Catherine Csassna, Slovakian Suspected Black Widow Serial Killer - 1880

FULL TEXT: At a town called Verbo, in Hungary [currently in Slovakia], not long since, a woman named Catherine Csassna buried her seventh husband. Her life appears to have been a strange succession of matrimonial adventures, none of which were very startling, but all of which make up a curious total. At the age of seventeen the buxom Catherine espoused a maker, who died after fifteen months of connubial felicity. The following year she married an aged widower, who said goodbye to her at the end of thirteen months. She remained a widow this time but one month, marrying for her third another widower, who lasted but four years. Doubtless determined to make a good choice sooner or later, she married a stout young fellow of twenty-eight; but in just four years he also died of consumption. Catherine remained a widow eight weeks, at the end of which time she married the village butcher, a fine fellow; but alas he was doomed to fade away, and in six years a cross in the little cemetery announced that he had gone over to the majority. For her sixth husband Catherine Csassna selected a man so robust and massive in physique that all the villagers in Verbo that he would survive Catherine, and great was the surprise and scandal when, four months after the celebration of the nuptials, this son of Anak was placed in the cheerless tomb. Many persons accused Catherine of being a female Bluebeard, of poisoning her unfortunate husbands, etc., but she snapped her fingers at them, and asked them to produce their proofs. As they could not well do this, the doughty Catherine married again, and, to the surprise and horror of every one, husband number seven cruelly deceived her by turning up his toes only a few days after the marriage. Catherine is now seeking an eighth husband, but all the men in Verbo tremble.

[“Much Married.” Vermont Phoenix (Battleboro, Vt.), Aug. 13, 1880, p. 1]

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FULL TEXT (translated from German): As a Pest newspaper from Verbo reports, a woman there, named Katharina Csassna, has three days ago her seventh husband to the grave. This woman has an interesting life story behind her, from which there are many surprising details to tell. She recalls the exact chronology of all her marriages and claims to have entered her first marriage in her seventeenth year. The first of her spouses was a brewer named Martin Bossak, who lived with her for only fifteen months, then died of withering. She was widowed for a year and then married Johann Hubicsek, who was also widowed and very elderly. With him she spent 13 years, then died of old age just in the hundredth year of his life.

She did not even mourn this man for a month, because she soon got married to the widower Martin Krchnik, who died of dropsy after four years. She mourned her third for nine months; then she managed to fish a man named Georg Nisznanszky, who was a young man at the age of 28. But even this marriage would not last long, because after four years our heroine was granted the opportunity to make a new marriage covenant. Nisznanszky died after four years of marriage from an unfortunate fall. After a mourning of eight weeks, the widow entered into a marriage with the butcher Josef Marczinka and spent six years with him.

When now he also died, she joined after a mourning of nine months with a tree-strong man named Josef Tomaskovics as a spouse. That was her sixth marriage; now Verba was generally convinced that this man would survive the woman. But after only four moons the sixth sank into the grave. Wept bitterly by the woman. The grave of the Sixth was not overgrown with grass yet, as the rumor spread that Csassna would take a seventh man in the person of the Master of the Masters, Josef Cilat, which actually took place. Now the Herculean woman buried this man too, and now only thinks of marrying again, and for the eighth time. The woman is 50 years old today, and she is still full of strength and health and can expect to bring her to twelve men.

["A woman burying seven spouses." Tages-Post (Linz, Austria), 9 Juli 1880, p. 2]

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FULL TEXT: Wie einem Pester Blatte aus Verbo berichtet wird, hat ein dortiges Weib, Namens Katharina Csaßna, vor drei Tagen ihren siebenten Gatten zu Grabe geführt. Dieses Weib hat eine interessante Lebensgeschichte hinter sich, aus der es viele überraschende Einzel heiten zu erzählen weiß. Sie erinnertsich genauder Chronologie aller ihrer Eheschließungen und gibt an, ihre erste Ehe in ihrem siebzehnten Lebensjahre eingegangen zu sein. Der erste ihrer Ehe gatten war ein Czischmenmachermeifter Namens Martin Boßak, der nur fünfzehn Monate mit ihr lebte, indem er dann an Abzehrung starb. Ein Jahr brachte sie als Witwe zu und ver heiratete sichdannmit Johann Hubicsek, der ebenfalls im verwitweten Zustande sich befand und sehr bejahrt war. Mit dem verlebte sie 13 Jahre, dann starber an Altersschwäche gerade im hundertsten Jahre seines Lebens.

Diesen Mann betrauerte sie nicht einmal einen Monat lang, denn alsbald vermälte sie sich mit dem Witwer Martin Krchnik, der nach vier Jahren an der Wassersucht starb. Sie beweinte ihren Dritten neun Monate lang; dann gelanges ihr wieder, einen Mann zuerfischen, der den Namen Georg Nisznanszky führte und ein junger Mensch mit 28 Jahren war. Doch auch diese Ehe sollte nicht lange währen, denn schon nach vier Jahren war es unserer Heldin beschieden, wieder einen neuen Ehebund schließen zu können. Nisznanszky ist schon nach vierjähriger Ehe dnrch einen unglücklichen Sturz um's Leben gekommen. Nach einer Trauer von acht Wochen ging die Witwe eine Heirat mit dem Fleischer Josef Marczinka ein und verlebte mit ihm sechs Jahre.

Als nun auch dieser starb, verband sie sich nach einer Trauer von neun Monaten mit einem baumstarken Manne Namens Josef Tomaskovics als Ehegattin. Das war ihre sechste Eheschließung; nun war man in Verba allgemein über zeugt, dieser Mann werde das Weib überleben. Aber schon nach kurzen vier Monden sank auch der Sechste in's Grab. Von dem Weibe bitterlich beweint. Noch war das Grab des Sechsten nicht mit Gras bewachsen, da verbreitete sich schon das Gerücht, die Csaßna werde einen siebenten Mann in der Person des Hafnermeisters Josef Cilat nehmen, was auch wirklich erfolgte. Nun bestattete das herkulische Weib auch diesen Mann und denkt auch jetzt nur daran, sich wieder und zwar zum achtenmale zu ver ehelichen. Die Frau ist heute 50 Jahre alt und strotzt noch von Kraft und Gesundheit und kann es voraussichtlich noch auf zwölf Männer bringen.

[“Ein Weib, das sieben Ehegatten begräbt.” Tages-Post (Linz, Austria), 9 Juli 1880, p. 2]

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Vrbové (German: Vrbau (modernized:Werbau); Hungarian: Verbó) is a town in the Trnava Region of Slovakia. It has a population of 6,309 as of 2005. The town lies around 8 km (5 mi) northwest from Piešťany.

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For links to other cases of woman who murdered 2 or more husbands (or paramours), see Black Widow Serial Killers.

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[559-6/17/19]

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