Murder at Crowhalt?

Crowhalt farm located in the Staffordshire Moorlands in the UK is a short distance from the R.S.P.B information centre at Six Oaks farm. If you drive past the information centre on Apesford Lane, travelling from the Ashbourne road direction you pass Cocketts farm on the right, after passing the farm you will see a drive and a cattle grid on your right. The drive splits into two the other side of the cattle grid, the left hand drive leads to Ringehay farm, the right hand drives drops down into the vallet where Crowhalt farm can be found.

I was able to photograph Crowhalt by using the public footpath which runs through Cocketts farm, it then crosses a field before entering a wood, after leaving the wood at the bottom of the valley Crowhalt can be seen to your left. I don’t recommend getting to close as they have a savage dog, fortunately my camera has a powerful zoom lens and I was able to photograph it.

Crowhalt. Photo by Gary Tacagni.

Crowhalt would have been the Horsley family home in the sixteenth century. Richard Horsley was probably born around 1625-30, he was married to Dorothea Horsley who would have been born around the same time. The married couple would go on to have two sons, Johannes Horsley who would have been born in 1649 and John Horsley who would have been born a year later in 1650.

Richard Horsley the boys father died in 1661 when the boys would have been 11 and 12 years old. It is known the family took on a housemaid for she would play a crucial role in what took place at a later date. However if Dorothea had taken on the housemaid at the time of Richard’s death she would have been at least 55 years old when Johannes, who by this time had entered the medical profession and become a doctor killed his brother John, who had gone on to become a lawyer.

Dorothea died in 1671 the two boys would have now been 21 and 22 y.ears old. I believe that she may have suffered ill health before she died and this would have been the reason she took on a housemaid to help with the upkeep of the farm and house. After Dorothea’s in 1671 the two young men and the housemaid must have got along okay as they lived under the same roof for the next 25 years, before Johannes went on to murder his brother in 1695.

We do know that John’s murder was premeditated by Johannes, the two brother’s having fallen in love with the housemaid, the popular belief is that John was poisoned, Johannes having access to poisons being a doctor. It is believed that after murdering John, Johannes took the body to the Coombes Valley, approximately a mile from Crowhalt, here he hid the body beneatha stone which would later become known as the Horsley Stone.

I assume that John’s disappearance would have alerted the authorities either from the housemaid or his friends or colleagues. Having been questioned by the authorities Johannes must have divulged the whereabouts of John’s body. We do know that John’s remains were given a Christian burial as his grave is located in St Edward’s church in Leek, this means that his body must have been recovered from the valley. At the time of his death in 1695 John would have been 45 years old.

An extract from the book “The Tale of Ipstones”, written by Rev. F . Brighton in 1937 tells of a poem relating to the events, the following is a verse from that poem.

Two brothers lived, so the old men say,

and one was skilled in the healing art,

the other bore a lawyers part.

The doctor deadly poisons mixed,

for on his brothers death he fixed.

And then the fearful deed to hide,

he burnt the corpse in an oven wide.

But the foul sin he could not screen,

for still his brothers ghost was seen.

The thing that I find puzzling is if Johannes had poisoned his brother and tried to dispose of his body by burning it in an oven, why then did he go to the trouble of transporting the remains over a mile to the Coombes Valley, to then hide it under a rock which is difficult to reach at the best of times. Why did he not bury the body nearer Crowhalt as there are plenty of places close by including an isolated wood?

I have recently discovered something which may shed more light on the subject. A couple of months ago I found an energy or Ley line which enters the Coombes Valley at 158 degrees south south east around 400 yards from the main gate at Buzzards Bank, the energy line then drops down into the Coombes Valley and appears to intersect with the Horsley Stone. It then climbs up the other side of the valley crossing the Woodcock Trail and eventually runs past Sharpcliffe Hall about 50 yards to the left of it through a copse of trees. Eventually I believe the line intersects a stone circle which Ralph de Tunstall Sneyd, a practising Druid used in his rituals back in the 1860s when he rented the hall.

For the Horsley Stone to have been placed on a Ley Line must mean that it had some importance placed upon it in the past. I don’t believe that it was mere coincidence that it is at this location, someone must have gone to a lot of effort to place it here.

The battle which took place in this valley between the British and the Anglo Saxon’s may shed more light on this stone. It is believed the Anglo Saxon invaders arrived in the Staffordshire Moorlands around the mid to late 6th century after having fought their way westwards, reaching the town of Leek and the surrounding area which became a part of Mercia, which basically consisted of various smaller tribes of Saxon’s. One of these tribes is known to have been living to the north of Leek and they were known as the Pecsietna. It is this tribe which I believe to have attacked two British army camps which would have overlooked the Coombes Valley and were situated where Sharpcliffe Hall now stands.

I believe that the Pecsietna would have been aware of the British encampments and the threat that they posed, as would the British encampments have been aware of the Pecsietna and the threat of attack by them. For this reason the British would have made sure that there were lookouts posted accordingly.

Whether the Pecsietna approached from the west as stated in “The Tale of Ipstones”, or they approached from the Ladymeadows and the Bottomhouse direction remains uncertain, however I believe that the Saxon invaders were spotted by the British, the alarm was raised and heavy fighting ensued on Sharpcliffe Ridge, which was renamed in years to come, becoming known as Ghost Ridge, presumably due to the heavy loss of life and sightings of phantom soldiers over the years since the battle.

I believe that not being caught off guard the British were able to drive the Saxon’s back down into the valley to a place which today is called Clough Meadow, however back then it would come to be known as “The Hell Hole”, presumably from the massacre which took place at this spot.

I don’t believe all the Saxon soldiers were killed in the battle and according to legend a number of these soldiers were taken prisoner. Whether straight away or at a later date I am not sure, they would according to legend have been taken to the southern end of the valley, where, is the legend is true they would have been sacrificed on a rock located in the Coombes Brook.

The reason I know that the British were victorious is that they would have been aware of the significance of this rock, whereas the Saxon’s probably wouldn’t have been. Whether the Saxon prisoners were killed out of revenge for the deaths of the British soldiers is not known, or perhaps there is a more sinister reason.

Fast forward a thousand years later and another possible sacrifice may have taken place here when Johannes Horsley may have possibly drugged his brother John, and transported him over a mile to the same spot in 1695 to sacrifice his brother, only for history to repeat itself, the rock becoming known as the Horsley Stone. Whether John’s spirit is at peace, or like a lot of people believe, that his spirit entered a bird is another story entirely!