The Woman in Black – Victorian Mourning as Criminal Disguise A look at the rogues’ gallery of crimes committed in the United States from about 1860 to 1929 under the cover of crape by The Women in Black.
The final chapter in my book The Ghost Wore Black: Ghastly Tales from the Past tells of a little-known 19th-century panic over those mistresses of the dark, The Women in Black. They were the female equivalent of Spring-heeled Jack, without the flames and (sometimes) the leaping, and they terrified communities across the United States from roughly 1865 to 1915.
Mistresses of the Dark: The Ghost Wore Black The final chapter in my book The Ghost Wore Black: Ghastly Tales from the Past tells of a little-known 19th-century panic over those mistresses of the dark, The Women in Black. This story is a good illustration of some of the features of the apparitions: clothed in widow’s weeds, seen outdoors at night, bullet-proof and evasive.