The Sodder Children Mystery

On Christmas Eve of 1945, the Sodder household was filled to the brim, with the entire family in town eagerly awaiting that Christmas morning. However this Christmas would bring nothing but years of heartache and pain for George and Jenni Sodder, as at 1am Christmas morning, their entire world went up in flames.

Case Information

George and Jenni Sodder both migrated from Italy to the United States at some point in their lives for different reasons. It was here that the two met and eventually married. They eventually settled in Fayetteville West Virginia, where they had a total of ten children together. They seemed to live a quiet life with their children in a largely Italian community. This particular Christmas Eve in 1945, only 9 of their 10 children were present at the house, as one of their sons was away in the army.

As the hours ticked by , the 5 younger Sodder children, Maurice age 14, Martha age 12, Louis age 9, Jennie age 8, and Betty age 5, were nowhere near ready to fall asleep. They begged their parents to let them stay up later. Their parents agreed, but on one condition. The children would have to do all their chores and turn the lights out before going to bed. The children happily agreed and Jenni and George, along with their other older children and their 2 year old daughter, all went to bed.

Around 12:30am that morning, Jenni was awoken by the ringing of the telephone. She rushed to answer it, and heard an unfamiliar female voice ask for an unfamiliar name. There was sounds of talking, loud music, and glass clinking in the background, all indicating a party. Jenni informed the woman she had the wrong number and hung up. As she returned to her bed, she saw that all the lights were still on, the curtains were drawn, and the door was unlocked. Assuming her children were still up, she returned to bed. She had just began to nod off once again when she was startled by a loud bang on her roof, followed by a rolling sound. She was awoken once again at 1am, this final time by the smoke now entering her room.

The family all rushed out of the house, only to find that 5 of the children were still inside. George rushed back into the house to try and reach them, but the stairs were completely engulfed in flames. George rushed back outside to try and access the rooms through the windows, but the ladder George normally kept at the side of the house was nowhere to be found. He then tried to park his cars closer to the house to climb on them, but the cars would not start, despite working fine the previous day.

Meanwhile one of the older Sodder children sprinted to a neighbors house to call the fire department, but there was no answer. Another neighbor who saw the fire also called, but they too received no answer. That neighbor ended up driving into town and finding the fire chief himself. Despite only being 2.5 miles away, the fire department did not reach the Sodder house until 8am, 7 hours after the fire had started. By that time the house was only ash.

After searching through the remains, there were no bones found at the scene. The cause of the fire was determined to be faulty wiring. The children were assumed dead, and George used a bulldozer to cover the sight of the old house with soil to plant a memorial garden for his children. Death certificates were issued for the 5 children and that was thought to be the end of it.



Despite having received closure, George and Jenni soon became suspicious of the death rulings. The Fire chief told the Sodders that there were no bones because the fire had turned them to ashes. However, Jenni did her own experiments, burning various animal bones. Every time she was left with charred bones. Various household items were also found among the remains that had not been turned to ash. Jenni asked a professional cremationist, who informed her that bones would not be reduced to ashes until being burned at 2000 degrees for 2 hours. The house was completely destroyed in 45 minutes.

On top of this, George recalled that they had had their wiring professionally checked very recently, and it was deemed to be safe. Not to mention if the fire had been started by faulty wiring then the lights would not have been on. The lights were reported to have been on during the fire, as well as before when Jenni saw them to answer the phone. Upon visiting the memorial site, Sylvia found a strange rubber object from the night of the fire, which turned out to be a "pineapple bomb" of the type used in warfare. Jenni recalled hearing the loud bang and the rolling on the roof. This led the Sodders to believe that the fire had been purposefully set. Then a neighbor came forward, claiming to have seen a man messing with George's ladder before the fire. The witness also noticed the man was carrying a block and tackle used for removing car engines. Things only got stranger from there.

A different witness came forward, and claimed she had seen the 5 missing children peering out the window of a van the night of the fire. The van drove away, and the children were gone. Then another witness claimed to see the children as she was working a tourist stop between Fayetteville and Charleston. She claimed to have served the children breakfast Christmas morning. The children were accompanied by two men and two women, all of Italian descent. She tried to make friendly chat with the children, but they ignored her. When one of the men gave her a menacing look, she decided to cease conversation with the child. The party left early the next morning. George and Jenni were now convinced that their children had not been killed in the fire, but instead had been kidnapped. 

While thus was enough to convince the Sodder family, the authorities still ruled the fire as accidental and considered the children dead. George and Jenni wrote a letter to the Federal Bureau of Investigation asking for their help with the case. The Federal Bureau of Investigation wrote back, stating they could not help without the permission of the local authorities. They offered their help to the Fayetteville Police and fire departments, but they declined the offer.

Jenni and George then turned to a private investigator named C.C. Tinsley. Tinsley discovered that not long before the fire, George had a run in with a life insurance sales man. When the man found out that his sale was not going to go through, he became very angry. He shouted in George's face "Your Goddamned house is going up in smoke and your children are going to be destroyed! You will be paid for the dirty remarks you have made about Mussolini!" the man then left. C.C. Tinsley also found out that this same life insurance salesman was a member of the coroner's jury who deemed the fire an accident.

While investigating, Tinsley also heard form the town's minister that the fire chief F.J. Morris claimed to have found a heart in the remains, but rather than report it, he buried it at the sight. Upon digging up the "heart" it was discovered that the "heart" was actually beef liver, that had never even been touched by fire.  Morris claimed he buried it hoping that finding any remains would give the family peace and stop them from continuing their search.

Throughout the years there were many other leads, and George followed each one. Each one lead to dead ends. Then in 1949, the Sodder's decided to search the site of the fire once again. This time, they found bones in what would have been the basement. The bones were sent to the Smithsonian Institution, who concluded the bones had never been exposed to fire, and likely belonged to a 16 or 17 year old. the oldest missing child was Maurice, who was only 14.


The Sodder family continued to follow every possible lead, but always came home empty handed. Then, in 1968, a little over 20 years after the fire, Jenni found an envelope in the mail addressed only to her. Inside, there was a picture of a man she believed to be her youngest missing son. On the back of the picture, someone had written "Louis Sodder. I love brother Frankie. Lil boys A90132 or 35". The Sodder's immediately hired a private Investigator to look into the case. They sent him to Kentucky, but he vanished, never to be heard from again.

Jenni and George Sodder continued to search for answers until their dying days. They died never knowing the fate of their children. There was a billboard advertising the case up for years, until it was eventually take down. To this day, the remaining Sodder family does not believe the children died in the fire, and are still searching for answers.


Theories

There are many theories floating around about this case. It is incredibly old and incredibly popular. However most theories seem to fall under two main theories.

Died in the fire

Some believe the children really did die in the fire that night. If the children awoke to find their bedroom engulfed in flames, they would not have attempted to flee the house, nor answer the calls of their family members. A young child's first instinct in a fire is to try and hide away someplace. Fire fighters say that when they find children in fires, they typically find them hiding in places like closets or tight corners. However the thought that 5 bodies could be missed while searching the area is simply unbelievable. The fire was not hot enough to destroy all remains, and there were never any other bodies found.

Kidnapped

The majority of people who look at this case agree with Jenni and George, and believe that the children were kidnapped that night, and the fire was set as a diversion. It was well known in the community that George was not a fan of Mussolini. His outspoken distaste for the Italian dictator could have something to do with what happened.

Some even believe that George may have left Italy running from the mafia, either because he owed them money, or because they ,at have tried to recruit him. Some believe that this could have been the reason behind his children's kidnapping and the house fire. As for what happened to the children after they were taken, we can only guess.



If you have any new information on this case, please contact the Fayetteville Police Department. This case is considered closed, therefore there are no current investigators. However if their was truly foul play involved than this family still deserves justice.