Emily Yeomans

[cap]

Was reading through the ghost stories in middleton woods section and came accross the part about Emily Yeomans , the girl who was murdered in middleton woods, does anyone know where abouts she was found in the woods? i saw it was next to the tram tracks and found under undergrowth but middleton woods i believe had quite a stretch of track and not too short of undergrowth either.

[buffaloskinner]

[Admin edit] This has been covered before: http://secretleeds.com/viewtopic.php?f= ... 2&start=50, relevant post content below.

Post by andrea70 » Tue Jun 24, 2008 8:22 pm

I'm usually sceptical about a lot of ghost stories & stuff - but talking about Middleton woods I do have a bit of a weird story about when I was a kid & me & my mates used to go down there a lot to play on the rope swings - there was one above a bell pit, must have been either 1984/5 when I was about 11/12 - whilst messin on the swing one of my mates said she'd just seen a 'lass' run past downhill on a mud path further down to us - noone else noticed as we werent looking at the time - my mate Lesley kept watching as she thought it a bit strange I suppose a young girl on her own running through woods - we all took a look further on through the woods not really that interested - & then - I remember this really well as we all saw it too - from behind one of the trees quite far off it was as if a girl was knelt behind it - she kind of leant out to one side on her arm & I remember the long hair fall around her shoulder - but I swear it was white - it only happened for a second & she went 'back in' behind the tree - I knelt down kind of in shock & remember shouting 'oi, whose that behind that tree?' but no answer - we all ran & ran until we got back up to middleton park pond & talked about it 'til we were blue in the face - we all swear we saw the same thing - very strange - I'm 35 now & still remember this as being the weirdest thing I've seen & I've never seen a 'ghost' since - if this is what it was. I'm not professing by any means that this was what it was but I honestly can't explain it - & I'm not a weirdo whose obsessed with things like this either. Time goes by & you tend to kind of forget about stuff like this but when I read these threads it made me think about it again. Curiously though also years later my grandma once got talking about when trams used to go through bottom of woods & as a young woman in 30's with my grandad they used to catch tram from Belle-Isle up to Middleton - in 1934 she said there was a girl murdered in the woods called Emily Yeomans - she used to live at Garnet Place in Beeston. Her body was found somewhere in undergrowth at side of tram track. It turned out to be her boyfried - David Marshall Blake from Lady Pit Lane, Beeston & I think he was tried at Leeds Town Hall & hung. It made me think though when I heard about this - could it have possibly been anything to do with this what we saw behind that tree that day? I'll never know.

[buffaloskinner]

Murder The Night Before The Wedding

David Blake had a distinctly unpleasant way with women. On the evening of Tuesday, October 16th, 1934, he went for a walk with Emily Yeomans, a waitress at the Lyons Cafe in the County Arcade, Leeds, raped her and strangled her, and left her body in Middleton Woods.

Next day he married his girlfriend, Jean Whitehead, and during the celebrations showed his best man, Albert Schofield, a story in the local paper about the Emily Yeomans murder the night before.

The day after the wedding Blake, an unemployed steel-erector of Lady Pit Lane, Leeds, met Schofield again in the Mulberry Inn, Leeds. This time Blake had yet another woman with him, and one who was evidently very taken by him.

Schofield didn’t know what to make of his womanising pal. He knew Blake had been out the night before the wedding with Emily Yeomans, who lived with her uncle at Garnet Place, Dewsbury Road, Leeds. Should he go to the police and tell them about it?

Finally he decided he must. He told detectives, who were looking for a man wearing a blue suit on the night of the murder, that his friend was wearing a blue suit that day. Blake was arrested and charged with Emily’s murder. Forensic evidence helped seal his fate; on Emily’s skirt there were strands of wool fibre from his suit.

The court was shown a powder compact retrieved from a house where Blake spent a night after the murder. Three Lyons’ Cafe waitresses were able to “absolutely” identify it as Emily’s.

After Blake was found guilty, the court learned that he had served a three-year prison sentence for robbing a woman and nearly choking her to death. He was hanged for Emily’s murder on FEBRUARY 7th, 1935, the day before his 30th birthday.

[buffaloskinner]

Try a google search, there seems to be plenty about it. Although I doubt if it will tell you the exact location, therefore stopping all the weird groupies.

[cap]

creepy to think i ride past the spot she was found everyday on way to work, not seen anything though but have walked through miggy woods in the dead of night thinking nothing of it until you realise your drunk and in the middle of miggy woods in pitch black darkness. The people who may or may not be there dont bother me as they can be quite easily taken care of but when it comes to the paranormal all you can do is run as fast as your legs can take you

[j.c.d.]

when we moved to Beeston in the late 1940s my Mother pointed out Middleton Woods and told us that story. there is a large detached house on the corner of Beeston Road and Sunnyview Gardens which was used as a funeral directors for many years. she said that earlier it had been a Doctors house and that there was a murder there. I do not know any more but maybe someone can shed light on this.

[tyke bhoy]

Tuesday, October 16th, 1934, he went for a walk with Emily Yeomans, a waitress at the Lyons Cafe in the County Arcade, Leeds, raped her and strangled her, and left her body in Middleton Woods.

After Blake was found guilty, the court learned that he had served a three-year prison sentence for robbing a woman and nearly choking her to death. He was hanged for Emily’s murder on FEBRUARY 7th, 1935, the day before his 30th birthday.

That's swift justice. Under 4 months for an arrest, conviction and execution. It wouldn't have got beyond the Magistrates court stage in that time these days.

[tyke bhoy]

when we moved to Beeston in the late 1940s my Mother pointed out Middleton Woods and told us that story. there is a large detached house on the corner of Beeston Road and Sunnyview Gardens which was used as a funeral directors for many years. she said that earlier it had been a Doctors house and that there was a murder there. I do not know any more but maybe someone can shed light on this.

From a comment on a photo of an unrelated property on Leodis http://www.leodis.net/display.aspx?reso ... SPLAY=FULL
This
https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid= ... 1296&hl=en

[j.c.d.]

Thanks Tyke Bhoy for that. Dr Dwyer indeed was the man.

Unrelated to that on the site they mention a certain Dr. Adams being the United club doctor who was instrumental in stopping the transfer of a young star Asa Hartford coming to Elland Road because the good Doc. found Asa supposedly had a hole in the heart condition. The story in and around the Pubs in Beeston at the time was that in fact he was quite fit and the X.Ray was done whilst he was wearing pyjamas and he had a Polo mint in his jacket breast pocket...... Apologies for going off topic.

[TABBYCAT]

Here's a report of said murder... EDIT Just realised same as above.

https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid= ... 1296&hl=en


Present day location...

http://goo.gl/maps/uwvco


And a picture of said Doctor.