Dr Helen Davidson - Is this murder solved?

 Has This Baffling Murder Case Been Solved?

Murdered doctor's faithful dog guarded her body until she was found

On November 9th 1966 a doctor from North Road, Amersham, Helen Davidson decided to take her wire-haired terrier and a pair of binoculars and do some bird watching, sadly she was never to return home as the next day her body was found in Hodgemoor Wood she had been viciously murdered. 

It took a 12-hour long search using dogs and 100 army soldiers to find the doctor, her dog was laying across her legs in order to protect her until she was found. The doctor's Hillman car had been found in the early hours of the morning of November 10th, 1966 parked in a lay-by on the road between Beaconsfield and Amersham but it took several more hours until 2pm that afternoon before her body was found about a half-mile into the woodland. The wood was somewhere that the 49-year-old doctor visited regularly with her dog. It was a horseshoe-shaped area of approximately 300 acres, so quite a large wood. 

There was no obvious reason for the killing, Helen hadn't been robbed nor had she been sexually assaulted, her eyes had been forced inside her skull and she had been really viciously beaten with a charred piece of wood and her head had been ground into the soil beneath her. There seemed to be no real explanation why anyone should want to kill the doctor and so the detective in charge of the murder investigation; Detective Chief Superintendent Jack  'Razor' Williams drew up his hypothesis and stuck with it. 

DCS Williams believed that Helen Davidson had come across homosexual men that were having illicit sex and she had been murdered in order to silence her. As most people will understand sex between two males was strictly illegal in the 1960s and therefore anyone with a reputation to protect may have not liked being "caught in the act" so to speak, but I doubt that anyone would have resorted to such a dreadfully violent attack culminating in the murder but it's possible. Hardly surprising that DCS Williams retired soon after the case. 

The first curious point that I have run across here is that according to another local doctor it must have been dark by the time Helen entered the woods as she had spoken to a local GP before she drove to Hodgemoor Wood and it was 4pm then. Why would she have been going "birdwatching" after dark? Remember at that time of the year it would be dark by around 5pm. So far I have not been given a satisfactory answer to this question. Apparently, this evidence was blatantly ignored during the original murder enquiry, as it simply "did not fit in" with the police's theories.

Now, other witnesses claimed that they saw Helen Davidson park her car in full view of The Magpie Public House at 4pm, so someone's information is not correct.

Unfortunately, I have been unable to get a great deal of information on the original case but it seems that a lady crime writer and amateur sleuth Monica Weller may have solved this murder without the aid of police files.

Real-life Miss Marple cracks murder case, unsolved since1966

Now I am not 100% sure that I agree totally with Monica Weller theories but she says that she has spent a number of years studying the case, including speaking to witnesses and making her own enquiries, The amateur sleuth has found some very interesting points that seem to suggest that the doctor was not quite the "well-liked and loved" person that was originally suggested, in fact, she was very much disliked by at least two people.

One of these was a man named Michael Larkam who had been involved in a road accident featuring Doctor Davidson. At the age of 21, he was riding his motorbike home between his work and home to lunch when the doctor was turning right from Station Road and stalled her car. Michael had some pretty horrific injuries after the collision and was known to swear that he would get justice one day, He always alleged that the doctor "got off lightly" in court with regard to the accident due to her having "friends in high places" and he had been known to say that if he saw Helen Davidson outside her front door he would kill her. 

Michael was safely locked up in prison on the day of the murder but there is of course that a "prison buddy" may have been released, tracked Helen down on Michael's behalf and killed her. That theory may not sound that plausible but what an opportunity; Micheal goes to prison meets up with a guy that fancied himself as a 'hitman' and does some kind of deal to 'get rid' of the doctor whilst Michael has a rock-solid alibi.

The next suspect in my mind is one that others seem not to have thought much about, Helen's husband Herbert Baker. He was 30 years older than Helen they had married very quietly after his first wife's death and lived almost two separate lives. Helen had not taken his name and hardly ever did anything like socialising with him they lived such separate lives that according to his story Herbert had no idea that his wife frequented Hodgemoor Woods on her regular Wednesday day off. 

When Herbert Baker called police to report Doctor Davidson missing on the evening of November 9th 1966 he told them he had absolutely no idea where she could be. So then let's think about this, Helen went regularly to Hodgemoor Woods and let's not forget that on the day in question she went there at 4pm on a winter afternoon, when it would have been almost dark apparently to do "birdwatching", what sort of birds do you get to watch in dense woodland in the dark?

Remember we are talking about 1966, no electronics, no see in the dark, night vision cameras of today, so were the binoculars just for show? If Helen was 49 at the time of her murder that would have made Herbert 79, without wishing to be personal, was he still "active" in the personal sense? Was Helen going to the woods to "meet" someone in a somewhat clandestine manner? Did Herbert find out and send someone after her? Did he go after her himself and lay-in-wait perhaps? 

Something which strikes me as very interesting here is that just 4 days after Helen's murder, Herbert acting in his position of ley-preacher gave a sermon at the local church asking the congregation to "forgive Helen's killer", hmmm not really something you'd expect of a 'grieving widower' to do such a short time after his wife's murder

Next, we come to Herbert Baker's loyal housekeeper, Kathleen; she had loyally served Herbert and his first wife for some 30 years, during the latter of which Herbert had been nursing his wife. now apparently Kathleen had developed some quite strong feelings for Mr Baker and had developed the hope that she and her employer would get together when the wife passed away. Of course, this did not happen and Herbert Baker moved out of his cottage and in with Helen Davidson when they married, gifting his home to his housekeeper to live in. 

Kathleen was by all accounts pretty upset and angered by the events after Mrs Baker's passing that culminated in Mr Baker marrying the doctor. It was well known locally that she had a personal hatred for Helen and was worried that in the event of Herbert's passing he would leave the cottage to Helen and she would, in turn, ask Kathleen to leave. 

For the record when Herbert did die he had left the cottage and half of his estate to Kathleen, but bear in mind Helen was by then dead, I can't help wonder what would have happened had she been still alive. 

Interestingly police denied any consideration of Kathleen being a suspect, but they dug both her front and back garden up, why we will probably never know. It is worth noting that for some years after Helen Davidson's murder many locals referred to Kathleen as "The Murderess".

Finally, the suspect in Monica Weller's book "Injured Parties" was a local gardener, George Garbett he was married but was reported by his GP as much more sexually interested in men and he was known to frequent Hodgemoor woods which was allegedly used as a lover's courting place during the day and as a sexual meeting place for homosexual men at night. Monica Weller believes that George knew that Helen Davidson had seen him in a compromising situation with another man and he couldn't risk his antics being revealed so he "silenced" Helen by killing her. I have to say I am not sure about that theory, although it is a possibility.

Interestingly, George was attending his GP surgery for five years after Helen Davidson was murdered and the GP said that he believed George was carrying the guilt of hurting a woman and was about ready to "offload" but he never made it to his next appointment which had been scheduled for 21st June 1971. 

Just a few days before the appointment George went to the garage where his car had been parked, drove the car out into the yard, went back in and fetched a can of petrol. He then sat back in the car poured petrol all over himself and lit a match, so was he carrying a huge burden of murder? I'm not convinced.

My money would be on either Herbert Baker or his "housekeeper" Kathleen but either way, at least the book has brought an old and somewhat forgotten case back to life and that is what matters. I'd love to have your thoughts on this one, so get in touch or leave a comment if you wish. I will be back with another blog and will see you all again very soon. 

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