All of the public-domain records that Morton accesses are real, but with fictitious content and a sometimes speedier service than might be experienced by regular genealogists!
Among the books that I found useful in the research and writing of this book were the following:
Bevan-Jones, M., Pieces of Cake (University of Wales, 2005)
Clayton, A., The Enemy is Listening (Crécy Books, 1993)
Escott, B. E., The WAAF (Shire Publications, 2011)
Humphreys, R. S., Hawkinge 1912-1961 (Meresborough Books, 1981)
Humphreys, R. S., RAF Hawkinge in Old Photographs (Alan Sutton, 1991)
Longden, S., Dunkirk, the Men they left behind (Constable, 2008)
Longmate, N., How we lived then (Arrow Books, 1973)
McKay, S., The Secret Life of Bletchley Park (Aurum, 2010)
McKay, S., The Lost World of Bletchley Park (Aurum, 2013)
Probert, R., Divorced, Bigamist, Bereaved? (Takeaway, 2015)
Ramsey, W. G., The Battle of Britain Then and Now (Battle of Britain Prints, 1996)
Ramsey, W. G., The Blitz Then and Now (Battle of Britain Prints, 1987)
Summers, J., Stranger in the House (Simon and Schuster, 2008)
Wellum, G., First Light (Penguin, 2009)
Wyn, K. G., Men of the Battle of Britain (Gliddon, 2015)
Younghusband, E., One Woman’s War (Candy Jar, 2011)
Acknowledgments
As usual, the research, writing and preparation of this book requires the knowledge and expertise of several kind and helpful people.
My first thanks must go to my newly-discovered and warmly familiar aunt, Pauline Daniels for graciously allowing me to rummage through her paperwork and to share aspects of her story, but mainly for being such a welcoming and lovely lady.
For their assistance with the WAAF and RAF research aspects of this book, I am indebted to the following people: Dr Ray Solly, Helen Likierman and Julian Hale, Kate Griffiths, Bryan Legate and Geoff Simpson. For putting up with a flurry of badgering questions regarding police procedure and trying not to laugh at my more outlandish scenarios, I am very grateful to Helen Woolven. For their help with the creation of the book cover, I would like to thank Sarah McCalden, Melanie Martin, Jane and Podge Gaskin, Vera and Tony Orsbourne and to Patrick Dengate for bringing everything together in his as-ever superb cover design. For her invaluable proof-reading services and advice, I thank Julia Gibbs. Thank you to the Rye Town Crier, Rex Swain, for agreeing to appear as himself in the book. As always, my thanks go to Robert Bristow for his encouragement and keenness to take part in each of Morton’s adventures.
Finally, I would like to extend my sincere gratitude to my readers. Your support and enthusiasm for the series has been truly amazing: thank you.
Although The Forensic Genealogist series can be read in any order, turn the page for Morton Farrier’s next adventure – The Missing Man…
The Missing Man - Prologue
24th December 1976, Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, USA
Velda was numb. The blanket over her shoulders, now heavy from the falling snow, did nothing to stop the acute quivering that rattled through her body. The police tape barricade, vibrating in the icy wind against her hands, had confined her to the street. The swelling congregation behind her—a motley mixture of prying and anxious neighbours and the whole gamut of emergency service personnel—were rendered faceless by the darkness of the night.
Velda’s eyes followed the thick snakes of white hose that crossed her lawn from the hydrant, into the hands of the firefighters, who were battling the great rasping flames that projected from every window of the house. Her house.
One of the firefighters—the chief, she assumed—approached her. He was sweating and his face was marked with black blotches. ‘Ma’am—are you sure your husband and daughter are still inside?’
‘Yes,’ she heard herself say.
‘They couldn’t have slipped out to get something from the grocery store or…?’
‘No,’ Velda sobbed. ‘They’re inside. Please find them.’
The fire chief nodded and turned back towards the house.
A moment later, without fanfare or warning, the house collapsed. The shocked gasps of her neighbours and the stricken cries of the firefighters on the lawn were lost to the appalling cacophony of metal, brick, wood and glass crumbling together, crescendo-ing into the night sky. A funnel of dense black smoke, peppered with flecks of bright red and orange, clashed in mid-air with the flurrying of falling snow.
Then, an odd stillness.
That her house—her home—could be reduced to this pile of indescribable burning debris in front of her shocked her anew.
This wasn’t how it was supposed to be.
The hermetic seal that had neatly separated past and present had just ruptured spectacularly.
And now it was all over.
Somebody touched her shoulder and said something. She turned. It was her son, Jack. Either Velda’s ears were still ringing with the sound of the house disintegrating, or Jack was speaking soundlessly. There was an urgency to his voice.
Velda tried to reply but a sagging sensation in her heart emanated out under her skin and down into her quivering limbs. Her legs buckled from beneath her and she crumpled helplessly into the snow.
The Missing Man - Chapter One
14th August 2016, Boston, Massachusetts, USA
Morton Farrier was shattered. He looked at his watch: just gone ten in the morning. He and his new wife, Juliette, had arrived at Logan International Airport late last night, following their marriage yesterday in their home town of Rye, England. He yawned. He’d had very little sleep and yet here he was sitting at a digital microfilm reader in Boston Public Library. He stretched and glanced around him. Having managed to navigate his way through busy and noisy corridors, courtyards and vast swathes of uninterrupted bookshelves, Morton now found
