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BBC Radio 4

Lucy Worsley investigates the crimes of Victorian women from a contemporary, feminist perspective.

Lady Killers with Lucy Worsley

Coming soon. Lucy Worsley and team return for a second series focusing on conwomen, thieves, hoaxers and swindlers.

Coming soon: Lady Swindlers Series 2

Lucy Worsley is back with a brand new series of Lady Swindlers, where true crime meets history - with a twist. Lucy and her team of all female detectives travel back more than a hundred years to revisit the audacious and surprising crimes of swindlers, hustlers and women on the make. Women trying to make it in a world made for men. 

In this first episode, Lucy is investigating the life of Mary Bateman who is living in Leeds in the first decade of the 19th century - a time when, despite huge leaps forward in science, many people still believe in the power of the supernatural. Mary is working as a ‘wise woman’ selling magic charms and potions, and showing off her prophetic chicken. But, as Lucy discovers, there’s a very dark side to Mary’s business too. 

With Lucy to explore Mary Bateman’s story is the writer and broadcaster Deborah Hyde, known to millions as one of the sceptical voices on the hit BBC podcast about the supernatural, Uncanny. 

Lucy is also joined by historian Rosalind Crone, Professor of History at the Open University. Lucy and Ros visit the part of Leeds where Mary lived and worked among a rapidly expanding population, and York Castle Prison where Mary’s story ends. 

Lucy wants to know if Mary Bateman believe she has special powers to heal and defeat the powers of evil - or if she's just a ruthless swindler. And what can Mary’s story tell us about women and belief in the supernatural today?

Producer: Jane Greenwood
Readers: Clare Corbett and Jonathan Keeble 
Sound design: Chris Maclean
Executive producer: Kirsty Hunter 

A StoryHunter production for BBC Radio 4.

41. Mary Bateman - Yorkshire Witch

Lucy Worsley continues her new series of Lady Swindlers, where true crime meets history, with a twist. Lucy and her team of all female detectives travel back more than a hundred years to tail scammers, crooks, conwomen and convicts. Women from all walks of life, who find themselves on the wrong side of the law.

In this episode, Lucy is investigating Annie Gordon Baillie, a serial swindler who has over 40 aliases. She cons everyone from the milkman to government ministers.

She specialises in petty swindling but also concocts an elaborate scheme to help the crofting community on the Isle of Skye in Scotland. She promises to fund their cause, give them a voice and provide them with their own land, while pocketing any donations.
With Lucy to explore Annie Gordon Baillie’s story is author Denise Mina, who writes historical fiction, crime fiction, and graphic novels.
Lucy is also joined by historian Rosalind Crone, Professor of History at the Open University and Archivist Catherine MacPhee. Catherine paints a picture of what life was like for the crofters of Skye. Lucy and Ros visit Old Scotland Yard to find out more about a tenacious detective, Henry Marshall, who finally brings Annie to justice.

Lucy asks how did a poor, illiterate woman pass herself off as aristocracy and get away with swindling for so long? And shows that Annie’s charitable fundraising has a very dark side.

Producer: Julia Hayball
Readers: Clare Corbett, Jonathan Keeble and Alex Phelps
Sound design: Chris Maclean
Executive producer: Kirsty Hunter

A StoryHunter production for BBC Radio 4.

42. Annie Gordon Baillie - Serial Swindler

Lucy Worsley is back with a brand new series of Lady Swindlers, where true crime meets history - with a twist. Lucy and her team of all female detectives travel back more than a hundred years to revisit the audacious and surprising crimes of swindlers, hustlers and women on the make. Women trying to make it in a world made for men.

In this episode Lucy is exploring the life of Catharine Murphy, a single mother of three children who has a small business making counterfeit coins on her kitchen table in 1780s London. But counterfeiting money is treated by the law as treason, and for women at this time the punishment for treason is death by burning at the stake.

With Lucy to explore Catharine Murphy’s story is the broadcaster, novelist and co-host of The Rest is Money podcast Steph McGovern, who shares with Lucy her insights into the relationship women have with money and risk today.

Lucy is also joined by historian Rosalind Crone, Professor of History at the Open University. Lucy and Ros visit the former Royal Mint inside the walls of the Tower of London to look at counterfeit coins, and the site of Newgate Prison, where women condemned to death for treason suffered horrific executions.

Lucy wants to know: what made women coiners like Catharine risk an agonising death? To what extent was currency fraud a female crime then, and how much is it a female crime today? And should women with children be treated differently to other offenders by the justice system?

Producer: Jane Greenwood
Readers: Clare Corbett and Jonathan Keeble
Singer: Olivia Bloore
Sound design: Chris Maclean
Executive producer: Kirsty Hunter

A StoryHunter production for BBC Radio 4.

A StoryHunter production for BBC Radio 4

43. Catharine Murphy - Money Maker

Lucy Worsley is back with a brand new series of Lady Swindlers, where true crime meets history - with a twist. Lucy and her team of all female detectives travel back more than a hundred years to revisit the audacious and surprising crimes of swindlers, hustlers and women on the make. Women trying to make it in a world made for men. 

In this episode Lucy is investigating the bobbed hair and flapper dresses of New York’s Jazz Age, on the heels of a 20 year old bandit, Celia Cooney. She and her husband Ed hold up local grocery stores and pharmacies in the hope of achieving a better life for their unborn child. But, as Lucy discovers, the papers quickly latch on to two key details - Celia’s stylish bobbed hair, and the fact she is a woman with a gun. 

With Lucy to explore Celia Cooney’s story is the Emmy Award winning journalist and CBS news correspondent Erin Moriarty, who gives us an insight into why the press were so enthralled by Celia, and can tell us how Celia’s New York compares to the city today. 

Lucy is also joined by historian, author and Pulitzer Prize winner Debby Applegate, who explains more about the Jazz Age - there was a dark side lurking alongside the flappers and parties. 

And in a Lady Swindlers first, Lucy speaks to Kat Palmiotti, the granddaughter of Celia Cooney, to find out how her family discovered her grandmother’s biggest secret. 

Lucy wants to know: what makes a woman like Celia Cooney, with a steady job and a baby on the way, turn to crime? And how much was the mania that surrounded her fuelled by the fact she was a woman, and one with a stylish hairstyle?

Producer: Hannah Fisher
Readers: Laurel Lefkow and Jonathan Keeble
Historical consultant: Rosalind Crone
Sound design: Chris Maclean
Executive producer: Kirsty Hunter 

A StoryHunter production for BBC Radio 4.

44. Celia Cooney - Bobbed Haired Bandit

Join Lucy Worsley and a team of female detectives as they investigate the crimes of Victorian women from a contemporary, feminist perspective. If you like what you hear, the whole series will be available to listen to from the 25th of July wherever you listen to podcasts. Or you can hear it right now in the UK – before anywhere else – first on BBC Sounds.

Welcome to Lady Killers with Lucy Worsley

Lucy Worsley investigates the crimes of Victorian women from a contemporary, feminist perspective. 

In the first case in the series, Lucy explores the story of Florence Bravo, the woman at the heart of one of the most sensational unsolved murder cases of the Victorian era, and asks whether she was a ruthless poisoner or an abused wife.

Lucy visits The Priory, Florence Bravo’s grand house in Balham where, on 21st April 1876, after three days of agony, her young husband Charles died of poisoning. They had been married for only five months but the relationship was already under strain - Charles was jealous of the much older doctor Florence had been involved with before their marriage, he was frustrated that he had only limited control of her large fortune, both of them were drinking heavily, and Florence had suffered two miscarriages in close succession. 

Lucy meets historian Rosalind Crone at the nearby pub where an inquest was held into Charles Bravo’s death. This case became known as The Balham Mystery and was a Victorian media sensation, with pages of coverage every day in the respectable broadsheets, tabloids and penny dreadfuls. An intimidating, all-male environment, Lucy and Rosalind discover how the inquest into Florence’s husband’s death degenerated into an inquiry into her sexual morality, and they wonder what Victorian women made of Florence’s story. And we hear Florence’s own words as she tried to defend herself at the inquest into her husband’s death. 

To gain a contemporary perspective on the Florence Bravo case, Lucy talks to the leading barrister Sasha Wass QC, who has worked on many high-profile cases including those of Rosemary West, Johnny Depp and Rolf Harris. Lucy wants to know why Florence’s accusations about her husband’s cruelty were ignored by the inquest. Would Florence have been treated differently had there been women in the police force, in her legal team, on the jury and in the press? Why do women in criminal investigations continue to undergo ‘trial by media’?

And, crucially, in a case that has never been solved, did she do it?

If you like what you hear, the whole series will be available to listen to from the 25th of July wherever you listen to podcasts. Or you can hear it right now in the UK – before anywhere else – first on BBC Sounds.

Producer: Jane Greenwood
Readers: Clare Corbett and Jonathan Keeble
Sound Design: Chris Maclean

A StoryHunter production for BBC Radio 4

1. Florence Bravo

Lucy Worsley investigates the crimes of Victorian women from a contemporary, feminist perspective. 

In this episode, Lucy explores the case of a young lady called Madeleine Smith. Part of high society in Glasgow in the 1850s, she was living the ideal life, attending balls and concerts, promenading around the shopping districts and spending her summers at her family’s large country home. 

But she was hiding a shameful secret - a clandestine love affair with a man ten years her senior and well below her station. His name was Pierre Emile L’Angelier, a warehouse clerk from Jersey. They met, wrote letters to each other regularly, and soon their relationship turned intimate. But when he found out she was soon to be married to a suitable match arranged by her parents, things turned sour. 

While Madeleine was burning the letters she received from Pierre Emile, he kept hers and threatened to send them to her father to expose their relationship. In a panic, Madeleine begged to meet so he could return her letters. 

On the evening of 22nd March 1857, Pierre Emile left his lodgings, allegedly to visit Madeleine. When he returned home, he became ill and died of arsenic poisoning. Police traced Madeleine through an entry in his diary, and she was arrested. She was put on trial for his murder and her letters, intended only for the eyes of her lover, were read out for all to hear. 

Presenter Lucy Worsley is joined by award-winning crime writer Denise Mina to piece together this curious case. Was Madeleine a manipulative young woman who wanted a bit of fanciful fun before marriage? Or was she naïve and innocent, swept off her feet by a controlling older man? And was she guilty? Or was the outcome of her trial determined by her class, gender and societal expectations of women?

Together with historian Rosalind Crone from the Open University, they visit the alleged scene of the crime to investigate if Madeleine could have possibly poisoned Pierre Emile L’Angelier that fateful evening in 1857. Lucy and Rosalind also visit some of Madeleine’s real letters at the Mitchell Library in Glasgow learning that, perhaps, a younger upper middle class Victorian lady may not have been as prim and proper as history would have us believe.

Producer: Hannah Fisher
Readers: Clare Corbett and Jonathan Keeble
Sound Design: Chris Maclean

A StoryHunter production for BBC Radio 4

2. Madeleine Smith

On a hot August day in 1892, a wealthy Massachusetts couple, Andrew and Abby Borden, were hacked to death during broad daylight in their home in the small industrial city of Fall River. 

Lizzie Borden, Andrew’s daughter from his first marriage, was arrested for double homicide. The trial gripped the nation – especially Victorian women who pack the courtroom to watch proceedings, in what one reporter described as a sea of calico and lace – referring to the female interest that bridges social divides. 

But what does a wealthy white woman accused of murder reveal about the growing immigrant population, swirling politics and dark underbelly of Fall River, New England and beyond? Was the trial as much a battle for what kind of America would dominate in an age of deep-seated tensions? Could a woman of such standing be allowed to be seen as culpable of such a crime? Why, despite an avalanche of circumstantial evidence pointing to Lizzie as the culprit, was she acquitted, only to be judged forever after as guilty by the court of public opinion and in the realms of American folklore?

In this latest episode of Lady Killers, Lucy Worsley meets with journalist Erin Moriarty, who reinvestigates the case from a modern legal standpoint. They examine the differences in how women in such a case were treated back then, compared with what happens today. 

And lawyer and historian Cara Robertson - who has written a book on the case - tours Fall River, examining exhibits from the trial and visiting the Borden family house. 

We see how this case helps us understand the life of wealthy Victorian women, how they are perceived and their role in American society.

Producer: Diane Hope
Readers: Colleen Prendergast and William Hope
Sound Design: Chris Maclean
A StoryHunter production for BBC Radio 4

3. Lizzie Borden

Lucy Worsley investigates the ordinary lives and extraordinary crimes of Victorian women. 

This story is about a young servant, Grace Marks, accused of two brutal murders that generated enormous attention in the new world of Upper Canada in 1843. In that time and in that place, murders were rare - and rarer still was a female murderer. 

Grace Marks and stable boy James McDermott went on the run, ending up in Lewiston, New York after their employers Thomas Kinnear and his housekeeper, Nancy were found dead. Grace insisted she didn't kill them and was forced by James McDermott to run away with him. But when Grace was arrested she was even wearing the clothing of the woman she was accused of murdering. 

Lucy examines the evidence, including duelling confessions from the accused, with the help of psychological scientist and host of the Bad People podcast, Dr Julia Shaw. 

They ask if the 16-year-old housemaid who had worked in five different houses in three years could be responsible for the violent killings.

We also hear from historian Susan Houston from York University, Toronto, who has written about the case and discusses the legal and social environment that is stacked against Grace. 

In the case made famous by Margarent Atwood in Alias Grace, we speculate on what happened and ask if Grace would have been treated differently if she had more power. Or was she actually a naïve 16-year-old caught up in the doomed plot of a disgruntled stable boy? You decide….

Producer: Sandra Bartlett 
Readers: Colleen Prendergast and William Hope
Sound Design: Chris Maclean

A StoryHunter production for BBC Radio 4

4. Grace Marks

In this new series Lucy Worsley switches her attention from Lady Killers to Lady Swindlers - con women, thieves and hustlers. 

This is where true crime meets history - with a twist. Lucy and her team of all female detectives travels back more than a hundred years to revisit the audacious and surprising crimes of women trying to make it in a world made for men. 

This time Lucy is in London telling the story of Madame Rachel - Sarah Rachel Russell - an utterly ruthless Victorian beauty scammer and blackmailer who promises her clients she will make them ‘beautiful for ever’. 

Madame Rachel’s exotic salon in Bond Street attracts the rich, and the posh, and – so she claims – the royal family. Her beauty products sell for outlandish prices. But when she turns to extortion and blackmail the full extent of her swindles are revealed. 

With Lucy to explore Madame Rachel’s story is the journalist and beauty editor Anita Bhagwandas, author of Ugly: Giving us back our beauty standards . They discover how Madame Rachel preys on the insecurities of women to sell her products, and how her notoriety fuels debates in Victorian England about the immorality of cosmetics and how much control women should have over their finances. 

Lucy is also joined by historian Professor Rosalind Crone. They visit the site of Madame Rachel’s salon in Bond Street, and London’s Central Criminal Court, the Old Bailey, where Madame Rachel’s career ended in disgrace – and where the truth about what was actually in her beauty products was finally revealed. 

Lucy wants to know: is Madame Rachel a pioneering Victorian businesswoman or is she the biggest beauty scammer of her day? And why are women today still in thrall to the beauty industry selling them promises of youth and beauty?

Producer: Jane Greenwood
Readers: Clare Corbett and Jonathan Keeble 
Singer: Olivia Bloore
Sound Design: Chris Maclean
Executive producer: Kirsty Hunter 

A StoryHunter production for BBC Radio 4.

If you're in the UK, listen to the newest episodes of Lady Killers first on BBC Sounds: https://bbc.in/3M2pT0K

37. Madame Rachel - Beauty Scammer

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