How a dry cleaning receipt caught a 1940s serial killer | UK News

‘Like any good con man, Haigh punched above his weight. He wore suits from Savile Row, jewelry from Hatton Gardens and frequented the most expensive hotel bars in Mayfair. He was a good actor and convinced people he was something special,’ Joel tells Metro.

But Haigh’s charm was a mask, he had money on his mind. In the post-war years, even the most wealthy individuals in London had seen their fortunes knocked. When the confident Haigh sidled up to them and spoke of investment opportunities, they jumped at the chance to get involved. 

Haigh lured his victims to his Crawley workshop or to his home, where he had a basement, to talk ‘business.’ Then, when they were bent over papers or documents, he would shoot them in the back of the head. 

Next, the depraved killer would don protective gear and drop their corpses in a vat of bubbling sulphuric acid. Their bodies became ‘liquid sludge’, which Haigh would pour onto the ground outside his workshop. 

He would sell any belongings they’d left behind and forge documents which would give him immediate ownership of their assets.

For Joel, Haigh simply ‘worked with what he had’ to woo his wealthy victims. 

‘He wasn’t the sharpest tool in the box by any stretch,’ he adds. ‘But he was very confident. Some people have remarkable talents, remarkable intellects, remarkable ambition or drive. He didn’t have any of those things really. He certainly wasn’t a master criminal. But what he did have was charm and patience.’

Theme park owner William Swann became Haigh’s first target and was murdered on September 9, 1944. After stealing his belongings, the murderer befriended the businessman’s parents – Donald and Amy. Less than a year later, on July 2, 1945, the couple were lured to Haigh’s workshop and suffered the same fate as their son. 

Haigh sold the Swann’s vast network of properties and belongings to make (in today’s money) around a quarter of a million pounds. Emboldened, he continued his killing spree.

Archibald Henderson, a rich doctor, was lured to Haigh’s workshop on February 23, 1948 and shot in the head. So the alarm wouldn’t be raised about the missing medical professional, Henderson’s wife Rosalie was then invited over – under the pretence her husband had fallen ill – and killed there the same day. Haigh sold the Henderson’s possessions but kept their pet dog for himself.

A year later, on February 18, 1949, Haigh then turned his attention to Olive Durand-Deacon, the wealthy widow of a war hero and solicitor John Durand-Deacon. The 69-year-old former Suffragette was a millionaire by today’s standards and lived full time at the Onslow Court Hotel in Kensington.

Olive had dreams of creating her own company which would sell false nails. When she met Haigh, who by this point claimed to be an inventor, he invited her to his Crawley workshop to look at ‘blueprints’. There, she met an untimely end. Haigh pocketed her jewellery and got her Persian lamb fur coat dry-cleaned in anticipation of selling it.

By dissolving his victims in acid, Haigh thought he had committed the perfect crime. There was no trace of their bodies to be found and no evidence which could prove he was a murderer. Or, so he thought…

18 human bones in the dirt

Once the alarm was raised about Olive Durand-Deacon’s disappearance, a cocky Haigh offered to help the search. He soon attracted suspicions of the police and Scotland Yard detectives decided to run a background check and visit his workshop. 

They discovered forged papers with the names of Haigh’s previous victims, an apron stained with acid and an old service revolver. But the most telling clue was a dry cleaning ticket for Durand-Deacon’s fur coat which proved she had been there. During excavations of the yard outside Haigh’s workshop, police pathologist Dr Keith Simpson discovered the missing widow’s gallstones and dentures, as well as the fragments of 18 human bones in the dirt. 

In a five-hour confession with police, Haigh claimed vampire-like urges to drink his victim’s blood had led to the killings.

The serial killer also told police about a dream he’d had where blood had ‘oozed’ from trees in a forest. Haigh, 40 by this point, explained: ‘A man went from each tree catching the blood … When the cup was full, he approached me. “Drink,” he said, but I was unable to move.’