Maesbrook

Maesbrook
OS grid reference	SJ305215
Unitary authority	Shropshire
Ceremonial county	Shropshire
Region	West Midlands
Country	England
Sovereign state	United Kingdom
Police	West Mercia
Fire	Shropshire
Ambulance	West Midlands

Maesbrook (/ˈmeɪsbrʊk/) is a village in Shropshire, England. Maesbury and Maesbury Marsh are about a mile north of Maesbrook. Pant is also nearby, just north of Llanymynech.

It lies between the villages of Llanymynech and Knockin, south of the town of Oswestry. The A5 road is nearby, as is the border with Wales.

History

Railway

Maesbrook railway station was on the defunct Shropshire and Montgomeryshire Railway. A branch line running from Shrewsbury, England to Llanymynech, Wales. It opened in 1911 becoming one of the Colonel Stephens Railways.

In 1933 passenger services were suspended. The railway was taken over by the War Department at the outbreak of World War II when a top-secret armaments storage centre was built at Kinnerley. The line remained in military ownership until it was closed in 1960. Notes on wartime role

2008 Murder suicide

On 25 August 2008 Christopher Foster, a multi-millionaire businessman who was in financial trouble, shot dead his family before setting fire to their £1.2 million home and committing suicide.

The tragedy occurred only hours after he, his wife 49-year-old Jill, and their 15-year-old daughter, Kirstie, had attended a barbecue party at a friend's home. Guests later told police that there was no indication in Foster's manner or behaviour of what was going to happen.

That night, emergency services were called to Osbaston House in Maesbrook when the manor house and its outbuildings were well ablaze. Eight days later West Mercia Police revealed that three bodies had been found in the main house. Dental records were used to identify Foster, his wife and teenage daughter due to the fires intensity.

Investigations later revealed that Foster's businesses had gone into liquidation and he was heavily in debt. On the night of the tragedy, his daughter had chatted to friends via the MSN instant messaging network until around midnight when Foster had told her to go to bed. At some point later he used his legally-owned rifle to kill his daughter and wife. CCTV footage then showed him outside shooting the family's horses and dogs. He also shot the tyres out on all the cars and blocked the entrance gate to the property with a horse transporter. Foster then doused the house, garage and stables in flammable oil. Once alight, he returned to his wife's body while the house burned in an apparent act of immolation.

A two-day inquest was held into the deaths in April 2009. An expert said that Foster killed his family to "protect" them from poverty. The coroner recorded that he killed himself and unlawfully killed his wife and daughter.