0:05 [Shane Waters]: It was Christmas Eve, 1945, in the small quiet town of Fayetteville, West Virginia. 0:12 [Shane Waters]: The solder family home, nestled in the ablation hills, was bustling with excitement. 0:19 [Shane Waters]: Ten children were eagerly anticipating Christmas morning, while their parents, George and Ginny watched the holiday unfold. 0:30 [Shane Waters]: The tree was decorated, and the younger children hung stockings by the fireplace before heading to bed. 0:40 [Shane Waters]: By the next morning, five of those children would be missing, seemingly vanished without a trace. 0:48 [Shane Waters]: A fire would consume the solder home, leaving behind nothing but ashes, and a mystery that still endures to this day. 1:03 [Shane Waters]: Welcome back, friend, to hometown history. 1:06 [Shane Waters]: Today, we're unraveling one of the most chilling and perplexing unsolved mysteries in American history, the disappearance of the solder children. 1:18 [Shane Waters]: What was initially believed to be a tragic house fire, soon revealed a web of strange circumstances, baffling clues and suspicions that have haunted the family and the town of Fayetteville for over seven decades. 1:36 [Shane Waters]: Let's start with George Sauder, a family man, a man who had built a solid life for himself and his family. 1:45 [Shane Waters]: Born as Georgios Soto, in Sardinia, Italy, he immigrated to the United States at the age of 13, eventually settling in West Virginia. 1:57 [Shane Waters]: A hard-working man, George started as a laborer before building a successful trucking business. 2:04 [Shane Waters]: His wife, Janice Priyani, was also of Italian 2:10 [Shane Waters]: And together they raised 10 children in a large home, filled with love and laughter. 2:17 [Shane Waters]: By all accounts, they were well-respected and close-knit family and their community. 2:23 [Shane Waters]: But George wasn't without enemies, he was a strong critic of Benino Mussolini, Italy's fascist dictator, and he didn't shy away from voicing his views. 2:36 [Shane Waters]: This, in a community with a significant number of Italian immigrants, earned him some animosity. 2:45 [Shane Waters]: In the months leading up to the fateful Christmas Eve, George and Jeannie began noticing unusual occurrences. 2:54 [Shane Waters]: For example, a man showed up at their home attempting to sell them life insurance when George declined. 3:02 [Shane Waters]: The man grew angry, and ominously warned him, your house is going up and smoke, and your children are going to be destroyed. 3:13 [Shane Waters]: You'll pay for the dirty remarks you've been making about Mussolini. 3:18 [Shane Waters]: George brushed off the threat, not thinking much of it at the time. 3:22 [Shane Waters]: But looking back, it seemed like a dark omen. 3:28 [Shane Waters]: Then there were more subtle, but equally disturbing signs. 3:32 [Shane Waters]: George's older sons noticed a strange man parked along the road. 3:38 [Shane Waters]: Watching the younger children as they came home from school. 3:42 [Shane Waters]: And on the night of the fire, Jeannie received a bizarre phone call at around 12.30 a.m. A woman's voice asked for someone she needed to know. 3:52 [Shane Waters]: And in the background, she heard laughter and the clinking of glasses. 3:58 [Shane Waters]: As if a party was happening on the other end of the line, 4:03 [Shane Waters]: Jeannie told the woman she had the wrong number, and hung up. 4:07 [Shane Waters]: She thought the love it, but the strangeness of the night was just beginning. 4:16 [Shane Waters]: At around 1 a.m. after returning to bed, Jeannie was startled awake again by a loud noise. 4:22 [Shane Waters]: A heavy thud on the roof, followed by a rolling sound, 4:29 [Shane Waters]: She listened for a moment, and when the noise stopped, she decided to go back to sleep. 4:36 [Shane Waters]: Let's then an hour later, at 130 AM, she woke up to the smell of smoke. 4:43 [Shane Waters]: Jeannie rushed to wake George and the children, and soon discovered that the living room was engulfed in flames. 4:52 [Shane Waters]: George managed to grab four of their children and escape outside, but five of the children. 4:59 [Shane Waters]: Maurice, 14, Martha, 12, Louis, 9, Jenny, 8, and Betty, five were still inside, 5:13 [Shane Waters]: What followed was a desperate, almost surreal attempt to rescue them, but every effort George and Jean-Made was thwarted in the most bizarre ways. 5:28 [Shane Waters]: First, George ran to grab the ladder that was always kept propped up against the house to reach the second floor. 5:36 [Shane Waters]: But it was gone. 5:44 [Shane Waters]: Then he thought to use his two trucks to drive up to the second story windows, and pull the children out. 5:52 [Shane Waters]: But inexplicably, neither truck would start, despite being imperfect working condition the day before. 6:01 [Shane Waters]: The phone lines, which Jenny had just used hours earlier, were now cut, preventing them from calling the fire department, 6:10 [Shane Waters]: In a panic, one of the solder's neighbors drove to a nearby tavern to call for help. 6:17 [Shane Waters]: However, the Fayetteville Fire Department was short-staffed due to the holiday, and the fire chief F.J. Morris was forced to rely on a phone tree system to alert volunteer firefighters. 6:31 [Shane Waters]: Each one had to be called individually. 6:35 [Shane Waters]: But the time the fire department arrived at 8am, the solder home had already been reduced to ash. 6:45 [Shane Waters]: Despite the complete devastation of the house, no remains of the five children were ever found. 6:53 [Shane Waters]: This fact puzzled everyone, especially fire experts, who insisted that even in the most intense fires, 7:05 [Shane Waters]: In the days following the fire, George and Jeannie began to suspect that their children hadn't perished in the flames, but instead had been kidnapped. 7:16 [Shane Waters]: As they sifted through the debris of their home, their suspicions only grew. 7:22 [Shane Waters]: Fire experts confirmed that the fire, which had burned for less than an hour, would not have been hot enough to completely cremate the bodies. 7:33 [Shane Waters]: Additionally, small household appliances like a stove that survived the fire intact. 7:41 [Shane Waters]: Further casting doubt on the idea that their children's bodies could have been reduced to nothing. 7:48 [Shane Waters]: Determined to find out what happened, the sodders launched their own investigation. 7:53 [Shane Waters]: They scoured the remains of the house. 7:56 [Shane Waters]: hired private detectives, and placed ads in newspapers across the country, offering a reward for any information about their children. 8:08 [Shane Waters]: The most prominent part of their campaign was a massive billboard that George erected a long Route 16, just outside they had fell. 8:19 [Shane Waters]: The Billboard featured photos of the five missing children and offered a $10,000 reward for information leading to their wearabouts. 8:29 [Shane Waters]: It became a local landmark in a symbol of the families we lentless search for the truth. 8:38 [Shane Waters]: In the years following the fire, the soldiers received several reports of sightings of the missing children. 8:46 [Shane Waters]: One woman claimed she had seen them in a car passing through Fayetteville on the night of the fire. 8:53 [Shane Waters]: Another said she had seen them at a hotel in Charleston, West Virginia, with two men and two women. 9:01 [Shane Waters]: But none of these leads ever panned out. 9:05 [Shane Waters]: Then, in 1968, Jeannie received a strange water in the mail. 9:11 [Shane Waters]: Inside was a photograph of a young man who bore striking resemblance to her missing son, Lewis. 9:19 [Shane Waters]: On the back of the photo was a cryptic note. 9:23 [Shane Waters]: Lewis, solder, I love, brother Frankie, little boys, A90132, or 35. 9:35 [Shane Waters]: The sawders hired another private investigator to follow the lead. 9:40 [Shane Waters]: But he vanished without a trace, leaving them no closer to solving the mystery. 9:47 [Shane Waters]: Adding to the bizarre nature of the case, a later excavation of the site in 1949 uncovered several bone fragments. 9:57 [Shane Waters]: These bones were sent to the Smithsonian Institution for analysis, and it was determined that they belonged to a human between the ages of 16 and 22. 10:08 [Shane Waters]: However, none of the missing solder children were that age. 10:14 [Shane Waters]: In more disturbingly, the bones showed no signs of having been exposed to fire. 10:22 [Shane Waters]: How they ended up at the site remains a mystery 10:26 [Shane Waters]: As the years passed, George and Jenny Sauder never gave up their search. 10:32 [Shane Waters]: George even traveled to New York City, to meet with a private detective, specializing in missing persons. 10:40 [Shane Waters]: But again, the search came up empty. 10:44 [Shane Waters]: George died in 1969, still believing that his children were alive 10:51 [Shane Waters]: Jeannie continued to wear black and morning until her death in 1989. 10:58 [Shane Waters]: The billboard remained standing for decades, a constant reminder of the five missing children and the questions that were never answered. 11:11 [Shane Waters]: So, what really happened on that Christmas Eve in 1945? 11:16 [Shane Waters]: Did the children perish in the fire or were they taken in some elaborate abduction plot? 11:24 [Shane Waters]: Could the missing ladder, the failed trucks and the cut phone lines, have been part of a coordinated effort to kidnap the children? 11:34 [Shane Waters]: And what about the sightings, the photograph, 11:40 [Shane Waters]: It's a case that defies easy explanations. 11:44 [Shane Waters]: The fire was ruled accidental, but the strange circumstances surrounding the disappearance of the Sauder children have left a room for doubt. 11:55 [Shane Waters]: The Sauder families believe that their children were still alive may have been fueled by grief. 12:02 [Shane Waters]: but it's also hard to ignore the strange evidence that seems to point towards something more than a tragic fire. 12:11 [Shane Waters]: Even today, the mystery of the solder children continues to haunt the town of Fayetteville. 12:18 [Shane Waters]: It's a case filled with more questions than answers. 12:22 [Shane Waters]: And it's likely that the truth may never fully come to light. 12:26 [Shane Waters]: But the story of the soughter family is also a testament to the power of love, resilience, and the refusal to give up hope, even in the face of unimaginable tragedy. 12:46 [Shane Waters]: And that's all for today's episode. 12:48 [Shane Waters]: The disappearance of the solder children remains one of America's most enduring mysteries. 12:55 [Shane Waters]: A case filled with twists, turns, and unanswered questions that continue to baffle investigators. 13:04 [Shane Waters]: Thanks for joining me on Home Town History. 13:07 [Shane Waters]: Be sure to tune in next time for another fascinating look
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