Agatha Christie's Disappearance Finally Has An Answer
Agatha Christie was a rising legend of literature in her mid-30s — and then one night she disappeared without a trace. Yes, the dame of mysteries suddenly became a central figure in her own detective story. The U.K. police and public searched desperately for the famed author for 11 days. It was a sequence right out of one of her famous whodunits. Yet this mystery didn't end in a nice, neat climax. The answer the authorities finally uncovered instead revealed a dark new story that tore Christie's family apart.
Rising star
This mystery started around Christmas time when Christie was 36 years old. The author had at this time already made a name for herself. But being an up-and-comer in the literary world was a far cry from her rather humble life in Sunningdale — a quiet suburb about an hour's train ride out of London.
Quiet night
Christie lived with her husband, Colonel Archibald Christie, and their young daughter, Rosalind. From the outside, everything probably seemed perfectly normal in the Christie household. But Archie had actually told Christie he wanted a divorce in August 1926. And then everything changed on one cold December night.
Gone
December 4th, 1926, officially marked day one of the Agatha Christie mystery. She had driven away from her home the night before — and not come back. Her disappearance soon paraded the headlines all across the world. A famous mystery writer mysteriously vanishes? It was irresistible — and the public ate it up.
Looking for answers
Search teams were swiftly deployed to look for the novelist. One newspaper said it'd give a reward to anyone who found her. Even the British home secretary urged the police to get results. And the police found their first — very worrying — clue on the morning of December 4.
