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Browse the 1966 Encyclopaedia of New Zealand
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Graphic: An Encyclopaedia of New Zealand 1966.

Warning

This information was published in 1966 in An Encyclopaedia of New Zealand, edited by A. H. McLintock. It has not been corrected and will not be updated.

Up-to-date information can be found elsewhere in Te Ara.

CRIMES, UNSOLVED

Contents


Murder of J. H. McCormack

The police were never able to solve the mystery of the throttling in a cloakroom at His Majesty's Theatre in Courtenay Place, Wellington, in December 1908, of John H. McCormack, a Liverpool seaman. The body was discovered soon after the murder, but although several unsavoury characters known to have been in the company of the dead man that evening were carefully questioned, the police were unable to find evidence warranting an arrest. Similarly, when in September 1914 a Mrs Frances Marshall was found in a factory alley in Upper Nelson Street with about 30 stab wounds in all parts of the body, there was a clear history of doubtful associates, many of them with criminal records, but no case could be made out against any individual.