The legend of Lavinia Fisher, the first known female serial killer in the U.S., is over a century old, dating back to the early 1800s. She is said to have rolled with a group of highway robbers and outlaws, including her husband John Fisher. They operated out of two houses in the backcountry of South Carolina, just outside of Charleston.

It is widely understood that Lavinia herself was the leader of the gang, and the men held a strong loyalty to both her and her husband. She would invite lone travelers into the house, where she would serve them poisoned tea as she asked about their occupation, covertly trying to figure out if they were rich or not. When the poisoned tea made the doomed traveler feel woozy and sick, she would escort them up to a guest bedroom. After they fell asleep, she would slip into the room as quiet as a mouse flipping a hidden lever that would collapse the bed into a pit. While her victims were trapped and unconscious, she and her husband would rob them for every penny they had. Some people say she’d release them afterwards; they’d wake up in the middle of nowhere on a lonely stretch of road, with no idea how they got there. Others say she installed spikes at the bottom of the pit, where the unconscious travelers would fall to their demise.

For years her gang managed to stay in the shadows, making a strong living off of robbing the weary and unsuspecting riders that would venture down the deserted road by their houses. Everything was going smoothly for the outlaws, until one day Lavinia invited a traveler named John Peeples to stay in her house. She went through her whole “caring hostess” act, offering him the secretly poisoned tea just as she had dozens of times before. However, Mr. Peeples couldn’t stand the taste of tea, and while Lavinia wasn’t looking, he dumped his cup into the sink. He became suspicious after she began interrogating him about his job and retired to the room she had prepared for him.

Still a bit unnerved by the bombardment of personal questions, he opted to sleep in a wooden chair just out of sight from the bedroom door. He awoke to the crash of the bed collapsing in the middle of the night, and wasted no time in leaping from the second-story window. He mounted his horse and flew to the Charleston police station, where he was able to tell them exactly what happened, along with the names of Lavinia and her husband. When the police arrived on the scene, two members of the Fisher’s gang had returned to the house. In an effort to save Lavinia from execution or arrest, John Fisher and the two gang members surrendered themselves. Despite their efforts, Lavinia was arrested as well, and was housed in the same cell as her husband at the Old Charleston Jail House. The Fishers pled not guilty to the charges of murder and robbery, and though their pleas were denied, they were placed in holding until their second trial a few months later. It was at this second trial that they were declared guilty, and sentenced to execution by hanging.

This timeless legend has been told over and over for more than a century, spooking lone travelers and children on road trips. Despite the infamy of Lavinia Fisher, there is no concrete proof that she ever even existed. She exists only in the oratory stories of barkeeps in roadside taverns and gas station attendants on lonely South Carolina roads. However, she is said to still haunt the Old City Jail today; tourists from all over claim to see the ghastly apparition of a woman walking through the cells. Her famous last words echo throughout the halls of the jail: “If any of you have a message for the devil, tell me now, for I will be seeing him shortly!”