# History's Deadliest Women: The Evil Stepmother

An episode of [Betwixt The Sheets: The History of Sex, Scandal & Society](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1612090432), 21 Aug 2026, 42 min.

Audio: https://sphinx.acast.com/p/acast/s/betwixt-the-sheets/e/6a85b1036701ba1ebb5a436e/media.mp3?tk=eyJ0ayI6ImRlZmF1bHQiLCJhZHMiOnRydWUsInNwb25zIjp0cnVlLCJzdGF0dXMiOiJwdWJsaWMifQ==&sig=AkM-0GLJHVt_phv8aEG5y_nto0to_qyopa3gtI_Cw4I

In 1909, the third and final woman hanged in Western Australia was executed. She had murdered three of her step children. What drove Martha Rendall to kill these children? Why did others in their neighbourhood stand by and not raise the alarm sooner? And how do our understandings of women who kill factor into the evil stepmother figure factor? This episode was edited by Tim Arstall. The producer was Sophie Gee. The senior producer was Freddy Chick. Sign up to History Hit for hundreds of hours of original documentaries, with a new release every week and ad-free podcasts. Sign up at https://www.historyhit.com/subscribe. You can take part in our listener survey here. All music from Epidemic Sounds. Betwixt the Sheets: History of Sex, Scandal & Society is a History Hit podcast. History Hit is part of Little Dot Studios, a Certified B Corp™ Voting is now open for the Listener's Choice Award at this year's Podcast Awards! UK & Ireland listeners please place your vote on the Spotify mobile app here: https://open.spotify.com/s/xhg6PJa Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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