In April 1876, Charles Bravo, a young London barrister, died in agony at his Balham home after ingesting a lethal dose of antimony. His death shocked Victorian society and set in motion one of the most baffling and sensational investigations of the 19th century. Despite two lengthy inquests, the question of who poisoned Charles Bravo […]
Agatha Christie and the unsolved murder of Charles Bravo
Which unsolved murder fascinated Agatha Christie so much that she decided to investigate it herself? Angela Buckley writes about the 1876 poisoning of Charles Bravo, also known as the Balham Mystery, still unsolved after 150 years. In Agatha Christie’s Ordeal by Innocence, while Dr MacMaster is trying to prove the wrongful conviction of Jack Argyle […]
Beatrice Cenci: innocent victim, cunning killer – or both?
Beatrice Cenci is elusive. Even ‘her’ portrait isn’t a painting of her. Executed for murdering her abusive father, was she an innocent victim or a cunning killer? Both, says Elizabeth Fremantle, whose novel, Sinners, is a powerful reinterpretation of her story. But above all, she says, Beatrice was human. Elizabeth won the 2024 HWA Gold […]
Love and Other Poisons by Lesley McDowell
1857, Glasgow. A young socialite named Madeleine Smith stands accused of murdering her lover. Thousands wait outside the court to hear the result. The scandalous nature of the affair, detailed explicitly in letters published in newspapers across the world, has made her case a worldwide sensation. But when the jury find themselves unable to decide […]
The Scot who was the Caribbean’s first serial killer
PD Lennon was intrigued to learn that there was a place in Jamaica called Edinburgh Castle. But she couldn’t have guessed the person who built it was an 18th-century Scot who’s remembered as the Caribbean’s first serial killer. She tells Historia about her research and how she blended fact and fiction for her new novel, […]
Murder in Anglo-Saxon England: Justice, Wergild, Revenge by Annie Whitehead
Historian and author Annie Whitehead has collated around 100 cases in Anglo-Saxon England, from regicides to robberies gone wrong, and from personal feuds to state-sanctioned slaughter, examining their veracity and asking what, if anything, they can tell us about the motives of those who recorded them and about Anglo-Saxon governance and society. The records contain […]
Murder and the law in Anglo-Saxon England
Annie Whitehead, author of Murder in Anglo-Saxon England, describes how she went about researching her new book. Were there laws that dealt with murder, justice and compensation? She also looks at some of the more surprising cases she found. I found enough murder stories to fill a book, and made a few accusations of my […]
Historical books to look out for in 2025
Welcome to Historia’s most popular regular feature, our round-up of historical books published by members of the Historical Writers’ Association (HWA) to look out for during the coming year. In 2025, there are over 130 books covering history, biography, and historical fiction and spanning eras from Ancient Greece to the 1980s. And there will be […]