When we think of serial killers we think of psychopaths who kill for pleasure, the kind of people who get a twisted thrill from taking a life. But some of the most terrifying serial killers from history are those who killed purely for profit.
It is believed Amelia Dyer, a Victorian nurse, killed hundreds of babies over 30 years. Why would she do something so heinous? Simple. To turn a quick buck.
Who Was Amelia Dyer?
Amelia Dyer was born in 1837 in the small village of Pyle Marsh near Bristol in the UK. She came from a respectable family, her father was a master shoemaker, and learned to read and write from an early age. This was not to say her youth was unmarred by tragedy.
Her mother was mentally ill (a result of typhus) and would often experience violent fits. Amelia was forced to care for her sick mother until she died in 1848. During this time Amelia also lost two younger sisters to illness.
After her father died in 1849 what was left of Amelia’s family fell apart. She chose to move to Bristol where met her future husband, George Thomas. Not long after meeting George, she began training as a nurse.
It was during her time as a nurse that she fell into contact with an unscrupulous midwife by the name of Ellen Dane. Dane introduced Amelia to the concept of baby farming. Amelia soon abandoned nursing and adopted the much more lucrative position of baby farmer.
A Quick Lesson on Baby Farming
Life in Britain as an unwed mother at that time was startlingly bleak. Single parenthood was highly frowned upon. This made it difficult for single mothers to find honest work and most workhouses wouldn’t take single mothers in due to their perceived “immorality”.
Single mothers faced a tough life of struggling to care for their children while also earning enough to survive. Very often there were only two options: prostitution (which came with many dangers including falling pregnant again) or getting rid of the child.
Sadly, fostering and adoption services in Victorian England saw barely any government oversight. This led to the rise of “baby farmers”. A baby farmer would approach an unhappy mother and offer to take the baby off of her hands.
They would take a fee from the mother and promise her the child would live a happy life. In reality, the children often faced a much worse future than if they had stayed with their starving mothers. Baby farming was only profitable if the farmers themselves had a way to get rid of the children. This was something at which Amelia Dyer proved to be all too adept.
Murders
As a baby farmer, Dyer would approach single mothers and advertise that she would nurse and adopt a baby in exchange for a large one-off payment. The fee ranged from around £10 (£1000 in today’s money) to around £80 (for wealthy families looking to get rid of embarrassing bastards).
She made sure that they believed she was respectable (having worked as a nurse) and married. Her “clients” had no way of knowing the terrible fates she had in store for the children.
It appears that at first Amelia stuck to her word. She may not have been very caring but she did set not out with a plan to kill babies. Unfortunately, at some point, it seems that Amelia realized that baby farming was much more profitable if she simply let the children die. Not feeding the children cut down on her outgoings considerably. She began allowing the children to die through general neglect and starvation.
When she began outright killing them is up for debate. Some experts believe she began strangling the children not long after becoming a baby farmer. Others believe she did not begin this practice until she had spent some time in prison.
In 1879 Dyer was caught for the first time. A doctor became suspicious of the sheer amount of child deaths Amelia had asked him to come and certify. He reported her to the authorities.
The idea that a woman was capable of mass child murder was so alien to the Victorian courts that Dyer got off lightly. She was only convicted of gross neglect and got off with a six-month sentence to a hard labor camp. Supposedly this experience almost broke her mentally. When she left the prison she was even more deranged than when she had entered.
Upon leaving prison Dyer tried to go back to nursing. This didn’t last long. It is believed by this point Dyer was abusing both alcohol and opium and could not hold down a normal job. She got herself into trouble with the law several times, each time ending up in an asylum.
It is believed Dyer may have been feigning insanity. She had learned all about madness from her mother and her time spent as an asylum nurse meant she knew how to make the best out of a stay in an asylum.
Eventually, Dyer went back to baby farming. This time she began killing babies as soon as they fell into her clutches to maximize profits. Aware that seeking death certificates could get her caught, she simply began throwing the corpses into rivers.
The sheer number of missing children and the precarious disposal method Dyer used began to catch the attention of the police. For years Dyer and her family dodged the police by repeatedly moving between various towns and cities. When things got too hot, Dyer would simply spend a spell in an asylum until things cooled down.
Discovery, Trial, and Execution
Dyer’s luck ran out on 30th March 1896 when a bargeman fished a package from the river Thames in Reading. Dyer had badly weighted the package and it had floated to the surface. Inside the grisly package was the body of a baby girl, Helena Fry.
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The package made its way to Detective Constable Anderson. On the package he found a label from Temple Meads station and on the wrapping paper he found a single name and address: that of a Mrs. Thomas.
Thomas was Dyer’s newest married name. Rivers were dredged and more babies were found. Police were soon at work gathering as many witnesses as they could and began to put the pieces together. When they had enough evidence against Dyer they organized a sting using a decoy single mother. It worked.
They also managed to tie Dyer to the death and disappearance of Doris Marmon. Marmon was a barmaid that had approached Dyer for help regarding an unwanted baby. When the two had disagreed over price, Dyer killed Marmon.
For a time Dyer’s murder of Marmon made her a popular suspect for the crimes of Jack the Ripper but there is next to no evidence to support this. Dyer had her own modus operandi and it wasn’t killing prostitutes.
On 22nd May 1896 Dyer appeared before the Old Bailey and pleaded guilty to the murder of Doris Marmon. Dyer tried to enter a plea of insanity but the Judge was having none of it. By this point, Dyer’s history of faking mental illnesses was well known.
It took only four and a half minutes for a jury of her peers to find Dyer guilty. She was hanged on 10th June 1896. In the preceding weeks, she had filled out five exercise books with her confession.
The Forgotten Killer
Despite being one of the most prolific serial killers in history Dyer is largely forgotten today. Everyone knows the name Jack the Ripper, but Dyer got no such catchy moniker.
It has been argued that this is because her crimes were so awful. The people of Victorian England simply could not comprehend that a woman (who societally speaking was supposed to care for children) could do such awful things. It challenged everything they thought they knew about the differences between the sexes.
Today we know the truth. Men and women are both equally capable of great good and great evil. But still, it is hard to fully believe the depths to which Amelia Dyer sunk, all in the name of easy money.
Top Image: Amelia Dyer, entering Wells Asylum in 1893. Source: Wells Asylum / Public Domain.
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