Parting from Her Doomed Lover.

National Police Gazette, December 29, 1888.

Franklin Asbury Hawkins murdered his mother on October 29, 1887, and dumped her body, beaten and shot, by the side of the road in Islip, Long Island. 22-year-old Hawkins was angered that his mother objected to his desire to marry Hattie Schrecht, a servant girl. Hawkins was easily convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to be hanged in December 1888.

Hattie Schrecht visited Hawkins in his jail cell the night before his execution. She blamed herself for the murder, but the weeping girl assured her doomed lover that they would meet again in heaven.

Read the full story here: The Hawkins Matricide. 

A Mysterious Tragedy.

Dr. Henry Clark of Boston was summoned to 11 Hamilton Place at around 7:00 the morning of December 30, 1879. A woman had been shot and needed urgent care. When he got there, she was nearly gone, and there was nothing he could do. 

A policeman and a medical examiner arrived soon after and determined that the woman, Mrs. Helen J. Ward, had been shot twice in the head. One shot entered her temple and went through her head, the other fractured her skull without entering. 

Her 18-year-old daughter, also named Helen, did her best to explain what happened. Mother and daughter shared a bed. They worried about burglars, so they kept a revolver on a chair beside the bed. Miss Ward believed she had been in a somnambulant state and fired at a moving object that she thought was a burglar. Alternatively, she thought the gun may have discharged accidentally. This took place around 4:00 am, raising the question of why she didn’t contact someone sooner. Miss Ward was considered cold and unfeeling because she did not seem overly affected by her mother’s death.

John Wesley Elkins.

John Wesley Elkins.

11-year-old John Wesley Elkins was slight of stature—four feet eight inches tall, weighing 73 pounds. He was intelligent and well-spoken, and he had never caused trouble until the day he murdered his parents. 

At 2:00 am, on July 24, 1889, while his parents were sleeping in their Iowa farmhouse, he shot his father in the head and then beat his mother to death with a club. Under questioning, Elkins quickly broke down and confessed. He had been unhappy at having to take care of his baby sister and wanted to set out on his own. After several unsuccessful attempts to run away, he concluded that murder was his only way out. 

John Wesley Elkins was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life at hard labor in Anamosa State Penitentiary.

Read the full story here: A Boy Murderer.

A Murdered Mother.

The morning of January 12, 1889, 22-year-old Elmer L. Sharkey ran to the home of his neighbor, John Clare. A noise on the stairway frightened Sharkey, who jumped out of the second-story window. He thought a burglar was in the house and ran for help.

Sharkey and Clare returned to the Sharkey farmhouse, two and a half miles north of Cincinnati, Ohio. They found his mother, Caroline Sharkey, lying in bed in a pool of blood. Her arm was broken, and the back of her head was “crushed to a jelly.” The murder weapon lay on the floor nearby—a wooden maul with iron rings on each end, used for splitting rails. Caroline Sharkey, age 46, was a widow living with her son on her 130-acre farm. Sharkey stuck the burglar story, though nothing was taken from the house.

News of the murder spread quickly, generating tremendous excitement in the region. Suspicion fell on Elmer Sharkey. Although he offered a $1,000 reward for the capture of his mother’s killer, he seemed utterly indifferent to his mother’s fate, showing little emotion.

Sharkey became restless and uneasy. After his mother’s funeral on January 14, he called his uncle and cousins together to talk about the murder. Then, in the presence of a reporter from the Cleveland Plain Dealer, Sharkey admitted that he killed his mother but did not know why he did it. Fearing a lynch mob, the police arrested Sharkey and quickly took him to jail.

The following April, Sharkey was tried for the first-degree murder of Caroline Sharkey. The motive given by the prosecution was Sharkey’s desire to inherit his mother’s 130-acre farm and to remove her objection to his proposed marriage. 

For his defense, Sharkey pled insanity. In addition to Sharkey’s strange behavior after the murder, the defense attorneys cited massive evidence of insanity in Sharkey’s family history. His mother had been in an insane asylum and twice had tried to commit suicide—once by jumping down a well and once by hanging herself. Her sister Sarah had also been in an asylum and had two insane children. Her uncle, John Risnger had attempted suicide by butting his head against a building. His sister Malinda had strange spells of suspected insanity, as did her brothers William and Levi. William’s daughter suffered from epilepsy, and several more of Elmer’s mother’s relatives were considered insane.

On his father’s side, his father Henry was epileptic and had attempted suicide, his uncle Michael had two insane children and a feeble-minded son, his uncle Noah had two epileptic daughters, and his aunt had two children who committed suicide.

However, the “insanity dodge,” as one newspaper called it, was unsuccessful. The jury found Elmer Sharkey guilty of first-degree murder, and he was sentenced to hang on September 13.

Sharkey was granted a stay of execution while his attorney prepared an appeal. The state Supreme Court granted a new trial due to errors in the first trial, and in April 1890, he was retried for the murder of his mother. Once again, Sharkey was found guilty and sentenced to hang. 

As his execution drew near, Sharkey claimed he had no recollection of what happened the night of the murder. He claimed his confession had been forced through threats of lynching.

Despite another appeal and a petition to commute his sentence to life in prison, Sharkey could not escape the gallows. Shortly after midnight on December 18, 1890, Elmer Sharkey was hanged in the annex of the Ohio Penitentiary in Columbus.

His last words were, “I will answer to God for what I have done and forgive all.”

---

Sources: 

“The Boy Murderer,” Evening Post., April 9, 1890.
“Convicted of the Murder of his Mother,” Evening Post, May 2, 1889.
“Elmer Sharkey Convicted,” Democratic Northwest., May 16, 1889.
“Found Murdered in Her Bed,” Cleveland Leader AND MORNING HERALD., January 13, 1889.
“Got a NEw Trial,” Lexington Herald Leader, November 20, 1889.
“Her Skull was Crushed,” National Police Gazette, February 2, 1889.
“Killed By Her Son,” Plain Dealer, January 15, 1889.
“A Murdered Mother,” Evening Post., January 14, 1889.
“Murderer Sharkey to Hang,” Ccourier-Post, May 22, 1889.
“News Article,” Erie Morning Dispatch, April 1, 1890.
“News Of The State,” Plain Dealer, February 26, 1890.
“Respited,” The Dayton Herald, November 20, 1889.
“Sharkey Must Go,” Columbus Evening Dispatch, July 25, 1890.
“A Stay of Execution Granted ,” The Piqua Daily Call, August 3, 1889.
“Two Murderers Hang,” The Daily Interocean, December 19, 1890.
“A Young Fiend,” Cleveland Leader AND MORNING HERALD., January 15, 1889.

Harry and Elizabeth.

Elizabeth Beecher married Henry King Jr. (known as Harry) in October 1886. Harry wanted to keep the marriage a secret from his father, a wealthy Chicago clothing wholesaler, so they lived under assumed names. The marriage was not a happy one, and the couple often fought. They separated for a while but could not stand to be apart. When Henry Sr. learned of the marriage, he offered Elizabeth $1,500 to give up all claims upon his son. Though her attorney advised her to take the money, Elizabeth stayed with Harry in Chicago.

In 1888, Harry moved to Omaha, promising to send Elizabeth money and bring her along when he was settled in business. The money stopped coming, so Elizabeth followed him to Omaha, only to learn he had married another woman. She and Henry spoke briefly in the parlor of the Paxton Hotel, then, as he turned to walk away, Elizabeth shot him four times in the back. Public sympathy was on Elizabeth’s side, and when the case went to trial, the jury deliberated for only thirty-five minutes before finding her not guilty.

Read the full story here: "I Have Shot my Husband."

An Impossible Suicide.

Mary Barrows, of Kittery Maine, told the coroner that her husband, Thomas, had committed suicide. The coroner was faced with two immediate mysteries; if Thomas Barrows had committed suicide, why did he wound himself five times before firing the shot to the head that killed him? And how had he shot himself six times with the five-barrel revolver found near the body? 

Mary Barrows and her son-in-law, Oscar Blaney were arrested for Thomas Barrows’s murder.

Read the full story here: The Kittery Crime.

A Boy Murderer.

11-year-old John Wesley Elkins (who went by Wesley) got out of bed around 2 a.m. on July 24, 1889, went outside the family’s Iowa farmhouse, and down to the road to make sure no one coming. On his way back to the house he stopped at the corncrib a picked up a club—a heavy piece of a wooden flail—and brought it back to his bedroom. Wesley took down an old muzzle-loading rifle that was hanging on the kitchen wall, loaded the rifle, then went into the room where his father, stepmother, and infant half-sister were sleeping. He put the barrel of the gun near his father’s head and pulled the trigger. Knowing he did not have time to reload the rifle, Wesley went back for the club. Then as his stepmother was leaning over his father, trying to understand what had happened, he beat her to death.

Wesley took the infant, splattered with blood, out of the room, and cleaned and dressed her. Then he hitched up the buggy and started for his grandfather’s house, stopping on the way to tell the neighbors that an assassin had murdered his parents; he took the baby and they fled for their lives.

 
The neighbor went to the Elkins’s house where they found the bodies of 45-year-old Mr. Elkins and his 25-year-old wife. Mr. Elkin’s head had been blown to pieces, and Mrs. Elkin’s head was beaten to a jelly. They sent for the police who were immediately skeptical of Wesley’s story.

Wesley Elkins, around the time of the murder

Under questioning in Mason City, Iowa, Wesley quickly broke down and told the police the whole story. His reasons, however, did not seem to fit the severity of the crime. Wesley had been unhappy at having to care for his half-sister so often and wanted to set out on his own.  He had run away from home several times but each time was brought back. He thought his only way out was killing his parents. Wesley was slight of stature—four feet eight inches tall, weighing 73 pounds—and had never caused trouble. He was intelligent and well-spoken as he calmly told his story. Some believed Wesley incapable of such a deed and thought he was covering for someone else.

John Wesley Elkins was indicted for first-degree murder. At his trial the following January,

Wesley Elkins, after his release.

Wesley pleaded guilty and told his story once again. Judge Hoyt sentenced him to life at hard labor in Anamosa State Penitentiary.

Wesley was believed to be the youngest person to date to be sent to prison in America, and his life sentenced prompted heated arguments. Some felt that no 11-year-old boy belonged in prison regardless of the crime, others felt that Wesley should be sent to the gallows.

Wesley Elkins used his time wisely while at Anamosa. He worked at the prison library and at the chapel and became proficient with the written and spoken word. In 1902, twelve years into Wesley’s sentence, after bitter debate Governor Cummins issued him parole papers. Wesley left the prison a free man.

Following his release, Wesley led a full life. He first settled in St. Paul, Minnesota where he worked on the railroad. Then in 1922, he married a Hawaiian woman in Honolulu. Eventually, he became a farmer in San Bernardino, California, where he resided until his death in 1961.

Originally posted April 30, 2016.

---

Sources:
"A Boy Murderer." Evening Star 27 Jul 1889.
"A Brilliant Beginning." National Police Gazette 9 Nov 1889.
"A Young Fiends' Confession.." New York Herald 20 Oct 1889.
"Double Murder by a Boy." New York Herald 27 Jul 1889.
"Murdered his Father and Mother." Daily Illinois State Register 27 Jul 1889.
Anamosa State Penitentiary: The Strange Case of Wesley Elkins.
"To Prison For Life." Kalamazoo Gazette 23 Jan 1890.
"Wesley Elkins." Wheeling Register 13 Jan 1890.

Shot by Her Stepson.

On Saturday, May 13, 1882, 16-year-old Thomas McCabe shot his stepmother, Catherine McCabe, in their New York City apartment. The wound to her neck was so serious that Coroner Knox was summoned to take her anti-mortem statement. She dictated her story:

“Shortly after 5 o’clock, I came from the kitchen and was putting oil in my lamp when my stepson, Thomas McCabe, fired a shot at me. I fell on my hands and knees and he said, ‘I done it! I done it!’ I said, ‘Why, Tom; why did you do it?’ He said nothing In reply, but stooped over me and took the contents of my pocket. I said, ‘it’s the money of the Land League,’ of which my husband is an officer. He also took my watch and an opera chain. I than said, ‘Oh, Tom; oh, Tom, don’t take my watch and chain!' He said, ‘I will take It; I want money to leave the city.’ I said, ‘Oh, Tom, don’t leave me, I never will mention your name. I will say I fell if you will only lift me up.’ He said, ‘I am not able,’ Then he left me. I called for help. I was paralyzed and could not get up, but after a long while Mrs. Whaley came In, and my stepson threw the pistol into his uncle’s bed. I saw him do it. When he went out be locked the door. I knew of no reason except that be wanted to rob me, I never had an angry word with him of late.”

Thomas McCabe bought a new suit of clothes with the money he stole from his stepmother, then went to a shooting gallery in the Bowery. He was practicing pistol shooting when the police arrested him.

McCabe had come with his father and stepmother from Ireland about four years earlier. He enjoyed life in New York, “but his tastes did not run in orderly grooves.” He did not like the discipline of school, was often truant, and caused trouble for his teachers and parents. His father would have whipped him many times, but for his stepmother’s intervention—she was thought to be too forbearing with him.

He finally got a job as a messenger for the District Telegraph Company but was often absent from this as well. McCabe was fired from the job but was afraid to tell his parents. Instead, he decided to rob them and leave town. When arrested for shooting his mother, McCabe showed no remorse.

At his trial the following September, Thomas McCabe was represented by William Howe of the firm Howe and Hummel, the most successful criminal lawyers in New York. McCabe’s plea was insanity. Under Howe’s cross-examination, McCabe’s father said Thomas had been weak-minded since birth, and at the James Street School, a Christian Brother had sent him home because he could make no progress with his studies and because he had “head trouble.” He was a boy of very weak intellect and was afflicted with epileptic fits.

Howe was not able to win an acquittal but was able to reduce the charge to second-degree manslaughter. Recorder Smyth, who presided over the case, was unhappy with the verdict and said this to McCabe as he handed down the maximum sentence:

“McCabe, the jury in your case took a more lenient and merciful view of your crime than your cowardly action deserved. They might well have rendered a verdict of guilty of murder in the first degree on the evidence, and you would have been at the bar of this Court answering with your life for the life you have taken. You were most ably defended, and you have already had all the protection and mercy that ought be bestowed on you. The sentence of the Court is that you be confined in State Prison for seven years.”

---

Sources:

“A Boy Matricide,” New York Herald, September 20, 1882.
“The Boy Murderer Sentenced,” Evening Star, September 29, 1882.
“City News Items,” New York Herald, July 12, 1882.
“Duties Neglected For A Convention,” New York Tribune, September 21, 1882.
“A Fatal Shot,” Evening Bulletin, May 16, 1882.
“Gotham Gossip,” Times-Picayune, May 19, 1882.
“The M'Cabe Trial,” Truth, September 26, 1882.
“Morning Summary,” Daily Gazette, May 15, 1882.
“Seven Years for a Life,” New York Herald, September 30, 1882.
“Shot by Her Stepson,” Cambria Freeman, May 19, 1882.
“Thomas McCabe,” National Police Gazette, June 10, 1882.
“The Trial of Thomas M' Cabe,” New York Herald, September 26, 1882.

She Didn’t Do as He Wished.

Little Murders

Shortly after 4:00, the afternoon of November 4, 1893, Fred L. Buck rushed into the police station in Elgin, Illinois and announced, “I’ve just killed my wife; she’s been leading a fast life and I had to end it.”

Police went to the Bucks’ residence and found Fred Buck’s wife, Julia, in the bedroom, lying face down in a pool of blood. He had shot her in the temple at such short range that the bullet went straight through her head and was found embedded in her hair, which she wore knotted in the back. A second shot he fired in her back had been unnecessary as the first shot had killed her instantly.

Fred Buck was the Illinois State Game and Fish Warden and had been in charge of the government aquariums in the Fisheries Building at the World’s Fair in Chicago. He was also engaged in the manufacture of a patent lantern and had previously been a private detective. His wife Julia, 30-years-old, was the brother of Theodore F. Swan who owned a large department store in Elgin. Both Fred and Julia were previously married and divorced.

Murdered her Mother.

Little Murders

Mrs. Annie Brownlee and her daughter, Mrs. Mary Marean, were two widows living together in a house on Dana Street, in a fashionable section of Cambridge, Massachusetts. In the fall of 1892, both women were both unwell. Mrs. Marean had suffered from the grippe two years earlier and had never fully recovered; Mrs. Brownlee, who was nearly 80 years old was probably suffering from the effects of old age.

The morning of October 31, Mary leaned over her mother who was lying in bed, and asked, “Do you love me?”

“Yes,” her mother replied, “of course I love all my children.”

House where the murder was committed.

They were her last words. Mrs. Brownlee got out of bed and as she started toward the stairway to the kitchen, Mary shoved her and she fell to the bottom of the stairs. Mary followed, and as Mrs. Brownlee lay stunned, her daughter smashed her head with a furnace shaker—a two-foot long iron wrench—until she was dead.

Mary washed the blood off the shaker and took it back to the basement. Then she went next door to her neighbor, Mrs. Endicott, and calmly told her that she had killed her mother. When Mrs. Endicott realized that Mary was telling the truth, she sent for the police.

While the murder appeared to have been somewhat premeditated, there was no motive, and it soon became clear to everyone that Mary Marean had lost touch with reality. When asked why she did it, Mary responded, “I don’t know; I had to do something. Every night for the past two weeks I felt something within me urging me on to a desperate undertaking. Oh, I had to do it, that’s all. What could I do when there was something that kept biting and knawing at my very brain.”

Neighbors told the police that Mary had lately been obsessed with the fear that she would die first leaving no one to take care of her mother. They believed that her brain had been affected by her bout with the grippe.

Mary Marean was never brought to trial. The police physician declared Mary insane, and Dr. Jelly, a Boston expert, confirmed his diagnosis. She was committed to the Worcester lunatic hospital.

---

Sources:
"A Matricide." Boston Journal 1 Nov 1892.
"Awful Act of a Cambridge Woman ." Springfield Republican 1 Nov 1892.
"Dr. Jelly as an Expert." Boston Daily Globe 5 Nov 1892.
"Killed by Her Daughter." National Police Gazette 19 Nov 1892.
"Killed Her Mother." Boston Daily Globe 1 Nov 1892.
"Murderess Adjudged Insane." Boston Daily Globe 18 Nov 1892.
"The Murder in Cambridge." Boston Herald 1 Nov 1892.

The Hawkins Matricide.

Islip was a quiet little town on the southern shore of Long Island, populated by the families of seafaring men and summer visitors from New York, escaping the noise and bustle of the city. The town had no saloons and had did not have enough crime to justify building a jail. So the discovery, in October 1887, of woman’s body, shot and beaten, off the Brentwood road in the woods just outside of Islip, threw the town into a state of high excitement.

The body might have been missed completely, but it was wrapped in a bright red shawl. The wagon driver who spotted it got down to take a look and found a middle-aged woman, shot three times in the head, her face bruised and disfigured beyond recognition.

From her clothing, she was identified as Mrs. Cynthiana Hawkins, widow of Captain Fredrick Hawkins, who had made a fortune as a sea captain and later in the lumber business. Her maiden name was Clock, one of the most prominent families in Long Island society. Her brothers immediately initiated an investigation of her murder. Robbery was ruled out as a motive; she had not been assaulted, it looked more like a revenge killing.

Insurance and Arsenic.

Little Murders
 

Frankie Morris Loveland

In 1884, Kansas attorney A. A. Hurd took out a $5,000 policy with the Mutual Life Insurance Company, on his mother-in-law, Mrs. Nancy Poinsett, naming his wife Frankie as beneficiary. Frankie Hurd liked this idea so much that, on a visit to Kansas City, she stopped at the Equitable Insurance office and took out another $10,000 policy on her mother’s life. It was reported that during the same trip she bought a supply of arsenic.

Soon after, Frankie and her husband were divorced, and she took the name Frankie Morris. Her mother, who was also estranged from her current husband, J. M. Poinsett, came to live with Frankie in Chanute, Kansas. On November 5, 1884, Mrs. Poinsett died from a sudden and painful illness; she was buried the following day. The circumstances of the death were so suspicious that both insurance companies refused to pay the policy claims. Frankie sued them, with her former husband A.A. Hurd handling the case.

The County Attorney was also suspicious, and began an investigation. Mrs. Poinsett’s body was disinterred and delivered to Professor Baily, a chemist at the State University at Lawrence, for analysis. He found crystals of arsenic in her stomach and signs of arsenic poisoning throughout the body. A witness claimed that Frankie gave her mother a large dose of arsenic in a glass of beer, while they were celebrating the election victory of Grover Cleveland. The chemist believed that Mrs. Poinsett had also been given smaller doses, before and after this.

Frankie was arrested in July, 1885; the matter was brought quickly to trial, and Frankie Morris was convicted of first degree murder. Before her arrest, Frankie had been engaged to be married to a commercial traveler from Wichita, named H. D. Loveland. He had left is wife and family for Frankie. The night of her conviction, probate judge H. F. Cory was called to marry them, in the presence of witnesses, including her ex-husband A. A. Hurd. Frankie Loveland was then taken to jail. Meanwhile, her attorneys filed an appeal for a new trial, citing, in addition to “the usual law points,” a charge that the verdict was obtained by jury tampering and witness suborning.

Frankie Morris Loveland was granted a new trial, primarily due to prejudicial statements made by the County Attorney outside of court. The second trial ended in a conviction and it was also successfully appealed. While the defense was alleging a conspiracy against their client, the prosecution, for the third trial, had amended their indictment, to include Frankie, A. A. Hurd, and J. M. Poinsett, the murdered woman’s husband in a conspiracy to commit murder and insurance fraud.

On November 17, 1885 the case was called, but postponed until December 7. On December 3, the prosecution declared nollo prosequi – the case against Frankie would be dropped and she would be set free. Two of their witnesses had left the state and the prosecution no longer had the evidence needed to win the case. While the state dropped the case against Frankie, the insurance companies stood firm, and it was reported that they had no intention of honoring her insurance claims.

---

"Another Chance for Her Life." New York Herald 10 Sep 1885.
"Arsenic in the Body." New Haven Register 8 Jul 1885.
"As Bad as a Bender." Kansas City Times 7 Jul 1885.
"He Believes Her Innocent." Kansas City Times 16 Aug 1885.
"Her Third Trial for Matricide." New York Herald 17 Nov 1885
"Proved His Love." Daily Illinois State Register 12 Aug 1885.
"The Frankie Morris Case." Rocky Mountain News 9 Dec 1885.
"This Wicked World." National Police Gazette 12 Dec 1885.

Murdered his Mother.

Little Murders:

Murdered his Mother.
 

National Police Gazette, Feb. 2, 1889

Elmer Sharkey, still wearing his night clothes, ran to his neighbor’s house, the morning of Saturday, January 11, 1889, calling for help. His house had been broken into and his mother had been murdered in her bed. Elmer, distraught over the death of his widowed mother, Caroline Sharkey, persuaded county officials in Eaton, Ohio, to offer a reward of $1,000 for the apprehension of her killer.

As soon as the reward was announced, Herman Hughes, a well-known young man of Eaton, had himself appointed special officer, and put Elmer Sharkey under arrest for the murder. Sharkey denied the charge and remained stolid until after his mother’s funeral the following Monday, when he finally broke down. Hughes had a talk with him after the funeral and Sharkey confessed to killing his mother, though he had not remembered the details until after her burial.
 

A Deed to Make Mankind Shudder.

Little Murders

(From Bangor Daily Whig And Courier, Augusta, Maine, February 28, 1881)

A Deed to Make Mankind Shudder

A Young Man Kills His Mother.
By Striking her on the Head With A Hammer.

He First Freezes the Body,
Then Cuts it Into Pieces.
And Tries to Burn It.

The Unnatural Son is Arrested.

He Confessed All—No Motive Assigned for the Hellish Deed.

Augusta, Me., Feb. 27, One of the most atrocious murders ever recorded in the annals of crime, has occurred near Weeks’ Mills, China, a beautiful little village twelve miles from Augusta. For cold-blooded wickedness and apathetic indifference, the murder will rank alongside any criminal whose foul deeds have made mankind shudder. One week ago Saturday, a young man named Charles Merrill killed his mother in the barn near the house, by striking her on the head with a hammer. He concealed the body in the hay mow until ti wsa frozen and then cut it into pieces. Part of these he burned as well as possible in the stove and fire place, throwing the charred remains into the manure heap.