Nation’s eyes will be on new excavation site to provide answers on Beaumont children — missing for 52 years
THE missing Beaumont children are an unwanted part of Australia’s folklore, an enduring mystery that robbed a nation of parents of their sense of safety and faith in strangers. Can Friday’s excavation change all that?
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- Woman’s claim of sexual assault by man at centre of investigation
- Harry Phipps named ‘person of interest’ in Beaumont case
- Beaumont suspect ‘seen with children before gunshots rang out’
- Police to dig at North Plympton in search for Beaumonts
THE missing Beaumont children are an unwanted part of Australia’s folklore, an enduring mystery that robbed a nation of parents of their sense of safety and faith in strangers.
The sweltering afternoon of Australia Day, 1966, remains a source of morbid intrigue for those old enough to remember and those not yet born.
Nine-year-old Jane, sister Arnna, 7, and little Grant Beaumont, 4, should today be middle-aged, with their own children and grandchildren — if not for a malignant force of evil that wandered among oblivious revellers on Colley Reserve, in the heart of Glenelg.
A nation today hopes its silent prayers will be answered — that the siblings’ remains will finally be unearthed, at the Castalloy factory at Plympton, and the person who eluded capture over one of the most heinous and brazen crimes ever seen, will be exposed.
The Beaumont children are an obsession for some, like a fable for others too young to remember and a feisty dinner-table debate for amateur sleuths. But nobody can truly fathom what Jim and Nancy Beaumont, now aged 92 and 90, have endured.
They have somehow survived 52 years of tears, shattered hopes and a desperate hunger for the truth, however grim that may be. Nancy Beaumont kissed her babies goodbye as they boarded a bus from Somerton Park to Glenelg that morning, while Jim was working as a travelling salesman in the Snowtown area.
Typical suburban parents until that day, the couple’s lives of unimaginable pain since that day are a tragedy all of their own. Their marriage eventually broke down under the blinding glare of publicity which continues to this day.
Now into their twilight years, they still live in the general area, but many years ago retreated from the spotlight and endless knocks on the door from reporters, authors and well-meaning members of the public.
Police Commissioner Grant Stevens on Thursday attempted to sum up the endless ordeal Jim and Nancy have suffered.
“I think you can imagine how they would feel about this having lost three children 52 years ago,” Mr Stevens said.
“It’s been a devastating impact on their lives and this is a story that just doesn’t end for them.”
Today’s excavation of a small patch of earth tucked away at the Castalloy factory founded by millionaire and suspected child killer Harry Phipps may prove to be Jim and Nancy’s last chance to learn what became of their innocent and smiling kids.
They have stoically endured a litany of false leads and theories that tried to pin the blame on some of Australia’s most-reviled killers, including Bevan Spencer Von Einem, Derek Percy and Arthur Stanley Brown.
Many believe the latest theory — that suave and rich factory owner Harry Phipps used his charm and wealth to lure then kill the two girls and their little brother — is the most credible yet. Phipps, who would now be 100 years old if still alive, ensconced himself in the company and confidence of Adelaide’s elite and powerful.
In an era when “old Adelaide money” was even more prevalent, the suggestion that Harry Phipps was the Beaumont murderer would have been the subject of scornful derision.
His peers included millionaires, powerbrokers and Premiers including Don Dunstan, who appointed the Glenelg father-of-two to the Industry Development Advisory Council — a far cry from the likes of pariahs such as convicted child killers Percy and Brown.
Current Premier Jay Weatherill used caution when speaking of the latest hope for real answers. “There have been many attempts and I wouldn’t want to raise people’s expectations about another attempt.
“It would be a wonderful comfort for many people if these children could be found and given the proper respect that they deserve. Let’s just wait and see what happens.”
An entire state — and nation — is today doing exactly that.
DID HARRY INFLICT EVIL, HIDING IN FULL VIEW?
By Andrew Dowdell
JUST who was Harry Phipps?
Was the multi-millionaire factory owner the “very generous gentleman”, eulogised for his “caring attitude, friendship and loyalty” to staff and their children?
Or was Frederick Henry Phipps a sexual deviant with a fetish for women’s satin clothes and a switchblade temper that could erupt in murder? Was he capable of unspeakable violence against his own flesh and blood, and any vulnerable child who crossed his path when his demons were in control?
As police home in on what many believe to be the hidden grave of Jane, Arnna and Grant Beaumont, Phipps’ name may today be forever etched into infamy.
Self-assured, superbly connected and confident, the co-founder of Plympton foundry Castalloy, lived to 85 without having to answer a single question from police.
The net of suspects in the Beaumonts’ murders saw dozens of men face the spectre of suspicion — but never Phipps — until disturbing allegations by his son Haydn emerged.
Troubled Haydn Phipps — who is now dead — bluntly told retired detective Bill Hayes that his father’s respectable facade masked an abyss of evil. He spoke of his father’s fetish for wearing satin, a bizarre kink which almost always ended in the boy being raped. Another woman this week claimed Phipps raped her when she was a teenager, in a brazen attack at Castalloy.
Renowned as a “brilliant engineer, entrepreneur and problem solver”, he ingratiated himself with power.
A member of the exclusive Adelaide Club, a contemporary of Premier Don Dunstan and a Queen’s Birthday Honours recipient, Phipps never fit the external template of evil many imagined the Beaumonts’ killer to be. Today may finally be the day of answers — or just another roadblock to a belated resolution for Jane, Arnna and Grant Beaumont and their heartbroken and elderly mum and dad.
THE ANOMALY THAT COULD BE KEY
By Jordanna Schriever
A SERIES of electric currents may have uncovered the gravesite of the missing Beaumont children and helped solve a 52-year-old mystery.
Police will today excavate a an area of up to 30sq m at the business premises of New Castalloy at North Plympton. Detectives and State Emergency Service volunteers visited the site yesterday to prepare for the dig, which will get underway from about 8am. Flinders University archaeologist Dr Ian Moffat, a world authority in geophysical imaging, used a series of 64 metal pegs connected to long cables to inject and receive electric current which was pumped into the ground to detect any disturbance in the soil.
The technique, known as Electrical Resistivity Tomography, produces data and a 3D view of soil to locate burial sites. It took Dr Moffat four days to complete the work, which uncovered an area of interest potentially matching a site two brothers believed they had dug a hole under the direction of the site’s former owner, businessman Harry Phipps.
“What we are seeing is where the soil conditions have changed rather than what’s there,” he said.
“The soil at the site has slightly different physical properties to the soil around it.”
He said it was not possible to know what was under the soil without digging it up.
“There are so many people in SA that have an interest in this case and it would be fantastic to see it resolved.
“If the technology that I used is able to make a small contribution to that I would be very happy.”
Dr Moffat, who has 15 years of research into mapping unmarked graves, believes it is the “first time the technology has been used in Australia as part of a forensic project”.
Newcastle University criminologist Dr Xanthe Mallett, who has been researching the disappearance of the Beaumont children, approached Dr Moffat to do the testing.
Originally published as Nation’s eyes will be on new excavation site to provide answers on Beaumont children — missing for 52 years
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