Amelia Dyer Victorian Baby Farmer

In late 19th-century England, Amelia Dyer, a former nurse turned baby farmer, made money by taking in unwanted infants for a fee and promising to adopt or care for them. Instead of raising them, from about 1869 to 1896, she strangled many of the babies she received, likely killing hundreds, and sometimes dumped their bodies in parcels in the River Thames.

Her crimes unraveled when a bargeman pulled a bundled infant corpse from the river and police traced the wrapping back to her, leading to the discovery of more dead children. Dyer was convicted of the murder of baby Doris Marmon and hanged in 1896, with later estimates attributing roughly 200 to 400 or more infant deaths to her, making her one of history’s most prolific serial killers.

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