A HAUNTING village saying which tells of a murder frustrated Joy Walker.

The lines, which were told to her repeatedly, went: "Matthew Dodds, of Hamsterley, County Durham - his wife was married twice, buried twice and both her husbands were hanged."

The cryptic clue to a family secret proved to be the start of years of research for Mrs Walker, who lives in nearby Crook, before she finally unravelled the mystery of a 1908 murder.

Her extraordinary detective story has now been published in a national magazine - but the amateur sleuth said that solving the grim case was more important.

Mrs Walker first came across the saying when she began researching her family history and, unexpectedly, managed to trace her grandmother, Nancy Dodds, back to Hamsterley.

And, having tracked her grandmother through the arch-ives, she uncovered a grisly tale of murder and intrigue leading to Matthew Dodds, who, she discovered, was Nancy's cousin.

Mrs Walker said: "Every time I enquired in the village, I was greeted with this peculiar saying about Matthew Dodds' wife, which had obviously passed into folklore. But nobody could tell me exactly what it meant."

A trawl through the newspap-er archives uncovered Matthew James Dodds, who was born in 1865 and was a master joiner, despite being partially crippled.

He married Mary Jane Marquis in 1905 and the pair lived at a house, now dilapidated, adjacent to the Hamsterley home of environmentalist and botanist, Dr David Bellamy.

The couple married after Mary's first husband had committed suicide by hanging.

Although she owned seven houses in Hamsterley, she had decided to leave just £40 to Dodds. But, in January 1908, she changed her will and left everything to him.

A month later, on February, 20, she was dead.

It was originally thought that the fire in which Mary died had started accidentally.

But 16 days later, the authorities ordered the body be exhumed after persistent gossip suggested all was not as it seemed.

This time it was decided that death was by strangulation and Dodds was arrested. He was tried for murder at Bishop Auckland and found guilty.

Dodds appealed - the very first appeal under the new Criminal Appeal Act - but it was rejected and the date of his hanging was fixed for August.

In a last letter to his brother, Dodds wrote: "It seems very hard that I have to suffer when I am quite innocent."

At 9am on a cold August morning, the hangman pulled the lever and Dodds rejoined his wife.

And so Mrs Walker solved the mystery of the mantra for herself - and the villagers of Hamsterley.