The first picture released in 1973 of David McGreavy after he was taken into custody Three children were murdered, apparently for no other reason than to silence the crying of a nine-month-old baby. Then, their small bodies broken, they were impaled on garden railings in an act of grotesque savagery that shocked the nation. The date was Friday, April 13, 1973. Mother Elsie Ralph, was 23 and working as a barmaid in Worcester. Her husband Clive Ralph had gone to collect her from work and had left their children in the care of David McGreavy, a family friend and lodger. The children knew him well, and had played with him happily in the past. The couple thought they had no reason to worry about the welfare of their children. Yet, when they returned to their home in Gillam Street, Worcester, they discovered that the police were waiting for them. An officer escorted to them to the local police station and broke the news: Paul, four, Dawn, two, and baby Samantha were all dead. The scene where Paul, Dawn and Samantha were found dead in Worcester in 1973 The couple were told McGreavy had admitted killing them, but that police were still looking for their bodies. Later that night, they were found in a row, impaled on a neighbour's spiked garden railings. McGreavy, 21, who had been kicked out of the Royal Navy, reportedly told police that Samantha had wanted her bottle and wouldn't stop crying. 'I put my hand over her mouth and it went from there,' he said. 'It's all in the house. On Paul I used a wire. I was going to bury [Paul] but I couldn't… I went outside and put them on the fence. All I can hear is kids, kids, kids.' Paul was strangled, Dawn had had her throat cut and Samantha died from a compound fracture to the skull. It remains unclear if there was more to the killings and prison psychologists who interviewed McGreavy explored the possibility that there may have been a 'sexual motive'. A police officer stands outside the family home in Worcester in 1973 In 2013, Mrs Urry, who took an overdose six months after losing her children, and has since moved from Worcester, said she had lived through '40 years of hell'. 'If he was released, I'd be waiting outside with a gun,' she said after McGreavy's Human Rights petition was quashed. 'Life should mean life and he should never get to walk free. He got off lightly with a life sentence – he should have been hanged. 'I think about what he did every minute of every day because he took my life away. I can't go to family parties any more, I can't celebrate anything. Put yourself in my shoes, how would you feel? 'I can't and will never move on. For what he did to my three children and me, he deserves the same treatment that they got – death.' All rights reserved for this news site dailymail and under his responsibility