June 29, 2022
Agatha Christie, who was born into a wealthy upper-middle-class family in Torquay, Devon, had been trying to get published for a while before she married her first husband, Archibald Christie in 1914. She finally started to find success in 1920, when her first detective novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, featuring detective Hercule Poirot was published. By 1922, she had published her second novel, The Secret Adversary. That same year, she and her husband participated in an around-the-world promotional tour for the British Empire Exhibition, and they spent 10 months traveling. Upon their return to England, Christie continued to write, and the couple bought a house in Sunningdale, Berkshire. She may have found success, but she also kept a tight rein on finances and insisted they live a modest lifestyle. In April 1926, Christie’s mother, Clarissa Miller died, which sent her into a depression as she had been very close to her mother.
According to newspaper reports, in August 1926, Christie had gone to a village near Biarritz to recover from a “breakdown” caused by “overwork.” That month, Archie asked her for a divorce; he had fallen in love with Nancy Neele. Some argue that Christie’s frugal lifestyle may have led to tensions in their relationship, which culminated in his affair with Neele. On December 3, he told Christie that he was planning to spend the weekend with friends, but Christie would not be joining them, which resulted in a quarrel. Christie disappeared from their house late that night. The next morning, her car was found parked at Newlands Corner with clothes and an expired driver’s license. Hence, Christie herself became the subject of a mystery.
She Surfaced At A Hotel 184 Miles Away From Home
After she disappeared, Archie and Neele both found themselves under suspicion, and more than a thousand policemen and 15,000 volunteers began a massive manhunt. They dredged a local lake, the Silent Pool and several airplanes searched the rural landscape. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle joined, enlisting the help of a clairvoyant who used one of Christie’s gloves to attempt to locate the missing writer. A newspaper offered £100 reward, and news of her disappearance was featured on the front page of The New York Times.
Ten days after she disappeared, on December 14, 1926, she was found 184 miles north of her home in Sunningdale. She had checked in to the Swan Hydropathic Hotel in Harrogate, Yorkshire under the name of Mrs. Tressa Neele (her husband’s mistress’s surname). She claimed to be from “Capetown [sic] S.A.” (South Africa). The owner of the hotel, which is now known as the Old Swan Hotel, contacted the police to let them know that the South African guest may actually be Christie in disguise.
She Never Explained What Had Happened
To identify the missing writer, Archie traveled to Yorkshire with police, and, from his seat in the hotel dining room, he watched Christie walk in and sit at another table, where she read a newspaper. When her estranged husband approached her, according to witnesses, she seemed genuinely puzzled and didn’t really seem to recognize him. The following day, she went to her sister’s home at Abney Hall, where she stayed “in guarded hall, gates locked, telephone cut off, and callers turned away.” She and Archie divorced, and she later met and married the archaeologist Sir Max Mallowan. Christie never explained her disappearance, nor did she mention it in her autobiography which was published posthumously in November 1977.
People Speculated But Could Not Solve The Mystery
The lack of an explanation has left people to speculate about what happened. One suggestion is that she had a nervous breakdown triggered by her mother’s death and her embarrassment because of her husband’s affair; according to this theory, she was aware of what she was doing, but not in control of her actions. Her biographer, Morgan, believes that she was experiencing a fugue state. The author Jared Cade concluded that her disappearance was a planned event intended to embarrass her husband, although she didn’t anticipate everything that would follow.
Archie stated Christie was suffering from amnesia, which was corroborated by two doctors and supported by the fact that she appeared to not recognize him. Another theory is that her disappearance was a publicity stunt, and the public perception at the time supported this idea or the idea that it was an attempt to frame her husband for murder. However, the mystery will go unsolved as this writer did not reveal the truth in the end.