Marriage and Imprisonment
On 6 July 1934, Haigh married the 23 year-old Beatrice Hamer. The marriage soon fell apart. The same year Haigh was jailed for fraud, Betty gave birth while he was in prison but she gave the baby girl up for adoption and left Haigh. Likewise, his conservative family ostracised him from that point onwards.
He then moved to London in 1936, and became chauffeur to William McSwan, the wealthy owner of amusement parlours. Additionally, he used his mechanical gifts to maintain McSwan's amusement machines. Following that he became a bogus solicitor and received a four-year jail sentence for fraud. Haigh was released just after the start of World War II and, continuing as a fraudster, was sentenced to several terms of imprisonment.
While in prison he dreamed up what he considered the perfect murder of being able to destroy the body by dissolving it with sulphuric acid. He experimented with mice and found it took only 30 minutes for the body to disappear.
Read more about this topic: John George Haigh
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