While some children escaped, the five oldest were missing. The family’s ladder was gone, and the house quickly burned down. The fire department initially blamed faulty wiring. Investigations yielded conflicting results: some said no children’s remains were found, others reported finding bone fragments (one was identified as beef liver). A coroner concluded the children died in the fire.

Despite this, the parents, George and Jenny, believed their children were kidnapped and the fire was arson. They pointed to a cut phone line, witness sightings of the children after the fire, and the lack of sufficient remains. Years later, an excavation found only a few small bones, insufficient to identify the children.

In 1968, they received a mysterious photo of a young man, with the message suggesting it was their son, Louis. The photo’s origin remains unknown. The Sodders spent their lives searching for their missing children, offering a reward. George died in 1969, Jenny in 1989. To this day, the case remains unsolved, with some believing the children perished in the fire, and others convinced they were abducted, possibly even taken to Italy. The youngest Sodder child continues to seek the truth.