Countess as Dope Fiend
Morphine murder mystery leads to Great War thread-pull; PLUS: Black Dahlia / Zodiac claim and AI update
In September 1919, a young woman staying at one of the best hotels in Montreux, Switzerland, made the acquaintance of a “Hungarian adventuress”. The young woman was around 24 years old and either English or American. She became “bosom friends” with the adventuress and loaned her a large sum of money, apparently to cover losses at bridge.
One evening, the young woman entered the adventuress’s room and found her giving herself a morphine injection.
“Will you have one too?” asked the adventuress.
“If you like,” replied the young woman.
Four hours later, the young woman was found dead from an overdose. The Montreux police began an investigation, and the adventuress was arrested. The police refused to disclose the names of the two women.
The story was reported in multiple newspapers in the UK and the US, including the Daily Express, which used the multi-part headline: “SWISS HOTEL TRAGEDY: Young Woman Killed by Morphine Injection — Administered by Adventuress Who Owed Her Money.” The accompanying article was only 132 words long and lacked many details. But, as with many a seemingly superficial story featured on Singular Discoveries, pulling its threads reveals a wealth of interest.
Morphine (and cocaine) use was becoming an increasing problem in 1919. Morphine was the primary form of pain relief during the Great War, and there was a post-war epidemic of opioid addiction among veterans and civilians. Earlier in 1919, the Daily Express reported on the inquest into the death of famous musical comedy actress Billie Carleton. 22-year-old Carleton was found dead in her room at the Savoy Court Mansions, a residential annexe of London’s Savoy Hotel.
The inquest found that Carleton had regularly taken cocaine and morphine, had tried heroin, and visited opium dens. The case involved a cast of seedy characters, including the actor and costume designer Raoul Reginald “Reggie” de Veulle, who held drug orgies at his London flat, and supplied drugs to Carleton alongside silent movie star Lionel Belcher. De Veulle obtained the drugs from wife-and-husband dealers Ada Lau Ping and Yu Lau Ping in London’s Chinatown.
Carleton likely died as a result of a morphine overdose administered to treat a “cocaine hangover”. The morphine had been supplied by Dr Frederick Stuart of Knightsbridge who, in addition to being Carleton’s physician, was also the “custodian of her money”. But it was Reggie de Veulle who was found guilty of manslaughter for supplying Carleton’s cocaine. De Veulle was subsequently acquitted of the manslaughter charge, although he and Ada Lau Ping were jailed for conspiracy to supply drugs.
Lionel Belcher, who had accompanied Carleton back to her room prior to her death, admitted to being a “dope trafficker” and heroin addict. He escaped charges, but reports said his “promising cinema career was more or less ruined”. (Belcher’s life story deserves further examination - watch this space.)
Going back to the Swiss hotel case in September 1919, several days after the initial story, the Daily Express reported a “sensational development” under the headline “COUNTESS AS DOPE FIEND”. The Hungarian adventuress, who had administered the fatal dose of morphine to the young English or American woman, was identified as Countess Ilona Tisza, the widow of the former Hungarian Prime Minister Count Istvan (Stephen) Tisza. Count Tisva had been assassinated in the previous year.
Ilona Tisza had married Istvan Tisza, her first cousin, in 1885. The couple had a son and a daughter, Istavan (II) and Juliska. Ilona was present at two of four assassination attempts on her husband, including the fatal attempt in October 1918. On that occasion, a group of armed soldiers entered the family’s villa in Budapest, where the Countess confronted them and said, “What do you want? Put your revolvers away.” When the Count appeared, one of the soldiers shouted, “You are responsible for plunging Europe into a bloody war!” and shot him dead.
Count Tisza was blamed by various parties — including British politicians — for the outbreak of the war, although he had been outspoken against armed conflict. The Kingdom of Hungary was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, which invaded Serbia in July 1914 following the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand.
Tisza had written to Franz Joseph, the King of Hungary and Emperor of Austria, stating that he was opposed to war with Serbia because it would likely trigger a wider European conflict, and that he wanted to give Serbia time to prove it had not plotted the assassination. However, after German Emperor and King of Prussia Kaiser Wilhelm pledged his full support, Tisza reluctantly changed his mind, and Franz Joseph declared war.
Following the death of King / Emperor Joseph and the ascension of King / Emperor Karl (Charles), Count Tisza resigned at the new monarch’s request. Tisza went to fight in the Great War on the Italian Front as Commander of the Imperial and Royal Hussars, and also travelled as a peace envoy — without success. The war ended eleven days after his killing. Although initially popular among his people, he became synonymous with the country’s ultimate defeat.
The Tiszas’ son Istvan (II) died of Spanish Flu five days after his father’s assassination. The daughter, Juliska, had died during childhood. This was a family entirely ruined. It seems easy to imagine why Countess Tisza might have been taking morphine in her hotel room in September 1919 after her ordeals. Following her arrest, she was transferred from prison to a psychiatric hospital at Cery, near Lausanne, for medical observation. “It is believed that the morphine habit has affected her brain,” reported the Express.
A week later, five men were arrested in Budapest in connection with the assassination of Count Tisza. The ensuing court case implicated a terrorist group loyal to Bela Kun, the leader of the Hungarian Communist Party, who was planning a communist revolution. Kun staged a successful coup in March 1919, and led the Hungarian Soviet Republic for four and a half months before the regime collapsed.
The trials of those accused of committing and agitating for the murder of Count Tisza took place in 1920 and 1921. An initial court-martial against four accused soldiers was described as a “sham trial” designed to protect the real perpetrators. All four were convicted, and three were sentenced to death, although one escaped, and the other two successfully appealed their sentence. In a subsequent civil lawsuit, charges against four other men were either dropped or substantially reduced. Commentators suggested that the real culprits had never been brought to justice.
Countess Tisza was released from hospital and returned to her family home, the Tisza Castle in Geszt. She died there in March 1925. The Countess was buried in the Tisza Castle family crypt alongside her husband and children.
Count Tisza’s reputation improved in subsequent years, and a statue was erected in his honour in Budapest in the 1930s. The statue was destroyed during the Second World War, but was recreated and reinaugurated in 2014.
One final thread pull reveals a gruesome postscript. In 1983, someone broke into the Tisza family crypt and stole Count Tisza’s skull. The perpetrator was never identified, and the skull has never been found.◆
Recommended
Article: An amateur codebreaker may have just solved the Black Dahlia and Zodiac killings by Christopher Goffard (Los Angeles Times)
This story rocked me back in my chair when I read it. Has an amateur sleuth really solved two of the most notorious murders in true crime history? On reflection, I’m not sure. But it’s a fascinating claim, backed by far too many coincidences to be ignored. Essentially, autistic code breaker Alex Barber claims to have solved a cipher sent in 1970 by the Zodiac Killer to the San Francisco Chronicle containing the words “My name is…” followed by a 13-character cryptogram. According to Barber, the hidden name is “Marvin Merrill”, which was the pseudonym adopted by Marvin Margolis, who was a key suspect in the Black Dahlia murder.
Barber’s claim, supported by numerous other findings, is that Marvin Margolis / Merrill was responsible for both the Black Dahlia and Zodiac killings, which were committed more than two decades apart. (The Black Dahlia Killer murdered Elizabeth Short in 1947, and the Zodiac Killer claimed to have murdered 37 people in 1968 and 1969). I have doubts. Barber used AI to help solve the cipher, and his supporting evidence is circumstantial. But it is tantalisingly possible that this could be true. There’s an accompanying podcast from true crime author Michael Connelly (though I found it a difficult listen), but the next step will be to wait for cold-case detectives to test the theory. You can read the story here.
Notebook
I no longer use AI-generated images to illustrate this newsletter. Previously, I’ve used AI tools to help make illustrations to accompany posts. I’d started using DALL-E and Midjourney a couple of years ago because historical stories can be difficult to illustrate as they often lack contemporary photos or other images. However, there’s no getting away from the fact that generative AI tools are trained on human creative work, often without consent or compensation. In effect, generative AI is stealing the work of human artists. I also feel the internet is drowning in AI gruel, and I don’t want to contribute to that in any way.
Because this is a free-of-charge newsletter, there’s no budget to hire artists to illustrate posts. So, going forward, my posts will generally not include a header image. That shouldn’t make too much difference, as the newsletter is about words rather than pictures. (I’ll still include newspaper clippings, original photos, maps, etc, where relevant.) I’ve also removed AI-generated images from the newsletter’s archive, so you might notice a change if you visit the Singular Discoveries homepage.
More next time. Thanks for reading Singular Discoveries. Please share and subscribe.
Main sources: Daily Express 15 & 25 September, 29 November, 1919.
Regarding the theft of Count Tisza’s skull, you can read this Origo article using Google Translate: We were on the trail of a stolen prime minister’s skull.