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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

Lucy Worsley is back with a new series of Lady Killers, where true crime meets history - with a twist. 
 
This time Lucy heads to Dorset to explore the life of Martha Brown, a victim of domestic violence, accused of murdering her husband John in 1856. Martha’s story goes on to inspire Thomas Hardy’s novel Tess of the d’Urbervilles. 

Martha initially claims John was kicked to death by his horse, but eventually confesses to his murder, revealing the long history of abuse she suffered at his hands. Will Martha’s confession win her a reprieve and save her from the gallows?
 
With Lucy to find out more is the solicitor Harriet Wistrich, the founder of the Centre for Women’s Justice and the co-founder of the campaigning organisation Justice for Women. Harriet works on behalf of women who have murdered their partners after years of abuse. She is best known for leading Sally Challen’s successful 2019 appeal when her conviction for murdering her abusive husband was overturned. 
 
Lucy is also joined by historian Professor Rosalind Crone and together they visit Dorchester to see the courtroom where Martha Brown was tried for murder and the site of the former prison where she is held before her trial.
 
Lucy wants to know what this case tells us about the lives of women experiencing domestic abuse in Victorian England and women in similar situations today. How much has the law changed since the 1850s concerning abused women who kill? And, if Martha Brown were on trial today, what might the outcome be?
 
Producer: Jane Greenwood
Readers: Clare Corbett, William Hope, Jonathan Keeble and Ruth Sillers
Sound design: Chris Maclean
Executive producer: Kirsty Hunter
 
A StoryHunter production for BBC Radio 4

54. Martha Brown - Domestic Violence

Lucy Worsley is back with a new series of Lady Killers, where true crime meets history - with a twist. 
 
In this episode, Lucy travels back to 1831 to Aldgate, then a poor part of East London, to investigate Elizabeth Cook, an Irish woman with a dark criminal background. When Elizabeth’s new lodger, an elderly peddler called Caroline Walsh, goes missing with no sign of her body, suspicions are high. When Elizabeth is discovered selling Caroline’s clothes, she is accused of her murder by her own son in court.
 
With Lucy to find out more about the case of Elizabeth Cook is Jaswant Narwal, the Chief Crown Prosecutor for London North, and the person who would prosecute this case if it came to court today. Jaswant shares her 35 years of experience prosecuting homicides, including ‘no body’ cases. 
 
Lucy is also joined by historian Professor Rosalind Crone and they visit Aldgate to find out more about Elizabeth Cook and Caroline Walsh. They also go to the site of the Royal London Hospital to discuss the grisly fate of many of London’s missing persons in the early 19th century.
 
Lucy wants to know what this case tells us about the lives of poor women in London in the 1830s. Can someone today be accused of murder if there is no body? Would Elizabeth Cook’s case go to court today and, if it did, what might the outcome be?
 
Producer: Jane Greenwood
Readers: Clare Corbett, Jonathan Keeble and Ruth Sillers
Sound design: Chris Maclean
Executive producer: Kirsty Hunter
 
A StoryHunter production for BBC Radio 4

53. Elizabeth Cook - Body Snatcher

Lucy Worsley is back with a brand new series of Lady Killers. Lucy and her team of all female detectives re-visit the unthinkable crimes, committed by murderesses, more than a hundred years ago. 

In this episode, Lucy looks at a case with a difference. It’s true crime meets family history - with a twist. The team receives an email from Lady Killers listener, Charlotte Godfrey, who says she has a Victorian Lady Killer in her family. Charlotte wants to find out more about her Great Great Aunt’s role in The Chertsey Murder.

It’s a tragic tale involving murder and suicide. On 16th May 1894, 18 year-old Amelia Haslett poisons her 9 year-old sister Daisy and then kills herself. What were the circumstances that led to this unimaginable crime?

Lucy brings in Lady Killers’ in-house historian Professor Rosalind Crone to help get to the bottom of this dark family secret. 

Ros meets Charlotte at the scene of the crime in Addlestone, Surrey and visits the church where her relatives are buried.

Back in the studio Lucy, Ros and Charlotte are joined by Dr Gwen Adshead who, for many years, was a consultant psychiatrist and psychotherapist at Broadmoor Hospital.

Can they answer Charlotte’s questions – why did Amelia do it and what may have been happening with her mental health.
 
Producer: Julia Hayball
Readers: Clare Corbett, Ruth Sillers, Jonathan Keeble and Bill Hope
Sound design: Chris Maclean
Executive Producer: Kirsty Hunter
 
A StoryHunter production for BBC Radio 4

52. Amelia Haslett - Lady Killer in My Family

Lady Killers with Lucy Worsley - the stories of women who kill - is back for a brand new series. 

This first episode is recorded in front of a live audience at the Hay Festival in 2025, with special guest Sarah Waters (bestselling author of Tipping the Velvet and Fingersmith) and in-house historian Professor Rosalind Crone. The team discovers which of our infamous lady killers inspired great writers to immortalise them in print. 

They explore the lives of women like Edith Thompson, accused of killing her husband, although she never laid a finger on him. Edith captured Sarah Waters' imagination while researching her romantic thriller The Paying Guests, which is set - just like Edith’s story - in socially turbulent 1920s suburbia. 

Then there’s Maria Manning, who was reincarnated as an ‘imperfectly tamed’ French maid Hortense by Charles Dickens in his proto-detective story, Bleak House.

And Margaret Garner, an enslaved woman on the run, who inspired Toni Morrison’s Pulitzer Prize-winning masterpiece, Beloved. 

With the usual mix of curiosity, insight and hilarity, Lucy and the team ask what makes these particular women so compelling. Can historical fiction actually communicate more than factual history? What makes for a good baddie? 

Featuring live readings from actor Clare Corbett and pre-recorded reconstructions, Lady Killers: Murder by the Book brings a contemporary feminist perspective to crime as it happened and as it’s reimagined on the page.

Recorded live at the Hay Festival 2025.

Producer: Sarah Goodman
Assistant Producers: Riham Moussa, Mikaela Carmichael
Readers: Clare Corbett and Moya Angela
Sound Design: Chris Maclean
Executive Producer: Kirsty Hunter

A StoryHunter production for BBC Radio 4.

51. Murder by the Book - Live from the Hay Festival

Lucy Worsley returns to cover more cases of murder and intrigue in a brand new series of Lady Killers.
Coming soon, first on BBC Sounds.

Coming soon - Lady Killers Series 4

In the final episode of season two of Lady Swindlers, Lucy Worsley and her partner in crime, Professor Rosalind Crone, are joined by novelist and game designer Naomi Alderman, author of the award-winning book, The Power. 

Together they explore one curious question - did our Lady Swindlers have superpowers?

From the strength and agility of Minnie Pheby, the Lady Burglar, to the psychic abilities of the Fox Sisters, these women used their talents to surprise, deceive and outwit the men around them. Whether they were slipping through windows, conducting séances, spiking drinks, or stealing museum masterpieces, each Lady Swindler flipped expectations on their head.

Lucy, Rosalind, and Naomi also take on big questions about women and power. Is crime a form of resistance? Do we romanticise female criminals? And what would a truly equal society actually look like?

Diving into the themes of The Power, they explore how stories and swindles expose the deeper gender dynamics of then and now. Featuring a lady burglar, spirit mediums, a hocusser, a drink-spiker, and a French art thief on the run, this finale asks what these women’s crimes reveal about the nature of power and women's lives.

Producer: Riham Moussa
Readers: Clare Corbett, Lauren Leko, Jonathan Keeble, and Alex Phelps
Historical Consultant: Rosalind Crone
Executive Producer: Kirsty Hunter

 A StoryHunter production for BBC Radio 4

50. Swindling Superpowers

Lucy Worsley is back with another episode 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 delving into the life of Elizabeth Manning, a daring Lady Swindler known as a hocusser, who spikes men’s drinks and empties their pockets in Victorian London. Most men she hocusses are too embarrassed to report the crime - but when will Elizabeth’s luck run out?

With Lucy to explore Elizabeth Manning’s story is the barrister Nneka Akudolu KC who shares her experience of prosecuting spiking cases today.

Lucy is also joined by historian Rosalind Crone, Professor of History at the Open University. Lucy and Ros visit the site of the lodgings where Elizabeth hocussed at least one of her victims, and Brixton Prison, the destination of many women who were trying and failing to make a living in Victorian London. 

Lucy wants to know how Elizabeth Manning went about hocussing her victims. How common was this crime in Victorian England? And what can Elizabeth’s story tell us about spiking today?

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

A StoryHunter production for BBC Radio 4.

49. Elizabeth Manning - Hocusser

Lucy Worsley is back with another episode 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 lodging houses and pawnbrokers of Victorian London on the trail of French art thief Amelie Decuzpere. She and her husband Paul make a habit of moving into new lodgings and swiftly disappearing, taking with them everything that isn’t nailed down. But, as Lucy discovers, they also have an eye for a valuable old master painting. 

With Lucy to explore Amelie Decuzpere’s story is the illustrator and graphic artist Malika Favre, who shares Amelie’s experience of living in London as a young French woman. 

Lucy is also joined by historian Rosalind Crone, Professor of History at the Open University. Lucy and Ros visit the Bow Street Museum of Crime and Justice to find out how the police went about tracking down Amelie, and the site of a London pawnbroker’s shop where Amelie was a frequent visitor.

Lucy wants to know how different women’s lives were in England and France in the mid-19th Century. And how does a foreign Lady Swindler navigate the English justice system?

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

A StoryHunter production for BBC Radio 4.

48. Amelie Decuzpere - International Art Thief

Lucy Worsley returns with 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 meet women who stepped outside of their ordinary lives to do extraordinary things. Together they investigate what their lives and crimes tell us about women in the past, and ask how different is it for women today? 

In this episode Lucy travels to New York to uncover the story of spirit mediums Maggie, Kate and Leah Fox. The sisters are credited with igniting the nineteenth-century Spiritualist movement, which claims that the living can contact and communicate with the dead. The craze for séances crosses class divides and Spiritualism garners millions of followers across the globe, including First Lady Mary Lincoln, Arthur Conan Doyle, and even Queen Victoria.

However, throughout their forty-year career as mediums the sisters face persistent accusations of fraud. To tease apart fact from fiction Lucy is joined by Dr Thema Bryant, past president of the American Psychological Association. A Professor in Psychology at Pepperdine University who specialises in the intersection of spirituality and psychology, Thema brings a modern lens to help understand the minds of the past. 

We visit the small hamlet where the mysterious occurrences first begin; the Fox property in snowy Hydesville, Upper New York State. Here Tracy Murphy, Director of Historic Palymra, recounts the moment when the young Fox sisters first encounter the mysterious ‘raps’ they convince others are signs from the spirit world. 

With Fox sisters expert and author Barbara Weisberg, Lucy and Thema examine how the sisters take the world by storm. They ask whether they are really audacious swindlers or the genuine founders of a spiritual movement? 

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

A StoryHunter production for BBC Radio 4.

47. Fox Sisters - Spirit Mediums

Lucy Worsley meets Minnie Pheby, a strong and agile young woman who defies all the gender stereotypes of Victorian society – not a homemaker, but a homebreaker. She’s the devil compared with the idealised ‘angel in the house’, sneaking into middle class homes in the dead of night. In West London as the Victorian era draws to a close, Minnie sleeps on a pillow of stolen dresses in a squat furnished with life’s little luxuries, all the proceeds of crime.

Lucy is joined by former Detective Chief Inspector Jackie Malton, famously the inspiration for Prime Suspect’s DCI Jane Tennison, who knows Minnie’s patch very well. She gives her expert insights on burglary, women in policing and what really makes a difference for repeat offenders like Minnie.

With historian Professor Rosalind Crone, Lucy and Jackie investigate Minnie’s past and discover if she ever hangs up her swag bag for good. Lucy and Ros test their mettle as undercover operatives in Shepherd’s Bush, staking out the house where Minnie was first arrested. Will Jackie be impressed by their efforts?

Together, the all-female team ask how common were lady burglars? How were they portrayed in the press? Why were the Victorians both appalled and fascinated by their physical capabilities and boldness?

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

A StoryHunter production for BBC Radio 4.

46. Minnie Pheby - Lady Burglar

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 travel back in time to revisit the audacious and surprising crimes of women trying to make it in a world made for men. 

In this episode Lucy is investigating the life of Fanny Davies, a thief who will take everything you have, including your trousers. A pickpocket and prostitute, at the age of 20 in 1785 she pulled off the daring theft of a huge sum of money in an Essex pub which turned her into a national celebrity. Condemned to death for her crime, Fanny’s story was taken up by pamphleteers determined to profit from her story, and they embellished her life with tales of highway robbery and aristocratic seduction. 

With Lucy to explore Fanny Davies’ story is the Essex-born barrister Alexandra Wilson. They discuss the glamorisation of female criminals then and now. And consider the reasons why a woman such as Fanny turned to a life of crime, finding uncomfortable parallels with women in the criminal justice system today. 

Lucy is also joined by historian Rosalind Crone. They visit Southwark in South East London where Fanny grew up and learned her trade as a prostitute and pickpocket, and they travel to Tilbury in Essex where Ros reveals an extraordinary twist in Fanny’s tale. 

Lucy wants to know: why did Fanny’s story capture the 18th century public imagination so powerfully? How can we get behind the celebrity criminal to find out what Fanny Davies’ life is really like? And what does Fanny’s story tell us about the lives of female criminals 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.

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

38. Fanny Davies - Uncommon Thief

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