Kathleen Durrans

Kathleen Durrans was found drowned in a clay pit in New Holland, Lincolnshire.

Her body was found by some children as they played near a disused brick pit in New Holland. After finding her body they informed the coastguard who recovered her body and removed it to the Yarborough Hotel.

She had lived in Yews Mount, Lockwood in Huddersfield and had left home on the Saturday 23 September 1905 to visit her brothers fiancee at 7 St Mary's Buildings in New Holland.

It was said that all had gone well until the Tuesday evening 26 September 1905 when she set out to meet her brothers fiancee at Pier Station as she returned from Hull where she worked by the New Holland ferry steamer, however, she was not seen again until her body was found the evening of Thursday 5 October 1905 in the clay pit drowned.

She had left the house at about 8.30pm to meet the woman and it was said that her brothers fiancee had tried to persuade her not to meet the ferry as she didn't know the area but that Kathleen Durrans had told that that it would be all right and that she would find the station. She was seen near the booking office at the station by a policeman at 8.55pm.

It was noted that Kathleen Durrans knew no one in New Holland beyond the woman's household and some of her friends and had not been there before.

It was said that it was a mystery as to how she had got into the pond as it was some way out of her course to the pier.

The pond itself was described as being about six feet deep.

It was thought that her body had been in the water for some days.

When she was removed from the pond, she was found to have 11s in money, a pocket handkerchief and a few small nuts on her.

It was noted that a year before that she had been an inmate of Storthall Asylum where she had stayed for four months but that when she had come out she was quite all right and that there had been no signs of any return of her disease.

Letters that she had written home after having gone to New Holland were examined, including one that she had written on the day she disappeared, but they contained nothing that threw any light on the affair.

It was noted that she had had no love affair and was never known to have threatened to commit suicide.

Her post-mortem concluded that there was every appearance that her death was due to drowning and that there was nothing to suggest violence had been used.

An open verdict was returned at her inquest. The coroner said that it was perfectly clear that her death was  due to drowning and said that he thought it was up to the jury to decide whether they thought that Kathleen Durrans had lost her way and then fallen into the pond, but said that he thought that it was a case for an open verdict which the jury returned, recording a verdict of 'Found drowned', adding that they were of the opinion that Kathleen Durrans was of a perfectly sound mind and that she had lost her way and then fallen into the pond.

She would have been 19 on 4 October 1905.

Her funeral service took place at the Mount Pleasant Wesleyan Chapel in Lockwood, Huddersfield on the afternoon of Monday 9 October 1905. The route to the cemetery was described as being lined with spectators and that many hundreds of onlookers had assembled at the cemetery grounds to watch her internment.