On 29th September 1935 two women, visiting Moffat, walked out of the town on the Beef Tub Road (A701). Looking over the Gardenholm Linn Bridge they saw what they thought looked like a human arm and quickly returned to Moffat to raise the alarm.
A search of the area followed, over many days, and resulted in 2 bodies being found, one believed to be male and the other female. The bodies had been dismembered and mutilated, parts of faces and fingertips had been removed- a total of 70 body parts were recovered. Also found was cotton sheeting, a child’s knitted romper suit, a woman’s blouse and newspaper pages that had been wrapping some of the remains.
Scientific experts were brought in from Glasgow and Edinburgh Universities and from other Police Forces to assist local officers. It was quickly established that the dismemberment of the bodies had been undertaken by someone with extensive anatomical knowledge. Identification of the bodies was going to be a very difficult and complex task.
The newspaper pages, which had been carefully dried and preserved by the local police, were found to have come from a limited edition of the of 15th September 1935 that had only been circulated in the Morecambe area.
When contact was made with the Police in Morecambe, attention was drawn to a newspaper story about a missing woman – Mary Jane Rogerson. Mary worked for Dr. Buck Ruxton in Lancaster. Dr. Ruxton was, at that time, expressing concerns about the whereabouts of his wife.
Further investigative work on the bodies found in Moffat suggested that both bodies may be female and Lancashire Police became heavily involved.
Checks on the blouse and child’s romper suit found in Moffat linked them to Mary Rogerson. Enquiries of Dr. Ruxton’s servants and visitors to his home revealed that blood-stained carpets and clothing had been removed from the house and destroyed in September.
On 13th October 1935 Ruxton was charged with Mary Rogerson’s murder.
Painstaking forensic investigations continued in Lancaster, at Dr. Ruxton’s house, and in the laboratories of the universities in Glasgow and Edinburgh as the Experts and the Police sought to prove that the bodies were those of Mary Jane Rogerson (Nursemaid) and Isabella Ruxton (Ruxton’s partner).
On 5th November 1935 Buck Ruxton was charged with the murder of his partner, Isabella Ruxton.
He was tried at Manchester Assizes in March 1936 and sentenced to death.
Dr Buck Ruxton was executed at Strangeways Prison on 12th May 1936.
A Popular Song of the Time
RED STAINS ON THE CARPET,
RED STAINS ON THE KNIFE;
OH, DR. BUCK RUXTON,
YOU MURDERED YOUR WIFE,
THE MAID CAME AND SAW YOU;
SHE SAID SHE WOULD TELL;
SO DR. BUCK RUXTON,
YOU KILLED HER AS WELL.
Sung to the tune of ‘Red Sails in the Sunset’ a ballad released in 1935, sung by both Bing Crosby and Gracie Fields. (Both versions are available on Spotify).
