/6.  I think anyone who hasn't been directly involved with 'closed' adoptions has difficulty understanding just how secret they were and the laws that surrounded them.  SC would have been 18/19 yoa when the law changed allowing adoptees access to their birth records.  Up until that point all concerned eg SC, June, NB and SC's birth family would never have conceived of a reunion.  It seems crazy to me that if you buy say a car from new and it later transpires that there's a manufacturing problem that the manufacturers will a) attempt to contact customers direct and/or b) place ads etc in national newspapers to alert customers to the problem(s) and encourage them to contact their dealer.  Yet with adoption policy/law we had a major change due to problems surrounding adoptees having a lack of identity and yet all those involved were just left to get on with it.  No contact the agency that arranged your adoption or your local social services dept etc.  So you end up with with the likes of SC very mentally fragile having this reunion with her birth mother with no professional support and probably getting tipped over the edge by it.  If the likes of Nicky Campbell found it tough and I know I did, even though it was an overall positive experience, then how much more difficult for SC?

Here's my link to Nicky's reunion with his birth parents:

http://jeremybamberforum.co.uk/index.php/topic,3974.msg164923.html#msg164923

Yet no one ever talks about the effect this would undoubtedly have had on SC's already fragile mental state only weeks before the murders.  The jury didn't hear about it.  SC's birth mother was never asked to provide a wit stat.  The only thing EP did was obtain copies of SC's letters sent to her birth mother for the CoA '02 hearing which I assume are held under PII?  Dr F was asked what effect it might have had on SC's mind and he said words to the effect he didn't know but that the parting may have been painful  Lol.

Was Sheila braver than I or had she just not thought through the ramifications of such a meeting which is a potential beginning ,rather than the end, of the story. I was not prepared to risk the positives of what 10 years of therapy had given me, and I knew, without a shadow of doubt, that if I became emotionally involved with another rejection/exploitation, it would all be stripped away and I'd probably have ended up in as big an emotional mess as Sheila. I CANNOT get my head around what seems like Dr F's casually dismissive attitude to her reunion with her biological mother.

[maggie]

Maggie, I was adopted at a time when illigitimate babies were available at ten a penny. Girls less so than boys. I wonder if that might say, that in general, there was the covert belief that girls were adopted to act, in later life, as cleaners/cooks/carers to aged parents out of gratitude for being kept out of orphanages, wheras boys, once raised would leave them to their own devices.

The National Adoption Society had its office in Baker Street, London and they sent out letters of introduction for the prospective adoptive mother to show to the birth mother. It was because of a hiccup in admin when two letters of introduction were sent out to different women, my mother being one of them and the child in question getting the luckiest break of her life, that my mother was promised the next girl baby to become available. Because of the circumstances there could have been no question of matching, the important thing was to provide this woman, already in her early 40s, with a baby girl. I don't think she needed to act, Maggie. There were more babies available than parents who wanted them. To fit the criteria as a parent all that was required was a good income and a spare room. My parents to be could provide both.

I do understand this April, my own experience of adoption in the 3rd world was pretty much the same as adoption here in the 1950s I should think.  The balance in the bank was most important as money is always the first consideration in the third world, understandably. 
When I worked in a Childrens Social Services Department I was involved with the Adoption Dept. and once even acted as an official in a very short adoption process.  I can still see the mum and the baby even now. the dad is hazy.  I don't believe all children and especially girls were adopted to provide support or to do the cleaning etc when they grew up.  The majority of parents no doubt had real and genuine strong urges to have a family.  Of course there are always people who are bad mothers or fathers or both and it's good that the procedure is far more strenuous these days than back then. 
I would never have been able to get either of my daughters to clean, cook or anything else but I knew a friend of one daughter who was treated like a servant by her natural mother.  I think it's necessary to be a bully to be able to use your daughter like that, imo

[maggie]

Was Sheila braver than I or had she just not thought through the ramifications of such a meeting which is a potential beginning ,rather than the end, of the story. I was not prepared to risk the positives of what 10 years of therapy had given me, and I knew, without a shadow of doubt, that if I became emotionally involved with another rejection/exploitation, it would all be stripped away and I'd probably have ended up in as big an emotional mess as Sheila. I CANNOT get my head around what seems like Dr F's casually dismissive attitude to her reunion with her biological mother.

I have come to the conclusion that Dr Ferguson was totally unaware of the workings of the female mind, or hormones.  He probably dismissed it as 'women's troubles' and didn't spare any more time on it.  You will remember as well as I that there was a real reason for the rise of feminism and the demand for women to be treated in an equal way to men. Even psychiatry was biased and of course hyster....the womb