John George Haigh also known as "The Vampire Killer", born on 24 July 1909, who is also refered to as the Acid Bath Murderer, was an English serial killer in the 1940s. He's famous for battering his victims to death or shooting them before proceeding to drink some of their blood and to make the crime undetected he dispose of the bodies of his victim in acid and watch the body dissolved, before forging papers to be able to sell the victims possessions and collect substantial sums of money.


His Victims:

After Haigh was freed from jail in 1943 for fraud, he met his former employer Donald McSwan, who became his first victim at a pub. McSwan introduced Haigh to his parents, Donald snr and Amy, who mentioned that they had invested in property. On 6 September 1944, McSwan disappeared. Haigh later admitted hitting him over the head after luring him into a basement which he use as a workshop. He then put McSwan's body into a 40-gallon drum and tipped concentrated sulphuric acid on to it. Two days later he returned to find the body had become sludge, which he poured down a manhole.

He told McSwan's parents, Donald snr and Amy, that their son had gone into hiding to avoid being called up for military service. Haigh then took over McSwan's house and when Donald and Amy became curious as to why their son had not returned as the war was coming to an end, he murdered them too – on 2 July 1945, he lured them to the same basement where he killed Donald and disposed of them.

Haigh stole McSwan's pension cheques, sold their properties – stealing about £8,000 – and moved into the Onslow Court Hotel in Kensington. By the summer of 1947, Haigh, a gambler, was running short of money. To solve his financial troubles, he found another young couple to kill and rob: Dr Archibald Henderson and his wife, Rose, whom he murdered after feigning interest in a house they were selling.

He rented a small workshop at 2 Leopold Road, Crawley, Sussex, and moved acid and drums there from Gloucester Road. Haigh was also known to have stayed at Crawley's George Hotel on several occasions. On 12 February 1948, he drove Henderson to Crawley, on the pretext of showing him an invention. When they arrived Haigh shot Henderson in the head with a revolver he had earlier stolen from the doctor’s house. He then lured Mrs Henderson to the workshop, claiming her husband had fallen ill, and shot her also.

After disposing of the Hendersons' bodies in oil drums filled with acid, he forged a letter from them and sold all of their possessions for £8,000 (except their dog and motor car, which he kept).

Haigh Last Victim:

Haigh's next and last victim was Olive Durand-Deacon, 69, the wealthy widow of solicitor John Durand-Deacon and a fellow resident at the Onslow Court Hotel. She mentioned to Haigh, by then calling himself an engineer, an idea that she had for artificial fingernails. He invited her down to the Leopold Road workshop on 18 February 1949, and once inside he shot her in the back of the neck with a .38 calibre Webley revolver, stripped her of her valuables, including a Persian lamb coat, and put her into the acid bath. Two days later Durand-Deacon’s friend, Constance Lane, reported her missing.

Detectives soon discovered Haigh’s record of theft and fraud and searched the workshop. Police not only found Haigh’s attaché case containing a dry cleaner’s receipt for Mrs. Durand-Deacon’s coat, but also papers referring to the Hendersons and McSwans. Further investigation of the sludge at the workshop by the pathologist Keith Simpson revealed three human gallstones and part of a denture which was later identified by Mrs Durand-Deacon's dentist during the trial and conviction.

Questioned by Detective Inspector Albert Webb, Haigh asked him "Tell me, frankly, what are the chances of anybody being released from Broadmoor?" (a high security psychiatric hospital). The inspector said he could not discuss that sort of thing, so Haigh replied "Well, if I told you the truth, you would not believe me. It sounds too fantastic to believe."

Haigh then confessed that he had killed not only Durand-Deacon, the McSwans and Hendersons, but also three other people: a young man called Max, a girl from Eastbourne and a woman from Hammersmith. These claims could not be substantiated.

Read more at http://www.duketundesblog.com/2016/06/see-how-acid-bath-murderer-killed-6.html#SWRa9JJCVc00gzMT.99