Hello and welcome back to paranormal activity with me, Yvette Fielding. Now, this week,

we have another chilling chapter in our special series, murders that horned. Over the past episodes,

we've explored the lingering spirits of those whose crimes or tragic fates have left echoes in the world beyond.

Now, if you remember, we examined the calculated poisoning of Mary Blandy, the turbulent reign of Alcapone,

and the hauntings their stories left behind.

But this week, we descend into the shadow surrounding one of Britain's most infamous female killers.

A woman whispered about in Victorian streets, feared by families and remembered in folklore with a chill.

Mary Ann Cotton, the black widow of the North East.

Her crimes were horrific. Her life was chaotic and her spirit,

many claim, has never left. So join me as we uncover the dark legacy and the hauntings

of Mary Anne Cotton. And joining me this week to talk in more detail about her and her case and read some of her

death cell letters is my only partner in crime, the wonderful Carl Beattie, but we'll be

chatting to him a bit later.

Welcome to another episode of paranormal activity. Now, you know that I like to start the show

with a little tickle of fact or fiction. Listen out for the answer at the end. Now, as this week's

episode is all about Mary Ann Cotton, I want to know whether it's fact or fiction that Mary Ann was

buried in Durham Prison in an unmarked grave.

Is that true or is it false?

Find out at the end of the show.

Close your eyes for a moment and imagine Victorian England in the mid-1800. Industrialisation is choking the air with coal smoke.

Entire towns are humming with a clatter of machinery and poverty presses on families from every direction.

In the northeast, the landscape is a patchwork of pit villages, shipyards and soot-blackened terraces where families often lived hand-to-mouth.

...