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

Vera Page was ten years old, an avid swimmer who lived in the Notting Hill district of London. At around four-thirty on the afternoon of December 14th, 1931, she asked her mother if she could walk the fifty yards to her aunt Minnie’s house; she wanted to stop by and show her aunt some swimming … More Vera Page

On July 20th, 1932, in East Sussex, England, twenty-three-year-old Arthur Edward Harman rose at five-twenty a.m., fixed himself and his wife Queenie a cup of cocoa, fed the couple’s one-year-old child, then caught the bus to the hauling company in Baldslow where he worked as a truck driver. As soon as he got to work, … More Queenie Winifred Harman

On the afternoon of June 1st, 1948, a woman and her daughter rushed to a train station in Texarkana. Secretly, the woman, Hazel Carpenter, hoped the train had already left so that she could drive her daughter to her destination, but unfortunately, the train was still on the platform. The younger woman kissed her mother … More Virginia Carpenter

In the early fall of 1922, a scandalous case in New Jersey would gin up all the tabloid fodder an eager public could possibly wish for: a double murder, a salacious affair, and the possible involvement of a wealthy and jealous spouse. In fact, prior to the Lindbergh kidnapping of the 1930s, this particular case … More The Hall-Mills Murder

On the HBO series Deadwood, which aired from 2004 to 2006, British actor Ian McShane portrayed one of the main characters, a saloon owner and ruthless pimp by the name of Al Swearengen. The series took some dramatic license with the real man behind the character, however, and by all accounts, the historical Al Swearengen … More Al Swearengen