Villains by Sue Kendall

1. Sue Kendall
RASPUTIN
CATHERINE DE MEDICI
SWEENEY TODD

2. RASPUTIN
1
My Childhood
My name is Grigori Yemifovich Rasputin and I was born on 10th January, 1869 in a
small village in Siberia, in northern Russia - one of the coldest places in the world.
My family were peasants and worked very hard. During the long difficult winters in
Siberia, there was very little to do. In the evenings, we usually sat beside the fire
and played cards. Summers were hot and I could run outside with my younger
sister, Maria, and my older brother, Dimitri.
Maria was not very strong and one day, while we were swimming in the river, she
drowned. Nobody knew how it happened, but my mother blamed me. ‘You’re
responsible for this tragedy, Grigori.’ She said. ‘You didn’t watch your sister.’
Another day, Dimitri and I were playing in the forest, climbing trees and running
after each other. Then, we jumped into the river to catch some fish. We held each
other’s heads under the water for a long time – just for fun – and he didn’t come up.
I tried to pull him out of the river, but he was too heavy for me. I panicked and
began to shout, ‘Help! Help! My brother is drowning!’
Suddenly, a man heard me. He jumped into the water and pulled my brother out of
the river. He helped him breathe again and, after a few minutes, Dimitri sat up and
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3. looked around. He was very angry with me. ‘You tried to kill me!’ he shouted at me.
‘How could you do that? I’m your brother.’
I didn’t answer him. After that, Dimitri got pneumonia. He died a few days later.
Then, I was the only child in my family.
* * *
I discovered my special powers during my childhood. In our village, Pokrovskoe,
and in many other Siberian villages, people usually met in homes in the evening.
One night, everybody came to our house. I was ill all the time, but I listened to the
conversations in the other room. My father told his friends about the theft of his
favourite horse. As soon as I heard this, I went into the room in my nightshirt and
pointed to one of the visitors. ‘This man stole your horse, Father!’ I said. My
parents and the visitors were very embarrassed and said nothing. Later, some of
the villagers were curious to see if I was right. They went with my father to the
man’s house and saw the stolen horse there. My father brought the horse home
and the man was immediately arrested.
The next morning, people came to make the sign of the Cross and pray in front of
our house, they marvelled at my’ powers’, but this confused me.
Soon, this incident became a legend in our village. Every time somebody came to
visit, my father told the story of his son and the horse thief. It made me
uncomfortable because I didn’t really understand it. Did I really have strange
powers? This thought frightened me very much.
I grew up and became a cart driver like my father. I got married and had three
children. I called two of them Maria and Dimitri, after my dead sister and brother.
Then, at the age of thirty-three, I drove a very special man in my cart and he
changed my life. He was studying to be a priest at the Verkhoture monastery. He
told me about his very unusual kind of Christianity and I was fascinated. At the end
of the trip, he convinced me to stay in the monastery and learn the teachings of his
group. I stayed there for three months and during this time, I became very
religious.
After leaving the monastery, I went to visit a religious man in a distant forest, an
Orthodox priest named Father Makari. ‘My son,’ he said to me, ‘you’ve got much to
learn about the world. You must leave your wife, children and possessions. God has
called you.’
I was very excited to hear these words. It was my new dream to dedicate my life to
God. I returned home to say goodbye to my wife and family. They accepted my
decision. If I was “called to God”, I didn’t have an option, they believed. I completely
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4. abandoned my family. What did my children think about my disappearance from
their lives? I don’t know, because the truth is, I didn’t ask them.
* * *
I travelled for years and lived like a vagabond. While I was travelling, I cured many
sick people and spoke about my new teachings. I lived on donations and charity.
Rumours circulated about my special powers. They called my acts, miracles.
Finally, I returned to Pokrovskoe, but not to my family. I went to live in a secret
underground room. My hair and beard grew long and I wore a black robe. Some
called me the “Mad Monk”. My family visited me and always found me praying and
asking for God’s pardon on my knees. I shouted and cried and repeated hundreds
of times, “Lord have compassion on us.” My wife and father often went on their
knees and prayed with me. They couldn’t stop themselves. They looked into my
eyes and I hypnotized them. I often questioned these strange powers I possessed.
Many people began to come to me for help and soon, I became famous in the whole
area. But some people didn’t believe in my teachings. One day, a priest arrived in
Prokovskoe. He wanted to know the truth about me and we started to talk. Soon,
we began to argue about religion. He looked into my eyes and began to tremble
with fear. Strange sounds came from his mouth. He repeated them over and over
again, but I couldn’t understand him and he ran away. He immediately wrote a
letter to the Church about my “evil teachings”. He called me a false prophet, and
suggested the Church should fight me. ‘The devil is inside Rasputin,’ he said. ‘He’s
an evil, dangerous man.’
2
Life at the Palace
One day, I received a special visitor – a very beautiful woman from Tsar Nicholas’
court. ‘My name is Anna Vyrubova,’ she said. ‘I’m a good friend of Tsarina
Alexandra, the Tsar’s wife. She has sent me to you to ask for help.’
‘But how can I help the Tsarina?’ I asked.
‘She’s heard about your special powers and she needs your help to cure her son,’
she explained.
‘What is her son’s problem?’ I asked, although I already knew about his disease.
Alexei was the only son, born after four daughters. He was the heir to the Romanov
dynasty and they needed a healthy heir.
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5. ‘Alexei is very ill,’ she explained. ‘He’s got a serious blood disease called
hemophilia. According to the doctors, he got it from his great grandmother, Queen
Victoria of England. But now, he’s in great danger. When he was on holiday with
his family, he fell off a horse and hurt himself badly. Because of his disease, he’s
lost a lot of blood and continues to lose more. The doctors say nothing can help
him and he’s probably going to die soon. Tsarina Alexandra sent me to you. Can
you come to the palace and save him?’
I couldn’t ignore Tsarina Alexandra so, of course, I went to help. I rode to the
palace as quickly as I could. The Tsarina was very happy to see me. ‘Please come
and look at my boy,’ she said. ‘He’s getting worse every moment. We can’t stop the
blood. If you don’t help him soon, he’ll die.’
I sat down beside the boy. His eyes were closed and he looked very pale. I held his
hand, prayed hard and tried to pass my strength to him. After a short time, he
opened his eyes and looked at me. By the evening, he was feeling better and in a
few days, he was playing outside. I can’t explain, but that’s how it was.
Another time, I was asked to help Alexei again. The Tsar and his wife were in St
Petersburg at the time, and I was in my house in Siberia. Even from far away, I
could help him with my prayers.
I helped Alexei every time the Tsarina asked me to. He began to feel much better
and the family began to trust me. ‘Rasputin, God speaks to me through you,’ the
Tsarina said. The Tsar called me “our friend” or “Rasputin, the religious man”.
Because of this, I soon became famous all over Russia.
I could also predict the future, so the Tsar began to ask my advice, and after a
while, I moved to the court and became his best advisor. I was a very powerful
person. If somebody wanted to see the Tsar or the Tsarina, he needed to get my
permission first.
Because of my special position, I began to have enemies among important political
and religious people in St Petersburg. Some began to spy on me and print bad
things about me in the newspapers. The entire country knew if I did something
wrong.
One day, I was sitting with the Tsar and the Tsarina, and some nobles came to talk
to the Tsar. It was too late to prevent them entering the court.
‘Your Majesty,’ one of them said. ‘You must tell this man to leave your court. He’s
causing you great damage and he gives you bad advice. He lives an unclean life,
very different from his beliefs. All of this is having a bad effect on your people.’
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6. ‘That’s ridiculous!’ said the Tsar. ‘Rasputin is the most religious man in Russia and
he cured my son. How can you say these terrible things about him? Leave my court
and never come back again!’
I won this battle with the nobles of the Tsar’s court, but there were other battles to
come.
3
The War Begins
World War I was a difficult time for Russia, and for me as well. The people accused
me of being unpatriotic and a spy. They also attacked Tsarina Alexandra. ‘She
wants to destroy Russia because she was born in Germany,’ they said. ‘She’s spying
for the German enemy.’
I tried to do something to help the Russian people. We were losing the war badly
and I wanted to understand the reason for this. I decided to go to the fighting, but
the commander of the Russian Army, Grand Duke Nicholas, didn’t let me go. I
wanted to bless the soldiers and try to keep them safe. But the Grand Duke didn’t
trust me, and his answer was very clear. ‘I’ll kill you if you try to come!’ he said. So I
stayed in the court and did as much as I could to help the Tsar and Tsarina in those
difficult times.
One night, I had an important dream and I told the Tsar about it the next morning.
‘I dreamed the Russian army won’t win this war until you personally take control
of the army.’
‘Should I do that?’ he asked me, a little nervous. ‘If you say so, I’ll do it.’
‘Yes, Your Highness. Your people need to see you in battle. You must be prepared
to die for your country like them,’ I said. ‘This will give them courage and maybe
help them change the situation.’
‘Then I’ll do it,’ he said. ‘Thank you, Rasputin. You’ve shown me my responsibility.’
After this, the Tsar went to take part in the fighting, even though he didn’t have
much experience of war.
While he was away, the Tsarina was very worried all the time. She began to depend
on me more and more to help her make decisions. I was her favourite advisor and
she trusted me completely. I used my situation to dismiss some of my enemies in
the court. One of them was a lady called Tyutcheva. She tried to stop me from
spending time with some of the women in the court. So I told the Tsarina to send
her away and she did. I also began to choose people to control many government
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7. offices. This way, I had more control of the court and my personal fortune grew
considerably.
But the war was very expensive, and the Russian economy became worse and
worse. The people were very dissatisfied with the Tsarina, and, because I was her
main advisor, they were also dissatisfied with me. There were also a lot of rumours
about our relationship.
At that time, public opinion was starting to turn against the monarchy. Many
people wanted “a government of the people, by the people”. They didn’t want the
Romanov family on the throne any more. They spoke in public against the family
and in favour of this new kind of government. They also wrote many articles about
this in all the newspapers.
The newspapers also attacked me because I argued with many important people in
the Russian Orthodox Church. In contrast to these church leaders, I believed people
could talk directly to God, and didn’t have to go through priests and churches. I
believed we could all learn humility by asking God to pardon our sins. The Tsarina
and the ladies of her court agreed with my view. But the Church was furious and
said I used this belief as an excuse to sin as much as I wanted.
They disliked my relationship with the Tsarina. She was a very religious woman,
they said, and could be easily influenced by me. The nobles and the Church started
to pressure me to leave the court.
One of them, Vladimir Purishkevich, made a speech in the Duma, the parliament of
Russia. ‘The Tsar’s ministers have become marionettes,’ he said. ‘Rasputin and
Tsarina Alexandra control them. He’s the devil genius of Russia. She’s a German on
the Russian throne and the enemy of the country and its people. The people’s
respect for the monarchy is gone. Now, St Petersburg is a corrupted city and all this
is because of the villain, Rasputin.’
Another important noble, Felix Yusupov, listened carefully to Purishkevich’s
speech. Afterwards, he went to see Purishkevich. In that meeting, they both agreed
to find a way to kill me.
It was not the first time somebody wanted to kill me. Once, a few years earlier, I
was attacked in Pokrovskoe by a disciple of the monk Iliodor. He hated me because
of my religious beliefs and taught his disciples to hate me, too. One of his disciples,
a woman called Guseva, stabbed me in my stomach. I fell to the ground and she
shouted for joy, ‘He’s dead! He’s dead! The evil man is dead!’ But I recovered and
after that, I felt invincible.
For that reason, I wasn’t afraid when my spies told me about the meeting between
Yusupov and Purishkevich.
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8. 4
Yusupov’s Story
My name is Felix Yusupov. I am one of the brave Russians responsible for the death
of that evil demon, Grigori Yefimovich Rasputin, I am proud to say. It was not easy,
but in the end, we finally killed him. Let me tell you how it happened.
On 16th December, 1916, I invited Rasputin and several of my noble friends to my
house. Rasputin wasn’t suspicious about this invitation. We served him cake and
red wine, both filled with cyanide, the most deadly poison in the world. My friend,
Vasily Maklakov, put enough poison into the food to kill five men! But, to our great
surprise, nothing happened. Rasputin continued eating the cake, drinking the wine
and talking about his religious beliefs.
I began to get very nervous and I said quietly to my friends, ‘If we don’t kill him
before morning, we won’t have time to hide the body. We must do something.’ I ran
to get my revolver, came back and shot Rasputin through the back. He fell to the
floor and we quickly left the palace to wait for him to die. I came back later and
leaned over his body to see if he was dead.
Suddenly, to my great shock, Rasputin opened his eyes and pulled me down by my
coat. He stared into my eyes and said, ‘You evil boy!’ Then, he tried to strangle me. I
tried to escape, but he was very strong. Fortunately, my friends came into the room
at the moment and shot him three times and he fell to the floor once more. But he
was still alive!
It was incredible, but he tried to get up again. We hit him with sticks until he finally
stopped moving. Then, we covered his body with a sheet and threw him into the
icy Neva River.
Three days later, Rasputin’s body was pulled from the river. An autopsy showed
the cause of death was drowning. His hands were held out in front of him, as if he
was still trying to get out from under the ice. There was water in his lungs. We
poisoned him, shot him four times and hit him several times but we couldn’t kill
him. In the end, he died from drowning – the same way his brother and sister died.
So justice was done.
Epilogue
Tsarina Alexandra buried Rasputin’s body near one of her palaces. She wanted him
close to her forever. But after the February Revolution of 1917, a group of workers
took Rasputin’s body out of the ground to a nearby forest and burned it. While they
8

9. were burning the body, something incredible happened. According to the legend,
the body moved and tried to sit up! Later, scientists explained this phenomenon.
‘Rasputin’s body wasn’t prepared well for burning,’ they said. ‘Its tendons
contracted and this caused his legs to bend and his body to sit up!’ But at the time,
nobody knew this and everybody ran away in fear. They thought Rasputin was
coming to life again!
Before he died, Rasputin left a letter. This was discovered by his secretary,
Simonovich, and published some time later:
I am writing this letter in St Petersburg in 1916 and leave it to be opened after my
death. I know I will be dead by 1st January 1917.
I wish to tell the Russian people my prophecy. If I am killed by common assassins or
by Russian peasants, the Tsar of Russia will have nothing to fear for his children. The
Romanovs will govern for hundreds of years.
However, if I am murdered by nobles of the Tsar’s family, none of his children or
relations will stay alive for more than two years. The Russian people will kill them.
Grigori Yefimovich Rasputin
So Rasputin’s prophecy was realised. Nobles killed him and the Russian Revolution
started a month later. Theirs was the last monarchy of Russia. Tsar Nicholas and
his entire family were killed and the Romanov rule ended. Rasputin’s vengeance
was quick.
9

10. CATHERINE DE MEDICI
All through history, many women have had an immense influence on the society of
their time. One of these women was Catherine de Medici, an Italian woman and later,
the Queen of France.
History has painted Catherine de Medici as “Madame Serpent”, an evil queen with a
strong need for power. This led to dark crimes, poisonings, spying and even
witchcraft. After her death, her letters revealed many cruel thoughts and murderous
plans. Some historians have blamed her difficult early life for many of her worst
actions. Others say she fought a desperate battle for control of the kingdom, wanting
only to keep her family on the throne at all the costs. This is her story.
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11. 1
Childhood
My name is Catherine de Medici and I was born in Florence in 1519. My parents, I
was told later, were “as happy as if I were a boy”. But the astrologers were not so
happy. My parents consulted them soon after my birth. ‘Your daughter will not
have an easy life,’ they said. ‘She is going to cause trouble for her husband’s family
and finally, she will destroy them completely.’
Then, they gave my parents some advice. ‘You should put her in a basket and leave
her on the city wall. If you are lucky, a cannon ball will hit her. If you don’t want to
do this, then send her to a closed convent for the rest of her life.’ It’s hard to
imagine my parents’ response to this piece of advice!
Soon after my birth, my mother died of the plague. She was only 17 at the time. A
few days later, my father died too and I became an orphan at only 12 days old. I
was very rich, because I was the only heiress of the Medici family, one of the
richest and most powerful families in Italy. They governed Florence and the area
around it. My great grandfather was a diplomat and a politician. He helped many
intellectuals, artists and poets to create one of the greatest periods in Italian art,
music and literature, the Renaissance. My father, the Duke of Urbino, was a
powerful politician and soldier. After my parents died, all the property and fortune
of the Medici family belonged to me. Everybody began to call me the “poor little
rich girl”.
At first, I lived with my grandmother, but she died a year later, and then I went to
live with my aunt. This was a nice time for me because I had some cousins to play
with. Finally, my father’s distant relative, Cardinal Giulio de Medici, came to
Florence to control the government there and to take care of me. I lived in the
palace with him, but this wasn’t as much fun as living with my cousins. The people
of Florence called me duchessina, the little duchess, because of my father, the duke.
One day, there was a rebellion against my family. The people of Florence were
always envious of the fortune and power of the Medicis. I was only eight years old
at the time, but I represented the Medicis for those people. An angry crowd
attacked our palace. I can’t forget that day. The rebels stood outside and threw
stones at the palace. They shouted, ‘Down with the Medicis!’ and they tried,
unsuccessfully, to enter the palace by force.
Finally, my relatives talked with the crowd. After a long discussion, the rebels
agreed to let the family leave the palace safely – except for me. I was forced to stay
inside the palace with the rebels. I was sure they were going to kill me. I tried to be
brave, but it was very difficult. I was eight years old and totally alone. I didn’t
forgive my family for leaving me, even though I never said a word about it later.
But that bad experience burned inside me and created a need for vengeance.
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12. In the end, the rebels didn’t kill me and they left the palace. My family returned,
convinced that my presence in the palace was putting their lives in danger. They
thought it would be better for me to leave the palace, so they sent me to different
convents in and around Florence. I spent the next five years studying in those
convents. The nuns were very strict but they took good care of me and my life
wasn’t so bad. I received an excellent education and became one of the best-
educated women of my time.
After my return to the palace, the fighting began again and I was in danger once
more. The crowd shouted, ‘Give us Catherine! Kill Catherine!’ I hid in a cupboard in
my bedroom, too frightened even to cry, but they found me. Several men came into
my room and they took me out of the palace. I was forced to ride through the
streets on a donkey. The angry crowd shouted terrible things and threw food and
stones at me. I was sure I was going to die this time and it was a terrible,
frightening experience for me. I survived the experience, but I was traumatised by
it forever.
After the fighting ended, my relative, Giulio de Medici, invited me to live with him
in Rome. He was now Pope Clement VII, and a very powerful man. On my arrival,
he kissed me, and with tears in his eyes, he promised to protect me. I was very
thankful to him.
Living with the Pope in Rome was not much fun for a young girl, but at least I
started to feel safe again. No doubt these very dramatic experiences in my
childhood made me a very angry person, and later, I released this anger on many
other people.
2
Madame Serpent
After a short time, the Pope decided that I should get married. I was sent to France
to marry Henry of Orleans, the second son of King Francis I of France, and a
member of the Valois family.
At the age of 14, I was short, thin, with fair hair, and not very pretty. I had the big,
prominent eyes of the Medici family. But I tried to make a good impression at my
wedding celebration at the Royal Court of France. I decided to organize a
magnificent entrance into the ceremony and I asked an artisan from Florence for
help. He surprised me with a wonderful idea. He made a pair of high-heeled shoes
for me – the first in the world – and I walked into the wedding ceremony much
taller than I really was. All the people of the court held their breath. I wasn’t
beautiful, but I was certainly impressive.
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13. Life wasn’t easy for me in the French court and I was very lonely. The French didn’t
respect me because I wasn’t a royal princess. For them, I was just a politician’s
daughter and everybody ignored me.
I wanted food from home to help me feel better. I brought several Italian cooks to
the French court and they tried to comfort me. They made all my favourite desserts
from my homeland – Italian sorbets, cakes and tarts. Surprisingly, the French court
loved them. My cooks also introduced new vegetables to the French court –
broccoli, peas and green beans. They prepared different kinds of meats in delicate
Italian sauces and the French ate them with great enthusiasm. I even tried to teach
them table manners – they didn’t even know how to use a knife and fork – but I
was not successful at this!
My married life was not very happy. I loved my husband, Henry, but he was in love
with another woman. Long before my arrival in France, my husband began a
relationship with his mistress, Diane de Poitiers, a woman 20 years older than him.
He always wore her colours of black and white to show how much he cared for her.
He also presented her with the jewels of the Royal Family. She continued being
loyal to him until his death. Of course, I was jealous and I hated her.
I began to travel around France with my husband’s father, King Francis I, and I saw
a lot of the country in a short time. Soon, the king realised I was a wonderful
travelling companion. He appreciated intelligent women and though I was not
beautiful, my passion for study made him love me very much. But, other than the
king, I didn’t have one friend in all of France, nor any influence in the court. I was
young, a foreigner from a country with little power in the world of politics, and I
had no experience in these matters. But I observed everything in the palace
carefully and I never forgot anything.
I lived a quiet life – some people would say a mysterious one – with my Italian
servants. I learned French, Latin and Greek although I always made errors in
French on purpose. I tried to appear less educated than I really was. I also studied
mathematics, natural history, astronomy and astrology, and I had a passionate
interest in tarot cards. I built an observatory in the palace. I often consulted
astronomers and intellectuals with philosophical questions, and asked astrologers
for advice before taking important decisions. It was unusual at that time for a
woman to be as well educated as I was, and many people were intimidated by my
intellect.
My favourite advisor was Nostradamus, the famous French astronomer and
psychic. He predicted my husband’s early death in a jousting match and that I was
going to live longer than all but one of my sons, although three would become king.
I didn’t always like the things he said but in the end most of them were realised. I
became his patron and protector, so he could continue his studies. During my son
Henry’s reign, I made Nostradamus his personal doctor and royal advisor.
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14. I also became interested in poisons. I kept them hidden in 200 cupboards in my
rooms. I brought many sick, unfortunate people into the palace to test my poisons
on them. I even sent my priests to Egypt to bring back mummies for my
experiments. Slowly, I perfected my talent with poisons and I used it later with
great success. The French always thought of Italians as poisoners and murderers,
so they were very suspicious of me. Because of my unusual interests, I became
known as “Madame Serpent”.
3
Henry Becomes King
My husband’s older brother, the Dauphin Francis, was next in line to the French
throne after King Francis’ death. I decided I must remove him from this position so
that my husband, Henry, could be king and I could be queen. Since I wasn’t very
attractive, I needed other women to help me manipulate my enemies. That is why I
surrounded myself with beautiful women. These women brought lots of delicious
food to my husband’s brother, Francis, but the food had poison in it. The women
brought him poisonous fish sauces and decorated apples and cakes. He could not
resist them. I sat with him at dinner while he was eating, and talked to him as if
nothing was wrong.
One evening, in 1536, I watched excitedly as he began to feel sicker and sicker until
finally, he fell over. His servants carried him to his bedroom and he died that night.
My plan was successful and I was happy: Henry was next in line for the French
throne!
But the French people weren’t happy at all. They didn’t want an Italian queen,
especially one without royal blood. They looked for a reason to replace me and
chose the fact that we didn’t have any children. This was a good enough reason to
remove me from the throne. ‘This woman is unacceptable,’ the people said. ‘The
king must get a divorce. We must have a new queen and she must give him many
royal children.’
I looked for help to medicine, astrology and magic and soon, I began to have
children one after the other. Over the next ten years, I had ten children! Three of
them died as babies but three of the others later became kings of France – Francis
II, Charles IX and Henry III. My position was safe!
In 1547, my husband’s father, King Francis I, died of natural causes. I loved him
and didn’t want to hurt him, not even to become queen. I was very sad to lose my
only friend in the French court. My husband became King Henry II of France and I
became Queen Catherine. However, during my husband’s reign, I didn’t have much
power. My husband spent much of his time with Diane de Poitiers and she had
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15. complete control over him. She controlled the court and made all the important
decisions for the country. This made me very angry, but I kept my feelings to
myself, although I plotted and schemed in my heart.
As Nostradamus predicted, in 1559 my husband died in a jousting match and my
weak, 15-year-old son became King Francis II. To my delight, Diane de Poitiers
immediately became a “nobody”. Francis was married to Mary, Queen of Scots, but
she was not interested in politics and was controlled by her uncles, the cardinal of
Lorraine and the Duke of Guise. Soon, I got tired of their power and began to plan
ways to take some of it from them. My poor Francis died a year later in a riding
accident and then my ten-year-old son, Charles, became King Charles IX.
After years of silence as Henry’s wife, I began to have more and more power in the
court during the reigns of my sons. I had a wonderful life. I gave magnificent
parties at the Chateau de Fontainebleau and I invented games and dances to
entertain everybody. I was a great archer and I loved hunting. I built and decorated
the Tuileries Palace and designed the Tuileries Garden in Paris. I even began to
write political pamphlets. This life continued for over 20 years.
But it was a difficult period in French history – the time of the French Wars of
Religion. There was constant fighting between the Protestants and the Catholics. At
first, I listened to my moderate advisors and tried to speak to both sides and solve
the conflicts. But I wasn’t a moderate character. Sometimes I supported the
Catholics because I was a Catholic myself. But other times, I supported the
Protestants because it helped to weaken the power of Mary’s family, especially de
Duke of Guise.
I saw politics as a career. I believed politicians needed to use secrecy, lies and
murder to win. I studied, The Prince, Machiavelli’s book written as a guide for my
father in Florence. I worried about my sons’ health because they were all
physically weak, and because of Nostradamus’ predictions of their early deaths.
After endless civil wars, I decided to try politics again. One of the best ways to
solve political problems was to marry my children to important allies. I married
my first daughter, Elizabeth of Valois, to Philip II of Spain and my third daughter to
the Duke of Navarre. I also tried to marry my third son to Queen Elizabeth I of
England, but this plan wasn’t successful.
Finally, I invited Admiral Gaspard de Coligny, a leader of the Protestants, to the
palace. My son Charles admired him very much and he began to be influenced by
the admiral’s political ideas. Soon, my son and I started to argue and our
relationship was in danger. I had only one choice – to kill Coligny before it was too
late.
I ordered his murder but the attempt failed, although the admiral was hurt. Then, I
became desperate. This time, I ordered the murder of Coligny and all his Protestant
15

16. followers. This event began on the night of 24th August, 1572 and was later called
the St Bartholomew’s Day Massacre.
4
The St Bartholomew’s day Massacre
On the evening before St Bartholomew’s Day, the city gates were locked, boats
were tied to the riverbank and many weapons were collected. The houses of the
Protestants were all marked with a cross. That evening, I invited everybody to see
a new ballet, Le Ballet Comique de la Reine (The Comic Ballet of the Queen). I wrote
the story myself and was very proud of it. It was performed at a banquet and
everybody enjoyed it very much.
At around two in the morning, my men rang all the church bells. Then, they
attacked Coligny’s house, killing everybody in their way. They wore white shirts
and decorated their hats with white crosses. The attackers ran into the admiral’s
room carrying swords, daggers, lances and guns. Coligny was still recovering from
the murder attempt a few days before. They killed him in his bed and threw him
out of the window. The crowds pulled his body through the streets and threw it
into the river Seine. The bells rang from all the towers in Paris, torches were lit,
and a night of murder, robbery and burning began all over the city.
Protestants were murdered in their beds or chased to the tops of houses and
thrown onto the road; bodies were pulled along the streets by ropes and thrown
into the Seine. Large piles of bodies were collected outside the Louvre Palace for
my son and I to see. Victims were stabbed on bridges, and then pushed into the
bloody water of the river Seine. As the survivors began to swim, stones were
thrown at them. Women were pulled along the streets. A pack of dogs ran freely,
thirsty for the blood in the streets. I ran from window to window of the palace,
taking pleasure in the murder of the Protestants below. Was I really an evil
woman?
In the chaos, people began to steal everything they could find. Valuable libraries
were robbed. Jewellers, shopkeepers, shoemakers, hat makers and silk merchants
were murdered in this wave of killings.
By midday, an official ceasefire was announced, but the killing continued and
extended to other cities of France for two more months. Over 20,000 Protestants
died in the massacre.
On 2nd September, a horseman arrived in Rome from Paris with the news of the
success of the massacre. He brought Coligny’s head with him. Pope Gregory XIII
16

17. gave the messenger 100 coins as a reward. Later, a medal was made with the
Pope’s head on one side and the Angel of Death on the other.
I was very satisfied with the success of my plan. Now Coligny was dead, I had
complete control of my son the king again. After that, I began to work on the
destruction of the power of the Guise family.
But in 1574, Charles died too, and my youngest son Henry became king Henry III.
In contrast to his brothers, I had only a limited influence over him. He surrounded
himself with bad advisors and the royal family became very unpopular.
I worried about the future of the Valois family as Henry was sterile and had no
heirs. When my youngest son, Francis of Valois, died on 10th June, 1584, it was
clear to everybody that the rule of the Valois family would end with the death of
Henry. I could do no more.
* * *
Catherine de Medici died 15 years later, on 5th January, 1589, a short time before the
murder of her son, Henry, on 1st August 1589. The years of her sons’ reigns have been
called “the age of Catherine de Medici”, because she was so clearly the real power
behind the throne.
17

18. SWEENEY TODD
The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
1
John Crook: Employer of Sweeney Todd
My name is John Crook and I’m a cutler by profession. My job is to make, sell and
repair all kinds of cutting instruments, from kitchen knives to swords, but mostly I
specialize in razors. My shop is called “Pistol and C” and it’s located in Holborn,
London.
One day in winter, a new apprentice came to my shop. He was called Sweeney
Todd. He was a thin, sad-looking orphan boy of around 12 and he probably never
had a decent meal in his life. ‘My mother and father are dead, and there is no
written record of me anywhere,’ Sweeney explained to me. ‘I was baptized in a
church, but it burned down soon after that, and all the books were burned in it. The
people at the church said I should come and work for you. I agreed because I like
knives.’
18

19. While he was working for me, I learned a lot about the boy’s unhappy childhood.
His family was very poor. They all lived together in one room and had very little
furniture. From a very early age, Sweeney was forced to work. He helped his family
prepare silk for a clothes factory. In 1758, Sweeney and his father were at the Silk
Workers’ Riots. The workers were protesting against the import of cheap cotton
cloth from India, because this took away a lot of their earnings. The young boy saw
many angry and violent scenes there and they left a strong impression on him.
To escape his unhappy life, Sweeney spent a lot of time at the Tower of London, not
far from his home. In the past, British kings imprisoned their enemies and
unwanted wives in the Tower of London, but later it became a museum and the
Royal Zoo. Sweeney loved listening to the stories of the Tower workers and was
fascinated by the instruments of torture there.
After some time, Sweeney began to have confidence in me and tell me more about
his family. He had a terrible father. ‘He either hit me or ignored me,’ the boy said.
But his mother loved him very much. However, Sweeney did not return her
affection. ‘She kissed me and called me “a pretty boy” all the time,’ he told me. ‘But
later, I wanted to hit her. Why did she bring me into this world if she didn’t have
enough money to help me survive in it?’
It was one of the coldest winters in London, and hundreds of poor people were
freezing to death in their homes and on the streets. Two months before Sweeney’s
arrival in my shop, his parents went out and left him alone at home. They never
returned. They probably went to look for alcohol to help them get warm and then
froze to death while they were looking for it. But Sweeney never forgave them for
leaving him alone. The young orphan tried to survive on the streets of London.
Soon, he was taken to the local church and they suggested that he find work. I still
don’t know how he survived until his arrival at my shop because he never talked
about it. Of course, he didn’t become rich working for me either. Employers didn’t
pay their apprentices, because we taught them a profession.
Unfortunately, two years after his arrival, Sweeney was arrested for theft. He
probably also stole from me while he was working for me in my shop. I didn’t catch
him because he was very clever. I was sure the boy was going to be hanged for his
crime, like most thieves at that time. But the judge had compassion for the poor
orphan – he was only 14 years old – and sent him to Newgate Prison for five years.
Sweeney was very lucky because in those days children were hanged for as little as
the theft of a handkerchief.
19

20. 2
Elmer Plummer: A Barber at Newgate Prison
Newgate Prison in London is a horrible, frightening place. There are all kinds of
prisoners there. Everybody inside the prison is corrupt. In fact, prisoners leave
Newgate much worse than when they entered. Only prisoners with money are
treated well by the prison workers. Prisoner pay bribes for the simplest things.
Somebody with no money is likely to find himself naked and starving in Newgate. I
know all about it. I’m Elmer Plummer, the prison barber, and I’m a prisoner myself.
People outside Newgate considered prisoners to be zoo animals. In fact, Londoners
paid money to get the chance to see some unhappy prisoners in their small cells.
Charles Dickens even wrote a book about us called Little Dorrit after his first visit
to Newgate.
I was serving a four year sentence for theft at the time of Sweeney Todd’s arrival. I
made a good living in the prison, thanks to the large number of rich prisoners
there. They still needed a good shave now and then. One day, Sweeney came to me
and asked me to teach him my profession. I agreed, and even gave him some of my
earnings.
Soon, we became good friends. I taught him how to be a barber and also how to
steal. One of my jobs was to shave prisoners before their hanging and Sweeney
often helped me in this job. We stole any coins from the pockets of the prisoners
while we were shaving them. Well, they certainly didn’t need them!
But Sweeney was an angry, violent person. He often thought of cutting the throats
of these poor men. The longer he stayed inside Newgate Prison, the angrier he
became towards the people outside. During his stay in Newgate, he promised to
take vengeance against society as soon as he was free.
Sweeney Todd left prison at the age of 19, and I saw him from time to time outside.
He started working as a travelling barber and practiced his trade in any free space.
Travelling barbers often got into fights over their territory – fights that sometimes
ended in bloodshed.
During his time as a travelling barber, Sweeney committed his first murder. He was
living with a woman at the time and he was a very jealous person. One afternoon, a
drunken man came to him for a shave and told him about his love affair with a
woman. He described her and she was very similar to Sweeney’s woman. Sweeney
could not control his anger and he used his razor to kill for the first time. ‘My first
one was a young Gent at Hyde Park Corner,’ Sweeney later confessed to me. ‘I cut
him from ear to ear.’
20

21. Sweeney Todd was never brought to justice for this crime. The incident, however,
ended his relationship with the young woman, and he was forced to practice his
profession in a different place for a while.
Several years after his first murder, Sweeney earned enough money to buy a shop
in Fleet Street. The choice of Fleet Street for a barber’s shop was unusual because
there were not many barbers in that part of the city – this was the famous street of
the newspaper publishers.
Sweeney’s shop was located in Fleet Street, between St Dunstan’s Church and a
little street called Hen and Chicken Court. He hung out his sign: Easy shaving for a
penny! and he also advertised other things. For example, he put jars with teeth in
the window. You see, barbers often pulled teeth in those days. He also showed jars
of blood, because barbers also took blood from people to cure them of different
diseases. Along with the jars of teeth and blood, there were also wigs of human
hair. Sweeney made them himself.
The shop was a small, dark place with a single barber’s chair in the middle of the
floor, a bench for waiting customers and a shelf full of combs, scissors, and, of
course, razors. It was a building with two floors and a basement. Sweeney lived
above the shop and used the basement for evil purposes. It was a very sinister
business.
3
Thomas Peckett Prest: Writer for a Fleet Street Newspaper
My name is Thomas Peckett Prest and I work as a writer on Fleet Street. I became
interested in Sweeney Todd soon after his arrival on Fleet Street, and I wrote a
book about him later.
Todd was a very disagreeable character with heavy eyebrows and a lot of black
hair. he had an evil look in his eyes. he was never happy and often complained
about the criminals and drunks outside his door.
In 1875 the Daily Courant, a Fleet Street newspaper, wrote about a murder.
A Cut-Throat Barber
A young gentleman from the country was murdered in Fleet Street while on a visit to London.
During a walk through the city, the gentleman stopped to admire the clock of St Dunstan’s Church
and began to talk with a barber. The two men argued and suddenly, the barber took out a razor and
cut the throat of the young man. Then, the barber disappeared into Hen and Chicken Court.
There was only one barber shop between St Dunstan’s and Hen and Chicken Court
– Sweeney Todd’s barber shop. How did he escape justice?
21

22. Soon after that incident, Sweeney’s name was mentioned again in connection with
another murder. An apprentice went to Sweeney’s shop for a haircut and carelessly
showed him a large sum of money belonging to his employer. Sweeney could not
resist the temptation. The employer came looking for the poor boy, but never
found him, or the money. Sweeney wasn’t arrested for that crime, either.
Sweeney used his skills as a cutler’s apprentice to build an ingenious mechanism to
help him kill and hide his victims’ bodies. The customer sat in the barber’s chair
and Sweeney cut his throat with his razor. Then, he pressed a special button and
the poor victim fell through a hole in the floor to the basement far below. After
that, the barber’s chair jumped back into place, ready for the next victim.
In 18th century London, many murders were mysteries. However, as more people
entered the demon barber’s shop and were never seen again, there began to be
rumours about Sweeney’s real activities. There were also problems in St Dunstan’s,
the old church next door. After Sweeney Todd’s arrival in the area, the smell from
there became intolerable. Ladies held perfumed handkerchiefs over their noses
during church services, and the vicar often sneezed during his sermon. Finally, the
vicar called Sir Richard Blunt, the chief of the police, to investigate the problem.
Sir Richard Blunt didn’t immediately connect Sweeney Todd to the smell in the
church. But he looked into his records and discovered that a local woman once
accused Todd of stealing some silver shoe buckles. The police found the buckles in
his shop but he was not imprisoned because the buckles were very ordinary ones.
According to the woman, her husband wore those buckles the day of his
mysterious disappearance several months earlier.
Blunt was suspicious and decided to watch Sweeney’s shop closely. Over the next
few months, three policemen saw many men entering the shop for a shave or
haircut and never leaving it. The police became more convinced that Sweeney was
murdering customers, and somehow, St Dunstan’s Church was connected to the
crime.
Finally, Blunt and his men decided to go down into the tunnels under the church.
They were shocked to find an enormous pile of bodies there, lying one on top of
each other. The pile reached halfway to the ceiling. The policemen continued
walking along the tunnels. These led to Sweeney’s shop and from there to a bakery
in Bell Yard.
A widow, Margaret Lovett, owned the bakery. Her first husband died under
mysterious circumstances a few years earlier. After that, Sweeney helped her open
the bakery. Soon afterwards, Mrs Lovett began to sell “the most delicious meat pies
in London”. They became very popular on Fleet Street.
It took some time but the police finally understood the horrific connection
between Sweeney’s murders and the bakery: Sweeney Todd was murdering his
22

23. customers and he was taking the meat from the bodies to Mrs Lovett. She was
using the meat to fill her pies!
The police still needed more evidence to prove their theory. Sir Richard’s men
were ordered to accompany every customer into Sweeney’s shop to prevent him
killing anybody else.
Policemen soon found clothes and jewellery in Sweeney’s flat with the victims’
names and initials written on some of them. Sweeney Todd and Mrs Lovett were
arrested immediately. After giving a full confession, Mrs Lovett poisoned herself
and Sweeney Todd was left to go on trial alone.
4
Frank Raymond: Reporter at the Trial of Sweeney Todd
My name is Frank Raymond and I was the reporter for the Daily Courant during the
trial of Sweeney Todd. London was very excited as the trial approached in
December 1801. In my entire career as a reporter, I never saw such excitement for
a criminal trial.
Todd was actually on trial for the murder of one sailor, Francis Thornhill. Despite
the large number of bodies and the large amount of evidence at his home, police
could not identify any other victims. Although the barber was a serial killer, one
murder was enough for him to be executed.
The prosecutor, dressed in a black gown and a white wig, opened his case.
‘Mr Thornhill was ordered to take some Oriental pearls, worth £16,000, to a young
lady in London,’ he began. ‘Thornhill’s ship arrived, and he went into the city to
deliver the pearls. On his way, he entered the prisoner’s shop for a shave, and
nobody saw him again.’
Todd admitted shaving the sailor but said, ‘I completed the job and Thornhill left.’
‘Gentlemen, those Oriental pearls soon appeared at the home of a man called Mr
John Mundel,’ the prosecutor continued. ‘Sweeney Todd sold them to him for
£1,000. Is that not enough evidence of his guilt?’
Then, the prosecutor described the scene under St Dunstan’s Church. ‘There was a
pile of new bodies with hardly any meat on them, but enough to produce the
terrible smell in the church.’
After that, the prosecutor described the connecting tunnels between Fleet Street
and Bell Yard, and linked it all to the evidence in Sweeney Todd’s house. ‘His house
was full of the possessions and clothing of 160 people,’ he said to the shocked
23

24. courtroom. ‘Yes, gentlemen of the jury, 160 people! And Francis Thornhill’s jacket
was among the clothing. Is a jacket enough evidence to imprison a man? The law
says no, and requires the body of the murdered man. We’ve got that evidence
because Mr Thornhill’s body was found among the skeletons under the church.’
Sir Richard Blunt, the chief of the police, testified next. ‘In my investigations, I
discovered that ten out of 13 victims planned to have a shave or haircut,’ he said.
‘Then, I heard about the disappearance of Francis Thornhill. He also went to Todd’s
shop and nobody saw him leave it.’
The last witness for the prosecution was Thornhill’s doctor, Sylvester Steers. He
identified a leg bone under Todd’s shop as belonging to Thornhill.
‘How did you come to this conclusion?’ the prosecutor asked.
‘Mr Thornhill had an unusual and painful accident as a young man,’ the doctor
answered. ‘Although he was cured, his bone was still deformed. I was his doctor
and I recognized it.’
Then, it was the defence lawyer’s turn to speak. He had a difficult job, but he tried
his best. ‘There’s no evidence against my client, just strange stories about bad
smells in churches, ingenious chairs, secret tunnels and meat pies,’ he began.
‘Really, gentlemen of the jury, this evidence is an insult to your intelligence.’
Next, he attacked the prosecution’s evidence. ‘How could the disappearance of
respectable men have any connection to Sweeney Todd?’ he asked. ‘Respectable
men like being shaved, and even Sir Richard Blunt had a shave several times at my
client’s shop, yet here he is, alive and well to give evidence today.
‘And the smell of St Dunstan’s? Why not say my client committed a crime because
this courtroom is not well ventilated?’
The most serious evidence against Sweeney Todd was the disappearance of
Francis Thornhill. ‘Why should my client be declared guilty of this murder?’ the
defence lawyer said. ‘Hundreds of people may have seen him come out of the shop
– and no doubt they did – but they didn’t recognize him because he was a stranger.
As for the leg bone…the doctor says he recognizes it, but gentlemen of the jury,
imagine if a man brought a window to this courtroom and declared it belonged to a
certain house. Would you believe him?’
He concluded his defence by blaming Margery Lovett for all the murders and
saying her suicide clearly showed her guilt.
The judge summed up the case and then the jury returned a “guilty” verdict after
only five minutes.
‘Have you got anything to say before the sentence?’ the judge asked Todd.
24

25. ‘I’m not guilty!’ Todd shouted.
‘It is now my painful responsibility to pass sentence upon you. You will be taken
from here to a place of execution and hanged by the neck until you are dead,’ the
judge declared. ‘Your dead body will be cut up. May heaven have compassion upon
you.’
On 25th January, 1582, in the prison yard at Newgate, Sweeney Todd was hanged in
front of a crowd of thousands, and after his execution, his body was cut up.
So Sweeney Todd ended his life in the same way so many of his victims did…as a
pile of meat and bones.
25