Most Terrifying Things About America’s First Serial Killer

How Holmes Disposed of the Bodies

The basement was equipped with a number of features to help Holmes dispose of the bodies without a trace. No one would even know they were there, to begin with. Holmes used giant furnaces to cremate the remains, which were, shockingly, the least suspicious installation out of all of the features his murder hotel had to offer.

The furnace was one of the most ingenious methods that Holmes used to dispose of the bodies of his victims. After all, Chicago winters get cold, and you’ve got to heat a giant building somehow. No one would ever suspect that the smoke billowing from the building had to do with anything but heating up the place. Cremation wasn’t the only way Holmes got rid of bodies. In a plot straight out of Breaking Bad, he used acid baths to dissolve the parts of his victims that he couldn’t sell. He would also use lime, which actually aids in the preservation of remains.