New research has revealed more about the life of a woman from Blaenau Ffestiniog who was murdered on Christmas Day in 1909.

Gwen Ellen Jones, 35, was killed in Holyhead. William Murphy, the man who killed her, gained notoriety as the last man to be hanged at Caernarfon Gaol.

Research revealed by Bangor University’s Colclough Centre for the History and Culture of the Book, focuses on written evidence to reveal the life of the victim of this violent crime.

Gwen Ellen Jones was described in newspapers as Murphy’s paramour, a prostitute, a beggar and a hawker.

Hazel Robbins, an associate member of the centre has been seeking the truth.

“Now, 110 years after her death, it is time that Gwen Ellen Jones is remembered as a person in her own right and not just as a footnote to William Murphy’s story,” she said.

Gwen was born in Blaenau Ffestiniog in 1874, the daughter of a slate miner.

After her mother died, the family moved to Llanfairfechan where in 1898 Gwen married Morris Jones, a labourer in the stone quarry.

Her father (who was in poor health) and younger sister moved in with them. She also adopted two-year-old Gwladys Jones, who had been born in Llanrwst workhouse and abandoned by her mother.

Gwen was clearly at the centre of a family who depended on her.

Gwen took in washing to help make ends meet, and through this, met William Murphy. Murphy had been in the army and served in India and South Africa and more recently, in the local militia.

They began an affair. Gwen’s son, born in 1903 was most likely Murphy’s child and she named him William John after her lover and her father.

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