By Jen Montz
On September 7th, 1941, in Neasden, England, a child was born who would commit crimes later in life that would bring him notoriety. His name was Graham Frederick young. Graham’s mother, Bessie, died shortly after giving birth to him of tuberculosis. Her death devastated Graham’s father, Fred, who had no choice but to send Graham to live with his Aunt Winnie and his daughter, Winifred, to live with her grandparents.
For 2 years the children lived with relatives, until their father remarried and settled down in St. Albans. The reunion with his father proved difficult for young Graham, who showed signs of being distressed by the separation from his aunt. As time progressed, Young became a very isolated, strange child, seeming to prefer the company of himself to his peers.
Time passed, and as he grew older, Young began to show an interest in accounts of various murderers, showing an interest in true crime stories rather than fictional accounts, such as the book “Sixty Famous Trials”. His favorite subjects were Dr. Hawley Harvey Crippen, a homeopathic physician who was found guilty of murdering his wife through poisoning in 1910 and William Palmer a Victorian doctor who poisoned his wife with antimony. At around 9 or 10, he began stealing perfumes and nail polish from his stepmother, Molly, to analyze what compounds it contained and sniff the vapors. He seemed to become absolutely obsessed with chemistry and forensic toxicology. However, since the coverage of these subjects was minimal in school, he was forced to study these subjects on his own, leading to an advanced knowledge of poisons and chemicals.
By age 12, he was also fascinated with Hitler, the SS and Nazi Germany. The experiments of Dr. Josef Mengele were also a point of fascination, and he would go on to anyone who would listen to him about how Hitler was misunderstood, a maligned leader. He wore a swastika badge to school on numerous occasions, only adding to his peers ostracizing him, as WWII was still an open wound in many people’s minds at the time.
Around this age, he also developed a fascination with the occult. This went as far as him claiming to have been recruited into a local coven, with Young trying to recruit local children as well as animal sacrifice. There is at least one account of sacrificing a cat, although the disappearance of several neighborhood cats suggests this was a common practice.
By 14, Graham Young had traded up in his experimentation. He went from sniffing perfume to sniffing ether to get a buzz. He had taken to carrying around a vial of acid, a move that eventually caused a hole in his blazer when the vial started leaking. Young would even take apart fireworks, using the gunpowder in them to make homemade bombs, which resulted in an explosion that blew up a hut and wall on a neighbor’s property. Yet, like so many young potential killers, he talked his way out of getting in any trouble, and the incident was chalked up to the old adage of “Boys will be boys.” His father just couldn’t fathom that his son, who he had a close relationship with, was anything but an average teen.
Despite his odd demeanor and isolation, he did manage to make one “friend”, a youth by the name of Christopher Williams, who was a neighbor of the Young family. Williams and Young would often be seen eating lunch together, even swapping sandwiches sometimes. After a time, Williams began getting sick, suffering stomachaches, headaches and general sickness. His mother was confounded by this, and thought that maybe he was faking to get out of school or other responsibilities. Even the doctors he was taken to see couldn’t figure it out, suggesting that he was probably suffering from migraines since stomachaches and headaches are common symptoms of the malady.
No one had reason to suspect that, in fact, the misery that Christopher was suffering was at the hands of Graham Young. Even with his extensive knowledge of chemistry, and despite the fact that his father had bought him a chemistry set (a move that, at this point in Graham’s life, was like giving a Basic English textbook to Shakespeare), Graham was only 13, not nearly old enough to get any materials to poison anyone. Well, unbeknownst to any parties, Young had somehow managed to pass himself off as a 17-year-old university student at local chemists’ shops, stockpiling enough antimony, thallium, digitalis and arsenic, and now possessed enough to kill a few hundred people
While Young’s interest in using these chemicals on Christopher seemed to be mostly experimental, there were a couple of occasions where Williams fell ill at the perfect time of benefit to Graham, including one interesting incident. Williams had secured a date with a girl that both he and Young were interested in. Williams was planning on taking her to a taping of a TV show. But mysteriously, he fell ill on the day of the date and Young took his place.
However, despite Graham’s experimentation on Christopher, and not withstanding a fight on the playground between the two boys in which Graham had said to Christopher “I will kill you for this,” they maintained a friendship. Graham was still free of any suspicion, feigning concern when his friend was sick, expressing his sympathy, watching in fascination, all the while basically telling his friend what to expect next as far as symptoms.
Through all of this, Graham had earned the nickname of “The Mad Professor”. Even though it was meant as a pejorative term, Graham took to the nickname. He also had developed a reputation because of various macabre drawings. One former schoolmate and friend of Christopher, Clive Creager, recalled some of the drawings. They showed Creager hanging over an acid vat from a gallows, stuck with vials labeled “poison”. He had said of Young “He was evil and I was afraid of him.”
Another drawing, this one described by Winifred Young, was of his stepmother, Molly. Drawn after she had confiscated a mouse he had been experimenting on, it was a tombstone, marked simply with “In Hateful Memory of Molly Young, R.I.P.” Yet another incident, recalled by Winifred in her book “Obsessive Poisoner”, was of Graham’s possession of a voodoo doll of Molly, pins stuck into it. He often told psychiatrists that his life would have been better and happier had his mother not died. It was thought he held particular resentment against Molly because she was very strict with him.
After some time, Graham realized that his poisoning of Christopher, while interesting, served little purpose since he could only observe the effects fully while he was in school. Since using his friend as a test subject was no longer an option, he turned to the human guinea pigs nearest and dearest to him, his family. After all, this way he had a captive group to experiment on, and could observe all effects firsthand, without having to miss out on any of the results.
Winifred was his first test subject. He served her a cup of tea one day in 1961. She took one sip and couldn’t drink anymore. It tasted too bitter to her. About an hour after that, on her way to work on the train, she started hallucinating. It was so severe she had to be helped from the station and eventually had to be seen in the hospital. After testing, the doctors found that she was a victim of belladonna poisoning, a plant which is extremely toxic. She told Fred, her father, and suddenly something clicked in his head. His son, Graham, was fascinated by chemistry…Was there a chance that he’d had a hand in this? After all, he’d been banned from conducting experiments in the house after setting fire to some furniture. Could he have accidentally poisoned Winifred?
Upon confrontation, Graham said it must’ve been Winifred herself, who had been using the teacups to mix shampoo. At least that was Graham’s account of things. This excuse was good enough for Fred, though, and he let the matter drop without any further investigation.
Around the same time, Molly Young, 37, had begun to fall ill, complaining of stomach cramps, diarrhea and vomiting. She figured it must just be a stomach flu, and didn’t give it a second thought. Soon after, Fred, 44, and Winifred, 22, started to suffer from the same symptoms. Even Graham wasn’t immune. It seemed that the Young household was suffering from a particularly virulent flu that just wouldn’t go away. Had they discovered the truth, Molly may have been spared her eventual fate.
It was Graham causing this mystery illness, spiking his family’s meals. No one is sure if Graham had been deliberately poisoning himself, if it was simply working with the chemicals that made him sick or if he’d simply forgotten what he’d poisoned, but in any case, it worked out for him, helping him avoid detection for quite a while. However, nothing lasts forever.
By early 1962, Molly’s condition had worsened severely. She was losing her hair, losing weight and had pain that would leave her writhing in pain and unable to move. She almost seemed to be wasting away, even aging noticeably through this ordeal, something that’s quite common with someone going through an extended illness. On Easter Sunday of 1962, Molly’s suffering would finally come to an end.
That morning she woke up feeling far worse than normal. Her hands and feet were tingling, feeling as if she had “pins and needles” sticking into them, and also had unusual stiffness and pain in her neck. Even though she was in pain, she still went out to shop, even though she returned before lunch while her husband was out at the pub. Later in the day, Fred returned home to find Molly writhing in pain in the back garden and Graham staring out the window in fascination, or perhaps in admiration of his work.
Later that day Molly was dead. Her doctors ruled the cause of death as a prolapsed spinal bone, one of the symptoms of long-term antimony poisoning. The connection was never made by doctors. Molly had been involved in a bus crash the year before and taken a blow to her head, which made it seem logical the slipped disk had caused her death. The reality of the situation, however, was much grimmer. Graham Young had been poisoning his stepmother over the past months with antimony, using enough over a long enough time that the woman had developed a tolerance. The youth had finally ended her life by poisoning her the previous day with a large amount of thallium. Graham had used 20 grains, overkill by any measure, enough to cause the deaths of at least five people. Unsurprisingly, there were accounts of people falling ill after the funeral, more than likely because of the spiked mustard that had been used on the sandwiches served to the guests.
After Molly’s untimely death, Fred’s symptoms worsened until he, too, ended up in the hospital. While at the hospital, Graham visited his father, repeating his earlier habit of describing the next step in the illness, and even discussing with the doctors treating his father whether it was arsenic or antimony that was the cause of his sickness. When the doctors figured out that it was antimony, they realized one more dose could have killed him. Even though he didn’t know that it was Graham poisoning him that caused the malady he was suffering through, he did tell Winifred that Graham shouldn’t be allowed to visit him in the hospital. His father later realized that he seemed to be sickest on Mondays, after spending the day before at the pub with Graham.
Even through all this, he didn’t piece together that it was his son causing these problems. The honor of finding Graham out went to the boy’s chemistry teacher. After the teacher contacted police, Graham’s desk was searched. Poisons were found, as were pages upon pages about poisoners and his infamous drawings.
After the discovery of the materials, Graham Young was sent to see a police psychiatrist. He showed off his extensive knowledge about various poisonous compounds. The psychiatrist became worried and told the police to report his findings. At first, Graham denied being involved in poisoning his family. He eventually confessed to the poisoning of Winifred, Fred and Christopher, but refused to admit he had killed Molly through the same means. Since she had been cremated, there was no way to prove his guilt in her death, and he escaped a murder charge. He even lead police to his stash, hidden in the hut he’d blown up across the road.
The trial date came, and after a guilty verdict for the poisonings, he was found to lack moral sense, what is now considered psychopathic behavior. Young was immediately committed to Broadmoor Hospital under the Mental Health Act, as he was a very obvious threat to others. This is perhaps best highlighted by a remark made by him before his trial. He’d said that he missed him antimony and the power it gave him. He was only 14 at the time of his commitment, the youngest patient in over 75 years.
Things at the institution were uneventful for the first few weeks following his arrival there. Soon enough, though, one of the inmates had fallen ill and died. His name was John Berridge, a man whom Young had complained about in letters to his sister, annoyed at his snoring. The death was ruled as a suicide, despite Young’s bragging that he’d been the one to kill him, claiming that he’d used cyanide made from the laurel bushes that were just outside of the institution.
A few other incidents occurred while Young was at Broadmoor. The staff and inmates drinks were poisoned on several occasions. Once, there was a powdered soap, often called sugar soap for its resemblance of sugar, found in a tea urn. Had it not been discovered, there was the potential for the poisoning and possible deaths of upward of 70 people. Another incident was the poisoning of the staff’s coffee with bleach. This led to threats from the staff when inmates misbehaved, threatening to let “Graham make your coffee.”
Another of Young’s old habits persisted: His obsession with Nazi culture. Even while locked up, he grew a Hitler-style moustache and reportedly carved hundreds of wooden swastikas that he would wear around his neck.
After about 8 years incarcerated in Broadmoor, Graham Young was said to have been cured. When informed, Young wrote a letter to Winifred, telling her “Your friendly neighborhood Frankenstein will soon be released.” He apparently also told a nurse that, upon his release, he’d kill one person for every year he’d spent in the institution. Despite all of this, on February 4th, 1971, Young walked out of Broadmoor a free man at the age of 23.
Graham’s father Fred wasn’t too keen on having his son move back in with him. He still hadn’t forgiven Graham for killing his wife, and couldn’t forgive the permanent damage the poison had inflicted on his system. However, Winifred was happy to hear Graham was now free, and invited her brother to stay with her and her husband. She was apprehensive at first, fearing another bout of illness caused by her brother, but the household escaped any harm at his hands.
While Graham seemed to have his former ways under control, he would still go on about Hitler, and how his “Final Solution” seemed to be the way to go with Northern Ireland, where hostilities had hit a high point at this time. He might have been cured, but was still visibly an odd man.
Soon after arriving at his sister’s home, he made a trip to the chemist’s he used to visit as a child, his old neighborhood and even his old teacher who’d originally reported him to the police. Like most killers, it seemed he couldn’t resist returning to the scenes of his crimes. During these visits, he recalled what he’d done, seeming prouder of that than the fact he was now rehabilitated.
Within a week, he’d found a job in Slough as a shopkeeper and moved to a hostel in town. Soon after moving into the hostel, one of the other residents by the name of Trevor Sparkes, age 34, began exhibiting strange symptoms like abdominal cramps and severe illness, familiar symptoms that plagued those Young’s family. At the suggestion of Young, Sparkes tried a glass of wine to calm his stomach. This only served to exacerbate the symptoms. Sparkes’ face swelled up, his stomach problems and vomiting became even worse, and he developed new symptoms, including scrotal pains and diarrhea. Sparkes’ symptoms became so grave that he lost control of his legs while on the pitch during a game. No doctor could find a medical cause for any of his symptoms and Sparkes could no longer play soccer, the sport that he loved so much. He experienced pains for years after the incident.
Another man fell ill with severe pain. He’d said he’d had a drink with a man who seemed infatuated with poisonous substances and chemicals. He would commit suicide due to the pain he was going through. If we count him as a victim, that brings Young’s total to 3, with the death of his stepmother and the Broadmoor inmate, even though no official connection between Graham and the latter 2 deaths were made.
Soon after these incidents, Young took a job at John Hadland Laboratories in Bodvington, Hertfordhsire. This particular lab dealt with photography supplies, including thallium, a former favorite poison of Young’s. Management at the lab did know about his incarceration at Broadmoor, although the circumstances that brought about the stay weren’t disclosed. Had they known Young had been locked up for poisoning his family, there may have been some apprehension in hiring him. They even contacted the psychiatrist who’d treated Young, Dr. Udwin. The doctor told the management at the lab Young had suffered from a personality disorder, but was now recovered.
Young was being trained by Ron Hewitt, who was staying on for a few weeks to train Young before his retirement. Young seemed to be a kind man, often making tea and coffee for his co-workers, a gesture that most people saw as a kindness. He even became close to his floor manager, Bob Egle, and Fred Biggs, the stock supervisor. They would let him bum cigarettes and give him bus fare. Soon, though, Hewitt was sick with diarrhea, stomach pains and a sensation of burning in his throat, all of which came about after drinking some tea that Young had given him. Doctors diagnosed him with either the flu or a case of food poisoning, since it only lasted a few days. After he was well enough, he went back to work, soon after becoming sick again. This cycle repeated at least twelve times, with the doctors baffled each time as to the cause of the symptoms.
Hewitt wasn’t the only person to get ill at Hadland. People were off sick in increasing numbers, some with flu-like symptoms, others with sexual dysfunction or hair loss. There was a search for a cause, and everything from water contamination, radiation poisoning and chemical leakage was considered, but no headway was made.
The numbers struck by mystery illnesses included Bob Egle and Fred Biggs, as well. Egle was experiencing dizziness and cramps, which were chalked up to being symptoms of what was being colloquially called the “Bodvington Bug”. Schoolchildren in the area had the same problems, so his sickness didn’t raise any concern. He would take time off to get over his sickness, and after recovering, he would relapse into his illness as soon as he returned to the Lab. After returning for what would be his last day at work, he was struck by the feeling of pins and needles in his extremities, and had severe pain every time he tried to move. He was admitted to the hospital and, essentially paralyzed from the numbness. He died on July 7th, 1971. The official cause was listed as pneumonia caused by Guillane-Barré syndrome. Young feigned concern so convincingly that he was chosen to attend the cremation of Bob Egle.
Soon enough, after a relatively calm period without incidents of sickness, Fred Biggs was exhibiting symptoms similar to Egle’s, as other workers began to experience worsening symptoms of the Bodvington Bug. One co-worker of Young’s, Jethro Batt, took a cup of coffee from Young, but threw it out after he tasted it. It was too bitter to him. Young immediately went on the defensive, asking if Batt thought that the coffee was poisoned. Peter Buck became ill, as well as David Tilson. Tilson and Batt both experienced hair loss and sexual dysfunction, while Diana got rather lucky, with smelly feet being her only complaint.
Biggs’ plight continued to worsen until his skin began to peel off. The pain he felt made it excruciating for even sheets to touch him. He ended up in the London Hospital for Nervous Diseases, which dashed any hopes Young had of observing his handiwork. Biggs ultimately died there after suffering through massive pain, on November 19th, 1971.
Two deaths in the shop raised red flags in the eyes of many. While the doctor for the lab tried to calm any worries in the worker’s minds, telling them the lab was compliant with all safety practices, Young continually impugned him, asking why thallium was no longer being considered as a possible source of the illness. Young’s in depth knowledge made the doctor suspicious, and he reported Young’s behavior to the police. Prior to this, thallium wasn’t used as a poison in England, and the symptoms weren’t widely known.
Death by thallium is a painful, long lasting one. In order to know about it, someone would have to be either a doctor or someone with firsthand experience. First comes stomach pain, diarrhea and vomiting. There’s often loss of hair, and skin becomes thick and scaly. Next comes nerve decay (which explains the strange pains that Molly, Biggs and Egle experienced, as well as Molly and Egle’s sensations of pins and needles), along with loss of control of the extremities, with delirium eventually setting in. Finally, the victim’s lungs give out. If the person survives, the toxin working its way out of their system is just as agonizing, taking days or weeks for the victim to be rid of it. In the case of repeated poisoning, as Young’s victims suffered through, the effects take weeks to kill someone.
The hubris Young displayed to the doctor would ultimately lead to his undoing. As there was already an investigation going on, it didn’t take long for Young to become a suspect after the confrontation between the doctor and him. The police realized that the symptoms started soon after Young started working at Hadland, and testing of the victims revealed thallium poisoning. It was then they officially made the connection, and after informing the lab of Young’s prior conviction involving the poisoning of his family.
A search of Young’s room yielded a wealth of material, including diaries that detailed in morbid detail the amount of toxins used on the victims as well as the effects. There were drawings on the walls of Hitler and other Nazi leaders, some of them looking cadaverous, all with the familiar “Poison” bottles in hand with hair falling out, clutching at their throats. Along with all this, they found Young’s stash of poisons on the windowsill.
This was enough for the police. Now all they had to do was arrest Young. He was visiting his father Fred and his aunt Winnie at the time they searched the hostel. Later that night, on November 21st, 1971 at 11:30, there was a knocking on the door at the Young residence. As soon as the door was opened and Fred saw the police standing there, he directed them to where his son was in the house. His aunt was baffled, and he just shook it off, acting as if nothing was wrong. However, on the way out of the door, he asked police which death was the cause of his arrest. After he was hauled off, Fred ripped up his son’s birth certificate and anything else in the house tying him and his son together.
After being arrested, Graham Young relished admitting the details of his crimes to police, gleefully bragging about killing his stepmother. However, he refused to sign anything confessing what he’d done. He knew it was over for him, so he figured he’d make sure he was recognized for what he’d done and become a national sensation, albeit in infamy. He was simply waiting for his day in court.
That day came June 19th, 1972. He was charged with 2 counts each of murder, attempted murder and poisoning. The media were referring to him as “The Teacup Poisoner”, which wasn’t a grandiose enough name in Young’s opinion. He thought “World Poisoner” a more appropriate moniker. During the trial, he took great joy in having his picture taken by the reporters, looking as sinister as possible for the cameras, trying to add to his notoriety as a killer.
He plead not guilty, feeling invincible since his previous convictions couldn’t be brought up. He thought that he’d be able to verbally tap dance out of this situation. Bob Egle had been cremated so there were no remains to test. Fred Biggs used thallium in his garden to keep pests at bay, which could have led to cross-contamination. His diary, he claimed in court, was a fiction story he was working on, and if his confession was brought up, he’d claim he was telling the authorities what they wanted so he’d be given clothes and food. He had everything thought out, seeing himself as an intellectual giant compared to those around him.
What he hadn’t counted on was the headway made in forensic science at the time. Forensic scientists tested Egle’s cremains, which yielded traces of thallium. Biggs’ wife told the court her husband never used thallium on his garden as a pesticide.
As far as his diary, it took on a much more disturbing air when it was read to the court. In it were detailed accounts, including ones about Fred, which read, “F is now seriously ill. He has developed paralysis and blindness. Even if the blindness is reverse, organic brain disease would render him a husk. From my point of view his death would be a relief. It would remove one more casualty from an already crowded field of battle.” A work of fiction, indeed.
Yet another entry described Young’s idea on how to end David Tilson’s life. Young planned on visiting Tilson in the hospital and bringing a flask of brandy. He’d offer Tilson a sip from the flask, which would’ve contained some poison, finishing the man off once and for all. This plan was thwarted only because Tilson was admitted to the hospital too late for Young to have access to him, and Tilson managed a full recovery.
On top of all this, Young had a failsafe of sorts. There was a vial of poison that he carried around in his pocket, ready for him to swallow should he ever be caught. With the mountain of evidence against him, he was found guilty on June 29th, 1972, of all the charges brought against him. His sentence was four life sentences for the murders and attempted murders, along with two sentences of 5 years for the poisoning charges.
After the sentencing, his sordid past was brought into the light. This ultimately brought about a review of the way poisons were made available to the public, as well as a review of mental health care at the time. People were aghast at the thought of a madman on the loose, especially one so obviously deranged. Shortly after his trial, measures were put into place to guarantee a snafu like this wouldn’t occur again.
Graham Young ended up in his final residence of Parkhurst Maximum Security Prison, located on the Isle of Wight, an honor given to the most demented criminals of the United Kingdom. While there, he found a friend in Ian Brady, known as the Moors Murderer. Both of the men shared a fascination with Nazi Germany, considered themselves to be men like Nietzsche’s famous Übermensch, and Young was sporting his Hitler moustache again at this point. 24-year-old Brady was attracted to Young, but Young wasn’t interested in Brady, who thought that Young seemed to be asexual.
The only things that aroused Young’s interests were death, experimentation, observation of the experiments, and death. This didn’t prevent them from spending time together, indulging in their common diversions. Even while playing chess, Young was able to make a connection to Nazis, saying the black pieces had power like the SS. Brady felt that, somewhere in Young’s mind, he probably likened himself to Hermann Goering during the Nuremburg trials.
Young fought to have his likeness preserved in Madame Tussaud’s Wax Museum, in the “Chamber of Horrors” exhibit. He was thrilled when it finally happened, knowing that his wax figure was alongside that of his idol, Dr. Crippen.
After years of living in paranoia of his fellow inmates trying to kill him, Graham Frederick Young finally passed away on August 1st, 1990, supposedly of heart failure. This point isn’t necessarily fact. There are some who believe his wariness wasn’t unfounded and someone poisoned him, and other believe he may have killed himself, using his extensive knowledge of chemicals and toxins to end his misery. No matter how he died, he lives on in infamy in the minds of many as being the first man ever to use thallium as a method of murder.
Editor's note: this article ran in Serial Killer Magazine and is published as the author wrote it. He now has an entry on this archive's roster, added September 15, 2026; when this note was first written he did not. The outline is not in dispute. The article gives his birth year as 1941. The record is 1947: he was fourteen when he was committed to Broadmoor in 1962 and forty-two when he died in 1990, and each of those fixes the year independently. The prose above is left as the author wrote it. Young was born in Neasden on September 7, 1947, poisoned members of his own family and a school friend as a teenager, and was sent to Broadmoor in 1962 at fourteen under the Mental Health Act after admitting the poisoning of his father, his sister and a friend. His stepmother Molly died in April 1962 and he was not charged over her death; she was cremated, which is the reason the question can never be settled. He was released in 1971, took a job at a photographic instrument warehouse in Bovingdon, and within months the staff there began falling ill with what was put down to a local virus. Bob Egle died in July 1971 and Fred Biggs in November. Young was convicted at St Albans Crown Court in June 1972 of two murders and two attempted murders, and sentenced to life. He died at Parkhurst on August 1, 1990. The closing paragraph raises the possibility that his death was not natural. No inquest finding of that kind has been published and this archive has seen nothing to support it. Read it as the author's speculation, which is how the paragraph itself puts it. The case is usually told as a story about a boy who liked poison. The part that has never been answered is administrative: he was released from Broadmoor after eight years, at twenty-three, having been sent there for poisoning three people, and he was then employed in a storeroom where he had the run of the tea trolley. Bob Egle was dead five months after the gate opened.