Killing of the Ormesher Sisters

Margaret Jane Ormesher (68) and Mary Ormesher (67), unmarried sisters who had lived in Ormskirk, Lancashire, all their lives, ran a tobacconist and sweetshop on Church Street and were well known locally, with Mary known as "Auntie Polly." They resided at Ivy Dene, 8 Asmall Lane, a former public house their father had once operated. For almost six years, a neighbour, Mrs Josephine Whitehouse, had accompanied Mary on her nightly walk home carrying the shop's takings, following advice that Mary should not walk alone or should bank the money.

On the evening of Saturday 5 May 1956, Mary walked home alone for the first time in nearly six years, carrying a brown attaché case containing the week's takings of £150. She was seen by neighbours along her route and arrived home between 10:10pm and 10:25pm. Around 11:15–11:30pm, neighbours in the surrounding Brickmakers Arms Yard heard groans, voices, breaking glass, and clattering, but dismissed the noises as not serious at the time.

The sisters were found dead the next morning, Sunday 6 May 1956, by Mrs Whitehouse and a neighbour, Thomas Patrick Cummins, after Whitehouse became concerned that the shop had not opened. Their bodies were discovered in the kitchen, showing evidence of a violent struggle and severe injuries to the head and upper body. The murder weapons — a brass poker with the head removed, two brass candlesticks, and a wine bottle — appeared to have come from within the house itself. The attaché case was found open on the kitchen table; one of two cash bags, containing roughly £100, was missing, while a second bag with £50 in silver was left behind. A bloodied fingerprint was recovered at the scene but was never matched.

The autopsy, conducted by Dr George B. Manning of the Home Office Forensic Science Laboratory in Preston, estimated the deaths occurred around midnight and had been carried out with considerable violence and force.

Police conducted a house-to-house investigation across Ormskirk and took fingerprints from every male over 18 in the town, but found no match to the print at the scene. Investigators looked into rumours that the sisters kept large sums hidden at home, checked names of wartime evacuees who had lodged with the sisters, and made inquiries among Teddy Boys who frequented local pubs and dancehalls. An 11-year-old local boy reported seeing an unidentified individual loitering suspiciously near the junction of Asmall Lane and Whiterails Drive on three consecutive nights before the murder. No arrests were ever made.

In February 1983, an anonymous caller believed to be a man in his 70s telephoned a Manchester newspaper claiming to know the killer's identity; the tip was passed to Lancashire CID and a suspect was investigated, but this did not lead to a conviction. As of March 2015, the case remained one of fifteen unsolved murders under investigation by Lancashire Police.