Hello everyone and welcome to Usual Disclaimer with Eleanor Neal, a true crime podcast where we crack open some of the most notorious cases in history.

Given the topics that we'll be investigating, it goes without saying that this show comes with a content warning.

The details can get a bit heavy and you might find some of the themes we discuss triggering.

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So HH H.H. H.H. H.H. H.H. H.H. H.H. H. H.H. H. H. H. H. H. H. H. H. H. H.H. Holmes is known as America's first serial killer, which is probably not true.

There were probably are definitely serial killers before him, but that's just how he's known.

He's the first kind of properly documented one. Holmes is believed by

some people to have claimed the lives of over 200 people in his killing spree, which is unlike any

other case I've ever heard. I've never heard a number quite so high. And Holmes is also famous for,

infamous for his murder castle or murder hotel. So yeah, let's just get into it. But before we do,

I just want to give my usual disclaimer that I'm in absolutely no disrespect to anyone that I talk about in this video.

This video is for educational purposes and everything that I'm about to say is just information that I talk about in this video. This video is for educational purposes

and everything that I'm about to say is just information that I away from his birth name which of course we'll talk about later.

He was born Herman Webster Mudgett on May 16th 1861 but for the sake of this video I'm just going to be calling him Holmes even though for the first like half of it his name was Herman Mudgeett.

He was born in New Hampshire in the US to his father Levi Mudgeett and his mother Theodate Price.

I hope I'm saying that right but I've never heard the name Theodate before so.

He was the middle child of five he had an older brother and sister named Helen and Arthur and a younger brother and sister named Henry and Mary.

His whole family were Protestant Christians, although I don't know how strict they were. I've read a bunch of different sources. Some say that they were super strict and others said that it didn't really affect his life that much, so I'm not too short.

His father, Levi, was a farmer, well, he came from like a farming family and he did do a lot of farming work, but he also did other jobs here and there, so he was a painter at one point.

But I don't think his father really took on these extra jobs like for extra money

because his family were really wealthy. He came from this farming background. It was a very

wealthy career to be in. So I think he kind of took these other jobs like painting and teaching and

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