The Poisoned Umbrella Murder That Shocked London

Added: 2026-06-01

[00:00:00]In 1978, a Bulgarian writer was murdered on a London street with a poisoned umbrella. Georgi Markov was walking across a Waterloo Bridge when a stranger jabbed him with an umbrella tip. The man apologized and disappeared into the crowd. Three days later, Markov was dead. Doctors found a tiny pellet in his leg, smaller than a pinhead, filled with ricin poison. The KGB had weaponized an everyday object into the perfect assassination tool. For decades, the killer remained a ghost until forensic breakthroughs finally identified the operative responsible. One umbrella, one pellet, one of the Cold War's most ingenious murders.