historical mysteries

I hadn't heard of this story before: one woman and 32 men stranded on an island for years directly following WWII:

Mary Queen of Scots: Secret letters written during imprisonment decoded. Secret letters written in code by Mary, Queen of Scots during her imprisonment in England have been uncovered and decoded by a team of cryptographers. The documents, which were believed to have been lost, were found in...

A team of researchers has cracked a five century-old code which reveals a rumoured French plot to kill the Holy Roman Emperor and King of Spain Charles V. Charles was one of the most powerful men of the 16th century, presiding over a vast empire that took in much of western Europe and the...

Between 1850 and 1855, someone published a series of unusual ads in the British newspaper The Times. They were made up of a series of seemingly random letters, apparently gobbledygook. Almost 200 years later, a group of codebreakers has finally been able to decrypt some of them and read what...

Henry VIII’s first wife may have commissioned the design as an act of defiance during the Tudor king’s attempt to divorce her. In July 1531, Tudor king Henry VIII rode out of Windsor Castle with his mistress, Anne Boleyn, at his side. He left without warning, failing to bid farewell to...

A scientific analysis commissioned by the FBI shortly before agents went digging for buried treasure suggested that a huge quantity of gold could be below the surface, according to newly released government documents and photos that deepen the mystery of the 2018 excavation in remote western...

The literary works of Charles Dickens have been translated into 150 languages and read the world over. However, there is one body of his work which has remained unread and still proves a mystery to academics. The reason: Dickens wrote it in complex code. Researchers have long been trying to...

I hadn't heard about Paul Redfern before, a fascinating tale. Lost Flight to Brazil in 1927: A Young Pilot Disappears in the Amazon Paul Redfern (right) sits beside Paul Varner, chairman of the committee backing his 1927 nonstop flight attempt to Rio de Janeiro, at Sea Island, Georgia. Costal...

When Swedish archaeologists in 2015 X-rayed the remains of a 17th-century bishop, they were shocked when the images revealed that the bishop shared his coffin with the remains of a stillborn premature baby. Now, ancient DNA analysis has revealed that the fetus was likely the bishop's grandson...

17 Of The Strangest Mysteries That Are Still Unsolved. Some freaky stuff. (Click titles in this list for sources) The Circleville Letters. The disappearance of the USS Cyclops. The mysterious disappearance and "reappearance" of Lawrence Joseph Bader. The Toxic Lady. The Oakville Blobs. The...

Scientists have long puzzled over the elusive recipe for ancient Roman concrete, which has withstood the test of time better than any of the concrete that’s been poured in the 20th century. Now, Maria Jackson from the University of Utah claims to have unravelled the mystery, and furthermore...

I have been reading some intriguing propositions regarding Napoléon: principally, that he made some major undisclosed discoveries in Egypt (within the pyramids, not the Rosetta Stone) and also apparently in Italy. Allegedly he was thus assisted in becoming a self-declared 'Emperor of the World'...

First, sorry if this has already been discussed somewhere- I searched and couldn't find anything. Second, there is hardly any information about this apart from the original Washington Post article and a long thread on Reddit. I'm not familiar with Reddit, and don't know how reliable it is but...

Russia, 1959, a group of skiers embark on a cross-country ski trip. On the night of February 2, 1959, some sort of accident happens, leaving them dead. Evidence points to them ripping open the tent in their hurry to flee, mostly in their nightclothes and shoeless. Several of them had injuries...

http/tinyurl.com/yqr5sy (Mod Edit: Original link is broken. Archived version found via The Wayback Machine here: https://web.archive.org/web/20090130100439/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/1545177/Caravaggio-was-actually-Merisi-of-Milan.html) rynner the ubiquitous

Agh! A real teaser here. A new Scientist article which is only available in full to subscribers. It begins: Can anyone post the rest? :?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/life/science/story/0,12996,1280700,00.html

http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,12084,975708,00.html I was reading this about Birmingham area. There is an opera about the story and everything. Does anyone know more?:eek!!!!:

So, what do you FTers think? Did George Mallory conquer Everest decades before Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tensing, despite dying in the attempt? Were you convinced by the FT story?

This is one of my favourite weird tales! It's like a 'Mary Celeste', but happened on the remote islands west of the Hebrides at the beginning of the last century. 'Strange Islands. The Flannan Islands have long been the focal point of many superstitions by the local people. Indeed there...

From The Scotsman

Does anyone know of the conspiracy regarding the loss of the Franklin Expedition during the search for the Northwest Passage? There has been considerable evidence to prove that the Admirality made certain that he was not found. They made sure nobody found the messages left in the he set up...

Memorial Service for Bermuda Triangle Lost Patrol And this from National Geographic: a longish examination of the various possibilities. It also gives links to other Bermuda Triangle sites. The National Geographic link is dead. The article is archived at the Wayback Machine. Here is the...

if we're mentioning derelicts how about the Ourang Medan? well spooky

(From a query about "ghost ships" in general ...) I don't think the Marie Celeste qualifies as a ghost ship, as it has never reappeared.

This is an old interest of mine, although it doesn't seem to have been mentioned on this MB before. New ideas on old Greek mechanism. Begins: WHEN a Greek sponge diver called Elias Stadiatos discovered the wreck of a cargo ship off the tiny island of Antikythera in 1900, it was the...

_http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/0814GhostBlimp14-ON.html_______ 'Ghost blimp' mystery unsolved 60 years later Mark J. Price Akron (Ohio) Beacon Journal Aug. 14, 2002 08:45:00 AKRON, Ohio - There's no way we'll ever really know what happened. We can read every document...

I was looking for some links on the disappearance of Michael Rockefeller and only managed to come up with this extremely poor effort.[1] Rockefeller disappeared at the age of 23 in the early 1960s whilst on an expedition around New Guinea. Whilst sailing with his guide the boat began to take on...

Amelia Earhart was the most celebrated aviatrix in history and was one of the most famous women of her time. As America's charismatic “Lady of the Air,” she set many aviation records, including becoming the first woman to fly across the Atlantic in 1928 as a passenger, the first woman (and...

As the Bard's birthday is almost here, just thought I'd ask who you all think he really was. Facts, theories, thoughts and hey nonny nonnies here. :)

Okay, Dark Detective, but you do realise this will now be ALL my social life? Aaron Kosminski - supposedly McNaughten's favourite suspect, but losing favour these days. Kosminski was said to have threatened his sister with a knife and threatened another with a chair leg. Neither of which is...

Who do YOU think did it? How had the means motive and opportunity to commit one of our most famous unsolved murders? Place your vote and make your comment :) 8¬)

Where are they now - Oak Island Money Pit I first heard this story some years ago, but little since. I read that the owners of the island are currently in some legal wranglings but that future excavations are planned. I also read at Csicop that the Money Pit is more likely to be a natural...

Can you believe I'd never heard of this until a few weeks ago when I was doing some (proper, historical) research on John Dee, and found it mentioned in a footnote, dug up a lot of info about it on the web. One ot the most fascinating things I've ever heard of, anyway, so I thought I'd ask...