Historical True Crime

By LizzieTrue Crime

Historical True Crime episodes

February 24, 2023 Murderer Kate Webster: The Barnes Mystery
The murder of Julia Martha Thomas by her maid, Kate Webster, was one of the most infamous and heinous murders committed in nineteenth-century England. Join us to hear the full story!
Source Materials:
https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/505155/barnes-mystery-twisted-tale-maids-murder-and-mistaken-identity
https://murderpedia.org/female.W/w/webster-catherine.htm
https://www.irishpost.com/news/ten-facts-kate-webster-irish-maid-hanged-dismembering-employer-victorian-london-131185
https://www.mylondon.news/news/west-london-news/victorian-murder-victim-whos-skull-16838132
O'Donnell, Elliot (1925). The Trial of Kate Webster. Edinburgh: William Hodge & Company.
22 min
February 17, 2023 Marguerite Alibert: Courtesan, Royal Mistress and Murderer
Marguerite Marie Alibert, often referred to as Princess Fahmy, Maggie Meller, and Marguerite Laurent, was a French socialite. She began her profession in Paris as a prostitute and courtesan. During 1917 and 1918, she had a relationship with the Prince of Wales (later Edward VIII). When she wed the Egyptian aristocrat Ali Kamel Fahmy Bey, the media of the day referred to her as Princess. She murdered her husband in 1923 at London's Savoy Hotel. During a trial at the Old Bailey, she was ultimately found not guilty.
Source Materials:
https://www.historicmysteries.com/marguerite-alibert/
https://medium.com/@editors_91459/from-sex-worker-to-princess-to-murderer-the-remarkable-rise-and-fall-of-marguerite-alibert-23a722a1f99e
https://www.tatler.com/article/prince-harrys-memoir-love-affair-edward-viii-and-french-courtesan
https://historycollection.com/marguerite-alibert-was-a-royal-mistress-who-got-away-with-murder/
https://www.news.com.au/entertainment/celebrity-life/royals/the-murderous-mistress-of-edward-viii-before-he-met-wallis-simpson/news-story/74d15592fbce8eb145a2cfecb7a029b7
https://culturico.com/2021/11/18/how-privilege-helped-this-wealthy-white-woman-get-away-with-murder/
https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-king-and-the-courtesan-inside-edward-viiis-steamy-french-affair
https://www.brides.com/king-edward-wallis-simpson-relationship-timeline-5193616
20 min
February 10, 2023 The Bermondsey Horror: Fred and Maria Manning
Fred and Maria Manning's story involves love, treachery, greed, and murder. In a scheme nicknamed "the Bermondsey tragedy," they murdered Marie's affluent lover in cold blood and attempted to profit from their victim's fortune. New technologies and the newly established police units that had appeared throughout Britain in the past two decades would be their undoing.
Source Materials:
https://www.theministryofhistory.co.uk/short-histories-blog/bermondsey-horror
https://headstuff.org/culture/history/terrible-people-from-history/fred-maria-manning-victorian-murderers/
https://www.capitalpunishmentuk.org/mannings.html
https://thecrimewire.com/multifarious/The-Bermondsey-Horror
22 min
February 03, 2023 The Bloody Benders: America's First Serial Killer Family
From May 1871 through December 1872, the Bender family—better known as the Bloody Benders—operated as a family of serial killers in Labette County, Kansas, in the United States. John Bender, his wife Elvira, their children, John Jr. and Kate, made up the family. The Bender family appeared seemingly out of thin air, carried out horrifying and uncountable acts of heinous brutality, and then vanished without a trace.

Source Materials:
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/03/bloody-benders-true-story-kate-bender-crimes-susan-jonusas.html
https://www.legendsofamerica.com/ks-benders/
https://crimereads.com/the-bloody-benders-americas-first-family-of-serial-killers/
https://allthatsinteresting.com/bloody-benders
https://nypost.com/2022/03/26/how-a-serial-killer-family-murdered-8-and-got-away-with-it/
https://www.historicmysteries.com/bloody-benders/
Hell's Half-Acre : The Untold Story of the Benders, America's First Serial Killer Family by Susan Jonusas
21 min
January 27, 2023 Cleveland Torso Killer
A serial killer who went by the names The Cleveland Torso Murderer and The Mad Butcher of Kingsbury Run operated in Cleveland, Ohio, in the 1930s. Twelve known victims were dismembered in the killings, and their bodies were dumped in the underprivileged Kingsbury Run community. These murders remain unsolved to this day.
Source Materials:
https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/632096/cleveland-torso-murderer-unsolved-serial-killer
https://www.clevelandpolicemuseum.org/collections/torso-murders/
https://nypost.com/2022/10/15/clevelands-torso-killer-was-more-vicious-than-jack-the-ripper/
https://www.history.com/topics/great-depression/great-depression-history

20 min
January 20, 2023 Jesse Pomeroy: America's Youngest Serial Killer
Jesse Pomeroy was the youngest person to be found guilty of first-degree murder in Massachusetts history in 1874. Even though he was just 14 years old, the brutal and violent atrocities he committed led to life in prison, where he died in 1932.
Source Materials:
https://www.aetv.com/real-crime/jesse-pomeroy
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/the-story-of-jesse-pomeroy-14-year-old-serial-killer/
https://allthatsinteresting.com/jesse-pomeroy
https://www.historicmysteries.com/jesse-pomeroy/
21 min
January 13, 2023 Gilles de Rais: History's First Serial Killer?
Gilles de Rais was a Breton nobleman, a soldier with a distinguished career in the Hundred Years’ War and as Joan of Arc’s comrade in arms. Today, however, those accomplishments are only viewed in the context of the secret life he led while committing more than a hundred horrifying child killings, a spree that may have made him the first serial murderer in history.

Source Materials:
Gilles de Rais: The Authentic Bluebeard by Jean Benedetti
Bluebeard: The Life and Crimes of Gilles de Rais by Leonard Wolf
https://allthatsinteresting.com/gilles-de-rais
https://www.britannica.com/story/gilles-de-rais-historys-first-serial-killer
https://explorethearchive.com/gilles-de-rais
20 min
January 06, 2023 Dr. Robert Liston: Surgeon with 300% Fatality Rate
In an era before anaesthetics, when speed mattered in terms of agony and survival, Robert Liston was a British surgeon renowned for his quickness and skill. The West End's "fastest knife" was said to be able to amputate a leg in just over two minutes. He is also notorious for performing the only surgery with a 300% death rate in history. Please join us to learn the entire tale and the horrifying surgical practises of the Victorian era.
Source Materials:
https://allthatsinteresting.com/robert-liston
https://www.aamc.org/news-insights/bloody-hands-dirty-knives-horrors-victorian-medicine
https://www.historyextra.com/period/victorian/an-appointment-at-the-house-of-death-the-horrors-of-the-early-victorian-hospital/
https://archiveandlibrary.rcsed.ac.uk/surgeon/3770447-robert-liston
https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/evolution/darwin/diary/1826.html
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8672962/
https://www.famousscientists.org/joseph-lister/
23 min
December 30, 2022 Eugène-François Vidocq: Convict, Detective and Father of Criminology
Eugène-François Vidocq was a French criminal who became a detective. Victor Hugo, Edgar Allan Poe, and Honoré de Balzac were all influenced by Eugène-François Vidocq's life. The former criminal went on to develop and lead the first known private detective agency as well as the first director of the crime-detection Sûreté nationale. Vidocq is revered as the founder of contemporary criminology.
Source Materials:
https://headstuff.org/culture/history/terrible-people-from-history/eugene-francois-vidocq-french-criminal-detective/
https://thrillingdetective.com/2019/05/10/eugene-francois-vidocq/
https://thecrimewire.com/multifarious/The-Father-of-Criminology-Eugene-Francois-Vidocq
http://scihi.org/eugene-vidocq/
30 min
December 23, 2022 The Papin Sisters
Christine and Lea Papin were responsible for one of the most heinous murders in French history on February 2, 1933. They disfigured their victims by tearing out their eyes and mutilating their genitals. Their victims were Léonie and Geneviève Lancelin, the mother and daughter of the wealthy family who employed them. But what drove them—madness, bloodlust, or class warfare?
Source Materials:
https://allthatsinteresting.com/papin-sisters
https://www.history101.com/papin-sisters/
https://www.ranker.com/list/papin-sisters/melissa-sartore
22 min

About Historical True Crime

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Step into the shadows of the past with "Historical True Crime," the podcast that takes you on a gripping journey through some of history's most captivating and chilling criminal stories. Each episode…