Killer Stories with Harvey Guillén - “Lady Rotten” Pt. 2 - Mary Ann Cotton

Episode Date: January 28, 2019

After suffering multiple miscarriages, she begins to see her children less as a blessing and more of a burden. Mary Ann Cotton’s severe struggles with PTSD and postpartum depression caused her to disconnect from her own thoughts and commit unthinkable crimes around England during the 1850s and 60s. Many of the people closest to her did not survive the wrath of her anger.  Sponsors! Torrid - Go to Torrid.com and use Promo Code SERIAL15 for $15 off every $50 you spend! That means you can get up to $150 off a $500 order! Upstart - Hurry to Upstart.com/SERIALKILLERS to find out HOW LOW your Upstart rate is! Checking your rate only takes 2 minutes—and won’t affect your credit! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Hasbro is not a sponsor of this promotion. Due to the graphic nature of this killer's crimes, listener discretion is advised. This episode includes discussions of murder and assault that some people may find offensive. We advise extreme caution for children under 13. It's a bitter cold winter's night in England. A fire crackles in a study lined with books and oil paintings.

In the kitchen, Marianne Cotton, the nanny of the house, puts a kettle on the stove. The grand house is what Marianne had always wanted, since she was a little girl. She longed to be the lady of a beautiful home, its many rooms adorned with the finest of everything money could buy. But one obstacle stood in the way of her life of lace and silks. Marianne takes a glass container of a fine white powder from her cabinet,

arsenic. She puts a spoonful into her kettle and takes the tea tray down the hall. She enters a room thick with the smell of vomit. A child lies in the bed, soaked with sweat. His skin has yellowed, and the hair on his head has come out in large clumps. He gasps for air as Marianne holds a cup to the dying boy's lips, coaxing him to take another sip of tea. She smiles. This was all part of her wicked plan.

Kill the child of a rich, eligible widower. Then let the man grieve in Marianne's arm. Soon she would be pregnant with his child, move into his bedroom, and take him for absolutely everything he had. Hi, I'm Greg Paulson, and this is serial killers on the Pardcast Network. Today we continue our journey into the crimes of Marianne Cotton, who murdered as many as 21 of her own children, friends, and loved ones. over two decades in Victorian era, England. I'm here with my co-host, Vanessa Richardson. Hi, everyone.

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It really does help us. We also now have merch. Head to parcast.com slash merch for more information. Last week, we covered Marianne Cotton's upbringing and the circumstances that led her to become a serial killer. We took a close look at her impoverished childhood as the daughter of a poor mining family and examined how that ignited her determination to rise above the working class life she was born to. We also discussed the series of traumatic miscarriages and infant deaths in her early adulthood that caused Mary Marianne to experience postpartum depression and post-traumatic stress.

These experiences ultimately caused her to disconnect from her own thoughts and feelings, eventually seeing her children not as loved ones to protect, but burdens associated with her traumatic history. Vanessa is going to take over on the psychology here. A reminder, she's not a licensed psychologist or psychiatrist, but she has done a lot of research for this show. Thanks, Greg. As we discussed last week, Marianne's ability to disconnect from those close to her is known as disassociating.

According to Dr. Sandra L. Brown, CEO of the Institute for Relational Harm Reduction and Public Pathology Education, disassociation is a defense mechanism that allows the victim of trauma to block out horrific events. While it can be useful in the short term, if it's used as a go-to defense mechanism, as was the case with Marianne, it can become a full-blown psychological disorder. This dissociation, paired with her drive to move up the economic ladder, soon became a deadly combination. She began to take out insurance policies on family members' lives and systematically poisoned them with arsenic in a morbid bid for financial gain. She murdered four victims over a span of five years, her two toddler daughters, her infant son, and her first.

first husband. At last free of a husband and young children, Marianne was able to leave the poor mining town she had always hated. This week, we continue to explore Marianne's killing spree as her murders become more habitual and sadistic, eventually earning her the nickname Britain's Black Widow Killer. In 1865, Marianne had settled into a new home at Seam Harbor, a seaside town on the northeastern coast of England. She had decided on Seam Harbor. She had decided on Seam Harbor because her lover, Joseph Natris, had recently moved there with his wife. And so, Marianne rented a flat with her last living child, seven-year-old Isabella. Once in Siem Harbor, Marianne was eager to erase all remnants of her past life and commit herself fully to her relationship

with Joseph. This included erasing her very much alive daughter, Isabella. Marianne began planning to poison her last living child. But thankfully, the girl was spared. Just a couple of months after arriving in Seam Harbor, Isabella was sent to live with Marianne's mother and stepfather. With Isabella out of the picture, Marianne was free to start fresh. Marianne was a woman of ruthless ambition.

She had few qualms about manipulating those around her until she no longer had use for them and constantly headed towards better prospects. And at the moment, that meant finding a job in her new home. In the summer of 1865, Marianne found a position as a nurse at the nearby Sunderland Infirmary, but she soon discovered that it was not the glamorous job that she had imagined. Nursing was just more of the cleaning and housework she was looking to escape, so she leaned on her beauty and charm to find a way out. It was while working at the hospital that Marianne

met George Ward, a recovering patient at Sunderland Infirmary and a young strapping engineer. This impressed Marianne, who assumed George had a life of wealth ahead of him. Marianne and George struck up a flirtation during his recovery, and he soon proposed. Once discharged, he and Marianne married in a simple church ceremony in August of 1865, less than a year after the death of her first husband. George was the answer to Marianne's prayers, a young man who was eager to please and had great earning potential, and to George, Marianne was his angel, the tender patient woman who nursed him from death. George was madly in love with Marianne, and Marianne was relieved to have found George so quickly.

Once he found engineering work, she believed she could finally live without the anxiety of poverty, looming around every corner. However, Marianne's relief turned to suspicion when week after week George struggled to find work, forcing her to keep her nursing job in order to support them both. Tensions grew high, and their marriage began to sour. All the while, Marianne continued her affair with Joseph Natris. After all, she had followed Joseph to see him harbor in order to be closer to him. Her marriage to George Ward was just a means to money.

Her relationship with Joseph was true love. But Marianne found herself in Joseph's bed more often than she had planned. She was dissatisfied with George sexually and rendezvoused frequently with Joseph to satisfy her desires. But she soon learned George was also a disappointment outside of the bedroom. Marianne discovered that George Ward had lied to her all along. He wasn't an engineer, but a mere laborer who manned the engine on steam vessels. Marianne was furious. She felt George had drained her of her resources and energy.

He had tricked her, and as a master manipulator herself, Mary Ann was furious that she had been scammed, and by such a pathetic man at that, George would pay for embarrassing her. Marianne took out a life insurance policy on George and got to work. Just a year after his typhus recovery, he found himself under Marianne's care again. But this time, she was intent on making him suffer. Marianne had created a new identity for herself in her new city. She was now a well-liked and respected nurse. at the local hospital, and doctors and patients alike praised her work at the infirmary. And ever the attentive nurse, she steadily slipped arsenic into the tea of her ailing husband, with his doctor none the wiser.

Marianne took advantage of her newfound reputation as a skilled nurse to kill in plain sight. As George wasted away on his deathbed, he continuously slipped in and out of consciousness. In his last five days of life, he never even woke up. George Ward, reduced to skin and bone, died in his sleep in October 1866 at age 33. He had become so light that his middle-aged wife was able to carry his body out of his sickbed herself. George and Marianne had been married for just 15 months. To Marianne, the life and death of George Ward was simply a blip in the grand scheme of Marianne's plans, an embarrassing period of her life she hoped to forget.

So she collected the insurance payout from his death and continued on. Now, George was nothing but a bad memory and a collection of shillings. According to Professor David Wilson and his book, Marianne Cotton, Britain's first female serial killer, Marianne, quote, embodied capitalism. And much of her life can be read as her dirty, desperate attempt to move on both economically, and socially, end quote. However, Mary Ann's desire to be near her lover Joseph Natress may have been the one exception.

It's true she moved from town to town and from husband to husband in the pursuit of better economic and social standings, but it was also in pursuit of Joseph. He was married and unattainable, but her lust for him just burned brighter. And wherever Joseph went, it seemed Marianne would follow. But during her marriage to George Ward, that changed. Joseph's wife fell ill, and Joseph put a stop to the affair. He was guilt-ridden

about his infidelity, wanting to change his ways in his wife's last months. Joseph moved away from Ciam Harbor, leaving Marianne alone in the city she'd moved to for him. Marianne felt bitter over Joseph breaking off the affair, and now as a recent widow, without a lover to share her freedom with, she had no reason to stay in Ciam Harbor. Mary Ann would soon move to her third new city in two years. Constant mobility was a lifestyle that served Marianne well, and it became characteristic of her murders. In fact, Marianne's transient killing style is what makes her unique among serial killers, especially female murderers. In their 2009 book entitled Serial Murder, Dr. Ronald and Stephen Holmes described typical female killers as being geographically stable,

meaning they murder within the same vicinity repeatedly. However, Marianne's crimes are best described as geographically transient. She killed in many locations, allowing her to elude police for almost two decades. But despite her constant roaming, the motivation remained consistent. Her crimes were committed for the sake of financial and social control. Though we don't have evidence from the time of Marianne's crimes, based on accounts of her life, Marianne fits the diagnosis for narcissistic personality disorder almost perfectly. According to the Mayo Clinic, individuals with narcissistic personality disorder

have an inflated sense of their own importance, take advantage of others to get what they want, and become preoccupied with fantasies about success, power, or beauty. Marianne had always thought of herself as special. She saw the circumstances she was born into as unfair and carried with her a deep sense that she was entitled to something more, something better. And all she had to do was take it. And she did.

In her next move, she would commit some of the most sadistic murders of her career. We'll meet her a string of hapless victims in a moment. Now back to the story. After George Ward's murder in 1866, Mary Ann moved to Sunderland, a larger city just up the coast from Siem Harbor where she worked, to seek the opulent life she believed she was destined for. And her move came with good timing. Marianne quickly found work as a housekeeper for James Robinson,

a wealthy shipwright and recently widowed man looking for someone to look after his five children. Marianne got the job and moved into the Robinson home a few days before Christmas in 1866. just two months after George Ward's death. As a man of a respectable profession with the means to own a home, James was exactly what Marianne had been hoping for. So she sought to make herself James Robinson's wife. The only obstacles in her path were his five children. If she could manage to eliminate James's children,

Marianne would not only be able to fully transition herself from James' housekeeper to his wife and start a new family with James. But once they were married, she would also be entitled to the insurance money James would receive for his dead sons and daughters. It was an extremely calculated plan. Marianne wasted no time. Within a matter of three weeks, James' baby's son had died of gastric fever and convulsions, a classic sign of arsenic poisoning. This soon drove the vulnerable James Robinson into the arms of his housekeeper.

and by her design, Marianne became pregnant with James Child. But before Marianne could secure a ring and a vow, her past came back to haunt her. In March of 1867, Marianne's mother became ill, and Marianne's stepfather urged Marianne to leave her post and return home. But complications didn't end there. Her mother had been watching over Isabella, Marianne's last living child. Now that her mother was sick, Marianne no longer. had an escape from obligations as Isabella's mother.

This was frustrating to Marianne. Since she had become pregnant with James Robinson's child, she was planning to begin cementing her relationship with him. This was a critical stage in locking herself into his life. But now she was forced to leave. Marianne needed to take care of things quickly. Marianne's mother, Margaret Jane, died in March 1867, only nine days after Marianne's arrival.

She was 54. Margaret Jane complained of severe stomach pains just before her death, and exhibited symptoms similar to arsenic poisoning. Marianne had struck again and in record time. A few weeks after killing her own mother, Marianne returned to the Robinson House with her daughter Isabella in tow. Things were not ideal for Marianne. She wanted to put herself in the best possible position to marry James

and having her child from a previous marriage hanging around wasn't exactly helping her look like the perfect potential wife. So she got rid of her. Almost immediately after returning to James Robinson's home, Marianne poisoned Isabella. Isabella's cause of death was documented as gastric fever. Just another sickness arsenic replicated. And with the last of her biological children now dead,

Marianne shifted her focus back to her soon-to-be step-chil. Since Isabella had died of a supposed gastric fever, it was plausible for this phantom illness Marianne had created to spread throughout the Robinson Manor. Marianne felt she could easily poison the other children without arousing suspicion. In the wake of Isabella's death, two more of James Robinson's children fell ill, with almost no warning. They experienced fevers, delirium, and incessant vomiting. The children were sentenced to their beds in the homes upstairs nursery. And as the homemaker in charge of the children, Marianne had full control over

the nursery. She persuaded James that, given her experience as a nurse, she knew what would be best for his children. She insisted he stay out of the room for fear that he should catch the fever. Of course, this was intentional. Outside the nursery, James couldn't watch what Marianne was truly doing to his children. He simply paced the hallways, watching as Marianne came in and out, always with a tray of hot tea in hand. He had no reason to be suspicious of the doting nurse. James II, James Robinson's five-year-old son, was the next to die. After days of writhing in pain and battling a torrent of sky-high fevers, he was weakened to the point of unconsciousness. Despite this, Marianne continued to give him liquids, spoon-feeding the boy arsenic-laced teas and

soups until his body finally succumbed to the poison. But Marianne's massacre of the Robinson's didn't end there, and she pivoted her attention to James' eight-year-old daughter, Elizabeth. She hoped that by killing the three youngest Robinson children, while seeming to care for them, she could endear herself to James while knocking out the children who needed the most care. She'd already dispatched with the baby and the five-year-old, so Elizabeth was the last target left in her original plan. But being older than her younger brothers, Elizabeth was able to withstand more of the poison in her body

and was taking longer to die. But Marianne was impatient. She simply up the dosage of the arsenic, and only four days after the death of her younger brother, Elizabeth died from what doctors diagnosed as gastric fever. The same illness Isabella was reported to have died from. All the children's symptoms were described in the same way. They rolled about in bed, foaming at the mouth and vomiting violently.

The agony they would have felt in their last days would be unimaginable. The symptoms of arsenic poisoning are nothing short of horrific. Though all of Marianne's victims experienced a combination of fever and gastrointestinal issues, arsenic has the ability to ravage the human body in far more hideous ways. Poisoned victims may also experience an inability to sweat. swallow, their fingernails turning coarse and yellow, hair loss and vomiting to the point of convulsions. Having killed so quickly, Marianne used much more arsenic on the children than she had before, and there's no doubt the symptoms they suffered would have been some of the most severe.

But to Marianne, their murders brought her neither guilt nor pleasure. The children were just pawns in her game of becoming a wealthy wife. And as planned, their deaths drew James. and Marianne closer together. Marianne buried Isabella in a grave alongside James' three children and used the facade of her grief to commiserate with him. By summertime, she was no longer just the housekeeper with whom he had had a short affair. Marianne had made herself invaluable to James,

and he had fallen deeply in love with her. It was the right time to play her winning hand. At four months pregnant, Marianne revealed to him that she was having. having his child. On a beautiful summer day in 1867, James Robinson and Marianne took a walk together in the town park, where James kneeled before her. He proposed to spend the rest of his days with Marianne, the angel who had entered his life, cared for his children, and cured his loneliness. It was the moment that Marianne had schemed and fought for. She had finally received her formal invitation

to a stable future with access to all of the luxuries and comforts she only dreamed of in her former life. She said yes. That August, at six months pregnant, Marianne married James Robinson. And just a few short months later in November, she gave birth to their first child, Margaret Isabella Robinson. James was overjoyed to have a new baby in the home. In the wake of his children's deaths, it was a fresh start, but one that ended. prematurely. The tiny infant was dead within just a few weeks of her birth, suffering from symptoms

eerily similar to that of her three poisoned siblings. The pregnancy had worked to secure Marianne's marriage to James, but Marianne had no interest in caring for a newborn. With 11 murders under her belt, Marianne now killed with ease. Murder had become a pattern of behavior that she was comfortable with, and she used She used it as a way of tailoring circumstances to her favor. She seemingly had no regard for human life, whether it was killing her husband, children, or even her own mother.

Marianne would do whatever it took to ensure she was able to pursue the security and comfort she felt entitled to. In order to continue killing repeatedly, Marianne protected herself from the guilt of her crimes by numbing her mind to the pain of other people. This follows the pattern of disassociation we discussed earlier in today's episode. It allowed Marianne to slip into a state of disconnect that shielded her from the suffering of her victims. In the book The Psychopathic Mind, Origins, Dynamics, and Treatment, Dr. J. Reed-Malloy explains that disassociation enables killers to deny responsibility and effectively neutralize any remorse. Marianne would rationalize her crimes to absolve herself of her.

own guilt. Her husbands deserved their fates. Her children were perhaps better off not living in such a harsh world. And as time were on, her justifications only grew more severe. But in the year following the murder of her newborn, Marianne put the arsenic down. Things were peaceful. Marianne was happy as the wife of James Robinson, at long last a lady of higher society. Money poured through James' generous fingers and into her open palms. And in June of 1869, Marianne gave birth to their second child, a boy named George. But as Marianne became more accustomed to her new lifestyle, her desires grew. The luxuries she enjoyed through her marriage to James were not enough. Plus, mothering a newborn and two children from James' previous marriage.

was proving to be a real bore. She wanted her own money, independent of James's control. So she began to steal from him, taking money he had asked her to put in the bank on his behalf. Marianne realized that she was dissatisfied with her role of rich man's wife. She missed having money that she alone controlled. Marianne was paranoid that one day she'd again find herself on her own and trapped by poverty.

Despite being wrapped in the comfort of James Robinson's wealth, She never felt safe. In the fall of 1869, James discovered that Marianne had not only stolen from him, but she had run up debts in his name. And soon, his oldest child, William, confessed to James that Marianne had forced him to pawn family valuables. All the while, Marianne had tried to persuade James to take out insurance policies on his life, as well as the lives of the three children left in the home.

An insurance payout on James' life would have been a huge, windfall for Marianne. Despite appearances of a peaceful year without violence, she had been planning her biggest move all along. If she could successfully kill James and take his estate, she would be financially set for life. She would never again have to worry about slipping back into poverty. Suddenly, everyone around her felt like lives she was entitled to take. This omnipotent sense of self is described in Robert Raskin and Jill Novichick's 19th. 91 study in the Journal of Clinical Psychology entitled, Narcissism and the Use of Fantasy, as a God complex, a belief in which an individual feels as though they're entitled to power

and supremacy over other people's lives, a trait common in killers like Marianne. To her, other people were far inferior to her. Therefore, she had the right to decide whether they lived or died. But James Robinson ripped that decision from Marianne's grasp. He never gave in to her insistence on taking out life insurance policies on himself and the children. And by refusing to do so, he saved their lives. James, furious and disgusted with Marianne, threw her out. However, Marianne took their baby boy with her, planning to use him as leverage when she returned once the argument had blown over.

She thought she could re-endear herself to James, but she was wrong. When Marianne returned to the Robinson House in December of 1869, she found it boarded up. James had hastily sold many of his possessions and moved himself and his surviving children to his sister's home. Seeing this, Marianne left baby George with a friend while she went out to mail a letter. But Marianne never returned. Later, little George was reunited with his father, making him one of Marianne's only children to survive her. Mary Ann was beside herself. She hadn't wanted her relationship with James to end so soon.

She was about to poison the rest of the Robinsons and obtain their wealth and power in one fell swoop through a massive inheritance. But now she found herself alone, and perhaps for the first time, without a plan to fall back on. And she was older. At 37, Marianne was still a woman of considerable charms, but they were fading. So she set out for the first susceptible man she could find. Marianne found a perfect target in Frederick Cotton, the brother of Marianne's childhood friend, Margaret. Frederick was a recent widower and minor. But more importantly, he was vulnerable.

He was still grieving his wife, who had died of consumption, and Margaret had moved into his home to care for his children. With Marianne around, Frederick had no need for nanny. So Marianne made a plan. She visited Margaret and Frederick in Wallbottle, where she flirted with Frederick and got to work on Margaret. It was time to dust off the arsenic bottles. A few months later, Margaret Cotton was gone. Marianne had added yet another victim to her growing death toll.

She was now up to a dozen and counting. Marianne took control of Frederick Cotton's affairs, and by that April, she was pregnant. with his child, just as she planned. In a rush to legitimize the pregnancy, Marianne married Frederick Cotton in September 1870. She now took up the infamous name that would carry her twisted reputation long past her death, Mary Ann Cotton. Mary Ann's new life with Frederick was a far cry from the one she had led as Mrs. James Robinson. She had sworn she'd never returned to the miners' villages she left behind in her youth. But there she was, back to tending the children and doing

the housework in a tiny, rundown cottage owned by a coal company. All for the measly salary of a man who returned home each day, covered in soot. Mary Ann felt she had nothing in common with a man like Frederick, and found him to be intellectually frustrating. She felt she deserved better, so Marianne did what she did well. She put on the first. of a happy wife, humoring Frederick as she built his trust, waiting to make her next move. Frederick and Marianne's son, Robert Cotton, was born in January of 1871. Marianne immediately ensured the lives of her husband, her two-step sons, 10-year-old Frederick Jr., 7-year-old Charles Edward, and her baby, Robert, with British prudential,

just as she had with her past victims. And in the spring of 1871, at Marianne's behest, the family packed their belongings and headed to a town called West Auckland. There, an old lover had been waiting for Marianne to join him. We'll see the end of Marianne's twisted plan after this. Now back to the story. Back in 1866, Marianne and her lover Joseph Natress parted ways. But after leaving the Robinson home in 1869, Marianne struck up a correspondence with him once again.

It's possible that the two may have even set up potential rendezvous while in their respective marriages. But now, in the spring of 1871, newlywed Mary Ann Cotton had learned through his letters that Joseph's wife had passed away and he was lodging with a family in West Auckland. Marianne, ever the opportunist, finally saw her chance to be with him.

Once the Cotton's moved to West Auckland, they found a home on Johnson Terrace, the same street that Joseph Natchez lived on at the time. Frederick Cotton even found work in the West Auckland coal mine, the very mine that Joseph Natchez worked in. But this was hardly a coincidence. Marianne had grown bored of Frederick, but she had also gained his trust.

So any suggestion Marianne made, Frederick dutifully followed, like a rodent following a trail of crumbs. But what he didn't know is that Marianne was methodically leading him to his grave. By the end of 1871, Frederick Cotton, Marianne's fourth husband, died at 40 years old. The cause of death was listed as typhoid, yet another disease with symptoms very similar to arsenic poisoning. With Frederick out of the way, Joseph Natress and Marianne Cotton, were free to be together. Just three months after Frederick's death,

Joseph moved in with Marianne, her baby boy and step-sons under the formality of being Mary Ann's lodger. This was a huge victory for Marianne. Something she had been plotting and hoping for since her first moved to Seam Harbor over six years ago. For so long, Joseph had been unattainable.

But finally, she found herself in the arms of the only man she had ever felt genuine interest or care for. The following year was bliss for the couple. Other men had been sexually or intellectually disappointing, but Joseph was different. Marianne thought of him almost as her male equal, and during their new life together in West Auckland, she was as happy to talk to him during the day as she was to be in his arms at night. Though she had always been after wealth and power, to Marianne, Joseph represented the last shred of her humanity she managed to hold on to.

Her dream to be with him reminded her that she was capable of caring for others, despite the murder after murder she committed. Now that she had him, things could be simple. But nothing was ever simple for Marianne. The problem was that she had built up the idea of being with Joseph so much during her years of longing that the reality of finally having him was disappointing. She found living with him was just the same as being married to any mining man,

Whether it was William Mowbray or Frederick Cotton, Joseph came home just the same way, covered in coal dust and expecting his bath to be drawn. Marianne grew resentful of him. She had sworn never to be with another miner, but here she was, breaking her own promise for the third time. But more importantly, Marianne had changed. She was not the newly widowed woman Joseph had known in C.M. Harbor. By the time they had reunited, Marianne was just shy of 40 and had killed 13 people across five different cities.

Her murder career had taken over her life. She realized that Joseph Natras was nothing more than a fraud, the promise of true love, broken by the harsh reality that he, too, was flawed. So Marianne drafted a plan. Marianne advertised her services as a nurse and soon was employed to, care for a bachelor named John Quick Manning, who was recovering from smallpox. John was an excise officer at the local brewery who ensured liquors had been taxed properly. But to Marianne, all that mattered was that John held a social station above that of a

working class minor like Joseph and had no children. This was a chance that Marianne couldn't ignore. If successful, she could secure herself once again in a higher realm of society. There was just one small problem, or rather four. Once again, Marianne Cotton had to rid herself of her dependence in order to move forward. Since murdering Frederick Cotton, Marianne had been left with his two sons, her own biological son, and of course, Joseph Natris. But this was just a small challenge for her. Now that Marianne no longer idealized Joseph,

she saw him as just another body standing in the way of an opportunity. So Marianne got to work and quickly. Perhaps for the first time, she poisoned three victims at once. But wanting to avoid all three dying on the same day, which would have been far too suspicious, Marianne varied her doses of arsenic. By this point in her serial killing career, she had perfected the craft. She carefully calibrated each serving, fully aware of how much poison would prolong suffering versus how much would swiftly take a life.

In the short span of three weeks between March 10th and April 1st of 1872, all three victims had died. The first to go was 10-year-old Frederick Jr. The second was her one-year-old son, Robert, and the last was Joseph. For the moment, she left Charles alive, perhaps because the murder of an entire family

would prove a little too suspicious. Nevertheless, it was one of the big, biggest exterminations Marianne had orchestrated. And the violence didn't go unnoticed. A neighbor of Marianne's who helped her with the care of the dying family described the agony of Joseph's final days, saying that Marianne, quote, waited on him and was constantly about him. I saw no one else wait on him, end quote. She also stated that Joseph complained of pain at the bottom of his bowels, and she, quote, saw him have fits. He was very tall.

twisted up and seemed in great agony, end quote, and that Marianne had to restrain him and use great force. We can only guess as to how Marianne felt watching her former lover writhe an agony on his deathbed while she held him down. But given Marianne's years of disassociation, we can guess she felt almost nothing. Joseph was no longer her saving grace, her anchor to humanity. he was just one more drop in a sea of cold-blooded murders, and Marianne had long since grown numb to its chill. Marianne soon went to the insurance office to collect the payment from their life insurance policies and used the money to move into a larger house.

There she continued to seduce her patient, John Quick Manning, as he recovered. And it was successful. Just a few months after Joseph Natress's death in the early summer of 1860, Mary Ann was pregnant with John's child, and she awaited his proposal. An inevitability, as far as she was concerned, given that this same tactic had led her to hasty marriages twice before. But the coast wasn't totally clear for Marianne to pursue John Quick Manning. She still had Charles Edward Cotton, Frederick Cotton's last living child in her care, and John Quick Manning was in no hurry to marry a woman who was in the possession of another

man's son. So she tried everything to get rid of Charles. She contacted the boy's uncle, but the uncle refused to take him. Then she spoke with a man named Thomas Riley, who managed a workhouse for the poor, and asked to admit Charles there. Little did Marianne know, this conversation with Thomas Riley would be her undoing. Thomas explained to Marianne that in order to admit Charles to the workhouse as a minor, she would need to be admitted with him. This frustration, her. She said, perhaps it won't matter. I won't be troubled long, and he will go like all the rest of the cottons. Thomas was shocked. He asked her, you don't mean to tell me that this little healthy fellow is going to die. Marianne simply replied that Charles Edward wouldn't live to reach

manhood. This raised Thomas Riley's suspicions and sabotaged her careful planning. Just six days after their conversation in July of 1872, Thomas Riley saw Marianne standing distressed in her doorway. When Thomas went to her, Marianne announced to him that Charles Edward had died. Thomas was stunned. He immediately went to the police and urged them to delay writing a death certificate for the boy until his body could be examined. As was her habit, Marianne's first stop after Charles' death was the insurance office to collect her payment.

However, when she arrived, she was told that no death certificate was received yet, and no money would be paid out until the certificate was issued. This was a blow to Mary Ann, but she kept her cool. When questioned by the police sergeant, Marianne seemed unfazed and maintained her innocence, claiming that Thomas Riley had only made the accusations against her because she had rejected his sexual advances. But it didn't take long for local gossip to stir up rumors of Marianne's sordid history, and soon authorities expose the tally of of Marianne's dead family members. With this information, Charles' body was exhumed,

and traces of arsenic were found in his stomach. Marianne was cornered. And alone. The local gossip had frightened John Quick Manning, who fled town and didn't return for Marianne or their unborn child. Marianne had no way out. In July of 1872, Marianne was arrested, and her home searched. As Marianne was in custody, the court ordered the exhumation of the graves of her other victims,

and by no surprise, they found more evidence of poisoning. Because of Marianne's pregnancy, the trial was delayed until after the baby's birth. This bought Marianne time while in jail to attempt to sway opinions about her. She leaned into the image of a dutiful mother, steadfast in her innocence. She wrote letters to her former friends and employers who spoke well of her, urging them to come to her aid, and some did. Playing the victim worked for Marianne. The town divided into two camps,

one that was certain that Marianne was a heartless killer and adulteress who poisoned even her own children, and another that believed Marianne to be a good mother, now being blamed for the deaths of loved ones claimed by disease. Even from the confines of her jail cell, Marianne was a master manipulator. On January 7, 1873, Marianne's eighth and final child was born at the Durham County Jail. Marianne named her Margaret Edith.

The infant was soon handed off to friends to be looked after during Marianne's trial. Marianne's trial began on March 5th. That day, Marianne wore a fashionable black and white shawl over a black dress. Marianne may have been a public pariah, but she was determined to be a well-dressed one. It's in this outfit that some of the only images of Marianne were taken, and they would be widely circulated. Unsurprisingly, this sort of attire suddenly went out of fashion all across England. Marianne's defense argued that her victims had died from inhaling arsenic used in the dye of the green wallpaper in Marianne's home, but their case was weak. Marianne's trial lasted three days. However, the jury only took an hour to reach their verdict.

the judge ordered Marianne to be hanged by the neck until dead. In the weeks leading up to her execution, Marianne wrote letter after letter, begging her supporters to petition the courts and save her from the gallows. For a woman known for her poise in the presence of death, Marianne was quite different when it was she who was facing her imminent demise. She was frantic. Marianne's efforts to rally support were too little, too late.

and on March 24th, 1873, the notorious Marianne Cotton was hanged. The image of Marianne Cotton, Britain's black widow killer, dead and dangling from the gallows, was one that would linger. It immortalized itself in a twisted children's rhyme that would long echo in England's schoolyards. Marianne Cotton, she's dead and forgotten, lying in bed with her bones all wrong, rotten. Sing, sing. What can I sing? Mary Ann Cotton, tied up with string. Thanks again for tuning in to serial killers. We'll be back next Monday with a new episode. You can find more episodes of serial killers as well as all of Parcast's other podcasts on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher,

Google Play, CastBox, tune in, or your favorite podcast directory. Several of you have asked how to help the show. And if you enjoy the show, the best way to help us is to leave a five-star review. And don't forget to follow us on Facebook and Instagram at Parcast and Twitter at Parcast Network. We'll see you next time. Have a killer week. Serial Killers was created by Max Cutler, is a production of Cutler media and is part of the Parcast Network. It is produced by Max and Ron Cutler, sound design by Carrie Murphy, with production assistance by Ron Shapiro and Paul Mahler. Additional production assistance by Carly Madden and Maggie Admeyer.

Serial Killers is written by Alex Garland and stars Greg Paulson and Vanessa Richardson. Blood Trails is a true crime podcast born in the outdoors, where the terrain is unforgiving, the evidence is scarce, and the truth gets buried under brush and silence. I've seen something in the road. I instantly thought it was a sleeping bed, and there was a full of blood. Somebody somewhere knows something. I'm Jordan Sillers. Season 2 is out now with new episodes every Thursday.

Listen on the IHart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. A beloved 75-year-old man washing up getting ready for bed is brutally beaten and killed. Despite an exhaustive investigation, the killer avoids arrest and then strikes again. I'm Global News crime reporter Nancy Hicks. You might listen to a... a lot of true crime podcast this year, but they're not crime beat. Search for and follow the award-winning podcast Crime Beat on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, and wherever you find your favorite podcasts.