What happened to Lord Lucan? Nobody knows what happened to Lord Lucan, but he probably killed himself shortly after murdering his children’s nanny and attacking his wife.
Richard John Bingham was the 7th Earl of Lucan. He was also Baron Bingham, Baron Lucan, Baronet Bingham of Castlebar, and Lord Lucan. He called himself Lucky because of his gambling. He started gambling when he was at school and after university, he spent two years doing national service in his father’s regiment and that is where he took up poker. He gave himself the name Lucky because he was anything but.
He managed to get a job working for a merchant bank with a decent salary, but his real passion was gambling. He was a member of the Clermont gaming club, which was a group of rich, mostly aristocratic, gamblers who met in the Clermont club in London. He quit his job when he won ￡26,000 in one night while gambling. He lived the life of a rich aristocrat, but the truth was that he always lost far more than he ever won. He borrowed money from anyone he could.
He met his wife, Veronica Duncan, in 1963 and they married later the same year. Lucan’s father died shortly after they were married and he inherited all of the titles and a lot of money, which he proceeded to gamble. He gambled pretty much every day, late into the evening. They had a happy marriage in the beginning, but things fell apart. They had three children, Frances, George and Camilla, and Veronica suffered heavily from post-natal depression. Coupled with that, she had to deal with their financial problems brought on by Lord Lucan’s addiction to gambling. She’d finally had enough and they separated. She kept the children, but he fought hard for custody. He took her to court and spent a fortune on lawyers. A fortune that he didn’t have, thanks to his gambling. He lost the court case in the end and his wife kept custody of the children. Lucan began to come unhinged. He gambled more, drank more, and smoked more. He also talked to several people about murdering his wife. He said that it would solve his financial problems, although how is unclear.
On the evening of 7th November, 1974, Sandra Rivett, the nanny that worked for Lord Lucan’s wife was murdered in their basement. She wasn’t supposed to be working because she always took Thursdays off, but she was working that Thursday. It was dark in the basement because the lightbulb had been removed. Veronica went to the basement, and she was attacked by a man coming out of it. She said that she recognized her husband’s voice. She was badly beaten, but she told her husband she would help him. He took her to the bedroom to lie down and then went off to search for drugs. While he was out of the room, Veronica escaped. She was taken to hospital.
Lucan made several calls to his mother over the next few hours and wrote some letters to friends. In all of them he claimed that Veronica had been attacked by an unknown man who had first killed the nanny. He said that his wife hated him and was going to use it as an opportunity to frame him. His car was found on the 10th of November near the English Channel and Lord Lucan was never heard from or seen again.
The press had a field day and there were reports that he had been spirited away by his wealthy friends. There were sightings of him in many countries over the years, but they all proved to be false. It was a very interesting idea, but probably not what happened.
So, what happened? Lucan said that he hadn’t been in the basement and he was not the attacker, but both his wife and daughter testified that he was. If we think like Occam’s razor and find the story with the fewest assumptions, then it seems most likely that Lord Lucan removed the lightbulb from the basement and waited for his wife to come in. When Sandra Rivett came in Lucan mistook her for his wife and killed her. Sandra was not supposed to be working on that day, although she changed her plans and did work. Lucan had even checked with his daughter to make sure Sandra wouldn’t be there. When he realized, he panicked. Then he saw his actual wife and came up with the attacker story on the fly. Then he ran away. Rather than being spirited away by friends, he probably lost control of his already fragile mental state and committed suicide, probably by going into the channel. It would not be unusual for a body not to be found. There is no proof for this, but it does seem to be the most likely explanation. And this is what I learned today.
Sources
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Bingham,_7th_Earl_of_Lucan
https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20260611-the-aristocrat-who-vanished-after-killing-a-nanny
Image By avalon.red – Original publication: UnknownImmediate Original source – https://avalon.solwee.com/editorial?blob=mag.dKs~sp.lord%20lucan&mp_sed=0505507825 – actual image taken from Daily Mail – http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-474358/Wealth-privilege-wickedness-downfall—obsessed-Lord-Lucan.html, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=36116676