Just read Dr Ferguson's witness stat's again. The last one dated 30th Sept 86 states the following:
"During her stay [Mar 85] she was obviously excited at the prospect of meeting her natural mother for the first time and was anxious to not only to be well, but to be seen to be well enough to leave hospital so as to avoid having to meet her mother whilst a patient".
He then goes on to state:
"I have been asked to comment upon the significance of her meeting with her natural mother after her discharge from the hospital. It was certainly an important event in her life but the parting may have been difficult. It is impossible to assess the effect of that occurrence: it may or may not have been an unsettling occurrence for one in her condition".
I previously posted a newspaper article re Rachel James who was adopted at birth and attempted to kill both her sons. She succeeded in killing one and the other escaped. She then had a failed suicide attempt and spent a number of years in a mental health hospital. On the anniversary of her son's death she set fire to herself in a toilet cubicle on a train and died.
Her ex partner states this is the follwing newspaper article:
"She decided to find her real mum in America and that's when she began to flip".
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/rachel-james-grieving-dad-hits-123282
I think something similar may have happened with Sheila. She met her birth mother, who flew in from her home in Canada, only weeks before the murders. The birthmother may have become overwhelmed with Sheila, her background and on-going problems.
Sheila may have waited up the night of the murders to phone her birth mother in Canada and maybe the conversation did not go well and set her off.....?
I agree with you, agap, I believe Sheila's meeting with her birth mother may have played a key role in what happened later.
Sheila told her friends in London that she was thrilled that her birth mother had travelled all the way from Canada to see her. According to Claire Powell - the journalist who interviewed Sheila's London friends and family and who later wrote a book about the murders - Sheila said that she and her birth mother had a brilliant time together. Her birth mother, Sheila said, was a wonderful person. Sheila said that she was amazed at how alike she and her birth mother were, they were both so emotionally expressive, whereas June, the woman with her arms hanging down by her side, was so cold and withdrawn. Sheila's London friends told Powell that, after Sheila's birth mother returned to Canada, Sheila told them that she and her birth mother were going to spend a lot more time together.
Yet how much of Sheila's account was real and how much of this was desperate wishful thinking on Sheila's part? If Sheila's meeting with her birth mother was such a happy one, why did Sheila's birth mother see Sheila just twice during her stay in England?Having traveled so far, the birth mother surely must have spent a week or longer here? If that's the case, the birth mother must have spent more time with her other family here than she did with her lost daughter and her grandsons. Why didn't the birth mother spend every day with Sheila and the boys, why did she apparently not introduce them to her other family here? And why did Sheila not visit her mother in Canada or why were plans not made for her to do so? I don't recall any mention of plans for such a visit.
Having made a new life for herself overseas, was this daughter of a high flying churchman too embarrassed to admit to her family that, as a young teenager, she had had an illegitimate daughter? The birth mother must have either recognised that Sheila was mentally ill or that all was not right with Sheila. Did Sheila tell her, as she told others, that she was a white witch and possessed by the devil? And was the birth mother overcome by guilt about Sheila's illness? Young teenage girls who become pregnant tend to be disturbed. Did Sheila's mental disturbance resurrect uncomfortable memories of her birth mother's own troubled past that he had long left behind?
