Somerton Man mystery solved?

July 26, 2022 10:48 PM

Somerton Man mystery ‘solved’: Professor identifies man found on beach in 1948 The Somerton Man (previously 1, 2, 3), was an unidentified man found dead on a beach outside Adelaide, Australia in 1948. His identity has been a mystery ever since. Professor Derek Abbott from the University of Adelaide claims to have identified the man as Carl “Charles” Webb, from Melbourne. Professor Abbott used DNA from hair found in a plaster "death" mask police made in the late 1940s. Abbott supervised a review of the case in 2009.

Some details:

Prof Abbott that Mr Webb was born on November 16, 1905, making him 43 when he died.

He is said to have worked as an electrical engineer, the Advertiser reported.

He married Dorothy Robertson, who became known as Doff Webb. He left her in April 1947.

“He disappeared and she appeared in court, saying that he had disappeared and she wanted to divorce,” Colleen Fitzpatrick from Identifiers International said.

By 1951, she had moved to Bute in South Australia, raising the possibilty that Mr Webb had come to find her.

The forensics experts used hairs taken from a plaster ‘death mask’ to analyse his DNA.

They used that DNA to build an extended family tree, and were finally able to identify the Somerton Man as Mr Webb on Saturday.

Professor Abbott appeared previously for compiling "the world’s biggest multilingual list" of animal sounds, commands, and pet names.

posted by kirkaracha (10 comments total)

There’s slightly more detail about how the forensic genealogical work was done in the BBC story linked from “claims” in the post:

Derek Abbott was able to analyse the Somerton Man's DNA using hairs preserved when authorities made a plaster model of his face.

He teamed up with renowned US forensic expert Colleen Fitzpatrick - who specialises in cold cases - to build an extended family tree using the DNA.

And from 4000 names, the pair narrowed it down to one - Carl Webb. They then tracked down the man's living relatives, using their DNA to confirm his identity.

"It's a triangulation from two different, totally distant parts of the [family] tree," Prof Abbott told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation.

posted by Kattullus at 1:59 AM on July 27, 2022 [1 favorite]

Somerton Man mystery solved? No! The man's identity is only one piece of this fascinating puzzle
posted by McNulty at 2:03 AM on July 27, 2022 [26 favorites]

.

There's a lot of emotional framework built up around him that will just fall to pieces if this is true. It would appear he is not a spy or someone's missing father but, like Deep Throat, just some guy. I hope he found rest.
posted by Countess Elena at 5:17 AM on July 27, 2022 [4 favorites]

There's a lot of emotional framework built up around him that will just fall to pieces if this is true. It would appear he is not a spy or someone's missing father but, like Deep Throat, just some guy. I hope he found rest.

It doesn't sound like he's anyone's father as far as we know, but I'm not seeing how we've ruled out spy.

I feel a little let down by the article (though that's not to say I'm not glad for the post. Thank you for posting) because it doesn't really solve any of the mystery parts. Spy really does seem still likely to me. I mean the book...from previous articles I don't have time to read right now, wasn't it a seventh edition that was found in the guy's car and when police contacted the publisher, there were only six editions published? WTF?
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 6:04 AM on July 27, 2022 [3 favorites]

The man's identity is only one piece of this fascinating puzzle

It's probably the least interesting piece. His known life story is totally ordinary except for the disappeared part. The manner and circumstances of his death, on the other hand, are most extraordinary and seem unlikely to be fully understood. His photo has been available for decades yet no one seems to have recognized him. Now that there's a name maybe that will trigger someone's memory but I'd bet he wasn't using that name when he died.
posted by tommasz at 6:31 AM on July 27, 2022 [2 favorites]

If Professor Abbott had read Stephen King's The Colorado Kid, he could have saved himself some trouble. As in the story, just giving the man a name doesn't really seem to have solved much of anything.
posted by Naberius at 7:16 AM on July 27, 2022 [2 favorites]

After Derek Abbott became obsessed with the case, he met and married a woman he believes to be the Somerton Man's granddaughter.

The Tamam Shud case is like a Dyatlov pass incident that keeps on happening.
posted by rdc at 9:19 AM on July 27, 2022 [6 favorites]

Hard agree, knowing the name solves nothing, just makes it seem more possible that we could learn more about this bizarre case.
posted by aspersioncast at 4:22 PM on July 27, 2022

Interesting update, but reading the list of odd clues, that should definitely be partially solved. Hope they can succeed with more discoveries on not just the identity but what actually happened and why.
posted by blue shadows at 11:29 PM on July 27, 2022

A middle aged drunk who was separated from his wife and not close to his family died alone of liver failure on a beach in Adelaide and no one ever identified or claimed the body. He made some notes on a scrap of paper torn from a popular paperback translation of Persian poems His luggage was full old hand me downs bearing the name of his brother in law and others with the name cut out, like you might do when giving them away.

The final scraps and rags he had with him as his life expired were enough to construct such a mystery that this unremarkable man became a legend. Such a strange twist of fate that surely he and old Khayyam are sharing a laugh and bottle over it if there is any life beyond.
posted by interogative mood at 10:26 AM on July 29, 2022 [4 favorites]