English murder victim (c.1893–1919)
Mamie Stuart (c. 24 November 1893 - November or December 1919) was a 26-year-old English woman who disappeared from her home in Caswell Bay, Wales, in 1919 and whose disappearance became known via the media as the Chorus Girl Mystery. Her husband, George Everard Shotton—who had bigamously married Stuart in 1918—was considered the prime suspect in her disappearance. Although investigators strongly suspected foul play, as no body could be found, Shotton could not be tried for Stuart's murder. He was instead convicted of bigamy and sentenced to eighteen months' imprisonment.
Stuart's dismembered body was found by three potholers in 1961, stashed behind a slab of rock inside a narrow, abandoned lead mine on the Gower Peninsula, just from the home Stuart had resided in at the time of her disappearance. Shotton had died of natural causes in a Fishponds hospital in April 1958. A coroner's court found him guilty of Stuart's murder in December 1961.
The disappearance and eventual discovery of Mamie Stuart was known as the Chorus Girl Mystery due to her background, the duration of time she remained missing, and the unanswered questions behind her ultimate fate.
Early life.
Amy Stuart was born in Sunderland in November 1893 to James Stuart, a ship's captain, and his wife Jane (née McGregor). She had one sister, Edith, and a younger brother, James Smith Stuart.
As an adolescent, Stuart developed a passion for dancing. She also developed aspirations to perform in music halls and West End theatres. With her parents' consent, at the age of fifteen Stuart performed as a chorus girl on provincial tours with a troupe named "The Magnets". She adopted the name "Mamie", and later left her family home to pursue her career. She later formed her own dance troupe, which she named "The Five Verona Girls". This troupe performed nationwide and became a popular attraction, with the dancers—in a prudish era—sometimes daring to expose their legs to knee height.
Stuart was later described by police as being an attractive young woman with brown, bobbed hair and grey-blue eyes, approximately to tall, with "very even teeth with one missing" and "of good carriage". As a result of an attack by a dog when she was a child, Stuart had four faint tooth marks on her right cheek, which she concealed with cosmetics.
By early 1917, one member of "The Five Verona Girls" had become pregnant, while another broke her ankle. Shortly thereafter, the troupe disbanded and Stuart returned to her family home.
Marriage.
Shortly after the disbandment of "The Five Verona Girls", in July 1917, Stuart (then aged 23) became acquainted with a marine engineer named George Shotton in their native Sunderland. Shotton introduced himself to Stuart as a widower, and the two soon began a relationship, with Shotton purchasing a diamond engagement ring for her within months of their acquaintance. Less than a year after their acquaintance, they had married in South Shields. The newlyweds then held their honeymoon in Droitwich Spa. Shotton and Stuart initially lived in Bristol before relocating to Swansea, residing in a property in Trafalgar Terrace for six months. The two then moved to live in Caswell Bay in the late summer of 1919, residing in a rented remote cottage overlooking Swansea Bay named Ty-Llanwydd. Stuart maintained regular correspondence with her family in Sunderland from this residence.
Unbeknownst to Stuart, Shotton's wife, Mary Shotton (née Leader), whom he had wed in September 1905, was still alive. The couple had a son named Arthur, although their relationship was fraught with violence, with Shotton frequently beating his wife. His wife and child lived in Penarth, with Mary believing her husband's employment being the reason he was frequently absent from the family home for extended periods of time.
Disappearance.
Stuart was last seen in November or early December 1919. In letters Stuart had posted in the months prior to her disappearance, she had hinted that her marriage was an unhappy one, increasingly fraught with violence, and of her increasing desire to leave Shotton, who refused to allow her to return to the stage. The final correspondence she is known to have penned to her parents from Ty-Llanwydd was dated 12 November. Shortly thereafter, her parents posted a reply, although this letter was returned to them marked 'House Closed'. Convinced an error had been made by the post office, the Stuarts posted a reply-paid telegram to their daughter, although this letter was also returned with the same marking.
Shortly before Christmas 1919, a telegram was sent to Stuart's parents—apparently from their daughter—wishing them "compliments of the season". No further correspondence from Stuart or her husband was received by her parents.
Investigation.
In March 1920, staff at Swansea's Grosvenor Hotel noted a leather trunk left by a male guest the previous December had remained unclaimed for approximately three months. As no address tag existed upon the exterior of the trunk, the manager of the hotel contacted police, who opened the trunk to discover two women's dresses and a pair of shoes, all extensively cut and torn. Also discovered inside the trunk were items of jewellery, a Bible, a rosary, and a manicure set.
A scrap of paper was also discovered within the trunk. This bore the address of Stuart's parents, who informed investigators their daughter was missing, and that they had been attempting to locate her for several months. Both feared for her safety, and handed police several letters they had received from their daughter the previous year revealing her increasing unhappiness regarding her husband and her fear for her own wellbeing. The Stuarts had also recently obtained a letter their daughter had penned weeks before her disappearance in which she had written: "If you don't hear from me, please wire to Mrs. Hearn [a friend] and see if she knows anything about me. The man is not all there. I don't think I will live with him much longer. My life is not worth living." Investigators also discovered that in letters to her parents, Stuart had indicated her abuse at Shotton's hands, of her desire to cease living with him, and of her knowledge there was something "odd" about him.
Shortly thereafter, a maid cleaning the couple's deserted cottage in preparation for the accommodation of new tenants recovered Stuart's mildewed brown leather handbag concealed behind a dresser in an upstairs bedroom. This handbag still contained two pounds in loose change and Stuart's sugar ration card.
Scotland Yard.
By the spring of 1920, South Wales Police were convinced Stuart had been murdered, that she had died at the hands of Shotton, and that the most likely motive for her murder had been either rage, control, jealousy, or a mixture of the three. Scotland Yard was contacted, and Chief Inspector William Draper dispatched to oversee the investigation. Draper ordered a thorough search of Ty-Llanwydd, the grounds of the property, and the surrounding terrain, although no trace of Stuart was found. A nationwide search for Stuart was ordered, with her description circulated throughout Britain. This tactic also yielded no successful leads.
Prime suspect.
The chief suspect of both South Wales Police and Scotland Yard was Stuart's husband, George Shotton. Draper quickly located Shotton, who was living in Penarth with his wife and child, barely two miles from Ty-Llanwydd. Shotton admitted to knowing Stuart and to leaving the trunk at the Swansea hotel, which he claimed he had done shortly after she had left him following an argument early the previous December. This argument, he claimed, sourced from her infidelity. He denied having married Stuart, or any knowledge of her current whereabouts.
Despite Shotton's claims to the contrary, investigations quickly revealed he had bigamously married Stuart almost two years earlier, although he denied doing so and said that when she walked out on him, he had simply chosen to go back to his wife. Scotland Yard also contacted Stuart's friend, Mrs. Hearn, who confirmed Stuart had suffered domestic abuse at Shotton's hands and had once begged her: "If I am ever missing, do your utmost to find me, won't you?"
As police could not find Stuart's body, they were unable to charge Shotton with her murder, as the law at the time prevented a suspect being tried for murder if there was no body. Convinced of—but unable to prove—Shotton's guilt, by the mid-1920s, investigators at Scotland Yard began referring to this case as the "perfect crime".
Bigamy charge.
Investigators had discovered early in their investigation that Shotton had bigamously married Stuart in South Shields on 25 March 1918. This bigamy charge proved to be the only they could charge him with. He was arrested on 29 May 1920 for this offence and brought to trial two months later at Glamorgan Assizes, pleading not guilty and claiming that although he had known and lived with Stuart, someone had assumed his identity to marry her. He also denied mistreating her, and repeated his claim the two had parted company following a quarrel in early December. Several individuals testified at trial the two were indeed married and that, initially, their matrimony had been harmonious. One individual to testify was Stuart's sister, Edith, who testified Shotton had frequently referred to Stuart as "my own little wife" and had typically signed his letters with the words "Your own loving husband".
At this bigamy trial, the prosecuting counsel, Sir Ellis Griffith KC, openly accused Shotton of "doing away with" Stuart, but in the absence of her body, nothing could be proven. On 13 July, Shotton was sentenced to serve eighteen months' imprisonment with hard labour for bigamously marrying Stuart. Shortly after he was released from jail, his legal wife divorced him.
Intervening years.
Sightings.
In the years following Shotton's bigamy conviction, numerous alleged sightings of Stuart were reported as far afield as Canada, South Africa, Australia and India. Many of these sightings received extensive press coverage. One early reported sighting of Stuart was made by the chief officer of the cargo ship "Blythmoor", Thomas James, who was a close friend of her father. He claimed to have seen Stuart in the portal town of Karachi in the early 1920s, and that she was part of a troupe of English travelling artists performing at a Karachi theatre. When approached by James, however, the woman had denied she was Stuart and quickly walked away. However, James was adamant the woman he had spoken to was Stuart.
Drainage pit discovery.
In 1950, a dentist purchased the remote cottage Shotton and Stuart had resided in at the time of her disappearance. Performing drainage work around the property, this individual discovered a pit at the rear of the house, close to a hole in the foundation which reached beneath the floorboards of the dining room. This pit had been filled with quicklime, although all that was recovered from the pit was one lady's shoe.
George Shotton.
After Shotton was released from prison in early 1922, he moved to Tintern, where he ran a smallholding. He was a regular churchgoer, and remembered in the village as "a charming chap" who "practically [ran] the tennis club". After several years living in his village, Shotton abruptly left, possibly due to a local newspaper having revived the story of Stuart's disappearance and his suspected culpability. He then relocated to Balham, South London, to live with his elderly mother, Louisa, taking a series of jobs including being an odd job man and a motor mechanic.
In May 1938, Shotton was arrested for threatening his sister, Gladys Austin, with a revolver at her Fareham home. He was also charged with causing actual bodily harm to her. This incident sourced from resentment between the siblings regarding their respective bequeathments in their mother's will. He was sentenced to serve twelve months in jail with hard labour. Following his release, Shotton severed all contact with his family and friends and moved to Ledbury, where he worked at an aircraft factory. He later relocated to Bristol.
Discovery.
Forty-two years after Stuart's disappearance, on 5 November 1961, her remains were discovered in a rotting sack hidden behind a large stone slab 50 feet down a disused lead mine at Brandy Cove in Caswell by three young potholers named Graham Jones, John Gerke and Chris MacNamara. Her body had been concealed just 200 yards from the home she and Shotton had resided in at the time of her disappearance.
One of the potholers, John Gerke, would later state that he and his friends had chosen to explore this area as it had formerly been used by