DETECTIVES have long been haunted by the case of ‘The Girl in the Green Mac‘ where a six-year-old girl went missing forever.
Youngster Sheila Fox vanished on her way home from her school in Farnworth, Bolton, on August 18 1944.
Sheila had left school as usual at 4pm and was thought by friends to be on her way home.
But classmates claimed they had later sighted her outside a local bakery.
A man with her was described as well-dressed, clean-shaven and said to be thin and aged between 25 and 30.
Various eyewitness described her as being either walking alongside him or riding on the handlebars of a bike he was riding.
Sheila was spoken to at the time and asked where she was going and she is said to have replied she was “going with this man”.
According to the police, the man was seen in the vicinity of Atherton Parish Church and rode in the direction of Leigh.
That night police and neighbours combed the district, shouting her name in a desperate bid to find the little girl.
Air raid shelters and farm buildings were scoured as the volunteers continued their hunt and hedgerows and fields were systematically searched as fears for Sheila’s safety mounted.
Over the weekend, the County Police were joined by air raid wardens and Army cadets as their search was stepped up.
The hunt went on throughout the weekend, unbroken – but Sheila was never seen again.
Sadly, Sheila’s disappearance happened during World War II and it was soon overshadowed by war coverage.
It was only until after the war, in 1948, that Sheila’s disappearance gained more attention, when a “tall, thin man” was wanted for stabbing two children and people believed he may have been responsible for her too.
Despite the search spanning decades, police never uncovered any evidence that she was abducted, came across a stitch of clothing or found a body.
Sheila’s family had, understandably, an incredibly difficult time believing their girl to be murdered, and so they left their front door unlocked for years after, in the hope that she’d return home.
Her parents, George and Miriam Fox, said that Sheila would have had to know the man very well because she was very shy.
They always believed that Sheila had tried to head to London, as some of her wartime schoolmates were refugee children from the capital.
Tragically, both George and Miriam died without knowing whatever happened to Sheila.
The youngster’s sister Betty eerily recalled a couple commenting on Sheila about three months before she vanished.
She said the couple sounded as if they were Londoners, or from the south.
Betty also claimed she had never seen them before or since, but they commented on what a lovely child Sheila was and said “they would have liked to take her with them”.
The trail went cold for nearly 60 years until 2001 when police received a tip-off about a garden in Manchester.
A huge police operation saw the lawn dug up after a man said that as a boy he had seen his neighbour putting something into the ground.
But detectives and forensic experts found nothing and Sheila – dubbed the “girl in the green mac” – remains missing.
One of her relatives had said at the turn of the millennium, she had hoped one day the case could be solved.
Sheila’s older sister Rene added: “I will be so glad if they find her because it was all so sudden. It left us all feeling so empty. It was a terrible time.
“We never even found her shoes or a ribbon. It was as if the earth had swallowed her up. It would be such a comfort if she could have a Christian burial.”
Sadly, this baffling tale remains unsolved, and nobody has been brought to justice for her disappearance over 75 years ago, resulting in a lifetime of pain for her family.
Police are keen to point out that the case will remain open, and if anyone thinks they can help then they should call Crimestoppers.
It comes after reports on New Year’s day that a Sheila Fox from the UK was found “alive and well” after a long disappearance.
However, this is a separate missing persons case where the woman coincidentally shares the same name.
