Could this be the face of Mystery murder victim’s appearance reconstructed 75 years on

THIS is the face of a woman whose ritualistic killing sparked one of Britain’s greatest murder mysteries.

Her name may, or may not have been, Bella, victim in the baffling 75-year-old ‘Bella in the Wych Elm’ case, a tangled wartime web of espionage and black magic.

The victim, whose skeleton was found wedged in a tree’s hollow near Hagley, in Worcestershire, has never been identified.

The killer who ritualistically maimed the body – a piece of taffeta cloth was forced in her mouth and one hand severed – was never brought to justice.

That may now change after Caroline Wilkinson, the expert tasked with rebuilding King Richard III’s face after the his remains were found under a Leicester car park, recreated Bella’s features.

The professor of craniofacial identification at Dundee University used photographs taken at the time to put a face to the name.

She could not use the actual skull, discovered by four young schoolboys collecting eggs in woodland because it has been lost, Birmingham councillor Peter Douglas Osborn, an expert on the case, revealed.

That was also confirmed by West Midlands Police, who said: “Searches have been conducted by the Police Museum volunteers and they have confirmed that we hold no exhibits, and can find no documentation, that may relate to this case at either of the West Midlands Police Museums

“Additionally, searches were carried out by our Force Records team, who have confirmed that there is no relevant documentation held with the major investigation team or in external storage.”

The skeleton dates back to a time when Hagley fell within the West Midlands police boundary, a spokesman explained.

The skull had previously been housed at a Birmingham forensics lab, then moved to the Tally Ho police base, in Pershore Road, Edgbaston.

But its whereabouts are not now known, a spokesperson admitted.

The striking image of Bella, suspected of being a Nazi spy, will feature in a new book, Who Put Bella In The Wych Elm?, written by father and son Alex and Pete Merrill.

It started out as a school project for 15-year-old Alex, who is currently studying for his GCSEs.

Mr Osborn, who has a keen interest in one of this country’s most baffling crimes, hopes it will at last provide answers. His late father, Squadron Leader William Douglas Osborn, was tasked with guarding the murder scene on the southern edge of the Black Country when the remains were found on April 18, 1943.

“I believe she was killed before 1941,” says Mr Osborn. “The recon- struction is impressive. Now it’s a question of asking members of the public to thumb through family albums. Anyone who had direct contact with her is probably dead.”

The strange case is the stuff of popular rural sleuth TV series, Midsomer Murders.

And the mystery has endured because of sporadic outbreaks of graffiti in Birmingham and the Black Country, the first appearing six months after the body was found.

Each scrawled message asked the same question: “Who put Bella in the Wych Elm?”

But the more pertinent question is, who was Bella?

Painstaking detective and forensic work revealed the victim was aged around 35 to 40 and had given birth.

The body had rotted within the hollow trunk of the tree for at least 18 months.

It is possible it was ritualistic as it had some hallmarks of a Satanic ceremony. The crime scene mirrored an ancient ceremony known as ‘Hand of Glory’ where bones are scattered to the wind.

A hand had been severed, a wad of taffeta wedged in the victim’s mouth.

One of her arms had been left 13 paces from the skeletal remains – an ancient custom used when a witch was executed.

The choice of tree was also significant. Wych elm plays an important part in the black arts. Add to the mix the fact that belladonna is the ancient name for deadly nightshade, a plant closely associated with witchcraft. So, too, was the murder scene, Hagley Wood.

The occult theory was cranked up following the murder of Charles Walton in February 1945, on nearby Meon Hill.

He was found skewered to the ground by a pitchfork, and Satanism was suspected by some. Locals remained tight-lipped when approached by the police.

But Mr Osborn believes the devil worship theories are a smokescreen spawned by MI5, and describes those 13 paces as “convenient”.

Bella was a Nazi spy, he believes. She was based in the Clent Hills area, an ideal place to monitor the munitions factories studded around the Black Country and Birmingham.

Others believe she was slain after tripping upon a Third Reich “cell”.

“I believe the spy story,” Mr Osborn said. “But it is circumstantial evidence, there is no proof as such.”

The graffiti is another red herring. “The initial ones may have been done by an ex-lover, attempting to get the case reopened,” he says. “The rest have been copy-cats.”

The book, published by Stourbridge publisher Andrew Sparke of APS Books, is available from Amazon, priced £7.99.

Anyone who had direct contact with her is probably dead Peter Douglas Osborn