The abbreviations in this list were decoded by the police during their investigation into the murder of Edward Evans - the first murder that Brady and Hindley were directly connected to due to David Smith’s statement to police the morning after the killing. Many of the abbreviations were straightforward to decipher - GN is clearly “gun”, “CLOTH” is clearly “clothing”, and “HAT” is hatchet. Others were more difficult to decode, and the two that I am still fixated on myself are “REC” and “W/H”.

 The police at the time eventually decoded them as “reconnaissance” (or “reconnoitre”, as Brady stated during trial) and “Woodhead” (though they considered that W/H could also mean Wessenden Head). Their reasoning behind this is that they believed that Brady had planned out Woodhead (or perhaps Wessenden Head) as a burial site for Evans beforehand, and that “reconnaissance” referred to checking that the planned site had not been disturbed. This turned out to not be the case of what those abbreviations actually meant… or did it?

Dr. Alan Keightley - Brady’s closest associate in his later life - was told by Brady that “REC” and “W/H” actually stood for “records” and “warehouse”. Brady claimed that he and Hindley were hiding records from all of their other murders (as well as for robberies Brady committed away from Hindley) in a locked room at the Millwards Merchandising warehouse, amongst unimportant archived documents relating to work at Millwards. After Brady’s arrest, Hindley supposedly burned all of those documents - documents which Brady claimed would have linked to the discovery of Keith’s body.

In theory, Ian Brady’s clarification of this evidence does make sense. Since Brady was the stock clerk, he probably would have been one of the only people in Millwards to have a key to access that room. It would also have been irresponsible to hide all of their evidence in one location (i.e. the railway station, which was where the suitcases containing the evidence of Lesley Ann Downey’s murder was discovered thanks to police finding the luggage ticket in Hindley’s prayer book). If going by that theory, it would also make sense in that “TICK - Place in P/B” was written right above it - the evidence depot at Millwards would surely be the next place they would think of if they were quickly coming up with this list. Neither being particularly well-off, they clearly would have utilised any possible hiding space they could afford to use. And to top it all off, Myra Hindley lost all credibility of ever being believed in any of her accounts of her killings due to her repeated lies about her involvement and culpability in them, and Brady knew that perfectly well.

All in all, it seems like the perfect story for Brady to tell and pass as the truth - it makes him seem incredibly devious, calculated and scary, and it implicates Hindley in such a cruel way that anybody would want to believe it. And who knows - this story could absolutely have been the truth.

But this is also where things start to sound a little iffy in my mind, and I’m inclined to believe that the “REC” and “W/H” clarification was an incredibly well thought-out lie from Brady.

*THE “REC” AND “W/H” THEORY - WERE THE POLICE ON THE RIGHT LINES ALL ALONG?*

The reason why Brady and Hindley hid the ticket in the spine of the prayer book was because it was such a subtle detail that could have only been picked up by a very sharp eye - like the incredibly sharp eye of DCI John Tyrrell, who discovered this crucial piece of evidence as he was just flicking through the book and heard a quiet creak in the spine of it. This was something that Brady in particular probably would not have anticipated (even in the event of his and/or Hindley’s arrest), as he truly thought he was smarter than the police - to him, the police were “thick fuckers” (according to David Smith).

So now, here’s another hypothetical scenario. If both Brady AND Hindley were arrested on the day after the murder, surely a locked room full of archived documents at Millwards would be a key place police would search - not only because Brady and Hindley both worked there, but because as a stock clerk, Brady would have had almost exclusive access to the key for that room. Knowing that they were dealing with a very calculated criminal (because that was glaringly apparent to police almost from the outset), the police would likely not only have run straight to that room, but they would have run every single document in there through every single resource they had at their arsenal - code breakers, forensics departments, perhaps land surveyors, etc. It wouldn’t make sense for Brady to do this, unless it was all a part of some deep twisted game - i.e. archived Millwards files being cleverly indistinguishable from files that supposedly included a “master list” that applied to not just murder, but any criminal activity that Brady and/or Hindley were to engage in whatsoever, a list of contacts (presumably for criminal purposes - they would not be listed as John Doe from X Company Ltd; they would have probably just had names and/or addresses and phone numbers on them unless they went to the effort of making up fake company names or listing them as contacts of Millwards), and even photographs and negatives hidden in envelopes. What organisation’s stock room of archived files would include undeveloped negatives for any reason? Did Brady just not think about that, or was he just lying through his teeth about the entire thing?

What about the “STN” column (stationary, i.e. “anything that does not move” - by all accounts, this is what it actually meant as Brady never contested this in the same way he contested “REC” and “W/H” later on)? Surely if this were the truth, there would have been a cross on the “STN” column on the plan, as a reminder to not move them from the warehouse?

And also, why would either Brady or Hindley think that hiding criminal records anywhere within their place of work would be a smart idea? They weren’t working in an airport - Millwards was a small company with only around 15 employees (source: One of Your Own by Carol Ann Lee). I understand that it consisted of both office and warehouse space, probably a lot of nooks and crannies, and that it was a chemical distributors that housed a lot of heavy containers and equipment that would likely be difficult and disruptive to move, but still - I don’t doubt that the police would have been able to search the premise relatively easily with express permission to do so - especially for a charge as serious as the murder of a child or a teenager. And given that Brady and Hindley spent so much time together in that place, surely Brady would have known that the police would have considered it a key place of interest if he and Hindley were both suspects for any reason? Or was he just banking on the fact that only one of them would be arrested at any time, so the other could easily go to the warehouse and destroy evidence?

It doesn’t make sense to me. At least with the train station, Brady would have known that there was no direct link, since the luggage ticket was “cleverly” hidden and - from what I can tell - didn’t have either his or Hindley’s name on it. In regards to comments that Brady made under cross-examination by the Attorney-General Mars-Jones (prosecutor in the 1966 murder trial) about being unaware of where Wessenden Head was:

Let us go to the next entry, 'REC'. What does that mean?

– Reconnoitre.

"Check periodically unmoved'. What were you going to check?

– That nobody had found Evans.

Precisely what you were doing time and again in regard to the graves of Downey and Kilbride, was it not?

– No. It was chiefly to see if anything had been left in the darkness or if there had been any traces left. Anything at all. We had to see it in daylight.

A simple means of recording where the body had been placed would be to have a photograph of the grave, would it not?

– I suppose so. The point is, I know this place.

Very well. Opposite is 'W/H’. What does that mean?

– Woodhead. It is on the way to Penistone.

What was the idea - were you going to bury the body in Woodhead?

– It was going to be buried in a spit. I am calling this place Penistone. I know it to be Penistone or near Penistone, but I am not saying it is actually Penistone.

Penistone is miles away from Woodhead.

– I am saying this place is on the road to Penistone, I am not saying it is Penistone itself or anywhere near. There is a long road between Penistone and Glossop.

Was not, in fact, ‘W/H' a reference to Wessenden Head Moor, just to the east of Saddleworth?

– I don't know any of these names.

Was the Saddleworth area known to you as Wessenden Head Moor?

– That area was known to me as across from Crowden.

You were really referring to the place where you had already buried the other bodies as
'W/H', were you not?

– No. I have never heard any of these names.

He said that the area was known to him as being “across from Crowden”. I am unsure what exactly this means, as Saddleworth Moor and Wessenden Head Moor are nowhere near Crowden. Woodhead is across from Crowden, so maybe he was referring to there, but he knew the name “Woodhead”, and by his own words throughout the trial as a whole, he had travelled all over the moors and knew them well. He knew that Woodhead was on that long road between Glossop and Penistone, so what does he mean by “I knew that area as across from Crowden?” Did he misunderstand the Attorney-General’s question, or is he deliberately trying to confuse the prosecution by subtly pretending like he misunderstood it?

I think that Brady’s intention in this line of questioning was to feign absolute ignorance in regard to both the locations of Saddleworth Moor and Wessenden Head Moor. This makes me think that there is more work to be done in investigating Wessenden Head Moor as a potential burial location, because since Wessenden Head refers to the name of a road, a moss, a moor and a reservoir that are all close to Saddleworth Moor, there’s no way that he didn’t know that name - even if it doesn’t appear on maps of Saddleworth Moor from the time.

Regarding a vague possibility that at least some evidence from the crimes was being kept at Millwards. According to One of Your Own by Carol Ann Lee:

[On Friday 8th October 1965, Myra] was allowed to leave the station after agreeing to return on Monday, when she had a meeting with solicitor Robert Fitzpatrick, who was acting on behalf of Ian. From Hyde, she travelled to her mother’s house and the two of them carried a large bag of washing to the laundrette near Millwards. Myra went on alone to her old workplace. [footnote 7; see below] According to her confession, she opened a cupboard near the fireplace, where some old records were stacked, and found an envelope containing evidence of some kind. She burned the envelope. [footnote 8; see below] Shortly afterwards, Tom Craig arrived. He had read about the murder in the Manchester Evening News and at first imagined it was Ian who had been killed. Having learned the truth, he told Myra that Ian was never to set foot in Millwards again.

*Footnote 7*
By then, working hours at Millwards had altered. The staff worked longer hours through the week and had Saturdays off. Brady and Hindley had signed a petition for the change, which was put into place immediately after their arrest. It isn’t clear how she got in, unless someone was already there to admit her.

*Footnote 8*
The contents are unknown. Topping suggested incriminating photographs, which Hindley denied, insisting that it was nothing to do with the murders but instead plans for robberies. The theory in The Lost Boy by Duncan Staff is that it was body disposal plans, but that’s extremely unlikely since the police had the last disposal plan and Brady would have already destroyed the others (‘destroy all lists’). Fairley disputes that Hindley had any opportunity to dispose of evidence.

That last sentence on Footnote 8 sticks out to me. Ian Fairley was at Millwards on that same Friday, where he spoke to staff and searched the place (although I am unsure at what time he did this. I presume it was before Hindley got there, although the book One of Your Own does not clarify this. That would explain why Fairley said that Hindley would have had no opportunity to destroy evidence.