befriended by the municipal rat-catcher, who enjoyed torturing and sexually abusing animals in front of him. The young Kürten found these experiences stimulating in ways which he could not begin to express or understand. As he got older, he came up with his own twists, stabbing sheep and tearing the heads off swans to drink their blood. It was a taste he would never lose.
In his late teens he attacked two girls, nearly killing one of them. Although he was soon convicted, he received only a four-year prison sentence. In later years, he would remember the days spent fantasizing in his cell about all the crimes he would one day commit. Arson came high on the list, because he found it to be so sexually satisfying. Poisoning children with arsenic was another idea he found appealing. Kürten got intense enjoyment out of inflicting pain.
It seems unlikely that he reached the age of thirty without killing anyone, but his first known murder was committed in 1913. He described his rape and killing of a ten-year-old innkeeper’s daughter with detailed relish at his trial seventeen years later, noting that the public horror and indignation ‘did me good’. When the First World War broke out the following year, he was called up, but allegedly deserted on his first day of service. If so, one wonders how he avoided being shot when arrested for yet another arson offence. Instead, he spent a few more years in jail. He was a well-behaved prisoner; however, when he volunteered to help with the laying out of dead prisoners his offer was, unfortunately, accepted.
Kürten did not look like a sadistic vampire. He was fastidious about his appearance, had perfect manners and an easy way with children. Around 1921 it seems he almost lost himself inside this mask. He married, and treated his wife with great gentleness. He got and kept a job. It was only his half-strangled mistresses who saw the violence still simmering within.
In 1925 his job sent him back to Düsseldorf, to where his troubles had all begun. ‘The sunset was blood-red on my return,’ he said later. ‘I considered this to be an omen symbolic of my destiny’.
He started killing with what seemed an ever-increasing ferocity – animals, children, women and men. He clubbed them, stabbed them, strangled them with his bare hands. The police, following this trail of carnage, could see only one connecting link – the frenzied consumption of blood. The papers called the killer the ‘Düsseldorf Vampire’, and Kürten’s wife was so frightened of becoming a victim of ‘the Vampire’ that she asked her husband to escort her home from work each night.
Early in 1930 he slashed a five-year-old girl to death, yet a few weeks later he let his last potential victim go, after checking that she did not remember his address. But the girl had tricked him, and Kürten soon realized as much.
Kürten confessed to his wife, and persuaded her to give him up for the reward. At his trial he pleaded guilty to nine charges of murder and a host of other crimes.
Before his execution, he told his psychiatrist that he hoped to hear, for just a second or two, the sound of blood gushing from his own neck. ‘That,’ he said, ‘would be the pleasure to end all pleasures’.
The East End Rackets
The Kray twins, Reggie and Ronnie, were probably the nearest London ever came to producing an indigenous Mafia. On the surface they were legitimate businessmen, the owners of clubs and restaurants haunted by the fashionable rich. But in reality they were racketeers and murderers, protected from prosecution by their reputation for extreme violence.
They were born in the London’s East End in 1933 – and soon had a reputation as fighters. Both became professional boxers and, after a brief stint in the army, bouncers at a Covent Garden nightclub. It was then that they started in the protection business, using levels of intimidation that were, to say the least, unusual for their time. Their cousin Ronald Hart
In his late teens he attacked two girls, nearly killing one of them. Although he was soon convicted, he received only a four-year prison sentence. In later years, he would remember the days spent fantasizing in his cell about all the crimes he would one day commit. Arson came high on the list, because he found it to be so sexually satisfying. Poisoning children with arsenic was another idea he found appealing. Kürten got intense enjoyment out of inflicting pain.
It seems unlikely that he reached the age of thirty without killing anyone, but his first known murder was committed in 1913. He described his rape and killing of a ten-year-old innkeeper’s daughter with detailed relish at his trial seventeen years later, noting that the public horror and indignation ‘did me good’. When the First World War broke out the following year, he was called up, but allegedly deserted on his first day of service. If so, one wonders how he avoided being shot when arrested for yet another arson offence. Instead, he spent a few more years in jail. He was a well-behaved prisoner; however, when he volunteered to help with the laying out of dead prisoners his offer was, unfortunately, accepted.
Kürten did not look like a sadistic vampire. He was fastidious about his appearance, had perfect manners and an easy way with children. Around 1921 it seems he almost lost himself inside this mask. He married, and treated his wife with great gentleness. He got and kept a job. It was only his half-strangled mistresses who saw the violence still simmering within.
In 1925 his job sent him back to Düsseldorf, to where his troubles had all begun. ‘The sunset was blood-red on my return,’ he said later. ‘I considered this to be an omen symbolic of my destiny’.
He started killing with what seemed an ever-increasing ferocity – animals, children, women and men. He clubbed them, stabbed them, strangled them with his bare hands. The police, following this trail of carnage, could see only one connecting link – the frenzied consumption of blood. The papers called the killer the ‘Düsseldorf Vampire’, and Kürten’s wife was so frightened of becoming a victim of ‘the Vampire’ that she asked her husband to escort her home from work each night.
Early in 1930 he slashed a five-year-old girl to death, yet a few weeks later he let his last potential victim go, after checking that she did not remember his address. But the girl had tricked him, and Kürten soon realized as much.
Kürten confessed to his wife, and persuaded her to give him up for the reward. At his trial he pleaded guilty to nine charges of murder and a host of other crimes.
Before his execution, he told his psychiatrist that he hoped to hear, for just a second or two, the sound of blood gushing from his own neck. ‘That,’ he said, ‘would be the pleasure to end all pleasures’.
The East End Rackets
The Kray twins, Reggie and Ronnie, were probably the nearest London ever came to producing an indigenous Mafia. On the surface they were legitimate businessmen, the owners of clubs and restaurants haunted by the fashionable rich. But in reality they were racketeers and murderers, protected from prosecution by their reputation for extreme violence.
They were born in the London’s East End in 1933 – and soon had a reputation as fighters. Both became professional boxers and, after a brief stint in the army, bouncers at a Covent Garden nightclub. It was then that they started in the protection business, using levels of intimidation that were, to say the least, unusual for their time. Their cousin Ronald Hart
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