There was a General Dyer, who ordered the heinous cold-blood massacre at Jallianwala Bagh in Amritsar on April 13, 1919, which left over 1,000 dead. But, another Dyer, a lady emerged as Britain’s worst serial killer, as she had killed 400 babies over the period of 30 years. She was hanged to death in 1896.
Amelia Dyer created sensations in the 19th century, when it was found that she grabbed the babies of desperate unmarried mothers who paid her to have their children adopted with the hope that she would find better life for them. She took the money, but killed the infants and dumped the bodies in the Thames River.
She started the series in Bristol in the late 1860s and carried on the activities for 30 years before being captured and executed. When she started fostering service, she went high in demand. Her crime got unnoticed even as she had killed 400 babies. She was caught only after the parcel paper on an infant’s body in the Thames, revealed the address of her rented house.
Over 50 bodies were recovered from The Thames after her arrest. She was hanged at Newgate Gaol, near the Old Bailey in London, in 1896. Dyer was 58 at the time of her execution.