Amelia Dyer, Angel Maker


Book Description

"Amelia Dyer: Angel Maker tells the true story of a "kind", "homely" and "motherly" nurse who made a living by strangling unwanted babies to death. Born into a respectable working-class family, Amelia joined a nationwide network of women who pursued an "occupation which shuns the light". Amelia became adept at her trade, sidestepping the authorities for almost three decades and even initiating her own daughter into her nefarious profession." "Using hospital, prison and police archives, census records, contemporary newspaper reports and Dyer's own correspondence, authors Alison Rattle and Allison Vale reconstruct her life. Here, for the first time, is the full story of this ordinary woman who became a monster."--BOOK JACKET.




Amelia Dyer and the Baby Farm Murders


Book Description

On 30 March 1896, a bargeman hooked a parcel from the river Thames at Caversham. Inside the brown paper package was the body of a baby girl - she had been strangled with tape. When two more tiny bodies were found in a carpet bag, the police launched a nationwide hunt for a serial killer. A faint name and address on the sodden wrapping provided Reading police with their first clue. Can Chief Constable George Tewsley and his colleagues catch this heartless baby farmer before more infants meet a similar fate? The first in a new historical true crime series, Victorian Supersleuth Investigates, Angela Buckley recounts the frantic race to stop Amelia Dyer - one of Britain's most prolific murderers.




Five Little Fiends


Book Description

Five little fiends, who each live in a statue and come out every day to enjoy the world around them, one day steal pieces of the world to admire, but give them back when they realize its beauty comes from being connected.




The Ogress of Reading


Book Description

The body of a baby found in a river, a young woman's sadness at giving up her child, one policeman's efforts to bring a killer to justice... Everyone has heard of Jack the Ripper who killed five women. Amelia Dyer, the Ogress of Reading, confessed to taking more than three hundred lives. She was a baby farmer and murderer in a society where unmarried women were shamed by pregnancy and the lives of their babies were not valued. The Ogress of Reading uses a mixture of fiction and fact to explore her crimes and the lives of those affected by them. The cover picture is "Bleeding Heart" by Joanna Bloor.




Massacre of the Innocents


Book Description

Before contraception was generally available, and when abortion was fraught with danger, infanticide was a common solution to the problem of unwanted children. Massacre of the Innocents, first published in 1986, shows the causes and consequences of the high tide of infanticide in Victorian Britain. Lionel Rose describes the ways in which unwanted and ‘surplus’ infants were disposed of, and the economic and social pressures on women to rid themselves of their burdens by covert criminal and sub-criminal means. He discusses the activities of infanticidal and abortionist midwives, and shows how the practices of wet nursing and baby farming were closely related to infanticide. Unscrupulous insurance salesman even turned infanticide into a profitable business, in their reckless grab for commissions. Infanticide declined with the growing practice of contraception, the lessening of pressure of unmarried mothers, and as adoption was made easier. This is a hard-hitting, scrupulously documented piece of social history. This title will be of interest to students of history and criminology.




Close Your Pretty Eyes


Book Description

This is Olivia's sixteenth home. It's her last chance for a family. But someone is determined to make sure she ruins everything ...




A Visitor's Guide to Victorian England


Book Description

An “utterly brilliant” and deeply researched guide to the sights, smells, endless wonders, and profound changes of nineteenth century British history (Books Monthly, UK). Step into the past and experience the world of Victorian England, from clothing to cuisine, toilet arrangements to transport—and everything in between. A Visitor’s Guide to Victorian England is “a brilliant guided tour of Charles Dickens’s and other eminent Victorian Englishmen’s England, with insights into where and where not to go, what type of people you’re likely to meet, and what sights and sounds to watch out for . . . Utterly brilliant!” (Books Monthly, UK). Like going back in time, Higgs’s book shows armchair travelers how to find the best seat on an omnibus, fasten a corset, deal with unwanted insects and vermin, get in and out of a vehicle while wearing a crinoline, and avoid catching an infectious disease. Drawing on a wide range of sources, this book blends accurate historical details with compelling stories to bring alive the fascinating details of Victorian daily life. It is a must-read for seasoned social history fans, costume drama lovers, history students, and anyone with an interest in the nineteenth century.




The Angel in the House


Book Description




The Ore Knob Mine Murders


Book Description

How could the peace and quiet of Ashe County, North Carolina (in the mountains, at the Virginia-Tennessee corner), turn into a nightmare of crime and drugs, and the old copper mine itself become a dumping ground for the dead? In 1982, two bodies had been chipped from an icy grave and brought up from the 250-foot mine shaft where they had been thrown while still alive. Now, there were rumors of 21 bodies still down there. If the mine was ever re-opened, what would they find--copper or bodies? Murder, drugs, prostitution and gangs come together in the history of the Ore Knob Mine. A small Appalachian community became the heart of a vicious drug ring ruled by the Outlaws motorcycle gang from Chicago. Ashe County made national headlines when a police informant came forward confessing that he had pushed a man alive into the Ore Knob Mine shaft. This book is the full story.




Families of Early Hartford, Connecticut


Book Description

This book contains the genealogical records of over 950 families of early Hartford, Connecticut. The records that were used were mainly church records, sexton's records, and probate records and are arranged alphabetically by family name.--From Preface.




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