This day in history: On this day in 1937, 30-year-old farm wife Elsie Nollen of Dennison, Iowa, backed the family car up to a window and piped deadly monoxide gas into a room, killing her six children and herself.
The children raged in age from two years to 11 years. The husband, Albert Nollen, and two friends, found the bodies.
Nollen left a suicide letter starting: "I'm doing this because I see the family is not going to be raised up right." Nollen was overwhelmed with jealousy and marital unhappiness.
Albert Nollen found the bodies when he returned to his home Sunday morning after a quarrel with his wife and an all-night "spree". He found her letter in the mailbox.
Also on this day in 1919 in Kimberly, Ohio, Mary Stravisar killed her seven children and herself. "The family was living in destitute circumstances and her husband Tony had left them in May that year to search for work, but hadn't been heard of since. Stravisar and her children, who were aged 6 weeks to 10 years, were aided by the local authorities, which eventually decided to take the children to the Athens County Home. The 35-year-old was greatly worried about this and on the day the children were to be removed she tied them to their beds, sprinkled the room with coal oil and set it on fire, burning or asphyxiating all of them." Source
A familicide is a type of murder or murder-suicide in which an individual, usually a man, kills multiple close family members in quick succession, most often children, spouses, siblings, or parents. In half the cases, the killer lastly kills themselves in a murder-suicide. If only the parents are killed, the case may also be referred to as a parricide. Where all members of a family are killed, the crime may be referred to as family annihilation.
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