Baby

The body of a newly born child was found in the River Derwent.

It was found on 8 June 1905 by three men that had been boating in the river not far from Cemetery Bridge at Belpar. They said that as they were boating not far from the bridge that they found the parcel made up of brown paper floating in the water and that when they opened it they found the body of the child.

A man gave evidence at the inquest stating that on the evening of 3 June 1905 that he and his sister had hired a boat at Belper and had gone off along the river towards Ambergate and that as they were near the bridge opposite the cemetery they saw the parcel thrown into the water, the parcel landing about six yards from their boat. He said that he remarked to his sister that he was thankful that it had not hit them.

He said that the parcel was thrown from the window of a train. He said that he saw the train pass in the Ambergate direction and distinctly saw someone throw the parcel from one of the windows. He noted that they were just passed the bridge by about six yards and that anyone in the train would not have seen them. He said that when it was thrown it was covered with a white cloth and that the cloth came away from the parcel and floated off whilst the parcel sank. He said that they didn't make any effort to recover the white cloth and saw nothing more of the parcel.

The man said that he didn't tell the police about what he had seen, but thought that his sister might have said something to someone but could not say how they came to find out what they had seen as they only talked about it at home.

The police said that they made enquiries with the Railway Company and found that a train had left Bristol at 3.30pm that would have passed through Belper at 7.11pm and that it was thought that the parcel would have been thrown from that train. However, they said that they had not been able to trace anyone having got on at Belpar with a parcel as described.

The child had been placed in a pillowcase before being wrapped up in the parcel.

The doctor that carried out the post-mortem said that the child had had a separate existence, noting that one lung had been filled, but that the other had collapsed.

After hearing the evidence, an open verdict was returned.