Early Life and Criminal Beginnings
John George Haigh possessed a great deal of natural charm and passed himself off as an engineer. He served three prison sentences for theft and fraud and, whilst in prison, hit upon a new scheme to “get rich quick.” He would kill his victims and then dissolve their bodies in acid, mistakenly believing he could not be charged with murder if there was no body.
The Murders and Disposal Methods
He battered or shot three men and three women to death between 1944 and 1949, all for financial gain, disposing of the bodies by dissolving them in sulphuric acid, which quickly reduced them to a liquid sludge that he could pour down the drain.
His victims were William Donald McSwan and later his parents, William and Amy McSwan. They were followed by Dr. Archibald Henderson and his wife, Rosalie, and finally by Mrs. Olive Durand-Deacon, for whose murder he would hang.
The McSwan Murders
William Donald McSwan had employed Haigh as a repairman at his amusement arcades. After release from his third prison sentence, Haigh met William and invited him to meet up in a basement at 79 Gloucester Road in London on Saturday, the 9th of September 1944, where Haigh said he was making pinball machines.
Here William was beaten to death, his body dissolved, and the remains simply poured away. Unfortunately for William’s parents, their son had told Haigh they were quite wealthy. Haigh forged letters purportedly from William to his parents, saying he had gone into hiding to avoid being called up for military service.
They too were separately lured to the basement in Gloucester Road, where they shared their son’s fate. Haigh lived off their £4,000 estate for the next two years.
The Henderson Murders
Haigh’s next victims were Dr. Archibald Henderson, age 52, and his wife, Rosalie, age 41. They were a wealthy couple who had advertised flats for sale in a large house they had converted into apartments in Dawes Road, Fulham. Haigh even made an offer on the flats.
They told him they were going to Brighton for a few days’ holiday, and Haigh followed them there, staying in the same hotel. He persuaded the Hendersons to view his factory in Leopold Road, Crawley, Sussex. Here, on the 16th of February 1948, they were shot, and their bodies placed in acid.
Haigh then turned to forgery to gain control of the Hendersons’ estate and managed to obtain some £8,000 from it.
The Murder of Mrs. Olive Durand-Deacon
The final victim was 69-year-old Mrs. Olive Durand-Deacon, who, like Haigh, lived at the Onslow Court Hotel in South Kensington, London. He got her interested in the factory in Leopold Road, which he told her was going to start making cosmetics.
He persuaded her to go with him on the 18th of February 1949 to look at the factory, which was little more than a storeroom. When he got her there, he shot her in the neck. He had previously equipped the building with a carboy of acid, a 40-gallon drum, and rubber gloves and apron.
He took Mrs. Durand-Deacon’s jewellery and other valuables, including her fur coat, which he had cleaned to remove the bloodstains prior to sale, and put her body into the acid to dissolve.
One of the other residents at the Onslow Court, a friend of Mrs. Durand-Deacon, was greatly concerned by her disappearance and asked Haigh to go with her to Chelsea police station to report her missing. The police became suspicious of Haigh and obtained a search warrant for his factory, where they discovered a .38 calibre Webley revolver that had belonged to Dr. Henderson, the acid drum, and some human remains.
These included bone fragments, Mrs. Durand-Deacon’s false teeth, and her gallstone. These were examined by the Home Office Pathologist, Dr. Keith Simpson, who was able to make a positive identification of the victim.
Arrest and Confession
When the police arrested Haigh on the 26th of February 1949 and put this evidence to him, he told them, “Mrs. Durand-Deacon no longer exists. I have destroyed her with acid. You can’t prove a murder without a body.”
He went on to admit to eight other killings, of which only five could be substantiated.
Trial and Execution
Haigh was tried at Lewes Assizes before Mr. Justice Humphreys on the 18th and 19th of July 1949. He put forward a defence of insanity and claimed that he was also a vampire who had drunk a glass of blood from each of his victims. This made sensational headlines in the newspapers.
However, the jury was less impressed and took just 17 minutes to find him guilty.
There was no appeal, and 39-year-old Haigh was hanged at Wandsworth Prison by Albert Pierrepoint, assisted by Harry Kirk, on Wednesday, the 10th of August 1949. Pierrepoint considered Haigh a special case and used his calf-leather wrist strap to pinion his wrists before giving him a drop of 7’ 4” for his 150 lb body weight. This resulted in a fracture/dislocation of the 2nd and 3rd cervical vertebrae and “complete laceration of (spinal) cord,” to quote from the LPC4 form.
Aftermath
A very large number of people were outside the main gate of Wandsworth that morning to see the execution notices posted.
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