Dark Stories: On This Day In True Crime History - Dark Stories True Crime Tours

2023: Erin Patterson Serves Death Cap Mushrooms to In-Laws at a Lunch in Leongatha

On 29 July 2023, Erin Patterson invited four relatives to her home in Leongatha, Victoria, and served them beef Wellington laced with toxic death cap mushrooms. All four were hospitalised within 24 hours, diagnosed with severe liver failure. Three died within six days, one despite receiving a liver transplant. Ian Wilkinson was the sole survivor, recovering seven weeks later.

Patterson was arrested in November 2023 and charged with three counts of murder and five counts of attempted murder. After charges relating to her estranged husband Simon were dropped, she faced trial before a jury in the Supreme Court of Victoria at Morwell. On 7 July 2025, the jury convicted her on all remaining charges. Justice Christopher Beale sentenced her to life imprisonment with a non-parole period of 33 years, in the first sentencing hearing in Victoria to be broadcast live.

Beef Wellington fillet with mushrooms

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Australia Leongatha Morwell Murder Poisoning Trial VIC

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1835: The Infernal Machine: Fieschi’s 25-Barrel Assassination Attempt on King Louis Philippe I

On 28 July 1835, Giuseppe Marco Fieschi fired a homemade 25-barrel volley gun, dubbed the ‘infernal machine’, from a third-floor window at 50 Boulevard du Temple in Paris, directly into the convoy of King Louis Philippe I of France. The weapon unleashed around 400 projectiles in a single volley; the king escaped with only a graze to the forehead, but 18 people were killed and 22 more wounded, at least four of whom had limbs amputated.

The gun’s design proved its own undoing: French artillery officers later concluded that if Fieschi had understood ballistics well enough to angle the barrels so they diverged and crossed, he could have killed up to 200 additional people and destroyed the king entirely. Instead, the parallel configuration limited the carnage. Fieschi himself was badly wounded when several barrels burst; he fled but was tracked by a trail of blood and captured shortly after.

Illustration of an assassination attempt on a king

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Assassination Europe France Paris Political Crime Trial

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1794: The Fall of Robespierre: The Architect of the Terror Meets the Guillotine

Maximilien Robespierre, the lawyer turned revolutionary who came to embody the ruthless machinery of the French Revolution, was executed by guillotine in Paris on 28 July 1794. As the dominant force on the Committee of Public Safety, he had overseen the Reign of Terror, a period in which thousands were sent to the blade in the name of republican virtue. His own arrest, the day before, had come swiftly after the National Convention turned against him.

The man who had signed so many death warrants met the same end he had prescribed for others. Wounded during his arrest, reportedly from a gunshot to the jaw, he was carried to the scaffold in agony. His execution marked the end of the Terror and the beginning of the Thermidorian Reaction, a conservative turn that dismantled much of what he had built.

Arrest of Robespierre during revolutionary unrest

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Europe Execution France Political Crime Revolution

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1791: James Chapman Hanged in Sydney for Burglary One Day After Sentencing

James Chapman arrived in New South Wales in June 1790 aboard a Second Fleet vessel, already a convicted burglar who had stolen fowls from a Hampshire farm in 1787 and been reprieved from death in exchange for transportation for life. Working as a labourer at Parramatta, he lasted barely a year before again crossing into crime, breaking and entering the home of John Petrie in July 1791 and stealing clothing and other goods, with additional charges relating to property belonging to John Medcalf.

Chapman pleaded guilty before the Court of Criminal Jurisdiction on 19 July 1791 and was sentenced to death. He was hanged in Sydney the following day, aged around 29. A man named Joseph Hatton, charged with receiving the stolen goods, was sentenced to 500 or 800 lashes.

James Chapman Hanged in <a href='https://darkstories.com.au/sydneytruecrimetour/' target='_blank' rel='noopener noreferrer'>Sydney</a> for Burglary One Day After Sentencing” style=”max-width:50%; height:auto; display:block; margin:16px auto;”/></p>
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Australia Burglary Colonial Crime Execution NSW Parramatta Prison Robbery Sydney Theft

2023: Erin Patterson Serves Death Cap Mushrooms to In-Laws at a Lunch in Leongatha

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1835: The Infernal Machine: Fieschi’s 25-Barrel Assassination Attempt on King Louis Philippe I

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1794: The Fall of Robespierre: The Architect of the Terror Meets the Guillotine

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1791: James Chapman Hanged in Sydney for Burglary One Day After Sentencing

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