The Phantom Barber of Pascagoula Strikes Fear into Innocent Follicles

In June of 1942, while World War II raged with unimaginable horrors, the small town of Pascagoula, Mississippi, faced a far different type of terror. A criminal prowled its streets at night and snuck into people’s homes—not to steal money or other valuables, but to steal hair. Known as the Phantom Barber, this follicle fiend would break into homes and cut the hair of young girls.

In one instance, the intruder entered a convent and cut locks from three girls. One of them woke as he was slipping out the window and only caught a glimpse. “He was sorta short, sorta fat, and he was wearing a white sweatshirt,” she told authorities.

As the strange snippings continued, the police put their bloodhounds on the case and offered a $300 reward for his capture (nearly $6,000 today). In addition to putting the department on alert, six volunteer officers were given guns to help catch the perpetrator. Parents nailed windows shut and began sleeping with their children to protect their precious tresses.

No one knew why someone would go to such lengths to snatch clumps of hair, though some speculated it was being used in “back country ‘hex’ ceremonies.”

Within a few months, after at least seven more nocturnal haircuts, police, with the help of a Pinkerton detective, apprehended William A. Dolan, a 57-year-old German chemist. According to the Pascagoula police chief, the barber was a Nazi sympathizer who wanted to strike at the morale of American workers helping with the war effort.

Though Dolan’s barbaric barbering left no one physically injured, a vicious attack with an iron rod on a married couple that summer led to an attempted murder charge. Hair trimmings and shears were found in his backyard. Dolan denied any wrong doings, but by November he was found guilty and sentenced to ten years in prison. Finally, the people of Pascagoula could sleep at night without worrying about waking up with a bad haircut.