Latest / Wicked and Grim: A True Crime Podcast / Who Put Bella In The Wych Elm?

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Who Put Bella In The Wych Elm? · Wicked and Grim: A True Crime Podcast

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Well, hello there, my name's Ben.
• 0:05
  Speaker 2: I'm Nicole, and you're listening to Wicked and Grim, a
• 0:08
  Speaker 2: true crime podcast.
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: Warning, the following podcast material intended warman's your audience, the
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: listener just question.
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: For some reason, you like caught me off guard at
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: that intro. I did, like I was just sitting here
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: drinking my tea and be like, oh shit, this is
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: what we're doing.
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: You watched me hit record.
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: I didn't action. My MIC's in the way. I can't see.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: Well, you're staring at your microphone, man, I guess is
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: it an interesting microphone? How's that vantage point?
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: Oh? Well, you know I have micshus in my face.
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: Well that's because it is face. It's right there.
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah, welcome to wicketing ground. How's everyone doing. We're actually
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: drinking hot drinks today, not alcohol. I was freezing. I
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: need a tea.
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: I am tired. I needed coffee.
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: There you go, yeah boom.
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: And we're recording early today.
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: Oh yes, we're basically like, got our homework done early
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: for once in our lives.
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: Instead of recording the day before the podcast night before,
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: the night before, literally hours before, we're actually a whole
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: day ahead. It's Sunday right now.
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: Sunday Night.
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: Good for us, high five.
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: And this one five I hit my mic way to go.
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: I'm actually really proud of us, Like, seriously, we deserve
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: that patent on the back.
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: We do, we do oneundred percent. We also need a
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: pat in the back for something else that's going on.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: What's that The website that.
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: We're starting that you're doing, it looks freaking bab.
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: It's it's pretty blah right now.
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: I thought it looked good.
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: Well, thank you. I appreciate that it's bare bones at
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: this moment, and I'm sure by the time we get
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: it updated. We're starting to updated, but uploaded and out
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: there on the interwebs for people to go visit, it's
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: still gonna be pretty bare bones and we'll just develop
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: it over time. But to get something.
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: Out there, it doesn't have to be fancy.
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: No, it's not gonna be fancy.
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: We're not fancy, but I mean, like, it's not.
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: Going to have a bunch of stuff on it. It's
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: going to be pretty basic. You can listen to the
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: podcast episodes on there. We're gonna have a little bit
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: of a blog that we're not going to post a
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: lot on, but we will post some updates that sort
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: of stuff, some little bit of behind the scenes for
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: you guys, and other.
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: Stuff, stuff and things, stuff.
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: And things and things and stuff.
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: There you go. It sounds awesome. Everyone's going to want
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: to check it out exactly just like our description, just
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: like everyone's gonna run.
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: We sold it. We sold it. We're going to be
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: a whole Netflix series here seeing with this website, just
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: people like, oh my god, get them on Netflix and
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: need a show speaking a show. Actually that was a
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: good like interlude with this.
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: What was actually transitions ad on the back. Wow.
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: So we started doing a little bit of logging today. Yeah,
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: so we're going to post stuff on a YouTube channel soon.
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: We were going to give that out to you guys soon.
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: We don't even know the name of It's not gonna
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: be Wickeding Graham, I don't think, because it's going to
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: involve like more lifestyle lifestyle stuff.
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: Well yeah, because the blog today was like just a
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: shit show really of our life. It was because our
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: life is kind of a shit show right now, and
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: I just wanted to say too. Our tiny home is
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: officially started being built.
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: Yes, the constructions being built.
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: We got photos on Friday.
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: It was unreal and We talked about that in the
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: blog that we're going to get up hopefully soon, but
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: god knows when.
• 3:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so that's super cool. It's yeah, it was a
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: bit of an interesting blog, but it's still that's just
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: what our life is right now.
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah. You can tell we're tired, you can tell we're
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: run down. You can tell we're also like excited for
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: what's happening.
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: But I'm like, this close to being on the verge
• 3:54
  Speaker 2: is starting to drink coffee, Like shit, we're getting there
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: by the end of the summer. I might be drinking coffee.
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: We need to get you. We need to get a
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: French press so you can have actual like delicious.
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: It's coming. I need it. It's coming. And then one
• 4:08
  Speaker 2: more quick thing. So much to talk about. We had
• 4:13
  Speaker 2: our giveaway we did, which was super cool. Thanks for
• 4:16
  Speaker 2: entering every one.
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: I'm actually pretty pumped to give this away.
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so we're gonna announce it tomorrow or Monday, but
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: then you guys will be hearing this on Tuesday, so
• 4:27
  Speaker 2: it's already announced the winner, So.
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: Hour tomorrow, but you're yesterday if you're listening to this
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: on Tuesday, Yes, tomorrow or Monday, we're posting it on Instagram.
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: The winner. It's already been closed, but the winter is
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: being announced Monday.
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: So congrats early. Congrats to them.
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: Okay, I thought you're almost gonna say it. Just congrats
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: to them. Don't say who, don't give it away.
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: I'm not. I want to, but I'm not. I'm keeping
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: a secret for once in my life.
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: Congratulations. So all this craziness aside, Are you ready for
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: the story?
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: I am, because I will. You've given me a little
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: bit of a hints, but I've never heard of this,
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: so I'm pretty calmed.
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: Well, this one. This is the story of a girl
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: crowded river and drowned the whole. Sorry, I've been wanting
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: to do that since we started this podcast.
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: I'm into it already. Let's go.
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: She looks so sad and photographs and.
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: What No, who is it again?
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: It's some bands, it's not. It's a dude singer.
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: Okay. Well, you like Avrilvine, so I thought.
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: It was just love Avril. She's my girl. She's my girl.
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: I'm not afraid to admit that you're not. But anyways,
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: this is the story of a girl.
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: But it's at it is.
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: This is a story of who put bella in the
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: witch elm. This is a mystery that has been baffling
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: people for years. Ke we just jumped up as a
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: as a visitor here. So he may bump microphones.
• 5:54
  Speaker 2: He's doing good so far.
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: So far, he might he might bother you, but he's
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: he's an attention horror. Let's put it that way.
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: He likes his attention.
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: Yep. Okay, So let's get into this on who put
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: Bella in the witch ow Wow? Okay, Okay. So on
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: April eighteenth, nineteen forty three, at the height of the
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: Second World War, four boys were in the area of
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: Witchbury Hill. This is a hill situated off Birmingham Road
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: in Worcestershire, England. Okay, I thought, I totally thought it
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: was going to be pe.
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: She did that really good because I almost cringed for you.
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: That's like one of the worst words to pus in
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: the English language. I nailed.
• 6:34
  Speaker 2: I would honestly probably not even do the case if
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: I had to say that, fucking.
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: World, that's that's a legitimate response right there. I was
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: mortified about it. I think I think that's the only
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: time I put it in here, So I think I'm
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: good from here on the job. So anyways, the four
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: boys were Robert Hart, Thomas Willette's, Bob Farmer, and Fred Payne. Okay,
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: now these four boys that were out poaching and bird nesting,
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: Okay in the Hagley Wood.
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: What does that mean? Bird nesting?
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: I'll get into it here in a second.
• 7:07
  Speaker 2: Oh.
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: Okay, in Hagley Wood, which is like this specific forested
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: area Okay, and it's a part of the Hagley Estate
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: which belongs to Lord Cobham near Witchbury Hill. So it's
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: this estate land owned by this dude basically, so it's
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: private property.
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: So okay, Yeah, I was just going to say they're
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: like trespassing basically.
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Okay, So like the poaching and bird nesting, it
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: wasn't an uncommon thing really because we're talking World War two,
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: which is like people are low on rations, you know,
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: families are pretty poverty stricken sort of thing. So basically
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: what they're doing is they're going out searching and raiding
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: bird nests for eggs.
• 7:46
  Speaker 2: Really.
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so they're trying to they're scavenging for food where
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: they can't, it's what they're doing. So, yeah, they're out
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: trying to find fine eggs for their families and stuff.
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: It's kind of sad, it is. I can't imagine having
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: to go through a time where you're actually out looking
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: for eggs just to survive.
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, because I can't imagine it's like tasty that the
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: eggs are finding.
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: Well, I mean depends on the eggs really, but I guess.
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: But yeah, I mean food is food at that point
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: in time, right, Okay. So while they're out looking in
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: the woods and searching for these these nests and eggs,
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: they came across a large witch elm tree, which would
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: be an ideal location for birds to nest in. So
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: one of the boys, Bob, began to climb the tree
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: and look for a nest. As he climbed, he glanced
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: down into the hollow trunk of the tree and saw
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: a skull sitting in the darkness.
• 8:37
  Speaker 2: That would be such a scary sight.
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: It I can't imagine. I would have shit myself.
• 8:41
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I would have fallen out of the tree,
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: broke a leg.
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: He didn't shit himself, He didn't fall out a tree,
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: he didn't break a leg. At first, he actually thought
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: it was an animal skull. Oh, may have crawled in
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: the tree, you know, to like die of old age.
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: Or something like that, or whatever it may be. He
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: quickly realized that when he grabbed the skull to pick
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: it up, there was long hair attached and the human
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: teeth gave way, just for him to realize it wasn't
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: an animal, it was human remains.
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: Oh man, okay, So like the hair stays attached with
• 9:12
  Speaker 2: these skulls.
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: Well, like think like dried skin and stuff like. It's
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: like when you find a bone, there's stuff stuck to it.
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: Still it's not perfectly bleached clean, depending on how long
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: it's been there.
• 9:25
  Speaker 2: I gah.
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: So there was still hair, not fully attached, but there
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: was still hair attached to the skull.
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: I don't really know if I've really seen anything like that,
• 9:32
  Speaker 2: So I don't. I have no idea.
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: I've got a picture I can show you later, okay, okay,
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: an actual picture of the skull that was found. So really,
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: so we already went over this. The boys were doing
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: a few things wrong here. They were trespassing on property.
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah right, so they're poaching like it's it's not They
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: weren't doing things they're supposed to be doing. So they
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: ended up putting the skull back, and the four boys
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: decided they were they would return home and they wouldn't
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: mention their discovery to anybody, really to remain a secret
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: between the four boys.
• 10:03
  Speaker 2: Oh that's kind of shocking, but.
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: We all know what happens when you're like, we're not
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: going to talk, it's going to be a secret. Someone talks.
• 10:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, always when they're young, right, Yeah.
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: I believe they were like young teenagers, like fourteen or
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: something like that.
• 10:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so that's not going to get held in.
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah. So once they got home, the youngest boy, Thomas,
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: he didn't like what happened. He didn't sit easy with them, right,
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: so he reported what he found to his parents. Okay,
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: his parents in turn quickly called the police, and the
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: Hagley Wood quickly transformed from a quiet, somber forest into
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: a sorrow and active crime scene.
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: M dun dun dum. Yeah.
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: I can't imagine just being out in the bush with
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: the boys kind of things, hanging out with the friends,
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: and you're just like, we just found a dead body.
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: I know.
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: That seems to happen a lot in Hollywood though.
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: Well that's honestly too. How like a lot of bodies
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: are found though it's like people well going for a
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: walk or something, or like fishing or something, and they
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: come across like like, if I ever found a dead body,
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: I would I think that would haunt me for a
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: life probably, Like that's terrifying.
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: So they found a dead body. Imagine going for a run,
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: your morning run, you find a dead body. That's what
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: these boys are doing. That's yeah, happened, that's what they're
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: going through.
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: Yikes.
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: So the skull that was found clearly is valuable evidence
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: in that it's still had some tots of hair. You know,
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: you can have some DNA could show what the person
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: may have looked like. Whatever that is.
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: Well, and I'm just gonna say it's good that they
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: probably said something because they touched or the one boil
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: least touched it.
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: It's like, well, I've seen mixed reports on it. That's
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: why I didn't include this on the air. How they
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: picked it up. Some reports said they picked it up
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: with a stick. Oh okay, so I wasn't. I couldn't
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: find definitive answers on that.
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: Well, yeah, I definitely wouldn't want to just grab it.
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: And this isn't the forties two. I'm not too sure
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: how fingerprints necessarily worse true. So they also had dental
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: patterns despite some missing teeth. But the police, hold on,
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: I totally missed my sentence up, messed my sentence up there,
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: that's right, Okakay, So yeah, they still had a clear
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: dental pattern despite some missing teeth. Okay, there we go.
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: I don't know how old this person is.
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: We're getting into it. So the police not only pulled
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: a skull from the witch Elm hollow, there was also
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: an entire skeleton inside the tree. The only thing that
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: was missing was a hand. Further investigation revealed a trail
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: of finger bones scattered around the outside of the tree
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: as well, to make up said missing hand.
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: Really yep, that's kind of odd.
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: Definitely, And there's that kind of plays into some theories later.
• 12:48
  Speaker 2: On too, like that's really weird. Just they removed their
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: fingers and sprinkled it around the friggin tree like it
• 12:55
  Speaker 2: was sparkles.
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: It was sparkling, like just some very dust.
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: It's weird.
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: Well, there's some we'll get into it later. But one
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: of the things is it could potentially be animal even right,
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: animals could have gotten to the bones, So, I mean,
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: we don't know for sure. Police also found clothing remnants,
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: a shoe, inside the tree, and the other shoe was
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: outside the tree, a gold wedding ring and some costume
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: jewelry on and around the remnants. Aside from these few clues,
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: there was no solid evidence that could identify the body,
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: and until an autopsy was performed, there is no way
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: of knowing how long that body had actually been hidden
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: inside the witch elm interesting. So now we're starting to
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: get into a little bit more of the body. Now
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: I'm going to be able to answer some things, like
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: you're talking about with age.
• 13:48
  Speaker 2: I have like a million questions, like I'm not honestly
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: holding back so much.
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: Okay, hit me with a couple of questions. I'm not
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: going to answer them right now. Just hit me and
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: let's see what's on your mind.
• 13:57
  Speaker 2: I'm curious, Well, I want to know how old they are?
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: For one now they've all left me for some reason.
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: Just how old are they now?
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: No, there was another one that was like burning and
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: I put it aside. Oh my gosh, what the heck
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: was it? Oh it's gone, it's gone.
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: Okay, Okay, it's.
• 14:19
  Speaker 2: Going to come back to me and I'm going to
• 14:20
  Speaker 2: intrupt you and ask.
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: Oh great, okay, Well, moving on from that, Once the
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: remains were recovered from the tree, medical examiner professional sorry
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: Professor James Webster was called in to investigate. He discovered
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: a number of crucial facts about the remains. He was
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: able to identify the body was female remains.
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: Okay, that was one question.
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: He believed the woman had passed away approximately eighteen months
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: prior to being discovered, so that would put it in
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: October of nineteen forty one. Okay, yeah, which provided months
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: a fairly specific timeline to police, which was good.
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: Because my other question was like, could could they just
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: have crawled in there and then got stuck and then died.
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: Maybe it's not even foul play. That was my other thing.
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: That kind of gets into some theories which I didn't
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: really touch on that one specifically, but there was some
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: talk about a person climbing in there on their own,
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: and they wouldn't have been able to do so without
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: severely harming themselves.
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: Oh okay, Okay.
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: Theoretically so okay, Okay. Anyway, I wasn't supposed to answer
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: your question, should I just did? Damn it?
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: I that have been last episode two.
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: We're bad for that.
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah, we're bad. We just like to answer each other
• 15:37
  Speaker 2: or something wrong with that.
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: No, okay, moving on, moving on, and not answering your
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: questions anymore. Listen to the story, figure it out, okay, okay.
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: So Professor Webster also deduced that the woman had met
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: her and close to the scene. He realized that with
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: the small opening in the hollow of the witch elm,
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: she wouldn't have been able to be put inside the
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: tree after the body had the effects of rigamortis. In
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: other words, her body had been shoved inside the witch
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: elm still warm, which does lead people into that theory
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: of maybe she got in there on her own.
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: Oh okay, so interesting.
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: And there is a quote here actually from the medical examiner,
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: Professor James Webster. It's an excellent place for the concealment
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: of a murder, and I think it indicates local knowledge.
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: Well, that does actually seem like an awesome place to
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: store a body.
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And if you look at like what a witch
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: elm looks like, it's not really any tree that you
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: would think of. It's almost like this big mass of
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: jumbled twigs and branches, and like the trunk is super thick,
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: but it's made up of like almost several different trees.
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: Oh and then it's like fairly stumpy with like major
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: branches going out, so it's like this crazy mass of
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: shit and it'd be a great place to put a body.
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: Are you gonna post a picture of what it like?
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: A tree like that looks like? Yeah? Probably could, at
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: least in our stories because I'm intrigued or I.
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: Mean, if you're not wanting to see her Instagram, there's
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: always Google. But yeah, I'll definitely at least Instagram. I
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: was trying to be nice and not push our social media. Okay.
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: So Professor Webster's finding also indicated that the woman had
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: been approximately thirty five years old at the time of
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: her death.
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: Okay, it's pretty young.
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: She had light brown hair and had been found to
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: have given birth to one child, and her skeleton measured
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: just five sorry I wrote that funny, just five feet
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: in height.
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: Oh.
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: Her bones also showed that she had no signs of
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: disease or trauma, but her lower jaw showed natural irregularities
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: and distinctive overlapping front teeth on the bottom. So because
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: of these irregularities in the jaw, police were confident they
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: were they would soon establish her identity.
• 17:49
  Speaker 2: Oh okay, I was like, what does that mean. Okay,
• 17:51
  Speaker 2: So she's.
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: Got fairly distinctive bottom teeth.
• 17:54
  Speaker 2: Well, and she's quite short too.
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: Yep, exactly. And there was actually one tooth that had
• 17:59
  Speaker 1: recently been pulled. I didn't put this in here, but
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: it's worth noting. Oh, okay, there's one tooth that was
• 18:05
  Speaker 1: actually recently pulled to they're confident that maybe they could
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: find a dental record of some way missing, you know.
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: With this dental record, it seemed like a good place
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: where they're going to be able to find who this
• 18:16
  Speaker 1: person is.
• 18:17
  Speaker 2: And I should say she's petite, not short, because there's
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: nothing wrong.
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: With being VI space efficient there.
• 18:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and she's a mom. Yeah, so yeah, there's quite
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: a little details there, definitely.
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: So these facts were of course crucial, all these facts
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: that we've been talking about to the investigation. The determining
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: facts exactly on what made her meet her end was
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: more difficult than anticipated, though it was not certain exactly
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: the cause of her death there, but there was a
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: piece of taffaa found shoved in her mouth and taffida.
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: I had had.
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: To google this, okay, I was like, because I don't
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: know what that is taffaa.
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: And this is directly from Google believe it was Wikipedia. Uh,
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: this is defined as a fine, lustrous silk or similar
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: synthetic fabric with a crisp texture. So the piece of
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: cloth basically.
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: Okay, like she could have gotten it, what would that
• 19:14
  Speaker 2: be called it? Have it over her mouth or whatever,
• 19:17
  Speaker 2: like exphyxiated, exsixiating. Yeah, that's what I was trying to
• 19:20
  Speaker 2: think of it. I was like, it was not grumb
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: into my brain.
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: My next line here. This led investigators to believe the
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: cause of her death may have been exphyxiation. Okay, but
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: but one thing though, this cloth is where did this
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: come from? It's not matching her clothes or anything. It's
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: just this random cloth shoved in her throat. So kind
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: of weird, kind of suss if you ask me.
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but I feel like if you were doing that
• 19:43
  Speaker 2: to someone, you'd take whatever you had that you were
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: doing it with. Yeah, I don't I would anyway. I
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: don't know what that says about me, but I am minded.
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: You're careful, you're going to cover your track. But I mean,
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: if it was someone who shoved it down her throat
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: and then they shoved, we're in a witch elm. They're like,
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: no one's ever going to find her.
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: That's true. They probably and especially eighteen months later, like,
• 20:05
  Speaker 2: actually that's not that long. They probably anticipated it would
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: have been way longer, probably years and years.
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: Well, private property often in this bush on this trun
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: never found. Probably exactly. I would have thought if it
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: was me put in that body there, but like, good luck,
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: not happening.
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: But if there's anything that this podcast is teaching me,
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: it's that, Yeah, you need to cover your tracks because
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: you're gonna get caught.
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: So you are.
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: So clearly police were keen to establish an identity of
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: the female victim, and of course the identity of someone
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: who may or may not have murdered said victim.
• 20:40
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: This pushed them to actually put and publish a probable
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: description of the victim out in the paper in hopes
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: that the public may help find this individual, and they
• 20:51
  Speaker 1: published it on April twenty fourth, nineteen forty three. Okay,
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: and this is what the probable description said. Her age
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: is given as between twenty five and forty most probably
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: thirty five, height, five feet, with light brown hair, and
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: dressed in dark blue and mustard colored striped cardigan and
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: mustard colored skirt, blue crape soule shoes size five and
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: a half. All the garments were described as poor quality,
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: and a wedding ring found among the bones of was
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: of rolled gold.
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: That's a really good description. It is like really good.
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: So that's what they had to go on for the
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: public to be kind of helping them and try and
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: get identified for this person. Okay, the description didn't lead
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: to much. It did lead to some tips being called
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: in and such, but none of them really came out
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: with helpful information after being investigated. So they were kind
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: of just dead ends and no one really.
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: Had which is sure interesting because I feel like just
• 21:50
  Speaker 2: the fact alone that she was wearing a wedding ring
• 21:54
  Speaker 2: that someone you think would be missing.
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: Her would think huh Okay, I'm.
• 21:59
  Speaker 2: Very totally Some answers like I know you said this
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: is a mystery, but I'm like, I need to know
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: a bit more here.
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: Well, let's see where we go. So we already talked
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: about the dental record. While they were investigating leads from
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: the call ins, police were also chasing the dental records, okay,
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: and like I said, the distinctive protruding teeth. They were
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: hoping that no, we got someone who should be fairly identifiable,
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: but it was to no avail. They couldn't find anything
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: in dental records. Useless, useless dang. Yeah, so gang dang.
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: But her dental records also became a point of contention
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: though for some who believed that this woman may have
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: actually not been from the British area at all.
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: Oh, okay, that can actually super explain it.
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: Then, yeah, I mean, there's no dental records of her
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: around here or anything.
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: So because even if she was from a different area
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: and was reported missing, the local police might not have
• 22:58
  Speaker 2: no idea exactly.
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: So we're going to get into a little bit of
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: that later on. The theories are.
• 23:03
  Speaker 2: At the end, okay interesting.
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: They also tediously searched through piles and piles of missing
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: persons reports to see if any of them matched the
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: description of the deceased, but again there were no leads.
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: And I can only imagine going through the missing person's
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: reports for that because we're talking World War II here.
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: How many missing persons do you think there are?
• 23:24
  Speaker 2: No kidding? So, yeah, that definitely adds to it, doesn't it. Yep,
• 23:30
  Speaker 2: never thought about that.
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: So the investigation then turned towards the personal effects found
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: on the scene. The crape. Sold shoes were traced to
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: a company called Waterfoot Company in Lancashire, England. Investigators were
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: able to actually find all but six pairs of shoes
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: that were sold from a market's stall in Dudley, a
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: town approximately eighteen kilometers from Birmingham where the remains were found,
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: but they didn't find all the shoes or like where
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: they all went to, so they couldn't find one of
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: the victims that it was sold, which happened to be
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: this body in the tree. So dang again a cold trail, Huh.
• 24:06
  Speaker 2: They're like doing so much.
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: Here, they are doing a lot and everything is cold. Yes,
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: everything's cold. The complexity of this like investigation just meant
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: like everything was getting colder by every week that went past,
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: and it was ridiculous. The numerous tragedies over war actually
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: like swallowed up the focus on this case. Though. What
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: actually happened is because they're not making any progress on
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: this case, people are getting distracted, not really talking about
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: it much, and it just kind of almost forgotten about
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: and pushed aside.
• 24:40
  Speaker 2: Oh really, hey, yeah, because that is honestly one thing
• 24:42
  Speaker 2: that probably helps so much, well, it helps with like
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: anything really is word of mouth.
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: Hey, yeah, exactly. So there was an inquest for what
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: was being called the Tree murder riddle at the time,
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: and the verdict returned as murder by some person or
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: person's unknown, and that seemed to be the end of
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: the case.
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: Until Okay, I'm like, well that's not satisfying for me.
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: Can we go on a little more?
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: There's a little more here. Until Christmas of nineteen forty three,
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: the case took an even more perplexing twist, which was
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: about six months after the investigation started, mysterious graffiti began
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: to appear in the area, chalked on a wall of
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: an empty premises in Birmingham, where the words who put
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: Bella down? The witch elm Hagleywood.
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: Whoa.
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: This marked the first time the mysterious murdered woman had
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: been given a.
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: Name name Yeah, because I'm like, they had no.
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: Idea in her name, they had no idea her name,
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: and all of a sudden, she's now being called.
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: Belle Ella, which I actually really liked that name.
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: It's a nice name.
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: It's a really nice name.
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: So the writing on the wall was considered to be
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: too high for any of the young kids in the
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: area or anything to just be doing a harmless prank.
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: So it was considered that it was an adult doing
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: this and they took it very seriously.
• 26:04
  Speaker 2: Well, yeah, because this adult obviously had some inside ing
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: bo if it.
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: Was accurate, because it Oh my god, look at that.
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: It's true.
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: Her name's Bella.
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: So shortly after Descrubb discovering the writing, another message was
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: actually discovered. It had been reported months prior to this one,
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: but had yacht net but had not yet been connected
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: to the case, making this the first connected but the
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: second one in the series of graffitis.
• 26:37
  Speaker 2: Oh.
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: The other message that was done months prior read who
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: put Lubella down? The witch Elm And it was on
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: a house on Hayden Hill Road not far from the area.
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: And this was even before Okay, wait, would that have
• 26:54
  Speaker 2: been before the body was found?
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: No, it was after, because this.
• 26:57
  Speaker 2: Okay right, it was like six months later.
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so it would have been. I couldn't find exactly
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: when the first one on the house was written, so
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: I'm assuming it's probably like three months or something like
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: that after the body was found, And then when the
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: second one was found six months later, they realized that
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: the first one was also part of it. So Yeah,
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: a little bit of a topsy turvy thing going on there.
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: But we have two messages discovered.
• 27:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah, someone's playing with them.
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: Yep. Now, both these messages were done in the exact
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: same handwriting and the spelling for which ELM was done
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: exactly correct, because which elm isn't witch, it's wyh.
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: Oh really yes, okay.
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: So they both were in the same handwriting and spelled
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: the name of the tree correct, which most people would
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: spell it incorrect.
• 27:45
  Speaker 2: Huh.
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: Interesting, So it gave police very good reason to suspect
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: that this was the same person, and they had good
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: knowledge of what may have happened. Yeah, so now people
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: were on the lookout for someone named Bella and they
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: were once again looking for the public's help. So in
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: nineteen forty four, more messages actually began to appear with
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: similar writings and words, but eventually they began to all
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: say the same thing. Who put Bella in the witch Elm.
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: To this day, they haven't been able to identify Bella,
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: and the graffiti artist is also unidentified. I did find
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: one I did find one source. It was a YouTube
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: video where I can't remember the channel, but it was
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: this YouTube video very well populated YouTube channel. They claimed
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: that the graffiti artist was found and it was just
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: some random dude fucking with the police. They had no sources.
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: I searched up and down. I couldn't find any source
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: for any of that information. Everything I found, the graffiti
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: artist has never been found. So I'm just gonna throw
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: that sipulation out there that there might be something, but
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: I couldn't find anything about that interesting.
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: Well, that's not satisfying at all. I want to know.
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: So through the decades, as more and more notable messages
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: appeared in the same handwriting.
• 29:12
  Speaker 2: As well, I just have to say one thing really
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: quickly though. If it was just some random person who
• 29:17
  Speaker 2: had no connection to this case whatsoever, Like, I don't
• 29:21
  Speaker 2: feel like they go on with it, Like I don't
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: think so either, boring and what's the point, right, So
• 29:26
  Speaker 2: I think that this person knows something or had something
• 29:29
  Speaker 2: to do with it.
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: I think so too. And like, continuing through the decades,
• 29:33
  Speaker 1: the same person was writing messages and they could identify
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: through the handwriting.
• 29:37
  Speaker 2: You know, yeah, no, I yeah, I don't think.
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: Of course as copycats. Though they are getting copycat messages,
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: they can identify, they can identify which your copycat and
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: which are not. But at one point I believe it
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: was like in the seventies or something like. That was
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: the last message from the original.
• 29:53
  Speaker 2: Handwriting, really so it went on for it did.
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: We are still getting messages to this day though from
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: copy cats.
• 30:00
  Speaker 2: What a waste of resources. Don't be a copycat.
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: But the message has been slightly altered over time, and
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: now the message is who put Bella in the witch elm?
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: Spelling it the incorrect way?
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: W I t h okay, because it's not the main
• 30:18
  Speaker 2: person exactly, and they're just thinking it's spelled that way. Okay.
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: Two people out there who are SMRT thinking that they
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: got this.
• 30:27
  Speaker 2: No, I would spell it wrong.
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: Stay at home, play a call of duty. We don't
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: want to talk to you. Fuck off. So anyways, a
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: little more modern part to this story, where am I here? Okay?
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: So before we do get to the theories, Professor Caroline
• 30:44
  Speaker 1: Wilkinson of the Craney Official Identification at Dundee University recently
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: released photographs. A recently used photographs taken at the time
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: to digitally reconstruct what Bella may have looked like.
• 30:58
  Speaker 2: Oh okay, that's cool.
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: She could not use the actual skull, though she had
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: to go by photographs and I want to ask, why
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: do you think she was not able to use the skull?
• 31:11
  Speaker 2: Well, I was thinking. My first thought was because they
• 31:13
  Speaker 2: don't have it anymore.
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: Yep. The skull was lost. They lost Bella's fucking skull,
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: like the police.
• 31:20
  Speaker 2: Yea, what the shit? Really yep, because I was like, oh,
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: maybe they like like buried it or something. No, how
• 31:27
  Speaker 2: do you lose a fucking skull?
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: I don't know. It had been housed at the Birmingham
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: Birmingham Forensics Lab then moved to the Politi City base.
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: Someone must have stole it or something. That's mess.
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: I don't know. The skulls whereabouts are not known. Cool
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: and it's actually been like admitted by police yet we
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: don't fucking know.
• 31:47
  Speaker 2: That's sad.
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: There's been investigators looking into it and they can't find
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: documentation or anything on where her skull is. Nothing, it's
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: just gone.
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: Well don't know. I feel like someone would have to
• 32:01
  Speaker 2: steal it then maybe potentially or would have been nicer.
• 32:05
  Speaker 2: She was like laid to rest.
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: But okay, so you're gonna hate me for this, but
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: that is all we know about Bella in the witchell
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: I figure that was coming out. We don't know very much, so.
• 32:17
  Speaker 2: They don't even haven't even fully identified her. They don't
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: even fully know if her name is Bella.
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: No, we do not. Bella is just as of right now,
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: a pseudonym.
• 32:27
  Speaker 2: That's crazy.
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah, then she has a kid somewhere out there, somewhere out.
• 32:34
  Speaker 2: There that doesn't make any sense.
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: So we are going to get into the theories though,
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: And there's some stuff in here that's it's kind of crazy.
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: Craig Cray. Let's see they.
• 32:44
  Speaker 2: Check the other trees, maybe the fellow families in there.
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: I'm sure they would have checked the other trees. Like
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: the whole forest was basically a crime scene at that point.
• 32:52
  Speaker 2: Right, Okay, so well there goes that theory.
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: I need you to talk for a minute because I'm
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: going to take a sip of coffee.
• 32:57
  Speaker 2: Enjoy your coffee. Ben will have a pause break here.
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: Can you can you sing us some Jeopardy music?
• 33:04
  Speaker 2: Do Do Do Do? Do? Do? Do? Do that Jeopardy?
• 33:10
  Speaker 2: It is okay because you gave me a look. I
• 33:12
  Speaker 2: was like, am I singing the wrong song?
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: I just didn't expect you to actually do it and
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: then the enthusiasm. Dude, you didn't give a fuck. I
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: loved it.
• 33:24
  Speaker 2: You asked me to do something. I did it for once.
• 33:27
  Speaker 2: Never listened to what you asked.
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: You don't ever listen to me at all.
• 33:31
  Speaker 2: I'm not very good at listening.
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: Get married, kids, This is this is what you have
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: to look forward to.
• 33:35
  Speaker 2: Oh it isn't great, then it isn't great.
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: I never said it was bad at all. I said
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: this is get married kids, this.
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: Is what you have to very little enthusiasm though.
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, just like you sang Jeopardy.
• 33:47
  Speaker 2: With I wasn't talking about my marriage.
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: Okay, anyways, let's move on here. I love you, babe,
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: I love you, but leaving me Jesus hanging there. Wow,
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: cut me deep. Okay, let's get onto the theories.
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, let's do it.
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: So the first theory is it was a ritualistic thing.
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: So Bella's identity came two years after her discovery. There
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: was Margaret Murray, a philosopher, professor at folkloris and folklorist
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: at University College in London. She theorized that the real
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: answer to Bella's end lay in the fact that one
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: of her hands was detached from the body. Its fingers
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: were scattered around the witch elm sprinkled You mean sprinkle, Yes,
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: actually I think you said glittered around. I think sparkled around.
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: Sparkled around. So she she cited an occult ritual called
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: Hand of Glory, in which the hand of a person
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: who is perished on the gallows, which Bella did not
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: in the gallows you know what gallows are like hanging gallows,
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: so she was not. However, she was asphyxiated, so that
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: might have been like a step in the right direction
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: of saying that. But anyways, the severed hand could be
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: used for supernatural purposes in this ritual.
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: Keep it. I'm already confused, Like, sorry, was she aren't
• 35:16
  Speaker 2: they aren't they use an already dead person for this ritual?
• 35:19
  Speaker 2: Or like they were like sacrificing her?
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: I believe sacrificing yes.
• 35:24
  Speaker 2: Oh okay, So if it was like a cult thing
• 35:26
  Speaker 2: like probably no one would ever say yeah exactly.
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: And there were rumors of riches and witches sabbaths there
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: we go in the Hagley Woods, and it made its
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: way around the community very fast, and people knew about it,
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: and Margaret, along with many others, are convinced that Bella
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: had been sacrificed by her coven in a witch trial.
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: To this day, people are enthralled with this theory. Police, however,
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: can't find any evidence to link this theory to the
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: Hagleywood remains.
• 35:56
  Speaker 2: That's interesting and honestly kind of makes a lot of
• 36:00
  Speaker 2: sense that the police wouldn't find anything with that really.
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: Yeah. The only thing that I'm thinking about though, is
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: if the hand was severed, there is a very very
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: high chance you're going to see marks on the wrist
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: or something like that from a knife, like in the bones.
• 36:17
  Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, because and that was never said anywhere.
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: That was never said anywhere. There was never as far
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: as I've found, there were no marks of any cutting
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: or sawing or anything on the bones. Which is you're
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: going to either go through bone or you're going to
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: go through the wrist joint, and to go through that joint,
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: you have to be very precise to not touch a bone, right,
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: Because I mean, I've done butchering as a hunter, right
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: ninety nine point nine percent of the time you're hacking
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: at bone and like sawing at awkward angles to get
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: through joints, and.
• 36:49
  Speaker 2: It's and that would have been noticed, Yeah.
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: It would have been noticed. So I think that one's
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: out the window, just just because of that, just because
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: of that.
• 36:58
  Speaker 2: So, but did you ever find anything to it say
• 37:00
  Speaker 2: that the hand was like torn off or that's what
• 37:03
  Speaker 2: we're assuming it was.
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: The hand was separate from the body. It never said
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: any nowhere does it ever say the hand was cut,
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: ripped or anything. The hand is separate from the body.
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: That's it, because I'm assuming they say that and not cut,
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: because there are no marks to say it was cut,
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: so they can't tell. So I'm gonna say the hand
• 37:22
  Speaker 1: was separated naturally.
• 37:24
  Speaker 2: But how though, like, how would animal have gotten in there?
• 37:27
  Speaker 2: And what kind of animal rat? I guess, yeah, I
• 37:31
  Speaker 2: guess so Ripley, Like when she found that bone down
• 37:35
  Speaker 2: the hill.
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: That one time, oh my parents place, she hit the jackpot.
• 37:38
  Speaker 2: She was, Yeah, she was just like tickled pink with.
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: Herself, comes running up the hill with a moose bone.
• 37:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah, well, let's clarify it was a mood.
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: Now she comes up with a human fear. Okay. The
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: second and most popular theory is that she was a Nazi.
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: Spot sounds far fetched, but let's get into it, and
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna explain why. Okay, this theory came to you
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: came to light like. Ten years later, a woman going
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: by the name of Anna of Claverly wrote a letter
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: to the local newspaper stating that she had information regarding
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: Bella's death. It just so happened. Hold on, sorry, I
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: just so happened. There we go. I wrote this little
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: like proud of myself moment in here. It just so happened.
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: I managed to find this letter and like scouring of
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: the internet, this was so hard to find that I
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: found the fucking levels.
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: Oh that's amazing. I love when that happens.
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: So the letter that she wrote to the paper says, this,
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: finish your articles Ari the witch Elm crimes. By all means,
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: they are interesting to your readers, but you will never
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: solve the mystery. The one person who could give the
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: answer is now beyond the jurisdictions of earthly courts. The
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: affair is closed and involves no witches, black magic or
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: moonlight rites. Much as I hate having to use non diplume,
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: whatever that means, I think you would appreciate if I
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: would think you would appreciate it if you knew me.
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: The only clue I can give you are that the
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: persons responsible for the crime died insane in nineteen forty two,
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: and the victim was Dutch and arrived in England illegally
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: about nineteen forty one. I have no wish to recall anymore.
• 39:28
  Speaker 2: That's kind of like a confusing letter. I'm not going
• 39:31
  Speaker 2: to lie.
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: Well, basically she's saying the person responsible for said person's
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: death also died. They're not alive anymore.
• 39:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, I gat that that.
• 39:41
  Speaker 1: And the person who died, Bella, was Dutch and arrived
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: in England illegally in nineteen forty one.
• 39:49
  Speaker 2: Oh okay, that's.
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: Essentially what it's saying. What it's saying. Yeah. So the
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: person who wrote this letter Anna was later identified as
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: Una Mosop and was interviewed by a journalist, Wilfred Byford Jones,
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: who later published the letter I just wrote. And she
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: said that Bella had been a German spy who worked
• 40:12
  Speaker 1: for or So I worked with a British officer, among
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: some other colorful characters in the army and all that
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: sort of stuff. So, according to Anna, Bella was a
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: member of the spy ring seeking information about the local
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: municipal munis munitions factories. I kept like almost wanting to
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: say municipal, but.
• 40:31
  Speaker 2: Well, that's what I thought you were going.
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: To say, munitions factory. So AMMO making ammunition?
• 40:35
  Speaker 2: Okay? Yeah.
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: So she alleged that her pilot husband, Jack Mosap, had
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: witnessed Bella's death.
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: Who's who's the husband? Whose husband? Anna's husband?
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: Anna's real name?
• 40:49
  Speaker 2: Okay, so I thought it was Bella's husband.
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: I was like, Anna is the pseudonym for the person
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: who wrote the letter?
• 40:55
  Speaker 2: Okay?
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: They were found to be Una Mosap.
• 40:58
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: So, according to or Una, I guess Bella was a
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: member of a spy ring seeking information about the location
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: of the factories. Blah blah. Sorry I backtracked a little
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: bit there. Okay. So she alleged that her pilot husband
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: Jack had witnessed Bella's death. Bella apparently got into a
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: deep got in too deep with aspy ring and a
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: Dutchman called Van Ralt. One evening, Van Ralt accompanied Bella
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: and picked up Jack in his car, and shortly after
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: Van Ralt strangled the woman Bella Bella allegedly because of
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: her spy associations, resulting in her body getting stuffed inside
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: the witch Elm. Jack shortly after was committed to a
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: Stanford mental hospital because he kept having reoccurring dreams of
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: a woman staring out at him from a tree. Oh gosh,
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: she died in hospital shortly before the body of Bella
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: was found in the witch Elm.
• 41:55
  Speaker 2: Okay. And also, and I just realized too in my
• 41:57
  Speaker 2: head that like Bella's family, if it was times of
• 42:01
  Speaker 2: the war and stuff, could have died too, and that's
• 42:03
  Speaker 2: it'd be why she never got reported missing.
• 42:05
  Speaker 1: Oh exactly, that missing's persons report. That's a very real thing. Yeah,
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: there's theories that you know, she could have been just
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: another casualty of war, never reported missing. That is a true,
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: very true thing, because we are in the height of
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: World War two and this whole spy thing, missing person's thing, like,
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: that's very real stuff for this time. There is another
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: variation in the story though, that h because this one
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: that I just read comes from Anna or Usa. This
• 42:32
  Speaker 1: variation not from her. But this variation goes at the
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: three Those three people were drinking at a pub and
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: it said that Bella became drunk and passed out while
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: they were driving home. So the men, for whatever fucking
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: reason or another, shoved her inside the witch Elm tree
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: as like a prank or something, and she just fucking.
• 42:51
  Speaker 2: Died in there and couldn't get out.
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: Yeah, kids don't shove people in trees as a prank.
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: That's a fucking dumb thing to do.
• 42:56
  Speaker 2: Yeah that, I don't think that. I don't know that
• 42:59
  Speaker 2: one is dumb.
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: Okay. So another one is she was actually an actress
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: who was also kind of spyish espionage anyways. So in
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: January of nineteen forty one, a German Man named Joseph
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: Jacobs had parachuted into the Hagleywood area and was captured.
• 43:17
  Speaker 1: He told the home guard that he was he was
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: going to make contact with a woman named Clara Burial Borel. Anyways, sorry,
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: Clara from here and out, okay. Jacobs explained that Clara
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: had been a German cabaret singer and actress before being
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: recruited as a German spy. This actually really reminds me
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: of I don't know if you've ever seen the movie
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: in Glorious back Inglorious Bastards. There's an actress in there
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: who's all like cabaret singer and stuff and very much
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: so a spy as well. Yeah, but she's not on
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: the German side. She's on the other side. But anyways,
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: I thought maybe it was like inspired by anyways.
• 43:55
  Speaker 2: Interesting, Well, it isn't. At one point when they first
• 43:58
  Speaker 2: started writing those messages like graffiti, Yep, wasn't it something
• 44:02
  Speaker 2: before Bella? Like it was a different was it Loubella? Loubella?
• 44:07
  Speaker 1: It was Lubella was the first message, and then after
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: that it was referred to as Bella.
• 44:11
  Speaker 2: Okay, interesting, Okay.
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: So after thoroughly investigating Jacob's man who parachuted in though
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: authorities determined that he could not be released and was
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: killed by firing squad, he was actually the last person
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: to perish at the Tower of London. This, though, begs
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: the question could the remains in the Hagley would be
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: you know Clara who had never managed to rendezvous with Jacobs.
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: There is actually a historical document that shows that Claaria
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: was actually a real person. She was a cabaret singer
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: and an actress who performed both in Germany and in
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: England for a time. It seemed, though, that she vanished
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: without a trace after nineteen forty one, with no film
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: credits or anything to connect her appearances to anything. And
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: she would have been thirty five in nineteen forty one,
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: same age of the remains as Bella.
• 44:59
  Speaker 2: Was she made married, I'm.
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: Not too sure about that one.
• 45:02
  Speaker 2: Huh.
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: However, did she have a child? I don't know that one.
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: I didn't do an abundant reason. I know.
• 45:09
  Speaker 2: Sorry, my brain is just like going here.
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: However, there is a release of a long lost quote
• 45:15
  Speaker 1: unquote long lost German records which indicate Claire had actually
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: died in German in Germany in nineteen forty two, largely
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: putting this theory to rest. But I just want to say,
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: cover ups from government spies in World War Two, maybe
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: something that's keeping us from knowing the truth. Like, I'm
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: sure that's not an abnormal thing. Yeah, oh she was
• 45:34
  Speaker 1: really a spy. No, she just actually just died.
• 45:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah. So this is just it's not at this point
• 45:41
  Speaker 2: just never going to get solved.
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: There is another theory, the last theory here that I'm
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: going to cover, and there's some other minor ones out
• 45:47
  Speaker 1: there that are just kind of like completely left wing. Okay,
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: but this other, this last one hear I'm going to
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: talk about she was actually a prostitute.
• 45:55
  Speaker 2: Okay.
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: So the speculation is that Bella may have been someone
• 45:58
  Speaker 1: with a transient lifestyle, a person not easily traced in life,
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: thus not particularly missed in death. It suggested that Bella
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: was a prostitute who worked in the streets around Hagley wrote.
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: According to police files, there was a Bella who disappeared
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: in nineteen forty one, which would fit the timeline of
• 46:16
  Speaker 1: events clearly. Locals point out the fact that Gypsies had
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: camped out in the vicinity of Hagleywoods during nineteen forty one,
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: and the theory is perhaps Bella was one of them,
• 46:27
  Speaker 1: and for one reason or another, was killed by a
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: member of her own community and hidden away in the
• 46:31
  Speaker 1: witch Elm. And since she was just a gypsy, a wanderer,
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: a transient, just no one cared to or have known
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: of her disappearance.
• 46:42
  Speaker 2: Interesting and being like that too, you could just have
• 46:45
  Speaker 2: jewelry and have had it on your finger and it
• 46:48
  Speaker 2: meant nothing really too yep.
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: And to note that rolled gold wedding ring was quote
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: unquote cheap as well.
• 46:57
  Speaker 2: Okay, so resting.
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And that is the story of who put Bella
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: in the witch Elm still unsolved to this day, and
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: I'm going to assume never to be solved, especially considering
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: the fact that we don't know where her fucking head is.
• 47:11
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, that's bad. Yeah, that's really bad.
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: Bad.
• 47:18
  Speaker 2: Do they have the rest of her body or did
• 47:21
  Speaker 2: that happen to go missing too.
• 47:22
  Speaker 1: I would assume they have the rest of her body.
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: I would assume, but I mean I don't know.
• 47:26
  Speaker 2: Jeez, huh so interesting interesting, Yeah, Okay, these cases are
• 47:34
  Speaker 2: kind of fun. And the fact that it just like
• 47:36
  Speaker 2: gets your your gears turning and your imagination.
• 47:39
  Speaker 1: You think, you try and like put those things together. Yeah,
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: even if the theories are completely left wing, like don't
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: make any sense or whatever, it's fun to humor them sometimes. Yeah,
• 47:48
  Speaker 1: so my my theory, I'm I think I'm gonna go
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: more for the transient.
• 47:54
  Speaker 2: One, the gypsy thing.
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: I think so, I think Bella just happened to be
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: some one who may have been not from the area,
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: so come in with a gypsy caravan or some sort
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: or just traveling along, made her way in and was
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: camping around, living around, doing whatever she wanted, just to
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: kind of live and get by. For one reason or another,
• 48:16
  Speaker 1: she got in it with someone else and they killed
• 48:19
  Speaker 1: her and hit her body.
• 48:21
  Speaker 2: That one does make a lot of sense, because it
• 48:23
  Speaker 2: makes a lot of sense that she never got reported.
• 48:26
  Speaker 2: You know, so I don't know, what do you think?
• 48:33
  Speaker 2: I think that one. I like that one does make
• 48:35
  Speaker 2: a lot of sense. But then also the the spy
• 48:39
  Speaker 2: one too.
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: That letter being written in though too, but it was
• 48:44
  Speaker 1: ten years after the fact that it was written in huh,
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: so who knows?
• 48:50
  Speaker 2: Yeah? Interesting?
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah, hit us up on Instagram. Let us know what
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: you guys.
• 48:55
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I want to know. It's always interesting to hear
• 48:57
  Speaker 2: what other people think too.
• 48:59
  Speaker 1: I've got quite a few. It wasn't gonna be posting
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: them up, so he'll probably do like two separate posts
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: at least for this one.
• 49:04
  Speaker 2: Okay, let us know. I'm intrigued.
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and until we see you guys' messages, make sure
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: you guys stay wicked.