He had a sister who lived in Melbourne and was married to a man named Thomas Keanelikely the T. Keane whose name appears on the clothing in the Somerton Mans suitcase. The case has long baffled detectives and amateur sleuths, and is regarded as one of Australia's most enduring mysteries because of strange clues linked to it, including a suspected code and a book of Persian poems. Australia Exhumes the Somerton Man, and His 70-Year Mystery This week the police disinterred a body, found on a beach in 1948, that has puzzled investigators for decades. [34], Early in the inquiry, Cleland stated, "I would be prepared to find that he died from poison, that the poison was probably a glucoside and that it was not accidentally administered; but I cannot say whether it was administered by the deceased himself or by some other person. But after more than 70 years, a researcher says he's solved the mystery - Somerton Man was Carl Webb. Shown the plaster cast by Paul Lawson, she does not identify the man as Alf Boxall, or any other person. The Somerton man mystery began in the early hours of December 1, 1948, when beachgoers found a body lying on Somerton beach in Adelaide. [98] Abbott believes an exhumation and an autosomal DNA test could link the Somerton man to a shortlist of surnames which, along with existing clues to the man's identity, would be the "final piece of the puzzle". The Somerton Man's suitcase and its forgotten fingerprints Now Australian scientists are close to solving the mystery By Hilary Whiteman, CNN Updated 10:42 PM EDT, Mon May 31, 2021 Link Copied! Somerton Man identified as Melbourne electrical engineer, researcher says. The text has not been deciphered or interpreted in a way that satisfies authorities on the case. [32] Mangnoson stated that "the car stopped and a man with a khaki handkerchief over his face told her to 'keep away from the police or else'". They found that the Somerton Man belonged to haplogroup H4a1a1a, possessed by only 1% of Europeans. Johnson identified himself at a police station. At least two sites relatively close to Adelaide were of interest to spies: the Radium Hill uranium mine and the Woomera Test Range, an Anglo-Australian military research facility. In 1951, Dorothy was reportedly living in Bute, South Australia, 144km (89mi) from Adelaide. 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[105], In December 2017, Abbott announced three "excellent" hairs "at the right development stage for extracting DNA" had been found on the plaster cast of the corpse, and had been submitted for analysis to the Australian Centre for Ancient DNA at the University of Adelaide. The man's body was found propped up against the seawall at Somerton Beach in Adelaide on December 1, 1948. [33], Cedric Stanton Hicks, professor of physiology and pharmacology at the University of Adelaide, testified that of a group of drugs, variants of a drug in that group he called "number 1" and in particular "number 2" were extremely toxic in a relatively small oral dose that would be extremely difficult if not impossible to identify even if it had been suspected in the first instance. Beachgoers found the body lying against a seawall on Somerton Beach in Adelaide on 1 December, 1948. SA Police have been contacted for comment. How an Electrical Engineer Solved Australia's Most Famous Cold Case At 6:30 am on December 1, 1948, police were called to Somerton Park beach south of Adelaide, South Australia after the body of a man was found. [20] Finally, his dental records were not able to be matched to any known person. Both kidneys were congested, and the liver contained a great excess of blood in its vessels. [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. When no one came forward to identify Somerton man, authorities were left with only cryptic clues to guide them. Some answers may come soon, some may take years, and some may never be answered, Abbott tells ABC. I solved it when I was looking back at my old notes on the tamam shud code, which had a solution. [24] With wartime rationing still enforced, clothing was difficult to acquire at that time. Professor Abbott said after more than a decade on the case, the discovery felt like summitting a mountain. [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. Early 1947: Harkness moves to a suburb of Adelaide, South Australia, and changes her surname to Thomson, the name of her future husband. Victoria detectives disproved all the claims and said that "other investigations" indicated it was unlikely that he was from Victoria. Initially, the letters were thought to be words in a foreign language[38] before it was realised it was a code. April 1947: Charles Webb leaves his wife Dorothy, whereupon she files for divorce. The discovery was made by Mr J. Lyons, of Whyte Rd, Somerton. (A spool of thread in the suitcase matched the orange stitches used to repair the mans clothing.) However, a bus conductor named Leslie Francis Wytkin (or Wytkins) handed in a copy of the. The police said this was the first time they knew that such action was needed. Tucked inside the watch pocket in his pants was a slip of paper with Persian words printed on it which meant "finished.". "Somerton Beach Mystery Man", Transcript, Broadcast 27 March 2009. Its possible that [Webb] came to this state to try and find her, Abbott tells CNN. Hicks stated that if death had occurred seven hours after the man was last seen to move, it would imply a massive dose that could still have been undetectable. Here's what they think of a Voice to Parliament, Prime minister says urgent care clinics will start relieving pressure on NT's busy emergency wards in coming months, Trump requests mistrial in rape civil case, NRL concedes error on crucial golden point call. 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 . Accessing the man's remains may be a first step in a process to build a DNA profile and uncover answers in one of the country's most famous cold cases. Prof Derek Abbott from the University of Adelaide said on Monday he believes the man found on 1 December 1948, was Carl Charles Webb, a 43-year-old electrical engineer from Melbourne. The site at tamamshud.blogspot.com shows exactly how it was uncovered and gives the precise methodology so that anyone can test it for themselves. 2023 BBC. [11][12] Witnesses said the body was in the same position when the police viewed it. Tamm Shud - The unsolved mystery of the Somerton man [11] For example, in the United States, the Federal Bureau of Investigation was unable to match the dead man's fingerprint with prints taken from files of domestic criminals. [39] The timing is significant as the man is presumed, based on the suitcase, to have arrived in Adelaide the day before he was found on the beach. [11] In news media, books and other discussions of the case, Thomson was frequently referred to by various pseudonyms, including the nickname "Jestyn" and names such as "Teresa Johnson ne Powell". They suggested that the Somerton man was Robin's father and, therefore, Rachel's grandfather. Ep 239: The Somerton Man - Mystery Solved? - Astonishing Legends Was there a connection with Jo, the nurse? The City Baths on King William St. were accessed from the station's northern exit via a lane way. The truth, however, is seemingly more mundane. My feeling has always been that its been suicide, that Rubaiyat was known as a kind of suicide handbook, Bilsborow said. Bilsborow said: Now that weve got his name, theres still so many questions. The secret mine that hid the Nazis' stolen treasure. Solving the Somerton man mystery: no Russian spy, just a bit of a loner 16 October 1912: Prosper Thomson is born in central Queensland. 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. [97], In March 2009, a University of Adelaide team led by Professor Derek Abbott began an attempt to solve the case through cracking the code and proposing to exhume the body to test for DNA. "There's lots of. [2], A number of possible identifications have been proposed over the years. The tree included about 4,000 people when that happened.. Kate Thomson opposed the exhumation as being disrespectful to her brother. 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. 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. [7], As one journalist wrote in June 1949, alluding to the line in Rubaiyat, "the Somerton Man seems to have made certain that the glass would be empty, save for speculation". [45] A 2014 analysis by computational linguist John Rehling strongly supports the theory that the letters consist of the initials of some English text, but finds no match for these in a large survey of literature, and concludes that the letters were likely written as a form of shorthand, not as a code, and that the original text can likely never be determined.[46]. Derek Abbott was able to analyse the Somerton Man's DNA using hairs preserved when authorities made a plaster model of his face. acute gastritis hemorrhage, extensive congestion of the liver and spleen, and the congestion to the brain. The poem's subject led police to theorise that the man had committed suicide by poison, although no other evidence corroborated the theory. [65] Police were skeptical, believing Walsh to be too old to be the dead man. "[86], The ID card, numbered 58757, was issued in the United States on 28 February 1918 to H. C. Reynolds, giving his nationality as "British" and age as 18. ), Carl 'Charles' Webb's prisoner-of-war brother bears resemblance to Somerton Man https://t.co/c7KcGhtiuI. Video, The secret mine that hid the Nazis' stolen treasure, Body exhumed in hope of solving Australia mystery, Explosion derails train in Russian border region, Banana artwork in Seoul museum eaten by visitor, Donald Trump arrives in Scotland on golf visit, NFL player's daughter, aged two, drowns in pool, Indian 'killer' elephant relocated to tiger reserve, Ding becomes China's first male world chess champion. Titled "Body found on Beach", it read: A body, believed to be of E.C. [47] When she was interviewed by police, Thomson said that she did not know the dead man or why he would have her phone number and choose to visit her suburb on the night of his death. 18 May 1953: death of Horace Charles Reynolds, Tasmanian man born in 1900 and regarded by some investigators as the owner of the "H. C. Reynolds" ID card. In. When police arrived, they found the man lying in the sand with his head resting on the sea wall, with his legs out in front of him, and his ankles crossed. For 73 years, the identity of a well-dressed man found slumped by a sea wall of Somerton beach, south of Adelaide, in 1948 has been a mystery leaving room for theories featuring jilted lovers and cold war spies. [50], When she was shown the plaster cast bust of the dead man by DS Leane, Thomson said she could not identify the person depicted. Per a 1949 inquest report, a doctor who examined the Somerton Mans remains placed his time of death around 2 a.m.
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