10 Respected Historical Figures (Who Were Psychopaths)

It's often said that you should never meet your heroes. And as we know, the reason is that nobody ever lives up to the hype. Even the nicest, cleverest, most talented figures have their off days, even a slightly dark side. But for some, that dark side is, shall we say, darker. The awful truth is that some of

history's most respected figures did some truly awful. So before we continue, beware. You might be about to meet your heroes on a seriously off day. These are the chapters most histories skim over. Like how Thomas Edison helped design the electric chair. How Elizabeth the First allowed the beheading of an entire village of innocent people. And how

Charles Dickens, the beloved creator of A Christmas Carol, tried to have his wife shut up in a lunatic asylum so that he could run off with someone else. Oh, Charles. >> Boys will be boys. >> And that's before we even get into the whole Winston Churchill caused a deadly famine debate. Let's get into it, shall

we?

There's no shortage of rulers that we could add to a list of historic despicable humans. I'm thinking genuine war criminals, ruthless killers, and the chaos that was Emperor Nero. Most of them wouldn't surprise you. After all, seizing power was often a bloody business, and it was even harder holding on to it. The annals of England's royal

family are filled with brutal plots and outright murders. One of the worst culprits was Henry VIII, the famous wife killer and land grabber. And then there was Bloody Mary, Henry's daughter, the burner of Protestants. For centuries, historians have portrayed her as a dangerous fanatic, completely without mercy. So surely the people of England