Five Children Vanished On Christmas Eve And The Clues Pointed To Theories More Sinister Than Any Could Imagine

On Christmas Eve 1945, George and Jennie Sodder went to sleep inside their family home outside Fayetteville, West Virginia, with nine of their ten children under the same roof.

By sunrise, the house was gone.

A fire had torn through the two-story timber home shortly after 1:30 am, forcing George, Jennie and four of their children outside while flames consumed the staircase leading to the bedrooms above.

Five siblings, Maurice, 14, Martha, 12, Louis, 10, Jennie, 8, and Betty, 5, were presumed trapped inside.