Dorothy Rosemary Morris

Dorothy Rosemary Morris went missing whilst out on a Sunday School outing to the seaside at Sandwich Bay in Kent on Saturday 12 August 1950.

She was last seen at about 4pm on the Saturday walking along the dunes crying by two hikers about a mile from Sandwich Bay.

It was also thought that she might have been seen by a man later on the Saturday who said that he saw a little girl crying on the shore of Sandwich Bay who said that when he spoke to her she told him that she, 'wanted her mummy'. He said that when he asked her where her mummy was the girl pointed towards a group of people nearby and so he thought that it was all right. The man said that the group comprised of a young woman in a red bathing costume, an elderly man, two or three young men and two or three children, all of whom the police said they were anxious to trace.

There had been about 150 children and 40 adults on the Sunday School outing.

It was thought that she might have fallen into the sea, but the police said that they were not ruling out the possibility of foul play and said that they were treating her disappearance as though it were that of a crime.

More than 200 police, RAF men and civilians were involved in searching the inland areas and quicksand’s around Sandwich Bay and the mouth of the River Stour for her, but with no luck. It was reported that they had searched an eight-mile area around the beach. The search was also assisted by a Tiger Moth plane that hopped the sand dunes in search of her as well as boats out at sea.

Dorothy Morris had lived with her family in Brookfield Avenue in Dover.

When she was last seen she had been wearing a pink floral bathing dress.

She was described as being about 3ft tall, with blonde hair tied on each side with blue ribbons, snub nosed and with blue eyes.

The police said that they had received reports of a man that was seen pushing a bicycle followed closely by a young child and a woman heading northwards along the high water mark between 4.15pm and 5pm on the Saturday, and that they were trying to trace them.

Her father said that he thought that Dorothy Morris had been taken off as she hated water, saying that they always had a job to make her have her bath. He also added that she was not one to wonder off on her own. He also said, 'Dorothy was suffering from a form of blood poisoning which came out on the soles of her feet and made them very tender. She would certainly not have gone very far like that by herself'.

The police said that it was an area where it was very easy to lose yourself. It was also noted that there were considerable areas of quicksand’s and that they were going to be dragged as part of the search.

On 6 September 1950 Derby police were handed a child's bathing dress which was thought to have been a valuable clue in the search for Dorothy Morris. It was a pink floral dress and was found on a seat in a car park in Shoeburyness Sands by a woman on 13 August 1950, the day after Dorothy Morris went missing. She said that as there was nobody about to claim it that she took it away with her, but said that it was not until she read about Dorothy Morris in the newspaper on Tuesday 5 September 1950 that she remembered it. She said that the bathing suit was worn, but not damp when she had found it. She said that she picked it up and put it in her car thinking that she would give it to some poor child.

She said that as the newspaper description of Dorothy Morris's bathing dress so closely resembled the one that she had found that she hurriedly took it to the police. The dress was then sent to the Kent police for examination.

The police said that if the suit was the one that Dorothy Morris's had been wearing that someone must have taken it to Shoeburyness.

However, nothing more about the bathing suit was reported.