A baby boy whose skeletal remains were discovered beneath the floorboards of a Victorian house in Bishop Auckland may have died up to 300 years ago, an inquest has heard. The remains, wrapped in a newspaper from 1910 and with twine looped around the neck, were found by a contractor in July 2024.
Initially believed to date from around 1910 due to the newspaper, radiocarbon dating has now indicated the child most likely lived between 1726 and 1812. The senior coroner Jeremy Chipperfield formally released the remains for a funeral to take place, after a post-mortem examination could not ascertain the cause of death.
Police were called and concluded the baby had been undisturbed for many years. Detective Chief Inspector Mel Sutherland said at the time: 'My focus is on finding out who the baby is, what happened and how it came to be under the floorboards.' DNA analysis confirmed the child was male, but he remains unidentified, dubbed 'Baby Auckland' for the inquest.
The inquest heard that the twine was wound three times around the boy's neck and that he was a full-term baby of about 40 weeks development. It was not possible to determine if he was stillborn. The newspaper was the 19 June 1910 edition of the Umpire, a Sunday paper founded in Manchester.
Radiocarbon dating ruled out birth after the first atomic bomb tests in 1945, and a more precise test suggested the most likely period he was alive was between 1726 and 1812. A funeral is scheduled for 27 April in Bishop Auckland, with the inquest adjourned until 18 May.
