The shocking true story of America's first female serial killer, half of a husband and wife team who terrorized Charleston, SC, in the early 19th century.On February 18th, 1820, John and Lavinia Fisher were executed in front of some two thousand South Carolinians. To this day, legends of the husband-and-wife serial killers range from the fearsome to the fantastical—and many swear they have encountered Lavinia's ghost haunting the Old Charleston Ja...

Explore the grizzly tale of Charleston's most infamous serial killers from the beginning of their reign of horror till their eventual incarceration and execution.In 1819, a young man outwitted death at the hands of John and Lavinia Fisher and sparked the hunt for Charleston's most notorious serial killers. Former homicide investigator Bruce Orr follows the story of the Fishers, from the initial police raid on their Six Mile Inn with its reportedly grisly cellar to ...

Berkeley County, just like its sister county of Charleston, is steeped in history and rich in legend and lore. With Native American beginnings and later infused with colonial and Gullah cultures, Berkeley has seen many people come to reside. And with each of these diverse cultures came the eerie tales of ghosts, ghouls and goblins. Now, for the first time, Berkeley County ghost stories have been collected in a single volume bound to frighten and chill even the bravest of readers. Join loca...

This book examines the concept of liberty in relation to civilization’s ability to live within ecological limits.Freedom, in all its renditions – choice, thought, action – has become inextricably linked to our understanding of what it means to be modern citizens. And yet, it is our relatively unbounded freedom that has resulted in so much ecological devastation. Liberty has piggy-backed on transformations in human–nature relationships that characterize the Anthropocene: increasing ...

In Bloody Crimes, James L. Swanson—the Edgar® Award-winning, New York Times bestselling author of Manhunt —brings to life two epic events of the Civil War era: the thrilling chase to apprehend Confederate president Jefferson Davis in the wake of the Lincoln assassination and the momentous 20 -day funeral that took Abraham Lincoln's body home to Springfield. A true tale full of fascinating twists and turns, and lavishly illustrated with dozens of rare his...

In The Assassin's Accomplice, historian Kate Clifford Larson tells the gripping story of Mary Surratt, a little-known participant in the plot to kill Abraham Lincoln, and the first woman ever to be executed by the federal government of the United States. Surratt, a Confederate sympathizer, ran the boarding house in Washington where the conspirators-including her rebel son, John Surratt-met to plan the assassination. When a military tribunal convicted her for her crimes and sentenc...

"It's history that reads like a race-against-the-clock thriller." — Harlan CobenDaniel Stashower, the two-time Edgar award–winning author of The Beautiful Cigar Girl, uncovers the riveting true story of the "Baltimore Plot," an audacious conspiracy to assassinate Abraham Lincoln on the eve of the Civil War in THE HOUR OF PERIL.In February of 1861, just days before he assumed the presidency, Abraham Lincoln faced a "clear and...

Named a New York Times Notable BookNamed A Boston Globe Best Nonfiction BookBestselling author Tony Horwitz tells the electrifying tale of the daring insurrection that put America on the path to bloody war.Plotted in secret, launched in the dark, John Brown's raid on Harpers Ferry was a pivotal moment in U.S. history. But few Americans know the true story of the men and women who launched a desperat...

For sheer bravado and style, no woman in the North or South rivaled the Civil War heroine Rose O’Neale Greenhow. Fearless spy for the Confederacy, glittering Washington hostess, legendary beauty and lover, Rose Greenhow risked everything for the cause she valued more than life itself. In this superb portrait, biographer Ann Blackman tells the surprising true story of a unique woman in history.“I am a Southern woman, born with revolutionary blood in my veins,” Rose once declared–and...

A National Book Award FinalistWinner of the Frederick Douglass Book PrizeA startling and eye-opening look into America’s First Family, Never Caught is the powerful story about a daring woman of “extraordinary grit” (The Philadelphia Inquirer).When George Washington was elected president, he reluctantly left behind his beloved Mount Vernon to serve in Philadelphia, the temporary seat of the nation’s ...

From Midnight to Dawn presents compelling portraits of the men and women who established the Underground Railroad and traveled it to find new lives in Canada. Evoking the turmoil and controversies of the time, Tobin illuminates the historic events that forever connected American and Canadian history by giving us the true stories behind well-known figures such as Harriet Tubman and John Brown. She also profiles lesser-known but equally heroic figures such as Mary Ann Shadd, who bec...

This sensitively told tale of suffering, brutality, and inhumanity explores an epic history of race and punishment in the deepest South from emancipation to the Civil Rights Era—and beyond.Immortalized in blues songs and movies like Cool Hand Luke and The Defiant Ones, Mississippi’s infamous Parchman State Penitentiary was synonymous with cruelty. Now, noted historian David Oshinsky gives us the true story of the notorious prison, drawing on polic...