Cold Files, Warm TeaS1 · E1July 7, 20260:4034 plays Members only

The Somerton Man: A Body, a Book and a Torn Scrap of Paper

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Show notes

The Somerton Man

For 74 years the man found on Somerton Beach in Adelaide was known only by the place he died. This episode sticks to what the coroner, the police and later the genealogists could actually document, and leaves the spy theories where they belong.

The suitcase at the railway station and the labels cut from every garment
The scrap of paper reading tamam shud and the book it came from
Why the 1949 inquest reached no finding on the cause of death
How forensic genealogy produced a name in 2022

Put the kettle on. This one is sad, careful and finally resolved.

Transcript

Good evening and welcome to Cold Files, Warm Tea. I am Declan Mulvaney, I spent my working life looking after old case files, and I have a cup of tea beside me. Tonight we go to a beach in Adelaide on the first morning of December 1948, where a man in a good suit was found resting against the sea wall. He had no wallet, no name, and every label had been cut out of his clothes. For most of a century he was simply the Somerton Man. What I want to do is set aside the spy stories and go through what the investigators actually had in their hands, piece by piece, and then tell you how a scientist with a plaster cast and a family tree finally gave him his name. You are listening on Witspeak Podcasts. Settle in.

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The Somerton Man: A Body, a Book and a Torn Scrap of Paper

The Somerton Man

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