Age: 0
Sex: female
Date: 11 Jan 1943
Place: Christleton, Cheshire
The body of a newly-born female child was found on a railway embankment at Christleton.
The body was found by a linesman who lived in Woodlands Drive, Hoole. He said that he had been walking along the Chester to Crewe main line on the Monday 11 January 1943 in the direction of Waverton when, at the Whitchurch Road Bridge at Christleton, he went up the embankment and when he neared the top he found a cardboard box. He said that when he opened one end of the box he found that it contained the body of a child. He noted that he also found some string lying near the box.
A policeman stationed in Christleton said that at about 3.40pm on the Monday afternoon he went to the railway bridge at Christleton and saw the linesman and that at the top of the embankment near the wall of the bridge he found the box that contained the body of the newly born child.
The pathologist that carried out the post-mortem said that the child appeared to have been dead for about five days and said that he thought that the child had lived for at least five minutes.
He concluded that he thought that death was due to lack of attention at birth.
see www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk
see Cheshire Observer - Saturday 16 January 1943, p7