THERE was once a tale of a Swindon murder that never happened and a ghost who never lived, let alone died.

It involved a Swindon murderer and victim who never existed.

The tale of the murder that never happened was sourced from people who never gave a name, passed on through a succession of people who never checked where it had come from and finally turned up in Malmo, Sweden.

There it was faithfully reproduced in a women’s magazine whose editor was evidently not too picky about firming up sources.

The only publication ever to get to the truth of the matter – as far as anybody could, anyway – was the Swindon Advertiser, and we ran the peculiar saga this week in 1980.

“The Great Magazine Hoax,” we said, “That’s what the Adver uncovered.

“We thought at first we’d got a great story – an old Swindon murder mystery, solved by the appearance of the victim’s ghost.”

The Swedish magazine story, we said, “...related how in March 1979 a five-year-old, ‘Veronica Curtis,’ living in a village ‘four miles east of Swindon’ saw a pretty girl walk straight through a hedge at the bottom of her garden and disappear.

“Then her mother, ‘Mrs Eunice Curtis,’ saw the girl too. So the girl’s father, ‘Mr Alan Curtis’, consulted a doctor and psychiatrist, ‘Professor William Rose.’”

The professor, according to the magazine story, showed the child photographs of girls from old newspaper stories, and she identified 16-year-old Ernestine Aird, who had vanished in 1942. A local man accused and cleared of her murder was killed in the war in 1944.

A police officer, so the tale went, then asked for permission to excavate the Curtis family’s garden, where the teenager’s skeleton was duly found.

This would have been an amazing story, had it not been complete nonsense, and we set about tracking the strange work of fiction to its source.

The magazine in Malmo had bought it from an agency in Stockholm, which had bought it from an agency in Ireland, where a Michael Sheldon told us he’d bought it from another source, but wouldn’t name it.

There the trail went cold and remains so - unless a Rewind reader has something to add.

In more conventional news, we told the stories of two real-life children who had done remarkable things. Eight-year-old Stuart Bell turned hero when fire broke out at his home in Eldene.

Stuart’s father, postman Angus, was at work at the time, and Stuart was with his three-year-old sister, Julie, and mum Maureen, who was disabled.

When fire broke out in his mum’s room, Stuart rushed his sister downstairs and went back to rescue his mum. He then dialled 999 and firefighters arrived to find him tackling the flames with milk bottles of water.

An understandably proud Angus Bell said later: “My wife says he is a great little life saver - which he is.”

Stuart’s heroism earned him a major publishing firm’s Young Citizen Award, which came with a £150 prize and an opportunity to meet Joanna Lumley.

He also won a Children of Courage Award from a women’s magazine in a ceremony attended by Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. In Aldbourne, another child proved indispensable in a different way.

“The love and kindness of nine-year-old Catherine Cope,” we said, “has helped a lonely widow face up to life without her husband.

“And as well as keeping 69-year-old Doris Swash cheerful, Catherine helps with jobs around the house. She pops in two or three times a day to visit Mrs Swash at her home in Whitley Road.

“Every evening neighbour Catherine checks Mrs Swash has locked up properly, and pops in each morning to make sure she is alright.”

Mrs Swash, who had written to tell us about Catherine, said: “When you are widowed you feel you are finished. I lost my husband at the end of last year. We had no children, which made life so very lonely.

“I don’t think I would have faced up to life if I had not had the care of this very kind girl.

“I’ve got a bad back, and when I go to my husband’s grave Catherine takes water and the mower and helps tend it.”

The week also saw a Swindon illusionist named as Magician of the Month by the British Ring of the International Brotherhood of Magicians.

Pressed Steel Fisher worker Colin Hughes, who lived in Cricklade Road, who had been performing and lecturing since the 1940s, said he was honoured by the accolade.

Mr Hughes, who died in 1994, recalled his first paid engagement for an audience of servicemen at the Fleet Street YMCA when he was 18.

He said: “I was paid 200 cigarettes... and I didn’t smoke.”

Another man in a cheery mood was an Adver journalist called Jack Loftin, whose pools win meant he made the news instead of just reporting it.

Mr Loftin won a one-third share of the £41,700 jackpot, which in those days was nearly enough to buy a small terraced house. He revealed he hadn’t even checked the winning coupon, as he was on holiday in Cornwall.