Disclaimer: The article contains mentions of abuse and murder. Readers’ discretion is advised.
Nannie Doss is an American serial killer who confessed to killing four of her husbands and is suspected to have killed some of her relatives. Every time she narrated the stories of her murders, she reportedly laughed, giving her the name Giggling Granny. Her laughter, reflecting a portrayal of a happy life, was covering up a series of murders that she committed between the 1920s and 1954.
When she was seven years old, Doss suffered a head injury. This reportedly impacted her view of life as a whole. She grew up with an idealistic view of romance. She hoped to fall in love and live happily with her husband. Her childhood was mostly spent on the family farm, where she helped out with chores.
When she was 16, Doss married Charley Braggs, with whom she had four children between the years 1921 and 1927. Nannie Doss, however, did not share a great relationship with her mother-in-law, who lived with the couple. When they separated in 1928, Braggs took their older daughter Melvina. After Doss’ second marriage, two of Melvina’s children, a newborn and a two-year-old, died in her care.
During this time, Doss was married to Frank Harrelson. She was married to Harrelson for 16 years until 1945, when she killed him. However, the death was believed to be caused by food poisoning. Doss got to collect life insurance, allowing her to purchase land and a home close to Jacksonville. Arlie Lanning, Doss’ next husband, died by poisoning in 1952, which also went uninvestigated as he was a heavy alcoholic, which was assumed to have caused his death.
Richard Morton, Doss’ next husband, was allegedly cheating on Doss and died under strange circumstances.
How did Nannie Doss get caught?
Samuel Doss, her final husband, allegedly controlled her and restricted her from reading magazines or watching television if it wasn’t for educational purposes. She poisoned his prune cake, resulting in him having to stay in the hospital for an entire month. Upon recovery, she again poisoned his coffee, which eventually led to Samuel Doss’ death.
Although it was a similar method that she employed to kill her previous partners, the killing of Samuel Doss led to Nannie Doss’ conviction. The doctor who was treating Samel Doss over his time at the hospital found unnatural levels of arsenic in his body. The doctor’s suspicions of foul play proved to be based, and he immediately alerted the authorities, whose investigation led to Nannie Doss being caught.
Doss’ previous husbands’ deaths were then investigated, and similar amounts of arsenic were found in their bodies, too. She then confessed to having killed four of her husbands, but authorities believe she killed as many as 12 people, including her sister. Nannie Doss claimed that she never killed for money but was just looking for some ‘real romance’ in life. When she didn’t find it in one partner, she would kill them and move on to the next.
She died in 1964 while she was serving time for the murder of Samuel Doss. Nannie Doss blamed her head injury for her criminal behavior and murders. She became widely popular as the Giggling Granny, who killed without even raising suspicions of murder.
Nannie Doss’ crimes are elaborately explored in the 11th episode of ‘Murderous Minds: Inside Serial Killers’, Season 1. The show is currently streaming on Prime Video.
