Random History's Most Fascinating Female Assassins (15 items)

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  (#3) Shi Jianqiao Assassinated Her Father's Killer In Public And Wasn't Punished

  Shi Jianqiao isn't famous for killing loads of people; rather, she's known for offing one specific person who had wronged her family. In 1925, Sun Chuanfang, a warlord in China, beheaded Shi Jianqiao's father for leading an opposition force against him and paraded the head in public. Shi Jianqiao tracked Sun Chuanfang for 10 years before shooting him three times.

  Instead of fleeing, she stuck around the scene to explain her actions by means of pamphlets, and, instead of being punished, she was freed because the act was determined to be an example of filial piety.
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  (#14) Sara Jane Moore

  • 89

  A mere 17 days after Lynette Fromme attempted to assassinate President Gerald Ford, Sara Jane Moore also attempted to shoot him. She'd previously been a target of the Secret Service but had been found not to be a threat and had had her weapon and ammunition confiscated by police just one day before the assassination attempt.

  Moore fired once but missed due to her gun being faulty, and a bystander attempted to take the gun from her, causing a second shot to fire and hit someone else, who survived. She pled guilty and was sentenced to life in prison, but was released after 32 years in 2007.
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  (#12) Khioniya Guseva Said She Killed The Antichrist

  Khioniya Guseva is famous not just for her attempt on the life of Gregori Rasputin, but also for the fact that she apparently had no nose at the time, either due to advanced syphilis or damage from medications. In 1914, Guseva attacked Rasputin as he was leaving his home, stabbing him in the abdomen with a knife.

  She reportedly shouted that she had killed the Antichrist. Rasputin didn't die, and Guseva was turned into the police and placed in an asylum for three years.
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  (#2) Lucrezia Borgia

  • Dec. at 39 (1480-1519)

  Though it's possible that Lucrezia Borgia – a member of the inimitable 15th-century Borgia clan – never actually murdered anybody, she's long been painted as a homicidal woman known for poisoning her enemies and unwanted husbands alike. Her family's enemies spread stories that she had a hollow ring that she would use to poison people at dinner parties when she could not persuade them to her position through more peaceful means.

  There's no historical evidence for any of this other than rumors, but they paint a fascinating picture of a woman whose outward persona was one of piety and purity to conceal her power-hungry nature.
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  (#6) Fanny Kaplan Was A Revolutionary From A Young Age

  A member of the "Socialist Revolutionaries" in Russia, Fanny Kaplan was a political activist from a young age. She was arrested for her involvement with a bomb plot at just 16 years old. After serving time in a Serbian work camp, she lost most of her sight but not her desire to make change.

  Because of the conflict between the Socialist Revolutionaries and the Bolsheviks, she gained a great dislike for Vladimir Lenin. After a meeting at the Hammer and Sickle, Kaplan shot Lenin three times, with two of the bullets doing serious damage. He survived, and Kaplan refused to name any accomplices, leading to her execution in 1918.
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  (#8) Judith of Bethulia Killed A Man To Prove A Point

  Though the Biblical Book of Judith is generally considered to be a parable rather than a historical account, the titular Judith is still a fascinating example of a historical female assassin. Judith, who believed that God would save her fellow countrymen from their conquerors, set out with a maid to dispatch Holofernes, an enemy general.

  By promising to provide him with information, she gained his trust and entered his tent one night while he was passed out drunk. Judith cut off his head and returned it to her home, and the general's death caused the dissolution of the Assyrian army, saving her country from their occupation.

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