7 p.m.8 p.m.: Various witness sightings. Freda Grace and Carl lived a 20-minute drive away from each other. Somerton Man Mystery 'Solved' as DNA Points to Man's Identity Some observers cited the code found on his copy of The Rubiyt, as well as the apparent attempts to mask his identity, as evidence that he was a Russian spy. The scrap had been torn from the final page of a copy of Rubaiyat of Omar Khayym, authored by 12th-century poet Omar Khayym. They included a suitcase, items of clothing with their labels removed and incoherent writings believed to be a code. Read about our approach to external linking. Shed been adopted as a child and grew up in New Zealand, unaware of her potential links to the cold case. Dubbed by authorities and the press as the Somerton Man, the man was found smartly dressed and slumped against a wall on a beach near Adelaide, Australia, in 1948, leading to a labyrinthine . Now Australian scientists are close to solving the mystery", "Australia Exhumes the Somerton Man, and His 70-Year Mystery", "After 65 years, new picture could reveal Unknown Man's identity | News.com.au", "How the Somerton Man played cupid from the grave", "Who was the Somerton Man? "The first cousin we found was on his paternal sideand the second one we found was on the maternal side," he said. "So, it's a triangulation from two different, totally distant parts of the tree, so that's very convincing.". We can't say for certain say that this is the reason he came, but it seems logical., Records showed that Webb enjoyed reading and writing poetry, as well as betting on horse races. "The fact he [Thomson] has a rare dental and ear condition matching the Somerton Man appears to be an extraordinary coincidence.". In October 1951, three years after the Somerton Mans death, Dorothy placed a notice in the Age newspaper stating that she had begun divorce proceedings against Webb on the grounds of desertion. [110], Abbott claimed his DNA identification from strands of hair found in the plaster death mask made by South Australian Police in the late 1940s. Somerton man mystery 'solved' as DNA points to man's - CNN But after more than 70 years, a researcher says he's solved the mystery - Somerton Man was Carl Webb. In addition, witness statements have disappeared from the police file over the years.[8]. "It's a triangulation from two different, totally distant parts of the [family] tree," Prof Abbott told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. AEST = Australian Eastern Standard Time which is 10 hours ahead of GMT (Greenwich Mean Time), abc.net.au/news/somerton-man-identified-melbourne-born-engineer-researcher-says/101272182, Jock Zonfrillo remembered as an 'incredible chef' and icon of Australia's culinary landscape, Jock Zonfrillo, celebrated chef and judge on MasterChef Australia, dies aged 46, Major route into the Kokoda track appears to have been blockaded amid tour operator feud, Russian freight train derails after being hit by explosive device, governor says, Tony Abbott mounts attack on Voice after a spat with parliamentary committee, 'The worm goes global': Rita Ora wowed by Adelaide lobbyist's dancefloor moves, Female teacher admits sexual offences against teen student, fights 10 other charges, New Zealand PM in favour of country becoming a republic, US authorities 'auction' First Republic Bank after second biggest bank failure in history. [42] In his book on the case, Gerry Feltus stated that when he interviewed Thomson in 2002, he found that she was either being "evasive" or she "just did not wish to talk about it". The Advertiser first mentioned the case in a small article on page three of its morning edition of 2 December 1948. The only problem is that the body is six feet under and seven decades old. It bore the phrase Tamm ShudPersian for its finished or its endedand was soon traced to The Rubiyt of Omar Khayym, a 12th-century book of Persian poetry popularized by an 1859 English translation. [77] The two were found by Neil McRae[note 7] of Largs Bay, who claimed he had seen the location of the two in a dream the night before. The case of the Somerton Man In 1948, the body of an unidentified man was found on Somerton Beach in Adelaide, Australia. There is some uncertainty about the circumstances under which the book was found. The Somerton Man had his prints taken a couple of days after he was found and a few weeks later they were forwarded to all the English speaking countries: Scotland Yard, The RCMP (Canada), the FBI, New Zealand, South Africa, Ireland, then the mammoth task of sending copies to every police station in Australia. The poem's subject led police to theorise that the man had committed suicide by poison, although no other evidence corroborated the theory. And so he was buried in Adelaide cemetery in 1949 with a tombstone reading: "Here lies the unknown man who was found at Somerton Beach.". Derek Abbott, from the University of Adelaide, says the body of a man found on one of the city's beaches in 1948 belonged to Carl "Charles" Webb, an electrical engineer and instrument . [83] Other key evidence no longer exists, such as the brown suitcase, which was destroyed in 1986. Tamam Shud Case: Everything We Know About The Somerton Man - PEDESTRIAN.TV "I'm hoping, ashis name gets out there, there will be somebody that will have an old photo album in a garden shed somewhere.". After finding a match to a distant cousin, the researchers constructed a family tree of some 4,000 people. Still, she denied knowing the man, and authorities didnt press her on the issue. Please enable Javascript or try a different browser. Webb, who was born in the Australian state of Victoria in 1905, fit the bill. From there, the trail went cold. Is climate change killing Australian wine? Carolyn Bilsborow, a film-maker and director of the documentary Missing Pieces about Somerton man, said the news was incredibly exciting. For decades, authorities, academics and the public alike have traded theories about the identity of the mysterious Somerton Man, whose body was found on a beach outside of Adelaide, Australia, on December 1, 1948. Between 8:30a.m. to 10:50am: There is no satisfactory explanation for what The Somerton Man does during these hours. "I have spoken to them, except they're all of a generation well below him and so none of them knew himand have no photos in their old family albums or in their garden sheds, unfortunately," he said. [58], The News featured their story on its first page, giving more details of the dead man. Although it was a very common practice to use name tags, it was also common when buying secondhand clothing to remove the tags of the previous owners. [91][92], An exhumation was carried out on 19 May 2021. I was convinced that he was from Europe maybe a displaced person after the second world war [who] was here alone., But to find out that hes Australian, from Victoria, and that he died, and no one obviously noticed he was missing, or no one followed up with the police that he was missing I find that particularly kind of tragic.. The man was well-built, about 40 to 50 years old, 5. Reflecting on the identification, Carolyn Bilsborow, a filmmaker who directed a 2018 documentary about the Somerton Man, tells the Guardian: We had all these grandiose ideas about him being Russian, American and European. [59][60] That same day, The News published a photograph of the dead man on its front page,[61] leading to additional calls from members of the public about his possible identity. However, she also reported that, at some time in late 1948, an unidentified man had attempted to visit her and asked a next door neighbour about her. Somerton man mystery 'solved' as DNA points to man's identity The police believed that Clive had been dead for twenty-four hours when his body was found. A police report was made by Detective Don O'Doherty. [25][26] Police believed that whoever removed the clothing tags either overlooked these three items or purposely left the "Keane" tags on the clothes, knowing Keane was not the dead man's name. [65] Police were skeptical, believing Walsh to be too old to be the dead man. Also in the suitcase was a thread card of Barbour brand orange waxed thread of "an unusual type" not available in Australiait was the same as that used to repair the lining in a pocket of the trousers the dead man was wearing. When an employee looked inside the case he told Harvey he had found an object inside the case he described as looking like a "needle". The ear shapes shared by both men were a "very good" match, although Henneberg also found what he called a "unique identifier"; a mole on the cheek that was the same shape and in the same position in both photographs. [32], On 6 June 1949, the body of two-year-old Clive Mangnoson was found in a sack in the Largs Bay sand hills, about 20 kilometres (12mi) up the coast from Somerton Park. Although poisoning remained a prime suspicion, the pasty was not believed to be the source. [49] She suggested that her mother and the Somerton man may both have been spies, noting that Jessica Thomson taught English to migrants, was interested in communism, and could speak Russian, although she would not disclose to Kate where she had learned it or why. Police suspect the calls may be a hoax and the caller may be the same person who also terrorised a woman in a nearby suburb who had recently lost her husband in tragic circumstances. In fact, theres probably more questions than there were yesterday, when we didnt have his name. The Somerton man mystery began in the early hours of December 1, 1948, when beachgoers found a body lying on Somerton beach in Adelaide. Mystery of the somerton man: Taman Shud case - Caso Criminal In 1951, Dorothy was reportedly living in Bute, South Australia, 144km (89mi) from Adelaide. Lawson's diary entry for that day names her as "Mrs Thompson" and states that she had a "nice figure" and was "very acceptable" (referring to the level of attractiveness) which allows the possibility of an affair with the Somerton man. As Hilary Whiteman reports for CNN, a new DNA analysis suggests the Somerton Man is Carl Charles Webb, an electrical engineer from Melbourne who vanished from the public record in April 1947. A researcher focusing on the famous Somerton man case believes that he has identified the man who washed . Police begin work to exhume the body in the early hours of Wednesday morning. [51] According to Leane, he described her reaction upon seeing the cast as "completely taken aback, to the point of giving the appearance that she was about to faint". A post-mortem ruled he had died from. 6:30am: Found dead by John Lyons and two men with a horse. Feltus in 2010 claimed he was given permission by Thomson's family to disclose her names and that of her husband, Prosper Thomson. They included a suitcase, more items of clothing with their labels removed, and incoherent writings believed to be a code. A plaster bust of the so-called Somerton Man, Investigators have never been able to decipher the code found in the man's book, Who killed 'Little Red Riding Hood'? Egan was Robins granddaughter. Ep 239: The Somerton Man - Mystery Solved? - Astonishing Legends In 1945, at the Clifton Gardens Hotel in Sydney, she had given it to an Australian Army lieutenant named Alf Boxall, who was serving at the time in the Water Transport Section of the Royal Australian Engineers. Mystery of Somerton man's identity solved after 73 years, researchers in Australia say This week Prof Derek Abbott of the University of Adelaide claimed to have identified Somerton man as. Was he murdered? But to find out that hes Australian, from Victoria, and that he died, and no one obviously noticed he was missing, or no one followed up with the police that he was missingI find that particularly kind of tragic. They observed that the format of the code also appeared to follow the quatrain format of Rubaiyat, leading them to theorise that the code was a one-time pad encryption algorithm. Copies of Rubaiyat, as well as the Talmud and Bible, were being compared to the code using computers to get a statistical base for letter frequencies. Derek Abbott, a physicist and electronic engineer at the University of Adelaide, and Colleen Fitzpatrick, a forensic genealogist who specializes in using DNA to solve cold cases, identified the Somerton Man using hairs caught in his death mask. [11][12] Witnesses said the body was in the same position when the police viewed it. The Somerton man mystery began in the early hours of December 1, 1948, when beachgoers found a body lying on Somerton beach in Adelaide. Born in Footscray, a suburb of Melbourne, on November 16, 1905, Webb was the sixth child of a German-born man and an Australian woman, writes ABCs Rebecca Opie. A suicide note perhaps? Complete remains of Somerton Man in 'reasonable condition' after exhumation, Nurse driving home from shift among victims of triple-fatal crash involving allegedly stolen car, Lauren Cranston jailed for eight years over one of Australia's biggest tax frauds, 'They will forever know their dad was a hero': 1,000 mourners farewell slain NSW paramedic, Family of man shot dead by police question why they weren't called in to help, There are 11 First Nations MPs and senators. In reply, Boxall says "no", and when asked if Harkness could have known, Boxall replies: "Not unless somebody else told her." Somerton Man body-on-the-beach mystery solved as family secrets unravel | Australian Story ABC News In-depth 1.22M subscribers Subscribe 21K Share 1M views 2 months ago #AustralianStory. Tucked inside the watch pocket in his pants was a slip of paper with Persian words printed on it which meant "finished.". The Somerton Man's suitcase and its forgotten fingerprints However, in July 1949, Boxall was found in Sydney and the final page of his copy of Rubaiyat (reportedly a 1924 edition published in Sydney) was intact, with the words "Tamam Shud" still in place. Last month Ms Chapman said the decision to exhume the body followed "intense public interest" in the case. "We have evidence that he had separated from his wife, and that she had moved to South Australia, so possibly, he had come to track her down.". An inquest into the man's death, conducted by coroner Thomas Erskine Cleland, commenced a few days following the discovery of the body but was adjourned until 17 June 1949. Somerton Man's death: Unearthed records a step closer to solving Its hard to see this as anything other than intentional, Fiona-Ellis Jones, host of The Somerton Man Mystery podcast, tells the Australian Broadcasting Companys (ABC) Bridget Judd. [11] Other than that, the coroner was unable to reach a conclusion as to the man's identity, cause of death, or whether the man seen alive at Somerton Beach on the evening of 30 November was the same man, as nobody had seen his face at that time. Professor Abbott said Webb was born in Footscray on November 16,1905 to Richard August Webb (1866-1939) and Eliza Amelia Morris Grace (1871-1946). [7] He was clean-shaven[7] and carried no identification, which led police to believe he had committed suicide. Your Privacy Rights "Sorry, The Unknown Man is (very probably) not H.C. Reynolds", "New twist in Somerton Man mystery as fresh claims emerge", "An immaculate corpse, a secret code and Australia's strangest cold case", "Somerton Man to be exhumed by police in attempt to solve mystery", "Somerton Man exhumation to be carried out in hope of solving decades-long mystery", "Complete remains of Somerton Man in 'reasonable condition' after exhumation", "Somerton man: Body exhumed in bid to solve Australian mystery". [49] Abbott also subsequently wrote to Rau in support of the Egans, saying that exhumation for DNA testing would be consistent with federal government policy of identifying soldiers in war graves, to bring closure to their families. The body of a man found on a South Australian beach more than 70 years ago has been exhumed in the hope of solving one of the country's most intriguing mysteries. [6] He was lying back with his head resting against the seawall, with his legs extended and his feet crossed. 28 February 1918: H. C. Reynolds identity card issued. A man showed police a 1941 edition of Edward FitzGerald's (1859) translation of Rubaiyat, published by Whitcombe and Tombs in Christchurch, New Zealand. Fitzpatrick said the DNA evidence disproves any genetic relationship with Robin Thomson, and therefore Abbotts own wife Robin Thomsons daughter, Rachel Egan whom Abbott met during investigations. 26 July 2022: Derek Abbott announces that his DNA analysis has identified the man as Carl "Charles" Webb, an electrical engineer and instrument maker born in Melbourne in 1905. One newspaper article refers to the book being found about a week or two before the body was found. Researchers now say the man is Carl Charles Webb, an electrical engineer from Melbourne. "So When That Angel of the Darker Drink", Australian Security Intelligence Organisation, "World War II Nominal Roll, "Boxall, Alfred", "List of facts on the Taman Shud Case that are often misreported", "Somerton Man identified as Melbourne electrical engineer, researcher says", "Seven-decade mystery of Somerton Man solved", "Professor's 15-year search for answers seeks to crack the secret code to the death of the 'Somerton man' found on an Adelaide beach", Unidentified Body Found at Somerton Beach, South Australia, on 1st December 1948, "Unsolved Death from 1948: The Somerton Man (The Taman Shud Case)", 'Unparalleled Mystery' Of Somerton Body Case, Curious aspects of unsolved beach mystery, Army Officer Sought to Help Solve Somerton Body Case, Unbreakable: Somerton Man's poetic mystery, "Computational linguistic analysis of the Tamam Shud Cipher", "No Sydney Clue to Dead Man Found at Somerton, S.A.", A Body, A Secret Pocket and a Mysterious Code, 30-Year-Old Death Riddle Probed In New Series, "Jessica Thomson's reaction to the dead man's bust", Somerton body said to be that of wood cutter, Somerton Body may be that of station hand. The copy not only had its last page torn out, but also incoherent writing believed to be a code on its back cover. 8:30a.m. to 10:50am: The Somerton Man is presumed to have arrived in Adelaide by train. They found that the Somerton Man belonged to haplogroup H4a1a1a, possessed by only 1% of Europeans. Mangnoson was born in Adelaide on 4 May 1914 and served as a Private in the Australian Army from 11 June 1941 until his discharge on 7 February 1945. There is no evidence that police knew in 1949 that she was not married. He was the youngest of six siblings and married Dorothy Robertson, known as Doff Webb. [5], Carl Webbs father Richard August Webb (died in 1939) had emigrated to Australia from Hamburg, Germany. In October 1941, he married Dorothy Jean Robertson, who is listed on the couples marriage certificate as a 21-year-old foot specialist. Australia's Greatest Mystery The Somerton Man An unknown dead body on an Adelaide Beach in post-war Australia In 1948 an unknown nameless man washed up on Somerton Park Beach in Adelaide,. Thomson's real name was considered important because it may be the decryption key for the purported code. Is climate change killing Australian wine? Although the last character in this line of text looks like an "L", it is fairly clear on closer inspection of the image that this is formed from an "I" and the extension of the line used to delete or underline that line of text. The man was well-built, about 40 to 50 years old, 1.8 metres tall, and had grey-blue eyes and gingery-brown hair that was greying at the sides. The Somerton Man code was actually cracked in late June 2020. [36] Public library officials called in to translate the text identified it as a phrase meaning "ended" or "finished" found on the last page of Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. The tags on his suit had been cut off, and forensic examiners suspected he had been poisoned. The case has been considered, since the early stages of the police investigation, "one of Australia's most profound mysteries". Walsh had left Adelaide several months earlier to buy sheep in Queensland but had failed to return at Christmas as planned. Tragic End To Four-day Search For Father And Son, "BOXALL ALFRED: Service Number NX83331". Johnson identified himself at a police station. Inside his pocket were the printed words "Tamam Shud", which means "finished . [43], In 1978, following a request from ABC Television's journalist Stuart Littlemore, Department of Defence cryptographers analysed the handwritten text. So possibly, he had come to track her down," he told the ABC. [27] A nationwide circulation of the dry-cleaning marks also proved fruitless. Its possible that [Webb] came to this state to try and find her, Abbott tells CNN. He added that there was sufficient DNA evidence to "definitively"disprove any links with his wife Rachel Egan, whose father ballet dancer Robin Thomson was believed to have potentially been a descendant of the Somerton Man. Between 11:00a.m. and 11:15a.m: Checks a brown suitcase into the railway station cloak room. When the bakery closed down, Carl retrained as an electrical instrument maker. Video, 00:02:36Who killed 'Little Red Riding Hood'? The City Baths on King William St. were accessed from the station's northern exit via a lane way. [103] However, Rachel Egan's DNA has been analysed and links were found to the grandparents of Prosper Thomson. Searches conducted by the US National Archives, the UK National Archives and the Australian War Memorial Research Centre have failed to find any records relating to H. C. Reynolds. However, the police did state that the body was consistent with that of a man who had been a wood cutter, although the state of the man's hands indicated he had not cut wood for at least eighteen months. Who killed 'Little Red Riding Hood'? [32] He added that this evidence fitted in with the theory that the body may have been brought to Somerton Park beach after the man's death, accounting for the lack of evidence of vomiting and convulsions, which are the two main physiological reactions to poison. 10 p.m.11 p.m.: Estimated time he had eaten a pasty based on time of death. [113], The marriage was not a harmonious one, largely due to Carl's personality. [48] Nevertheless, the names Feltus used in his book were pseudonyms. A month after his death, police found a suitcase believed to belong to him at the Adelaide Railway Station. And then and then came Spring, and Rose-in-hand [11] They speculated he had showered and shaved at the adjacent City Baths (although there was no Baths ticket on his body) before returning to the railway station to purchase a ticket for the 10:50a.m. train to Henley Beach, which, for whatever reason, he did not board. This Twitter post cannot be displayed in your browser. 16 RACHEL EGAN'S DNA LINKED TO PROSPER THOMSON.. - The Somerton Man [53], Thomson also said that while she was working at Royal North Shore Hospital in Sydney during World War II,[42] she had owned a copy of Rubaiyat. [5], On 1 December 1948 at 6:30am, the police were contacted after the body of a man was discovered on Somerton Park beach near Glenelg, about 11km (7mi) southwest of Adelaide, South Australia. You may want to read Twitters cookie policy, external and privacy policy, external before accepting. He was put to rest in an Adelaide cemetery under a headstone reading only "the unknown man". As a result of their conversations with Thomson, police suspected that Boxall was the dead man. Australia's "Somerton Man" Mystery Solved After 7 Decades, Says - NDTV On December 1, 1948, the body of a man was found on Somerton beach. [note 2] Detective Sergeant Lionel Leane, who led the initial investigation, often protected the privacy of witnesses in public statements by using pseudonyms;[14] Leane referred to the man who found the book by the pseudonym "Ronald Francis" and he has never been officially identified. [110], Abbott's research indicates Webb enjoyed betting on horses, thus the coded messages could be horse names. [94] The remains were deeper in the ground than previously thought. Bilsborow said: Now that weve got his name, theres still so many questions. [90], In October 2019, however, Attorney-General Vickie Chapman granted approval for his body to be exhumed to extract DNA for analysis. Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday. It was noted that the movement seen by witnesses at 7 p.m. could have been the last convulsion preceding death. The cryptographers reported that it would be impossible to provide "a satisfactory answer": if the text were an encrypted message, its brevity meant that it had "insufficient symbols" from which a clear meaning could be extracted, and the text could be the "meaningless" product of a "disturbed mind". Adelaide's 73-Year-Old MysteryThe Somerton Man | Unsettling & Unsolved 500 Apologies, but something went wrong on our end. The pathologist, Dr. Dwyer, concluded: "I am quite convinced the death could not have been natural the poison I suggested was a barbiturate or a soluble hypnotic". They then tracked down the man's living relatives, using their DNA to confirm his identity. Solving the Somerton man mystery: no Russian spy, just a bit of a loner Did he die by suicide? Abbott had attempted to contact the Thomson family, but upon finding both Jo Thomson and her son Robin Thomson dead, sought expert opinion which showed biological links between Robin and the Somerton man likely due to sharing the same rare dental and ear conditions, on top of the muscular calves which helped Thomson become a professional dancer. July 1948: "Prosper McTaggart Thomson, hire car proprietor, of Moseley Street, Glenelg" appears in Adelaide Local Court as defendant in a car sale dispute, dating from November 1947, establishing Prosper Thomson as active in Adelaide from 1947. [113] In 1941, he married Dorothy "Doff" Robertson, a pharmacist and chiropodist. Detective H. Strangway and Constable J. Moss are enquiring.