The Mysterious Disappearance Of Beaumont Children

The Mysterious Disappearance of the Beaumont Children

Three kids left for a sunny day at a South Australian beach and were never seen again.

Glenelg is a famous beach suburb in Adelaide, South Australia. The town’s sunny beaches give relief from the urban bustle, and the public arrives to sit there during the summer months. But on one sunny day in January, dark gathered at Glenelg’s shores.

It was Australia Day, January 26, 1966, and burning hot in Adelaide. The Beaumont children were on the way to the beach for a day’s swim. Jane, the oldest was 9-years-old and he was responsible for her younger siblings, Anna, 7-year-old, and Grant, 4-years-old.

The siblings had boarded a local bus at 10:00 A.M. for a five-minute drive to the seaside—a journey they completed only yesterday. Their mum Nancy spent the morning with her colleague, while her spouse Jim was at the job. Nancy instructed her children to come back home by 2:00 P.M. for lunch.

When the expected time came and went, Nancy, believed her children just missed the bus. But when the next bus came and the children were nowhere to be noticed, the mother grew worried.

She phoned the authority quickly thereafter. The next day, the Beaumont kids were officially declared missing.

Beachgoers who noticed the Beaumonts on the fateful morning of their disappearance said that the children left the seaside around 10:15 A.M. The next sighting happened nearly 45 minutes later; an aged woman told she saw the Beaumont children playing near a sprinkler. According to this observer, still, someone else was present at playtime: a bright man with a garnish build who was dressed in a blue swimsuit. At first, this mystery guy had been lying on the soil, seeing the children play. Shortly thereafter, still, the blond man got up and met the Beaumonts in their celebration.

The kids were next observed at a nearby cake shop at almost 11:45 A.M. Here they bought sweets and paid for the treats with a £1 bill. For police, this was the first important evidence that something was awry— the children’s mother did not send them off with that much cash. Someone must have met them and gave the money.

The last sighting came courtesy of a local postman who was friendly with the Beaumont family. He said he saw the children at about 3 P.M. stepping along Jetty Road, away from the seaside. According to this viewer, the Beaumont siblings seemed in good moods; the youngsters even stayed to say hi. Police did not suspect the postman of deceiving them. Yet they were shocked by the late-afternoon timestamp, as it clashed with the order of previous sightings. They assumed the chance that the postman had misremembered the time of his sighting, and that it happened first in the day.

In either case, after the postman’s noted meeting, the children's trail went cold.

The disappearance of the Beaumont children frightened Australia and accelerated one of the biggest missing person researches in the nation’s history. Drowning was ruled out, as all their belongings were also disappeared. A request from Jim Beaumont was released on national TV. Police followed every hint, but every key led to nowhere.

Even paranormal detectives were contacted for service. Gerard Croiset, a well-known Dutch parapsychologist and psychic, was flown to Australia from the Netherlands. His call resulted in a media circus. Croiset declared his sixth sense led him to a warehouse where he thought the corpses were buried. The warehouse’s proprietors, opposed at first to participate, ultimately raised $40,000 to have the building demolished. An excavation started, but no corpses were discovered.

Some two years after the disappearance the Beaumont parents received a series of strange letters declaring the kids were held captive. The mysterious author told he would return the children at a designated time and spot. Delighted, the Beaumonts toured to the pre-arranged spot, only to be met by no one.

A next letter reached quickly thereafter, declaring that because an undercover investigator had been present, the author withheld the children, and would now protect them forever. Twenty-five years later, the forensic analysis concluded the letters were a fraud.

The inquiry remains open to this day. A $1 million reward is offered to anyone with evidence that might crack the trial.

Nearly 50 years later, the problem remains: What happened to the three Beaumont children that hot day at the seaside?