On May 16th, 1937, twenty-nine-year-old Laetitia Toureaux was found murdered in a carriage on the Paris Métro at the Porte Dorée station. The cause of death was a single stab wound to the neck. Significantly, Laetitia was the first person to ever be killed on the Métro, undoubtedly a tragic claim to fame. One of … More Laetitia Toureaux

In 1925, Arthur Schumacher, better known as Buddy, was eight years old and lived with his parents and older sister in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin. At around nine o’clock on the morning of July 25th, Buddy and three other boys from the neighborhood hopped a freight train to ride to a local swimming hole they frequented. Shortly … More Arthur “Buddy” Schumacher

James Douglas Edgar was born in 1884 in Newcastle upon Tyne, England, and by the time he became an adult, he was well on his way to a successful career as a professional golfer. He won the French Open in 1914, and five years later, emigrated to the United States, where he settled in Atlanta, … More James Douglas Edgar

In the summer of 1919, Mabel Greenwood lived in a comfortable house in Kidwelly, Carmarthenshire, in southwest Wales. Her husband Harold was a solicitor, originally from Yorkshire, and the couple had four children. On June 16th, Mabel was feeling under the weather and started complaining of stomach pains after eating gooseberry pie and a glass … More Mabel Greenwood

Twenty-one-year-old Billy Stone worked the night shift as a telegraph operator at the Whitby Junction railroad station in Whitby, Ontario, Canada. Just after midnight on December 11th, 1914, Billy extinguished nearly all the lights in the station, as he usually did, leaving only his desk lamp burning. Suddenly, at around twelve-thirty-seven a.m., a single gunshot … More Billy Stone

It was the summer of 1909 in New York City, and twenty-year-old Elsie Sigel left her family’s apartment to visit her grandmother not far away. Elsie, who was the granddaughter of famed Civil War general Franz Sigel, was herself a missionary who worked in Chinatown, helping young women who had become involved in drugs and … More Elsie Sigel

It was New Year’s Day of 1902 in a rural town called Towitta, in South Australia. Thirteen-year-old Bertha Schippan and her twenty-four-year-old sister Mary were spending the evening at the family farm alone. Their parents, Matthes and Johanne, were visiting relatives, and their three brothers were away working on other nearby farms. Sometime around ten … More Bertha Schippan

In England in the 1920s and 1930s, there was a small but horrific trend in a very particular type of crime, in which murder victims were dismembered and stashed inside trunks, some of which were discovered at train stations. Though these murders were ultimately found to be unrelated, the bizarre series gave the seaside town … More The Brighton Trunk Murders

Janet Kennedy Smith was a young Scottish woman who had been working as a nursemaid for the Baker family since January of 1923. Frederick and Doreen Baker, wealthy owners of an import-export business, were apparently happy with Janet’s care of their newborn daughter Rosemary, for they asked the nursemaid to accompany them when they moved … More Janet Kennedy Smith

It was late afternoon on Saturday, February 26th, 1921, among the numerous farms that occupied the land outside the village of North Motton in Tasmania, Australia. Ena May Dawes gave her daughter Chrissie Venn a basket and some money, and asked the fourteen-year-old if she would walk the three miles into town to buy some … More Chrissie Venn