Unknown Gender History: Josepha Perez, “The She-Wolf,” Spanish Serial Killer

Thursday, September 22, 2011

Josepha Perez, “The She-Wolf,” Spanish Serial Killer – 1862

FULL TEXT: A letter from Madrid says: -- ‘A woman known as the ‘She Wolf’ has been the terror of Gallicia and the neighboring provinces for the last twenty years. Always on horseback, and followed by a small number of bandits, she was at the head of all the robberies and murders committed in that part of Spain. Woe to the travellers and muleteers who crossed her path. Any attempt at resistance was sure to be punished by death, which was accompanied by the most atrocious tortures. Josepha Perez, as the woman was named, committed the most revolting acts of ferocity on her victims. Often she has had to defend herself against armed forces, and the advantage has always been on her side until now, when the Mayor of San Jacobo de Compostella, who was in search of a criminal, discovered the cave which served as a place of concealment to the ‘She Wolf,’ and in which she was arrested with one of her accomplices.’

[Untitled, The Colonist [Nelson, New Zealand), Sep. 5, 1862, p. 3]

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FULL TEXT (translated from German): A bandit leader, feared in Spain, Josefa Perez la Masreita, known as "the she-wolf" [La Loba], who has for 20 years been the head of a mounted band of robbers there, having committed numerous robberies and murders, and even victoriously defended against the military sent against her band, was finally taken prisoner, in a mountain grotto where she was alone with one of her accomplices..

["A robber chief," Gemeinde-Zeitung (Vienna, Austria), June 28, 1862. p. 409 (9 in issue)]

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FULL TEXT: Eine Räuberhauptmännin, die in Spanien gefürchtete Josefa Perez la Masreita, bekannt unter dem Namen: “die Wölfin”, welche bereits eit 20 Jahren daselbst an der Spitze einer berittenen Räuberbande stand, zahlreiche Räubereien und Mordthaten verübte, und sich sogar gegen das wider sie ausgeschickte Militär siegreich wehrte, ist endlich gefangengenommen worden, und zwar in einer Gebirgsgrotte, in welcher sie sich mit einem ihrer Mitschuldigen allein befand.

[“Eine Räuberhauptmännin,” Gemeinde-Zeitung (Vienna, Austria), 28. Juni 1862. p. 409 (9 in issue)]

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