List of unsolved murders (before 1900)

Last updated

This list of unsolved murders includes notable cases where victims have been murdered under unknown circumstances.

Contents

Before 1800

The Bocksten Man, a bog body discovered in 1936. He had likely been killed in the 14th century. The Bocksten Bog Man 1.jpg
The Bocksten Man, a bog body discovered in 1936. He had likely been killed in the 14th century.

1800s

T. C. Hindman Hindman.jpg
T. C. Hindman

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lizzie Borden</span> American murder suspect (1860–1927)

Lizzie Andrew Borden was an American woman who was tried and acquitted of the August 4, 1892 axe murders of her father and stepmother in Fall River, Massachusetts. No one else was charged in the murders, and, despite ostracism from other residents, Borden spent the remainder of her life in Fall River. She died of pneumonia at the age of 66, just days before the death of her older sister, Emma.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Zodiac Killer</span> Serial killer in California in the 1960s

The Zodiac Killer is the pseudonym of an unidentified serial killer who murdered five known victims in the San Francisco Bay Area between December 1968 and October 1969. The case has been described as "arguably the most famous unsolved murder case in American history," and has become both a fixture of popular culture and a focus for efforts by amateur detectives.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hammersmith nude murders</span> Series of six murders in 1960s London

The Hammersmith nude murders is the name of a series of six murders in West London, England, in 1964 and 1965. The victims, all prostitutes, were found undressed in or near the River Thames, leading the press to nickname the killer Jack the Stripper. Two earlier murders, committed in West London in 1959 and 1963, have also been linked by some investigators to the same perpetrator.

<i>The Legend of Lizzie Borden</i> 1975 American TV series or program

The Legend of Lizzie Borden is a 1975 American historical mystery television film directed by Paul Wendkos and starring Elizabeth Montgomery—in an Emmy-nominated performance—as Lizzie Borden, an American woman who was accused of murdering her father and stepmother in 1892. It co-stars Katherine Helmond, Fritz Weaver, Fionnula Flanagan, and Hayden Rorke. It premiered on ABC on February 10, 1975. The film was nominated for a Golden Globe award for Best Motion Picture Made for Television in 1976.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Texarkana Moonlight Murders</span> Unsolved 1946 serial murders in Texarkana, United States

The Texarkana Moonlight Murders, a term coined by the contemporary press, was a series of four unsolved serial murders and related violent crimes committed in the Texarkana region of the United States in early 1946. They were attributed to an alleged unidentified perpetrator known as the Phantom of Texarkana, the Phantom Killer, or the Phantom Slayer. This hypothetical suspect is credited with attacking eight people, five of them fatally, in a ten-week period.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Oakland County Child Killer</span> Unidentified serial murderer

The Oakland County Child Killer (OCCK) is the name given to the perpetrator(s) responsible for the serial killings of at least four children in Oakland County, Michigan, between 1976 and 1977. The victims were held captive before being killed, and the four deaths triggered a murder investigation, which at the time was the largest in U.S. history, with Detroit's two daily newspapers, as well as the area's numerous radio and television stations, covering the case. A presentation on WXYT radio, titled Winter's Fear: The Children, the Killer, the Search, won the Peabody Award in 1977.

Autopsy is a television series of HBO's America Undercover documentary series. Dr. Michael Baden, a real-life forensic pathologist, is the primary analyst, and has been personally involved in many of the cases that are reviewed.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tommy Lynn Sells</span> American serial killer

Tommy Lynn Sells was an American serial killer, often referred to as "the Coast to Coast Killer" due to his claims of committing murders across the United States. Though convicted of only one murder, for which he received the death penalty and was eventually executed in 2014, he is believed to have committed at least 22 murders, with Sells himself claiming over 70 victims.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Christopher Wilder</span> Australian serial killer (1945–1984)

Christopher Bernard Wilder, also known as the Beauty Queen Killer and the Snapshot Killer, was an Australian-American serial killer who abducted at least twelve young women and girls, killing eight of them during a six-week, cross-country crime spree in the United States in early 1984. Wilder's series of murders began in Florida on February 26, 1984, and continued across the country through Texas, Oklahoma, Colorado, Nevada and California, with attempted abductions in Washington and New York. Wilder victimized attractive young women, most of whom he would entice by promising to take their pictures. After subduing them, he would torture and rape them before shooting, stabbing with a knife, or strangling them to death. Two or more of his victims were electrocuted using a makeshift electrical cord.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robert Zarinsky</span> American convicted murderer

Robert Zarinsky was an American serial killer and Neo-Nazi who killed three teenage girls in Monmouth County, New Jersey between 1965 and 1969. Convicted of one of these murders, he was sentenced to life in prison. He was also a suspect in four other murders, including the 1958 murder of a police officer in Rahway, but he was later acquitted for that crime.

Blood Relations is a psychological murder mystery written by Sharon Pollock. The play is based on historical fact and speculation surrounding the life of Lizzie Borden and the murders of her father and stepmother, crimes with which Borden was arrested for, though acquitted from and found not guilty.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Doodler</span> 1970s serial killer in San Francisco

The Doodler is an unidentified serial killer believed responsible for between six and sixteen murders and three assaults of men in San Francisco, California, United States, between January 1974 and September 1975. The nickname was given due to the perpetrator's habit of sketching his victims prior to stabbing them to death. The perpetrator met his victims at gay nightclubs, bars and restaurants.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ivan Milat</span> Australian serial killer (1944–2019)

Ivan Robert Marko Milat, commonly referred to in media as the Backpacker Murderer, was an Australian serial killer who abducted, assaulted, robbed and murdered two men and five women in New South Wales between 1989 and 1992. His modus operandi was to approach backpackers along the Hume Highway under the guise of providing them transport to areas of southern New South Wales, then take his victims into the Belanglo State Forest where he would incapacitate and murder them. Milat is also suspected of having committed many other similar offences around Australia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Axe murder</span> Murder in which the victim was struck and killed by an axe or hatchet

An axe murder is a murder in which the victim was struck and killed by an axe or hatchet.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lizzie Halliday</span> Irish-American serial killer

Lizzie Halliday was an Irish-American serial killer responsible for the deaths of four people in upstate New York during the 1890s. In 1894, she became the first woman to be sentenced to death by the electric chair. Halliday's sentence was commuted and she spent the rest of her life in a mental institution. She killed a nurse while institutionalized and is speculated to have killed her first two husbands.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rahway murder of 1887</span> Famous unidentified decedent

The Rahway murder of 1887 is the murder of an unidentified young woman whose body was found in Rahway, New Jersey on March 25, 1887. She is also known as the Unknown Woman or the Rahway Jane Doe.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Samuel Little</span> American serial killer (1940–2020)

Samuel Little was an American serial killer of women who was convicted of eight murders and confessed to committing 93 murders between 1970 and 2005. The Federal Bureau of Investigation's Violent Criminal Apprehension Program has confirmed his involvement in at least 60 murders, the largest number of confirmed victims for any serial killer in American history. Little provided sketches for twenty-six of his victims although not all have been linked to known murders.

References

  1. "British Museum exhibit Gebelein Man died 'violent death'". BBC News. 16 November 2012.
  2. Fischer, Christian (1998), "Bog bodies of Denmark and north-west Europe", Mummies, Disease & Ancient Cultures (second edition), Cambridge University Press, pp. 237–262, ISBN   0-521-58954-1
  3. Susan K. Lewis—PBS (2006). "Tollund Man". Public Broadcasting System—NOVA. Archived from the original on 18 November 2020. Retrieved 22 September 2007.
  4. Sammut, Dave; Craig, Chantelle (23 July 2019). "Bodies in the Bog: The Lindow Mysteries". Distillations. Science History Institute . Retrieved 28 August 2019.
  5. 1 2 "Caesarion". World History Encyclopedia . Retrieved 6 April 2019.
  6. "The Priory of Sion". skirret.com. Retrieved 19 March 2019.
  7. 1 2 Hanton, Alex (20 October 2016). "10 Shocking Murders By The Original Assassins". Listverse.
  8. Pražák, Richard (2002). "Vencel (László)". In Kristó, Gyula (ed.). Magyarország vegyes házi királyai [The Kings of Various Dynasties of Hungary] (in Hungarian). Szukits Könyvkiadó. pp. 7–14. ISBN   963-9441-58-9.
  9. Žemlička, Josef (2011). "The Realm of Přemysl Ottokar II and Wenceslas II". In Pánek, Jaroslav; Tůma, Oldřich (eds.). A History of the Czech Lands. Charles University in Prague. pp. 106–116. ISBN   978-80-246-1645-2.
  10. Bernadette Williams (ed.), The Annals of Ireland by Friar John Clyn (Dublin, 2007), pp. 95–96, 95–101, 102, 194, ISBN 978-1-84682-034-2.
  11. "Anselm Adornes of Bruges: Traveller in the East and Friend of James III". University of Strathclyde Glasgow.
  12. "Giovanni (Juan) Borgia – Prisoners of Eternity" . Retrieved 4 May 2019.
  13. Tototepec (23 July 2018). "The Death of Emperor Montezuma". The Aztec Vault. Retrieved 4 May 2019.
  14. Betham, rev William (1801). The baronetage of England, or, The history of the English baronets, and such baronets of Scotland, as are of English families.
  15. Laughton, John Knox (1892). "Knight, John (d.1606)". In Lee, Sidney (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography. Vol. 31. London: Smith, Elder & Co. pp. 254–255.
  16. Todd, Margo (2004). "Dorislaus, Isaac (1595–1649)" . Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/7832 . Retrieved 24 October 2012.(Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  17. Spencer, Charles, Killers of the King: The Men Who Dared to Execute Charles I p 33
  18. Kenyon, J.P. (2000). The Popish Plot. Phoenix Press reissue.
  19. "Top 10 Composers Who Died Unnatural or Odd Deaths". Listverse. 21 May 2009. Retrieved 4 May 2019.
  20. Henri Malo, yksityisasiamies Landolphe: seurasi Du Clerc à Rio-de-Janeiro (1710), Maritime League,1943, 107 Sivumäärä, -8, 15 x 24 cm, s. 99 - 106.
  21. "Jean – Marie Leclair (1697–1764) | early-music.com" . Retrieved 4 May 2019.
  22. Bradsby, Henry C. (1893). History of Luzerne County, Pennsylvania. Chicago: Nelson. p. 1.567. Retrieved 23 October 2016.
  23. "Weeks' trial sheds light on early procedure". History.com. 2009.
  24. "Victorian True Crime: Convicted in minutes, the unjust execution of Dominic Daley and James Halligan".
  25. "The Murder of Joe the Quilter". Northumberland Archives. 31 January 2017. Retrieved 13 November 2021.
  26. O'Neil, Tim (7 November 1837). "A crusading editor is killed defending the freedom of the press". St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Retrieved 17 November 2019.
  27. "Helen Jewett: The newspapers of 1836 were transfixed by the story of a prostitute murdered by a client". The Vintage News. 1 June 2017. Retrieved 11 May 2020.
  28. Ramsland, Katherine. "The sensational murder of Helen Jewett, gorgeous NY prostitute". Crime Library. Archived from the original on 2 May 2014. Retrieved 31 March 2018.
  29. Siddle, John (15 July 2015). "The mystery killing of shipping magnate John Bibby". Liverpool Echo.
  30. Meyers, Jeffrey (1992). Edgar Allan Poe: His Life and Legacy (Paperback ed.). New York: Cooper Square Press. p. 135. ISBN   0-8154-1038-7.
  31. Erika Niedowski, "RI governor pardons Irish man hanged in 1845", Associated Press, 2011-06-29.
  32. "Duchess de Choiseul-Praslin: Her Murder in 1847". Geri Walton. 19 August 2016. Retrieved 30 August 2019.
  33. Harlow, Alvin Fay (1 January 1976). Old Waybills: The Romance of the Express Companies. Arno Press. ISBN   9780405076923 via Google Books.
  34. Moody, Ralph (1 January 2005). Wells Fargo. U of Nebraska Press. ISBN   0803283032 via Google Books.
  35. Maria Nikolaeva Todorova, Balkan Identities: Nation and Memory (New York: NYU Press, 2004), p. 289
  36. Goodman, Kent. "The Real John Bozeman: with sneaky ways and low morals," February 1, 2015. https://bozemanmagazine.com/articles/2015/02/01/101576-the-real-john-bozeman-with-sneaky-ways-and-low.
  37. Gombrich, Marius, "Crime scene investigation: Edo: Samurai Sakamoto Ryoma's murder scene makes a grisly but fascinating show", Japan Times , 7 May 2010, p. 15.
  38. National Diet Library (NDL), Portraits of Modern Japanese Historical Figures, Nakaoka, Shintaro
  39. "5 of Japan's Most Famous Unsolved Crimes". Tokyo Weekender. 7 December 2018. Retrieved 11 September 2019.
  40. Lane, Charles, 1961- (2019). Freedom's detective : the Secret Service, the Ku Klux Klan and the man who masterminded America's first war on terror. Toronto, Ontario, Canada. pp. 71–79, 87, 91, 276. ISBN   9781335006851. OCLC   1091189008.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  41. "HINDMAN, Thomas Carmichael". Biographical Directory of the United States Congress. Retrieved 6 October 2008.
  42. Rogers, William Warren (2 January 2013). "The Boyd Incident: Black Belt Violence During Reconstruction". Civil War History. 21 (4): 309–329. doi:10.1353/cwh.1975.0009. ISSN   1533-6271. S2CID   144484750.
  43. Nathan-Kazis, Benjamin (13 January 2010). "A Death in the Family". Tablet . Retrieved 27 April 2015.
  44. Baynes, Thomas Spencer (1891). The Encyclopædia Britannica: A Dictionary of Arts, Sciences, and General Literature. M. Sommerville.
  45. "A Double Crime". Illinois State Register. 29 April 1871. Archived from the original on 4 November 2013. Retrieved 12 November 2014.
  46. Paddock, F.; et al. (1970). "An inquest on the death of Charles Francis Hall". N. Engl. J. Med. 282 (14): 784–786. doi:10.1056/nejm197004022821406. PMID   4907067.
  47. Barr, W., ed. (2016). Polaris: The Chief Scientist's Recollections of the American North Pole Expedition. UCalgary Press. ISBN   9781552388754.
  48. Ross, Greg (12 January 2011). "An Obscure Exit". futilitycloset.com. Retrieved 19 March 2012.
  49. Brown, A: Poisoned at the Priory: The death of Charles Bravo, featuring Agatha Christie's theory (Cold Case Jury: True Crime Collection, Band 4) ISBN   978-1912624799
  50. Ames, John Edward (2004). The Real Deadwood: True Life Histories of Wild Bill Hickok, Calamity Jane, Outlaw Towns, and Other Characters of the Lawless West. Penguin. ISBN   9781596090316.
  51. Congressional Record, V. 153, Part 19, October 1, 2007 to October 16, 2007. Government Printing Office.
  52. "A WESTCHESTER MYSTERY". The New York Times. 5 June 1878.
  53. "DeFoor". atlantasupperwestside.com. Retrieved 29 June 2018.
  54. "Euston Square Mystery: Canterbury woman Matilda Hacker found murdered in cellar". Kent Online. 21 May 2022. Retrieved 4 July 2023.
  55. "Canadian Mysteries, The Massacre of the "Black" Donnellys" . Retrieved 30 January 2012.
  56. O’Gorman, Ronnie (28 January 2010). "The Maamtrasna Murders, August 17 1882". Galway Advertiser. Retrieved 12 September 2019.
  57. "Johnny Ringo: The Wild West Outlaw Too Fearsome To Ever End Up In Prison". All That's Interesting. 25 January 2019. Retrieved 8 October 2019.
  58. Bell, Bob Boze. "Billy the Kid & Pat Garrett vs. A Las Vegas Mob". True West Magazine. Retrieved 22 July 2017.
  59. Avrich, Paul (1984). The Haymarket Tragedy. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. ISBN   0-691-00600-8.
  60. "History". Rahway Police Department. 14 March 2015. Retrieved 17 June 2019.
  61. "1211UFNJ". doenetwork.org. Retrieved 17 June 2019.
  62. Begg, Paul (2003). Jack the Ripper: The Definitive History. London: Pearson Education. ISBN   0-582-50631-X
  63. "The Westminster Mystery", Morning Advertiser , 23 October 1888, retrieved 21 April 2019
  64. "John Middleton Clayton (1840–1889)". Encyclopedia of Arkansas History and Culture. Retrieved 6 October 2008.
  65. "Truth Dims the Legend of Outlaw Queen Belle Starr". Los Angeles Times. 17 February 2002. Retrieved 19 November 2019.
  66. "FrontierTimes – Outlaws – Belle Starr". www.frontiertimes.com. Retrieved 19 November 2019.
  67. "Chad | South African History Online". www.sahistory.org.za. Retrieved 19 May 2022.
  68. DeCosta-Willis, Miriam (March 1, 2018) [October 8, 2017]. "Ida B. Wells-Barnett". Tennessee Encyclopedia (online). Tennessee Historical Society. Retrieved February 25, 2019.
  69. "The Trial of Lizzie Borden". University of Missouri–Kansas City School of Law. Archived from the original on 9 October 2008. Retrieved 6 October 2008.
  70. "Epilogue: A forgotten mystery of death and destruction". Lincoln Journal-Star. 22 February 2010.
  71. Lukas, J. Anthony (1998). Big Trouble: A Murder in a Small Western Town Sets Off a Struggle for the Soul of America . Simon and Schuster. ISBN   978-0-684-84617-0.
  72. Finnegan, Terence (2013). A Deed So Accursed: Lynching in Mississippi and South Carolina, 1881–1940. American South series. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press. pp. 50–55. ISBN   978-0-8139-3385-6. Retrieved May 21, 2013.
  73. Whiticker, Alan J. (2005). Twelve Crimes That Shocked the Nation. ISBN   1-74110-110-7