Dark Histories

Episodes page 3 of 6

1. The Bussey’s Woods Ghost Mystery & The Murders of Franklin B. Evans

   11 Jul 2023 · 1 h 19 min · S7 E14

   Hi everyone! Thanks for bearing with me over the short summer break! It's good to be back and I've got a cracking episode to launch into the second half of the season. This one has it all, ghosts, murder... well…

2. The Horror of M.R. James: Lost Hearts & A School Story

   26 Jun 2023 · 48 min · S7 E13

   It's time for a mid-season summer break and to tide us over I've got a couple of tales for you from the genius of M.R. James. I've picked two of my favourites to read, I hope you enjoy them! ------- This episode is…

3. Cocos Island & The Lost Treasure of Lima

   12 Jun 2023 · 1 h 10 min · S7 E12

   Deep in the Pacific Ocean, 350 miles off the coast of Central America sits a small, unimposing island, surrounded in natural beauty. One of the island's lesser known claims to fame is that its tropical climate and…

4. Sarah Hart: Murder on the Telegraph Cables

   31 May 2023 · 1 h 18 min · S7 E11

   When a young woman was found lying on her hearth rug, foaming at the mouth on New Years Day of 1845, few would have guessed that the winding path leading up to her death would result in a mystery that would become…

5. Russel Colvin’s Return from the Dead

   17 May 2023 · 1 h 11 min · S7 E10

   In 1812, in the Manchester settlement of Vermont, a local man named Russell Colvin mysteriously vanished, and despite extensive searches, no trace of him was found. Years later, rumours began to circulate that Russell…

6. Rhynwick Williams & The London Monster

   8 May 2023 · 1 h 15 min · S7 E9

   19th century London saw two of the most sensational public scares in its long history when the enigmatic Spring Heeled Jack stalked the alleyways of the capital city and in 1888, when Jack the Ripper enacted his reign…

7. Escape From Yozgat: The Spooks of Jones & Hill

   19 Apr 2023 · 1 h 26 min · S7 E8

   During the First World War, the Ottoman Empire established a wide network of camps to house prisoners of war from the allied powers. Like most, the conditions were often poor, the treatment often harsh and the…

8. Object No. 22542: The Unlucky Mummy

   4 Apr 2023 · 59 min · S7 E7

   Almost thirty years before the opening of the tomb of Tutankhamun and the fabled “curse of the pharaohs” was unleashed upon an excitable population, rumours and stories of another curse, attached to an ancient object,…

9. The Mount Stewart Farm Murder Mystery

   22 Mar 2023 · 1 h 17 min · S7 E6

   In 1866 a gruesome murder on a rural farm in the centre of Scotland shocked the local community. With little clues to go on outside of a bloody axe, a boiled egg and a missing door key, the police would eventually be…

10. Introducing - Cover Up: Ministry of Secrets

    14 Mar 2023 · 6:07 · Episode 32

    Cover Up is a series of investigative stories that take us on a journey into a world of subterfuge and secrecy - a world where the truth is concealed under a blanket of lies. From corrupt individuals to clandestine…

11. Hugh & Mary Parsons & The Springfield Witch Trials

    8 Mar 2023 · 1 h 09 min · S7 E5

    Forty years before the infamous witch trials in Salem, Massachusetts, Hugh Parsons stepped out of his dirty, disease ridden prison cell in Boston and was carted off towards the courthouse in order to stand trial as a…

12. Dr Buck Ruxton & The Jigsaw Murders

    24 Feb 2023 · 1 h 13 min · S7 E4

    By the 1930s forensic police work had just begun to come into its own. The late 1920s had introduced advancements that had seen investigations using more than simple fingerprint evidence to solve crime and in America…

13. Electricity, Galvanism & The Resurrection of Thomas Weems

    7 Feb 2023 · 53 min · S7 E3

    In 1818 Mary Shelley published her infamous novel, “Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus”. More than just a work of gothic fiction, it represented a host of fears and concerns that the public held after viewing…

14. Early Cinematography & The Disappearance of Louis Le Prince

    24 Jan 2023 · 1 h 02 min · S7 E2

    In the 19th century moving images were everywhere. Illusionists cast tricks using mirrors and shadows, whilst flick books, magic lanterns and Zoopraxiscopes unveiled the hidden mysteries of motion to a wide-eyed…

15. The Black Dog of Bungay & Other Spectral Beasts

    9 Jan 2023 · 55 min · S7 E1

    From ancient origins, to Churchill, who popularised the Victorian phrase “The black dog on your back”, the concept of the spectral black dog as a portent of doom, death and catastrophe is one that has maintained, with…

16. Christmas Campfire 2022 (Part 2)

    29 Dec 2022 · 38 min · S6 E22

    Hi everyone, I hope you all have had a wonderful Christmas or at least a nice bit of time off work... Here's part 2 of the 2022 Campfire episode, which should hopefully be something to help pass the time in these…

17. Introducing: The Last Resort

    24 Dec 2022 · 10 min · Episode 31

    What if California seceded from the United States? If it did, what would happen? The Last Resort is a new documentary podcast about the rise, fall, and rebirth of CAL-EXIT: the campaign for Californian Independence.…

18. Christmas Campfire 2022 (Part 1)

    24 Dec 2022 · 1 h 00 min · S6 E21

    Hi everyone, Christmas Campfire is back for it's 6th year! A big thank you to everyone who wrote in and shared their personal stories. There were tons this year, so I've split it into two episodes and part 2 will be…

19. Introducing The Evaporated: Gone with the Gods

    15 Dec 2022 · 9:06

    What if someone close to you just … vanished one day? That happens to tens of thousands of families a year in Japan, and it happened to Jake Adelstein, too, back in 2018 — when his accountant disappeared, just before…

20. Virginia Campbell & The Sauchie Poltergeist

    5 Dec 2022 · 58 min · S6 E20

    Despite the number of documented cases, the poltergeist has consistently been one of the most difficult forms of paranormal phenomena to define with very little consensus over what they are actually supposed to be.…

21. Eliza Grimwood & The Lambeth Ripper

    16 Nov 2022 · 1 h 11 min · S6 E19

    In 1838 a violent murder took place in the Lambeth area of London that set a trend for the stories of the Victorian penny papers for decades to come. Inspiring Charles Dickens, who paid close interest to the case,…

22. Amazon Music Presents MrBallen Podcast: Strange, Dark, and Mysterious Stories

    2 Nov 2022 · 9:07

    A hiker terrorized for days by two unknown figures… A man stalked through the woods while camping, who barely escaped with his life… two cops who quit their job at a local theater because of unexplained encounters with…

23. Amazon Music Presents: I Hear Fear

    1 Nov 2022 · 7:15

    Nothing is as terrifying as the sounds we hear in the dark. The slow creak of a door opening late at night... or a whisper in a room when you thought you were alone... or a distant scream in the wind. One noise at the…

24. Demonic Possession & Exorcism Through The Ages

    31 Oct 2022 · 56 min · S6 E18

    According to the late Father Gabrielle Amorth, co-founder of the International Association of Exorcists, Hitler, Stalin, ISIS, Harry Potter and Yoga were all, in one way or another, touched by demonic influence, This…

25. The Debosnys Ciphers

    17 Oct 2022 · 55 min · S6 E17

    Whether it be hidden messages transmitted around the world from the hundreds of operating number stations, or the bizarre illustrations on the sheepskin pages of a medieval manuscript, unsolved ciphers and codes have…

26. Madeleine Smith & The Dangerous Game of Dating in the 19th Century

    29 Sep 2022 · 1 h 14 min · S6 E16

    Dating in the 21st century can be a tricky path to manoeuvre, but in reality, the difficulties pale in comparison when compared to the complex etiquette and social pressures that one was doomed to follow in the…

27. The Bizarre History of the Hollow Earth

    12 Sep 2022 · 52 min · S6 E15

    Far from being a modern, internet crackpot idea, hollow earth theory has walked a long and winding path, many centuries old. From the mythological pits of hell, to the pseudo-scientific theories of the enlightenment,…

28. The Thin Place: Netta Fornario & The Occult

    25 Aug 2022 · 1 h 00 min · S6 E14

    Widely mischaracterized in popular understanding, the early 20th century world of the occult has never failed to serve up a plethora of intriguing tales. From stories of new age magic, otherworldly realms, alchemy and…

29. The Haunting of Willington Mill

    7 Aug 2022 · 1 h 08 min · S6 E13

    In England, the Tyne River, famously flowing through the centre of Newcastle on its way to the North Eastern coast, has for many centuries been a vein of industry. In the early 19th Century the banks were filled with…

30. The Tichborne Claimant: A Tale of Two Butchers

    26 Jul 2022 · 1 h 23 min · S6 E12

    When Sir Roger Tichborne was shipwrecked and lost at sea in 1854, his mother fell into a deep state of mourning, both devastated by the loss of her son and insistent that he was still alive. As much as the rest of her…

31. The Murder of George Little & The Broadstone Mystery

    6 Jul 2022 · 1 h 18 min · S6 E11

    Broadstone station in Dublin, Ireland creaked, clanked and clattered with the din of everyday rail traffic. In 19th Century Ireland, it was one of the grandest buildings in the country's capital, and every day hundreds…

32. Esther Cox & The Great Amherst Mystery

    20 Jun 2022 · 1 h 05 min · S6 E10

    “The manifestations described in this story commenced one year ago. No person has yet been able to ascertain their cause. Scientific men from all parts of Canada and the United States have investigated them in vain.…

33. Catherine Elise Muller & Her Mission to Mars

    6 Jun 2022 · 1 h 06 min · S6 E9

    The belief of extraterrestrial life is one of the most exotic, exciting and long endearing throughout human history. Mars in particular has always proven to be of particular interest. One of our nearest planetary…

34. The Mary Cecilia Rogers Mystery

    18 May 2022 · 1 h 01 min · S6 E8

    In the 19th Century, the Elysian Fields in New Jersey, lay just a short boat trip away for New Yorkers looking to stretch their legs, take in some rural, countryside air or relax on the lawn of a riverside refreshment…

35. Garbo & The Ghost Spies of WWII

    2 May 2022 · 1 h 07 min · S6 E7

    When the Allied forces hit the beaches of Normandy on D-Day, in June of 1944, everyone was well aware of the importance of success. Gaining a foothold on the beaches was the first step in the liberation of France,…

36. The Medieval Ghosts of Byland Abbey

    11 Apr 2022 · 49 min · S6 E6

    Some time around the turn of the fifteenth century, a Cistercian monk of Byland Abbey took it upon himself to pen a series of ghost stories on the empty pages of a folio containing some of the library's more…

37. Iron Mike Malloy: The Man Who Would Not Die

    29 Mar 2022 · 1 h 17 min · S6 E5

    Depression-era New York was a tough time for a guy just looking to get by. The pressure of feeding a family, the lack of available work, the poor conditions suffered from much of the work that was available and at the…

38. Jürgenson, Raudive & A Brief History of EVP

    14 Mar 2022 · 1 h 00 min · S6 E4

    An evolution of centuries-long efforts to contact and communicate with the dead, the practice of recording voices from the great beyond was attempted almost as soon as radio and tape recording technology became widely…

39. The Floreana Affair: Murder in Paradise

    2 Mar 2022 · 1 h 09 min · S6 E3

    Given a certain degree of infamy thanks to Charles Darwin, the Galapagos Islands are far less famous for their role in playing host to a tiny, isolated German ex-pat community in the 1930s, living quietly, surrounded…

40. The Unsolved Murder of Sir Harry Oakes

    14 Feb 2022 · 1 h 10 min · S6 E2

    In the 1940s the Bahamas was something of a tropical paradise for the world’s rich. Used as a tax haven and an island getaway far removed from the battlefields of war, it was an idyllic retreat for those that could…

41. Tom Slick & The Search for the Yeti

    23 Jan 2022 · 1 h 17 min · S6 E1

    High up in the peaks of the Himalayas, a footprint in the snow baffles a mountaineer as he attempts to climb Everest for the first time. Pulling out his camera, he prepares to snap a shot, eyeing the horizon nervously…

42. Christmas Campfire 2021 (Part 2)

    4 Jan 2022 · 1 h 02 min · S5 E20

    Happy New Year! Here is part of the Christmas (New year? Holiday?) Campfire episode! This year's campfire was a brilliant collection of stories, thank you so much to everyone who sent in stories and got involved.…

43. Christmas Campfire 2021 (Part 1)

    24 Dec 2021 · 1 h 07 min · S5 E19

    Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, Happy Holidays everyone! Here is the first part of this years Christmas Campfire episode and I have to say a massive thank you to everyone who sent stories in! This year the Campfire…

44. The Gloucester Sea Serpent of 1817

    7 Dec 2021 · 1 h 08 min · S5 E18

    From the ancient pages of the Old Norse Edda to the interwar pages of American adventure magazines, the depths of our oceans have, in imagination, been host to unspeakable monsters for many hundreds of years. In modern…

45. The New York Press & The Headless Torso Mystery

    17 Nov 2021 · 1 h 15 min · S5 E18

    New York journalism in 1897 was in a pretty technicolor space. Newspapers, so long the grey, stolid, medium of the merchants and businessman, were instead being filled with lurid stories of murder, scandal and drunken…

46. The Supernatural in War

    1 Nov 2021 · 1 h 06 min · S5 E17

    Prior to the First World War, ghostly apparitions across battlefields tended to be confined to large scale skirmishes fought in the skies. In America, Modern folklore has helped to spawn a cottage industry within the…

47. The Borley Rectory Affair

    17 Oct 2021 · 1 h 28 min · Episode 30

    When Harry Price published his first book covering Borley Rectory in 1940, he would have been well aware of how sensational, and potentially controversial, the title would appear. “The Most Haunted House in England”…

48. Biped Beavers & The Man Bats from the Moon

    27 Sep 2021 · 1 h 32 min · S5 E15

    1938 saw one of the world's most famous media hoaxes terrify a nation of unexpecting listeners when the original War of the Worlds radio broadcast was sent out across the airwaves unannounced, leading many to believe…

49. The Many Confessions of Alfred Packer

    5 Sep 2021 · 1 h 39 min · S5 E14

    The North American mineral rushes of the 19th Century saw hundreds of thousands flock to mountains and mines across the continent in search of fame and fortune, from panning for gold to working long, dangerous shifts…

50. Somerton Man With Professor Derek Abbott

    27 Jul 2021 · 55 min · S5 E13

    Hi everyone, I'm taking a small summer break for a couple of weeks, so to cover the gap I have a few older patreon bonus episodes to put out for the main feed and give everyone a chance to hear them. Here is an…