Age: 7
Sex: female
Date: 17 May 1917
Place: Hill Top, Conisbro
Millicent Goodland was found shot dead at Hill Top.
She was shot while she had been playing in the saddle-room attached to a farm.
A groom at the farm was thought to have been cleaning a gun at the time but he had afterward fled and could not be found.
Millicent Goodland was the daughter of the landlord of Hill Top Hotel.
A blacksmith's striker said that he was in the Hill Top Hotel on the Monday evening when he heard the report of a gun and that a woman then told him that Millicent Goodland had been shot. He said that he went over to the saddle-room where he saw Millicent Goodland just outside in the road. He said he also saw a broken pain of glass.
He said then that he went into the saddle-room and saw the groom, who was described as being 69 years old and that he seemed greatly distressed and placed the gun in such a position and said that it had gone off accidently and that he was very sorry.
Another woman said that she had heard the shot and when she saw the groom she said that he said 'Please, ma'am, I was cleaning the gun when it went off and shot Molly Goodland, and I think her face is blown off'. She said that the groom then went off and she thought that he was going to get help but he was not seen again.
The Coroner said that the groom's disappearance was a most unfortunate feature of the affair, but that the jury must not proceed from the assumption that it was necessarily evidence of criminal culpability.
An open verdict was returned.
see www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk
see Sheffield Independent - Thursday 17 May 1917