Cyril Martin

Cyril Martin was found unconscious in Marlow Road, Maidenhead on 21 August 1985 and died eight weeks later on 16 October 1985 without regaining consciousness.

He had been beaten to death with a blunt instrument.

He had been a tramp and was said to have been well-known in Maidenhead.

He was found by workmen lying unconscious in a pool of blood behind the old art college in Marlow Road in an outbuilding where he had been sleeping rough.

He was taken to Charing Cross Hospital and then later taken to Wexham Park Hospital in Slough where he died, having suffered a fractured skull.

However, shortly after his death, the police said:

However, on the Crimewatch programme it was said that he had been severely beaten about the head and that it was thought he had been robbed.

The police said that they were seeking two men, as potential witnesses, that had been hitch-hiking who were thought to have been from the outskirts of Maidstone.

They had been seen drinking in the Bell pub in Maidenhead on the day Cyril Martin was attacked. Cyril Martin spent the evening drinking there and had left the pub at about 10.55pm.

Cyril Martin was seen soon after, at about 11.15pm, talking to two men outside the Brewer's Tea House pub in High Street, about 300 yards away from the Bell pub.

It was said that after leaving the Brewer's Tea House pub that he would have taken the pedestrian subway under the A4 and then walked back along Marlow Road to the old art college where he would have followed a side lane to the outbuilding where he was found dead.

Cyril Martin had been wearing a scruffy donkey jacket and possibly a check cap and glasses.

The two hitch-hikers had also been seen drinking in the Rose and Crown public house in Thorpe Green, Egham on the night of the attack. It was thought that they might also have lived within three or four miles of Lenham. One of them was said to have worked with computers and possibly for a TV company, whilst the other had possibly recently left college.

It was believed that they had hitch-hiked from Maidstone to Devon and had spent two or three weeks hitch-hiking around the south and south-west and that they might have spent the night of 20 August 1985 in Bristol.

The first man was described as:

• About 19 years old.
• 6ft 1in tall.
• Shoulder length dark hair.
• Proportionate build.
• Wearing a long coat.
• Carrying a rucksack with aluminium framing with a guitar hanging from it.
• Southern accent.

The second man was described as:

• About 20 years old.
• 5ft 9in tall.
• Slim build.
• Brown mousey hair swept back.
• Wearing gold rim spectacles.
• Possibly wearing an orange anorak.
• Also believed to have had a rucksack.

In January 1986 it was reported that two men had been questioned by the police but released without charge, although it’s not known whether there was any connection with the hitch-hikers.

On Friday 24 January 1986 a 28-year-old man was questioned.

Cyril Martin had been married and a father of six.