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The apprentice of Split Crow Lane : the story of the Carr's Hill Murder

Housham, Jane2016
Books, Manuscripts
Gateshead, April 1866. Five-year-old Sarah Melvin was walking along Split Crow Lane looking for her father when she disappeared. Later that night a couple walking home from the pub tripped over her body. Sarah was the child of Irish immigrants who had been drawn to the North-east in search of work. Poor, perceived with prejudice, they quickly came under suspicion of killing their own child. The true murderer was a misfit whose social awkwardness stopped him ever rising above apprentice. He would eventually make clear exactly why he killed Sarah - and the reason would scandalise the whole country, yet to him had a dreadful logic.
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