The Pitchfork Murder

      His two-pronged pitchfork was thrust through his neck, pinning him to the ground. His hedger's slash-hook was embedded in his chest. The dead face of the old man was frozen in an expression of terror. This was how they found Charles Walton in 1945, victim of possibly the last ritualistic 'witchcraft' murder in Britain. Detective Superintendent Fabian--the famous "Fabian of Scotland Yard'--spent many months leading the investigation of the crime. But the mystery of who did it, and why, was never solved. It remains an enigma, horrific in an atmosphere of mystic fear.

Odd-job man

      To all appearances Charles Walton was a harmless, endearing old man, such as one might meet in any English village that has not been caught up in the pace of modern life. He lived with his niece in a thatched cottage in Lower Quinton, Warwickshire, earning enough to keep body and soul together by doing odd jobs about the farms at 18 pence an hour.

      He was not seen much in the local pubs, preferring to buy cider by the gallon and drink alone by his kitchen fireside. He was a man, as they say in the country, who 'kept himself to himself'.

      But Old Walton, though not over-fond of human companionship, was at home in the countryside, alone with nature. He would spend hours talking to the wild birds--and he believed there was an understanding between them.

      He did not much care for dogs, but in his back garden he bred toads--big natterjacks. There was a local legend that he used to harness them in a miniature plough and follow them across the fields.

Whispering of witchcraft

      It was a winter's day in February when Charles failed to return from his work in the fields, and searchers found his mutilated body under a willow tree. Donald McCormick, who wrote the book on the crime, claimed that he could make a good guess at who the killer was. So too could Fabian.

      But no evidence could be produce to justify a prosecution. Only tales of Old Walton's communion with the birds, of his toad plough-teams . . . . and sinister whisperings that he was killed because he was a witch.