The Clutter Family Murders
The real story behind Truman Capote’s “In Cold Blood”.
In April this year, the home with a dark history went back on the market. What was once home to the Clutter family was said to fetch between $150,000 and $200,000 in price.
The seemingly regular farmhouse continues to attract visitors six decades later, to see the place where four people were viciously murdered. Its former owners even charged $5 per visitor and created a flourishing operation, before it was closed down due to a lack of business permits.
The story sounds like a film script, but how much of Truman Capote’s novel is true?
The Clutter family of six were farmers who lived in Holcomb, Kansas. Their farmhouse was large, with 14 rooms and acres of agricultural land surrounding it. Herbert Clutter had made his fortune using new technology to grow wheat and had been interviewed by The New York Times for what was considered a pioneering move at the time.
The 48-year-old and his wife Bonnie had four children, adults Beverly and Eveanna, 16-year-old Nancy and Kenyon who was 15. Capote misused Bonnie’s back pain in the novel and gave her…
