On the evening of May 20th, 1947, the body of 22-year-old Christina Kettlewell was found 150 feet from her honeymoon cottage in just nine inches of water on the banks of a river in Severn Falls, Ontario. Christina Mocon lived in Mimico, Ontario, and worked at a bank, where she was described as a capable employee. On May 12th, 1947, Christina eloped with John Ray Kettlewell, a 26-year-old war veteran better known as Jack, after knowing each other for three years.
Christina’s family had a concern about the marriage. Ronald Barrie, a 28-year-old immigrant from Italy, was Jack’s best friend and a professional ballroom dancer. It’s said that Jack, Christina, and Ronald spent an inordinate amount of time together. Christina’s sister, Helen, would comment that the family thought that perhaps Ronald was in love with Christina.
Following the elopement, the Kettlewells spent the next few days at an apartment in Toronto on Tindle Avenue. Bizarrely, Ronald joined them for the entirety of their honeymoon. And on May 17th, the trio headed out to Ronald’s remote cottage in Severn Falls, only accessible by boat.
Christina Kettlewell acting strangely during honeymoon
During their time at the cottage, it’s reported that Christina Kettlewell began to act out of character. She would go into crying fits while, at other times, seemed completely dazed. Evidence suggests that Christina had conversations with Ronald about whether or not Jack truly loved her. On May 20th, Christina disappeared from the cottage, curiously on the same day that Ronald’s cottage mysteriously caught fire. Ronald returned to the cabin to find a disoriented Jack sitting in the cabin with an apparent head injury and pulled him out of the blaze. He looked for Christina, but couldn’t find her anywhere in the cottage.
Ronald recalled that the cottage burned to the ground in just an hour. He took Jack on a boat to Severn Falls to reach a car to drive him to the hospital and contacted the police. It was then that Ronald discovered that the situation became even worse. That evening, Christina’s body was found in nine inches of water just 150 feet away from the cottage by Neville Sweet, an owner of a boathouse in the area. Her body was free from burns or any signs of violence.
An official autopsy found traces of codeine in her stomach, but her ultimate cause of death was declared a drowning. Interesting, Major Lawrence Scardifield, who tried to help put out the fire in the cottage, said he saw no signs of Christina’s body in the area when he went to fetch water from the river to help with the flames just hours earlier.
Police interrogated Jack for three hours after being treated for burns and injuries
Jack, Ronald, and 20 other people were questioned by police in connection with the case. Jack was interrogated by the police for three hours after being released from the hospital, where he was treated for burns, shock, a head injury, and apparent drugging.
However, Jack claimed to not remember anything that occurred after 11 a.m. on the day of Christina’s death. Ronald was questioned by the police for a grueling 13 hours, in which he provided a 3,000-word statement that the police would describe as “fantastic.”
Inquest was started into Christina’s death
On June 19th, an inquest into Christina’s death began, which became quite the spectacle. The public packed not only the courtroom but the grounds outside, with some even approaching Jack and Ronald, the main witnesses, for autographs. It should be noted that Jack and Ronald were not on trial for murder. This was simply a case to determine whether or not foul play had been involved in Christina’s death.
While the highly-sensationalized investigation uncovered many interesting bits of information, the jury of the inquest ultimately could not agree on whether Christina’s death was the result of foul play or not, stating, “due to the fact that the post-mortem examination disclosed codeine in the stomach of the deceased, and due to the suspicious fact that she was found drowned, this jury is unable to decide on the evidence given whether or not foul means were employed in her death.”
Jack and Ronald were in the clear, as there was no evidence implicating either of them in the death. But their relationships to both Christina and each other were thoroughly exposed in the process. The police report claims that there were signs and evidence that Christina was very distressed by the “unnatural conduct of her husband and Barrie.”
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