Florence Mabel Oliver Gooding was born in 1883 in Hastings, East Sussex, a coastal town known for its Regency elegance and pebbled beaches. By the mid-twentieth century, she had settled into a modest, independent life as a widow in Oxted, a picturesque commuter village nestled in the Tandridge district. Her home, Oast Hatch on Oast … More Florence Gooding
Six-year-old Carol Ann Stephens was a bright, rosy-cheeked girl with brown hair and steel-rimmed glasses, described by those who knew her as confident, chatty, and endlessly curious. Born into a hardworking family, she lived with her mother Mavis, stepfather Ken, and siblings in a modest home on Malefant Street in Cathays, a working-class enclave in … More Carol Ann Stephens
Susan Southgate was born in the very house where she would meet her end: The Mill House on Writtle Road just a stone’s throw from the bustling city of Chelmsford in Essex, England. She was the last of a long line of millers who had tended the grinding wheels of the River Wid since the … More Susan Southgate
The Cameo Cinema, a modest 200-seat venue converted from a former Methodist chapel, stood at the corner of Bird Street and Webster Road in the Wavertree neighborhood of Liverpool, England. On the evening of March 19th, 1949, patrons settled in to watch Bond Street, a lighthearted British comedy-drama, oblivious to a horror that would shortly … More Leonard Thomas & Bernard Catterall: The Cameo Cinema Murders
Born on July 17th, 1921, in Barnsley, Yorkshire, England, Joan Woodhouse was the only child of John and Nellie Woodhouse. Doted on by her parents and adoring aunts Annie Blades and Ida Sheriff, she grew up in a close-knit, working-class family. Educated at Barnsley Girls’ High School from 1933 to 1939, Joan developed a passion … More Joan Woodhouse: The Arundel Murder
Jerzy Strzadala was born on April 18th, 1915, in the rural village of Zabozorzy in southern Poland. Trained as a wheelwright, his early life was upended by the outbreak of World War II. In 1939, Nazi Germany invaded Poland, and Strzadala lived under occupation until 1943, when he was briefly conscripted into the German Army—a … More Jerzy Strzadla
Thirty-nine-year-old Caroline Evans had carved out a respected life as headmistress of the infants’ school in Wern, in the quiet village of Coedpoeth in Wrexham, North Wales. She was married to Edward Daniel “Dan” Evans, a forty-year-old clerk at a local leather works. The couple resided at 20 Park Road, a modest home overlooking the … More Caroline Evans
Born Teresa Skarżyńska on April 18th, 1884, in the Podole region of what was then Russian Poland (now Ukraine), Teresa hailed from one of the country’s storied aristocratic families. The daughter of aviator and nobleman Władysław Skarżyński and Dorota Gołębiowska, she received an elite education at Jazłowiec College, a prestigious Catholic boarding school run by … More Countess Teresa Łubieńska
Born in 1919 in Stirlingshire, Scotland, Frederick Walter Jeffs moved to Birmingham, England as a child. He trained as an electrician at the Austin Longbridge car factory, a hub of wartime production, before enlisting in the Royal Army Service Corps during World War II. Captured as a prisoner of war, Jeffs endured the hardships of … More Fred Jeffs
In the quiet coastal village of Laugharne, Carmarthenshire, Wales—a place immortalized by poet Dylan Thomas for its serene estuary views and timeless charm—a single scream shattered the winter twilight on January 10th, 1953. Seventy-eight-year-old Elizabeth Thomas, a beloved local figure known for her cheerful demeanor and tireless work as a church cleaner, was brutally attacked … More Elizabeth Thomas
Crime Immemorial 