Peter Kurten - The Vampire of Düsseldorf

 Peter Kurten was a German serial killer. He was born on 26 May 1883. He was one of 13 children. His father was an alcoholic and physically abused Peter. 

Kurten later claimed he committed his first murders when he was 9. He said he pushed a friend, who could not swim, off a raft. Another boy jumped in to save him but Kurten held the would-be rescuer underwater. The other boy, unable to swim, drowned. The authorities ascribed the two deaths to accidental drowning. Whether Kurten killed them or whether the deaths were accidental is not known.

Kurten claimed that he began abusing animals when he was 13. As an adult, Kurten had a record of petty crimes such as stealing and fraud and he spent much of his life in prison.

Kurten committed his first definite murder on 25 May 1913. He broke into an inn. Kurten found a 9-year-old girl called Christine Klein asleep. He strangled her, then cut her throat. Unfortunately, Kurten was not caught. 

From 1925 to 1929, Kurten committed many crimes of arson in Dusseldorf. Then, on 3 February 1929 a woman named Apollonia Khun was attacked with a knife. Fortunately, she survived. On 8 February Kurten strangled and stabbed an 8-year-old girl named Rose Ohliger. On 13 February 1929 Kurten stabbed a 45-year-old man named Scheer while he was walking along the street drunk. Kurten attempted to strangle four women between March and July 1929. However, all escaped. The next murder was on 11 August when Kurten strangled and stabbed a woman named Maria Hahn. 

On 21 August Kurten stabbed three strangers. All three survived. Then, on 24 August Kurten killed two girls, Gertrude Hamacher aged 5 and her adopted sister Luise Lenzen aged 14. Kurten persuaded the older girl to go to buy him some cigarettes. While she was away he strangled the younger girl and cut her throat. He did the same to the older girl when she returned. The next day, 25 August Kurten met a young woman named Gertrude Schulte. Kurten asked to have sex with him. The woman said ‘I’d rather die’. Kurten replied ‘Well die then’ and stabbed her several times. Fortunately, she survived. 

For his next murder, Kurten used a hammer. He killed a young woman called Ida Reuter on 30 September 1929. On 11 October 1929, he killed a young woman named Elizabeth Dorrier with a hammer. On 25 October 1929 Kurten attacked two women with a hammer but both survived.

However, on 7 November 1929 a 5-year-old child was not so lucky. Kurten strangled and they stabbed her. In 1930 Kurten continued to attack young women early in 1930 but all of them survived.

Finally a woman called Maria Budlick came to Dusseldorf by train looking for a job. She had the misfortune to meet Peter Kurten. He persuaded her to come to his apartment for a meal. She agreed and afterward he offered to take her to a hostel. Instead he lured her to a secluded place where he tried to strangle her. Budlick screamed so Kurten let her go. 

Budlick did not inform the police. Instead she wrote a letter, which was incorrectly addressed. A postal worker opened the letter and upon reading the contents he showed it to the police. They spoke to Budlick and she was able to show them the building where Kurten lived. 

By chance Kurten returned to the building and saw police there. He fled the scene and went to live in lodgings. But on 23 May he returned home and he confessed to his wife and urged her to claim the reward for finding the murderer. 

Kurten seems to have decided that the game was up. On 24 May his wife told the police. She also told them that Peter had agreed to meet her at St. Rochus church later that day. Kurten was arrested when he came to the rendezvous. He surrendered without any struggle or protest. Instead he made a long confession to all his crimes. 

Kurten went on trial on 13 April 1931. At first he pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity but he later changed his plea to guilty. On 22 April he was convicted of nine murders. Peter Kurten was executed by guillotine on 2 July 1931. 

Fritz Haarmann - The Butcher of Hanover

 Fritz Haarmann was a German serial killer. He was born in Hanover on 25 October 1875. At school, he was a low-ability student. At the age of 15, Fritz was sent to a military academy but he was soon discharged after showing symptoms of epilepsy. Fritz then worked in his father’s cigar factory. 

Haarmann began luring boys to secluded places then sexually abused them. He was soon arrested but he was diagnosed as ‘incurably deranged’. He was detained in a mental asylum but in 1897, he escaped to Switzerland. He returned to Hanover in 1899. 

He was conscripted into the army in 1900. He later claimed that he enjoyed his time in the army but he was discharged from the army on medical grounds as he had mental health problems.

He was awarded a pension but it was not enough to live on. So Haarmann turned to stealing. 

In 1914 he was sentenced to 5 years in prison but he was released in 1918. Despite his criminal record, he became a police informer. 

He also became a murderer. His first victim was a 17 year old boy named Friedel Rothe who was killed in October 1918. Later Haarmann the police caught Haarmann in bed with a 13 year old boy. He was sentenced to 9 months in prison. 

On his release in 1919 he met a man named Hans Grans. The two began a relationship and Grans later became an accomplice. 

The pair met boys at the railway station and lured them into Haarmann’s home, where they were killed, dismembered and thrown into the River Leine. Haarmann sold the boys' clothes. 

The second murder was in February 1923 and many more followed. Haarmann claimed he strangled boys by biting their throats. However, inevitably people began to find human remains in the river. In May 1924 children found a human skull on the banks of the river. A pathologist said it was the skull of a young man and it had been cut from the body.

Meanwhile people had, of course noticed the large number of teenage boys who were disappearing in Hanover. In the following weeks three more skulls were found. Children also found a sack of bones near the river. Eventually the police dredged the river and they found hundreds of human bones. Haarman was a suspect because of his previous offences against boys and he was placed under surveillance. Two undercover policemen saw him arguing with a 15 year old boy. 

Foolishly, Haarmann himself went to two other officers and demanded they arrest the boy for travelling with forged documents. The boy told the police he had been staying with Haarmann for several days and that the adult had sexually assaulted him several times. 

The police arrested Haarmann and searched his apartment. They found the walls and floors were bloodstained. Haarmann claimed the bloodstains were from animals he had butchered and sold. But the police also found large numbers of clothes and other personal effects. 

The police placed the clothes on display in the police station and the relatives of the missing boys were invited to look at them to see if they could identify them. Many of the clothes were indeed identified as belonging to missing youths. Eventually Haarmann confessed to the murders, although he claimed he couldn’t remember how many boys he had killed. In the end the police were able to identify 27 victims. 

The trial began on 4 December 1924. Haarmann was convicted of 24 murders, he was acquitted of 3 of them. He was sentenced to death. 

His lover Hans Grans was also put on trial. He was also found guilty of being an accomplice and he was sentenced to 12 years in prison.  

Fritz Haarmann was executed by guillotine on 15 April 1925. Haarman’s head was preserved for research. It was finally cremated in 2014. 

Burke and Hare

 Burke and Hare are often called grave robbers. In reality, they did not rob graves. Instead, they murdered people and then sold the victims’ bodies to surgeons for dissection. Today, many people donate their bodies to science but in the early 19th century, attitudes were very different. Most people were horrified by the idea of being cut up after they were dead. As a result, surgeons found it hard to find bodies to dissect in lectures. So some were willing to pay large amounts of money for dead bodies, without asking too many questions. Burke and Hare are believed to have murdered 16 people. 

William Burke was born in Ireland around 1792, and it’s believed he came to Scotland to work as a navvy on the canals. He eventually settled in Edinburgh, where he worked as a cobbler, repairing shoes. It’s not certain when William Hare was born. He was probably from Ireland. At any rate, by 1827, he owned a lodging house in Edinburgh and he had befriended William Burke. 

The murders began in stages. In November 1827, a boarder known as Old Donald died in Hare’s lodging house. He died owing £4 (a considerable sum of money in those days). Hare told Burke and they decided to sell the body to anatomists to recoup the money. They told the authorities that Old Donald was dead. A carpenter made a coffin for him. Burke and Hare filled it with bark (normally used for tanning). They sold the body to a surgeon, Dr Robert Knox, for £7 and 10 shillings (there were 20 shillings in a pound). So they made a handsome profit from his death.

The next step was to murder a man who was ill but still alive. A tenant called Joseph, a miller, fell ill with an infectious disease. That would drive away other tenants from the lodging house. The two men gave Joseph whisky, then suffocated him.

This time, Burke and Hare sold the body for £10. Suffocating him meant there were no marks on the body. When the body was dissected, it would not be obvious that the person had been murdered.

Burke and Hare began regularly killing people and selling the victims’ bodies. It’s not certain in what order they killed the victims, but the third victim was probably a woman named Abigail Simpson. In February 1828, she was lured to the lodging house and given whisky. She was then suffocated. Once again, they sold the body for £10. Over the next months, Burke and Hare continued luring people to the lodging house, giving them whisky, then suffocating them, and then selling the bodies. 

One of the victims was a mentally disabled man, James Wilson. He was called ‘Daft Jamie’. He was well known in Edinburgh. He was often seen begging. The unfortunate man was lured to the lodging house, where he was given whisky and suffocated. They sold the body, as usual, but this time several medical students recognised the dead person. Local people also noticed James was missing. Dr Knox likely suspected the truth because he ordered the immediate dissection of James’ body. Like so many other murderers, Burke and Hare became overconfident and started being careless.

The last victim was an Irishwoman named Margaret Docherty. She was murdered on 31 October 1828. Burke and Hare befriended her. She was invited to stay at the lodging house. Two other lodgers, James and Ann Gray, were told they must move out to make room for her. Margaret Docherty was suffocated in the usual way and her body was hidden under some straw. The Grays returned the next day to collect their belongings. They were left alone in the house and they looked under the straw, discovering the dead body. 

The Grays immediately alerted the authorities but while they were away, Burke and Hare removed the body and took it to be dissected. 

On 3 November, Burke and Hare were arrested. But the authorities were not sure if they could secure convictions.

So Hare was offered immunity from prosecution if he turned King’s evidence, that is if he testified against Burke. On 25 December 1828, William Burke was found guilty of murder and he was sentenced to death. 

He was hanged in public in Edinburgh on 28 January 1829. Burke’s body was publicly dissected, as his victims' bodies were. His skeleton was given to the Anatomical Museum of the Edinburgh Medical School. 

William Hare moved to England. What happened to him after that is not known. No action was taken against the surgeon, Dr Robert Knox.

The dreadful crimes were remembered in a rhyme:

‘Burke's the butcher, Hare's the thief, Knox the boy that buys the beef’

Dr Marcel Petiot

 Dr Marcel Petiot was a French doctor who killed 27 people. Petiot was born on 17 January 1897. Like many murderers Petiot had a history of petty crime before he started killing people. At the age of 17 he robbed a post box. In 1916 he was conscripted into the French army. However Petiot showed many signs of mental illness. In July 1919 he was discharged from the army with a disability pension. 

Despite that he was able to study medicine under an accelerated education programme for war veterans. and he qualified as a doctor in 1921. Petiot practiced medicine in Villeneuve.

Marcel Petiot became mayor of Villeneuve in 1926. In 1927 he married and they had a son the next year. Following many accusations of stealing he was suspended as mayor in 1931. He later resigned and in 1933 he moved to Paris. He purchased a building in Rue Lesueur. 

In 1940 the Germans conquered France. The German army occupied northern France, including Paris. From November 1942 they occupied the whole country. Dr Petiot thought of an ingenious way to make money. Many rich people were desperate to escape from occupied France. Dr Petiot offered to arrange to smuggle them out of France to South America in return for a large sum of money. 

He told them they would need a vaccination against malaria or some other infectious disease. He told them that, as a doctor he could give them the vaccination himself.

When the victim arrived at his surgery Petiot told them he would give them the required vaccination. Instead he injected them with cyanide. When the victim was dead Petiot would dispose of the body with quicklime or he burned them in a stove. 

Dr Petiot killed people during 1942 and the early months of 1943. In May 1943 Petiot was arrested by the Gestapo and held on suspicion of helping people to escape from France. However he was released in December 1943. Why they released him is not certain but Dr Petiot soon returned to killing people. 

Hic crimes came to light On 11 March 1944. Black smoke was pouring from a chimney of a house in Rue Lesuer. A neighbour called the police. The police phoned Dr Petiot who promised to come to the building. Thinking a chimney must be on fire the police called the fire brigade. Firemen who entered the building discovered human remains burning in a stove. When Dr Petiot arrived he informed the police that the dead bodies were those of traitors. The police allowed him to go. Petiot promptly disappeared. 

Dr Petiot was arrested on 31 October 1944. He claimed he was a member of the resistance and that all the people he killed were collaborators. 

However the police could find no evidence that he had ever been part of the resistance. Dr Petiot went on trial on 19 March 1946. On 4 April he was convicted of 26 murders. 

(He was acquitted of one of the murders he was charged with though it is very likely he was guilty). Marcel Petiot was guillotined on 26 May 1946. 

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