Before she left for a dance on the night of May 27, 1817, a 20-year-old woman named Mary Ashford told a friend's mother she had bad feelings about the week ahead. She went anyway. Her body was found the next morning pulled from a muddy pool on the edge of what would later become Pype Hayes Park in Erdington, England. She had been raped and strangled. The prime suspect was a man named Abraham Thornton, who had been seen with her near midnight. He was acquitted.

One hundred and fifty-seven years later, on May 27, 1974, a 20-year-old nurse named Barbara Forrest told a coworker she felt it would be her unlucky month. She was found that same day in a ditch on the edge of Pype Hayes Park, in the same area where Mary's body had been discovered. She had also been raped and strangled. The prime suspect was her coworker, a man named Michael Ian Thornton, who lived nearby. Blood was found on his clothing. His alibi proved false. The case was entirely circumstantial, and he was acquitted.

The Overlap That Makes It Hard to Dismiss

Both women were 20 years old. Both spent the final hours of their lives dancing. Both were killed on May 27, in the same location, by the same method. Both had a man named Thornton as the prime suspect. Both Thorntons were acquitted. Both murders remain officially unsolved. The details line up with a precision that resists easy explanation.

Barbara's sister Erika never accepted the outcome. Decades after the acquittal, she pushed publicly for the case to be reopened, demanding that DNA evidence be reviewed with modern forensic tools. As of the early 2010s, the file remained open. No new charges have been filed.

The Part of the 1817 Case Nobody Expects

When Abraham Thornton was acquitted of Mary Ashford's murder, her brother William refused to accept the verdict and launched a formal legal appeal. What happened next had not occurred in English courtrooms for centuries. Thornton appeared before the court wearing a gauntlet and threw it to the floor, invoking his right to trial by battle. The law, a medieval provision that had never been repealed by Parliament, allowed an accused person to demand physical combat rather than face a second prosecution. The court examined the evidence and decided it was not overwhelming enough to override the right. Trial by battle was declared permissible.

William Ashford, physically smaller and far less robust than Thornton, withdrew the appeal rather than fight him. Thornton walked free a second time.

The case caused such public outrage that Parliament passed the Abolition of Appeals Act in 1819, removing the right to appeal a murder verdict entirely from English law. The Mary Ashford case is the direct reason that law no longer exists.

What Happened to Abraham Thornton

Thornton found the public hostility in England unbearable after his acquittal. He emigrated to the United States, where he married, had children, and died in relative obscurity around 1860. He was never charged with any crime related to Mary Ashford's death. Her murder, like Barbara Forrest's 157 years later, was never officially solved.

Two women. Same age. Same night of the week. Same park. Same method. Same suspect surname. Both dead on May 27. Both cases closed without a conviction.