Murderous Maine.

 At first glance, the State of Maine seems an unlikely spot for a murder. With its primeval forests and rocky coastline, Maine is a nature lover’s dream. But conditions are harsh; the winters are long and cold, and in the nineteenth century, the isolation could be unbearable. Aa a result, Maine became the site of many brutal and mysterious murders. Here are just a few: 

	The Hart-Meservey Murder. The winter of 1877, Captain Luther Meservey of Tenant’s Harbor went to sea leaving his wife Sarah alone. When Sarah was found strangled in her own home, Nathan Hart, a neighbor of the Meservey’s was tried and convicted on evidence so circumstantial that many in town refused to accept the verdict.
	The Smuttynose Murders. With their men away fishing, The night of March 6, 1873, Maren Hontvet, Karen Christensen, and Anethe Christensen were prepared to be alone in their cold house, but nothing could have prepared them for the arrival, by rowboat, of a deranged axe murderer.
	John True Gordon. John True Gordon was convicted of the axe murder of his brother Almon, his brother’s wife Emma, and their infant daughter, Millie. He shared a gallows with Louis Wagner, convicted of the Smuttynose murders, in Maine's most gruesome execution.
	The Bangor Mystery. William B. Elliot, a constable and tax collector for the town of Glenburn, Maine was found on the road, brutally hacked to death. The identity of his killer remains a mystery.
	The Kittery Crime. On November 14, 1883, Thomas Barrows of Kittery, Maine, was found dead with six bullet wounds in his arms, legs, and head. His wife called it a suicide, but if so, why did he wound himself five times before firing the shot that killed him? And how had he shot himself six times with the five-barrel revolver found near the bed?
	"Mary Bean" - The Factory Girl. A body, identified as Mary Bean, a young factory girl who was treated for typhoid, was found floating in a culvert in the mill town of Saco, Maine, in April 1850. Her real name was not Mary Bean and her condition was not typhoid. When the truth was learned, the story of Mary Bean's death became a cautionary tale exhorting factory girls to guard their virtue.