40. A Christmas Mystery - What Happened to the Five Sodder Children?

Hard Times and True Crimes

A fire broke out around midnight on Christmas Eve in 1945 at the Sodder house in Fayetteville, West Virginia. Five of the Sodder family's ten children didn't make it outside with the rest of their family. George Sodder, their father tried desperately to save them but it was to no avail. At first everyone believed the children died in the fire. However, no skeletal remains were ever found. After several new pieces of evidence came to light and some extremely odd circumstances surrounding the night of the fire, the family and many people all over the world came to believe the children were kidnapped just before the fire was started. Today, I (Darlene) am going to tell Melody the family's story and we will discuss what we believe happened to the children.
Male Narrator- Curtis Hildreth
Music by Isaiah Hildreth
Sources:
Wikipedia
findagrave.com
newspapers.com
investigationandiscovery.comhttps://www.investigationdiscovery.com/crimefeed/mystery/5-curious-details-about-the-missing-sodder-children
thesmithsonian.com https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-children-who-went-up-in-smoke-172429802/
legendsofamerica.com https://www.legendsofamerica.com/missing-sodder-children/
allthatsintresting.com https://allthatsinteresting.com/sodder-children
wtrf.com https://www.wtrf.com/west-virginia/west-virginia-unsolved-mystery-the-sodden-five-a-series-of-unfortunate-events-or-a-conspiracy-to-traffic-children/
onlyinyourstate.com https://www.onlyinyourstate.com/west-virginia/mafia-town-wv/
crime capsule.com https://crimecapsule.com/black-hand-beat/
wvpublicorg.comhttps://wvpublic.org/february-11-1923-eight-members-of-the-black-hand-arrested-in-harrison-county/
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