In December of 1909, a few days before Christmas, the murder of a wealthy old woman in Glasgow sparked a cascade of events that would go on to write an incredible story of prejudice, conspiracy and eventual justice. Featuring a starring role by none other than the creator of Sherlock Holmes, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, it was then and remains still, one of the most fascinating, perplexing and straight confusing incidents of cause celebre in modern history.
In 1888, Whitechapel, was gripped by fear of a brutal series of murders perpetrated by a sadistic killer that named himself Jack the Ripper. He would go on to be one of the world’s most famous, and elusive serial killers of all time. Jacks escapades took place just a single step ahead of the curve of criminal forensics, an opportune window in time aiding him in his flight from capture. Across The Channel, just a decade later, another, less well known nightmare was stalking the countryside. No less brutal in his killing spree, Vacher the Ripper, was tearing up victims in secluded forest pathways and the deserted barns of isolated, rural communities across France. The march of science, psychology and criminology had not been standing still, however, and what were only the nuclei of ideas during Jack’s reign, were emerging as full fledged methodologies, developed to pull a criminal from the shadows or a brutal murder out, from under the shroud of speculation.
In April, 1876, Charles Bravo took to his bedroom, rubbed a dose of laudanum into his gums and poured himself a glass of water from the jug on his nightstand. Within minutes of retiring to bed, Charles Bravo fell desperately ill. Within two days, he would be pronounced dead, the victim of Antimony poisoning. Suicide, manslaughter and murder have been cast forward by amateur historians and famous crime writers alike. 145 years on, some have claimed to have solved the mystery of the death of Charles Bravo, but in reality, the truth lies as buried as the characters themselves. Two inquests to the good, the question remains, who killed Charles Bravo?
Lord Lucan, a name of considerable infamy, not as a member of the aristocracy, but for the murder of his children’s nanny in a house in the elitist district of Belgravia, London in 1973 and his subsequent disappearance. It was a story that the press went to town on, a classic us vs them tale of Class superiority and those that would seek to protect the hierarchy at all costs, but how much of it was based on truth and how much just a convenient narrative for the journalists that covered the case? It was a case that was launched into mythical status after the Lord himself vanished without trace, leaving a question that runs until today. Where in the world is Lord Lucan? This is Dark Histories, where the facts are worse than fiction.
Faeries, changelings and herbalist doctors might seem like characters in a winding tale of medieval folklore today, but in 1895, Ireland bore witness to a case that saw these facets of folk tradition flare up in a very real way when Michael Cleary, a skilled tradesman of County Tipperary set fire to his wife, burning her to death. As the body of Bridget Cleary was placed in the ground, her husband was convinced that he would see his wife again, riding on the back of a grey horse as she emerged from an invisible plane. The body in the ground was merely that of a changeling, an imposter placed in his house by the fairies, he had merely expedited the process of return.
The tale of room 1046 of the President Hotel in Kansas City is a strange one. A murder mystery with almost no clues and no evidence at the crime scene, but a victim with three names, left beaten, possibly tortured and a trail of several peculiar phone calls.
In 1941, a man named Phillip Peters was found murdered in his home in Denver, Colorado. The doors and windows to the house showed no signs of forced entry and were locked when neighbours discovered the body. Strange stories of odd sightings flew around the neighbourhood, with the attack becoming known in the papers as “The Denver ghost house slayings”. The truth however, was to be something far stranger and probably for most, far more terrifying.
In 1946, The American twin city of Texarkana was plunged into the depths of panic and fear. The population of the postwar suburb was subjected to a series of murders that shook the dual cities to their core, prompting curfews, rumours and unease to spread through the area like the rail tracks that crept from it’s central hub. Nights of midnight movies, drive-in cafes, the songs of Duke Ellington and big band orchestras were perforated with tales of a man with a white sheet over his head, holes cut out for eyes, performing brutal executions upon the vulnerable and unexpecting.
In 2011, Russia bore witness to one the most bizarre cases in the countries criminal history. A story of Black magic, the Occult and one man’s very unusual hobby.
All aboard, we’re going back to the Victorian era to shed some light on the first ever murder on a train in Britain at a time when people were already terrified on this crazy new technology. It’s not all high speed steam trains though, we’ve even got a super slow-mo police chase across the Atlantic!
