Had some games gone wrong? Later questions seemed to show that there was a wall of silence. One of the crowd actually said that they did not know Brian at all, which seems very strange. The police enquiry was thorough and extensive; Mr Howden noted that Sergeant Gurney and his team had worked very hard: ‘You have been to a tremendous amount of trouble and I appreciate it.’ But most of the statements made threw no light on this tragic death at all. One of the officers said they had taken twenty-six statements but that the team could work ‘from now until Christmas and it would not do any good.’

We are left with a death by misadventure. But somewhere under these facts there is the possibility of a terrifying accident, maybe something rash and spontaneous that led to the drowning. The truth will never come out, but through contemporary eyes, with accumulated wisdom of similar cases, the contradictions and denials point to a sub-plot to Brian Ladlow’s death. The bare facts make one want to know much more, and to ask questions that were never reported, such as how good a swimmer was the boy? Did he have a history of risk-taking? Were there any factions in the group at play?

All this has sunk into oblivion, but one haunting statement hints at the untold story: Barry Neall’s description of all the kids playing, swimming from one side to the other – and more importantly, that each tube belonged to particular people. The hint is that something like ‘I’m the King of the Castle’ got out of hand. But that’s a guess, just a theory, and all deaths without a satisfying closure invite us to make our theories. The fact that very little direct evidence had been collected, when there were so very many witnesses, creates understandable suspicion in the mind of any objective investigator.

The secret is in and around the River Ancholme and in distant history.