George Sharpes

George Sharpes murdered Milly Illingworth Crabtree 25 by battering her to death at Manor Farm House, Ladbroke on 13 January 1926.

Milly Crabtree was found dead in the sitting room of Manor Farm House with her head fractured with a hammer nearby. George Sharpes was found in another room with a superficial neck wound from an attempt to commit suicide.

George Sharpes was a farm servant and had been employed at Manor Farm House for 2 days. Previously he had lived in Chesire where he had been in a reformatory for 4 years. He was hoping that when he went to Warwick he could make a fresh start. However, within 2 days everyone knew about the reformatory and he blamed Milly Crabtree and so killed her.

When arrested he said 'This is why I done it. When I was in Cheshire all the people in the village knew I had been in a reformatory for four years, and I thought that when coming with Mr Crabtree to Warwick I expected to make a fresh start. I had not been at Manor Farm two days before other people at the farm knew I had been in a reformatory. I found Mrs Crabtree had told them. This shattered all my hopes. If I had had the birch this might not have happened.'

I prison he was obsessed with his death and drew on a slate a picture of a coffin approaching a church entitled 'George Sharpes Funeral'.

see National Archives - HO 144/6000

see Aberdeen Journal - Tuesday 26 January 1926

see Cheltenham Chronicle - Saturday 13 March 1926