A New Year's Murder.

RHODE ISLAND INEQUITY

Amasa Sprague

The body of Amasa Sprague was found shot and beaten on the road between his factory and his mansion on New Year’s Day, 1844, and suspicion immediately fell on three members of Sragueville’s Irish community. Nicholas Gordon was known to hold a grudge against Amasa Sprague; John and William Gordon would do whatever their older brother asked, but it was a conspiracy theory based more on bigotry and class warfare than hard evidence. The arrest of three immigrants would strain the already tense relations between Rhode Island’s English and Irish communities and begin an official injustice that was not rectified until 2011.

Date:	December 31, 1843
Location:	Spragueville, Rhode Island
Victim:	Amasa Sprague
Cause of Death:	Beating, Gunshot
Accused:	John,William, and Nicholas Gordon

Read the complete story, "Rhode Island Inequity,"  in the new book The Bloody Century

Maggie Estars

Little Murders:

From Defenders and Offenders:

Maggie Estars.

"Maggie Estars was the keeper of a low resort at Fort Worth, Texas, and was accused of the crime of killing a man of the same place by the name of A. T. Truett. Truett went to the woman’s place of business, and quarreled with her. He endeavored to escape through the front door, when the woman picked up a fire shovel, and just as he was going out of the door, hit him on the head with it, and from the effects of which he died."

---

Defenders and offenders. New York: D. Buchner & Co., 1888.

Horace Millen.

On April 22, 1874, the body of four-year-old Horace Millen was found in a clambake pit on Savin Hill Beach in the Dorchester neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts. It was the second murder committed by fourteen-year-old Jesse Pomeroy.

This drawing, published in Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper on May 9, 1874, depicts an informal shrine to Horace Millen set up at the site of the murder by some Dorchester residents.

 Read the story of Jesse Pomeroy, "Boston Boy Fiend" in The Bloody Century.

The Bloody Century

Praise for The Bloody Century

Unlike other countries in the nineteenth century, the murder rate skyrocketed in the United States, and this wide statistical gap remains to this day. No one has chronicled the resulting tales of murder in nineteenth-century America as thoroughly as Robert Wilhelm has in his blog Murder By Gaslight, and in his book The Bloody Century he revisits the most compelling murder cases from this era. Wilhelm puts each murderer back on trial with a detailed investigation into the available evidence drawn from the newspapers, trial reports, and murder ballads that saturated the reading market. The result is an arresting portrait of the dark-side of American life, when the country became a “Homicidal Nation” and the intrigue of murderous deeds captivated the nation.
--- Anthony Vaver, Author of Early American Criminals and Bound with an Iron Chain


I've been a fan of Robert Wilhelm's "Murder by Gaslight" blog for years and I'm so pleased that readers are being treated to the very best of his posts in this interesting and entertaining collection.  There's something here for everyone - tragedy and comedy, open-and-shut cases and wrongful convictions, rich and poor, city and country, and more.  Readers will delight in the period engravings, the emphasis on how the cases influenced popular culture, and the extensive research that provides for further reading.  The Bloody Century is a welcome and lively companion to Judith Flanders' recent The Invention of Murder, with a decidedly American flavor.
--- James M. Schmidt, Author of Galveston and the Civil War and Notre Dame and the Civil War

The Bloody Century By Robert Wilhelm

The Worst Woman on Earth.

When two bodies were found in a hayloft on Paul Halliday’s farm in the town of Mukakating, in New York’s Catskill Mountains, his young Gypsy wife, Lizzie, became the prime suspect in their murders. It was not the first time Lizzie Halliday was accused of murder and it would not be the last. In court she would tear her clothes and babble incoherently; in captivity she was a danger to herself and everyone around her. Though she exhibited all the signs of a woman who was violently insane, many believed that Lizzie was merely a gifted actress. But no one disagreed when the press crowned Lizzie Halliday, “Worst woman on earth.”

Little Murders:

The Slayback Homicide.

Alonzo W. Slayback and John A. Cockrell were two of the most respected men in St. Louis; Slayback was a prominent attorney and politician, and Cockerell the managing editor of the Post-Dispatch. Both were members of the Elks Club and reportedly had been amiable, if not close friends. But hey had their differences, Slayback had been a colonel in the Confederate army and Cockrell a Union colonel under General Sherman, and in the fall of 1882 they took opposite sides in a local election. Slayback’s law partner, James Broadhead was running for congress and the Post-Dispatch was publishing editorials against Broadhead and Slayback, one of which called Col. Slayback a coward.

Now Available! The Bloody Century

New book...

 



Buy it Now! at Amazon.

A murderous atmosphere pervaded nineteenth century America unlike anything seen before or since. Lurid murder stories dominated newspaper headlines, and as if responding to the need for sensational copy, Americans everywhere began to see murder as a solution to their problems. The Bloody Century retells their stories -- some still famous, some long buried, all endlessly fascinating.

The Bloody Century is a collection of true stories of ordinary Americans, driven by desperation, greed, jealousy or an irrational bloodlust, to take the life of someone around them. The book includes facts, motives, circumstances and outcomes, narrating fifty of the most intriguing murder cases of nineteenth century America. Richly illustrated with scenes and portraits originally published at the time of the murders, and including songs and poems written to commemorate the crimes, The Bloody Century invokes a fitting atmosphere for Victorian homicide. 

The days of America’s distant past, the time of gaslights and horse drawn carriages, are often viewed as quaint and sentimental, but a closer look reveals passions, fears, and motives that are timeless and universal, and a population inured to violence, capable of monstrous acts. A visit to The Bloody Century may well give us insight into our own.

"I've been a fan of Robert Wilhelm's "Murder by Gaslight" blog for years and I'm so pleased that readers are being treated to the very best of his posts in this interesting and entertaining collection.  There's something here for everyone - tragedy and comedy, open-and-shut cases and wrongful convictions, rich and poor, city and country, and more.  Readers will delight in the period engravings, the emphasis on how the cases influenced popular culture, and the extensive research that provides for further reading.  The Bloody Century is a welcome and lively companion to Judith Flanders' recent  The Invention of Murder, with a decidedly American flavor."
--- James M. Schmidt, Author of Galveston and the Civil War and Notre Dame and the Civil War

Murder or Suicide?

Little Murders

 

(From Plain Dealer, Cleveland, Ohio, November 12, 1878)

Murder or Suicide?

 

The Mystery of the Dead Body Found in the Woods Still Unsolved.

 

The case of Joseph Straka, whose dead body was found in the woods, is still unraveled. Indeed, the mystery surrounding it seems to deepen. The post mortem examination was made yesterday by Professor Holliday and that revealed nothing definite.

The Coroner was to have held an inquest to-day but has postponed it until to-morrow because he cannot yet find the solution of the problem but hopes to by further investigation.

All sorts of theories have been made up, both for murder and suicide, but there is nothing to fasten to. The belief that Straka was murdered seems to be gaining ground but the difficulty in the way of that theory is to find a motive.

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.
 

The Bloody Century.

October 2014 marked the fifth anniversary of weekly posts on Murder by Gaslight (and last week marked our 1,000,000th pageview) to celebrate we are pleased to announce the forthcoming release of a new book, The Bloody Century, by Robert Wilhelm. The book contains fifty true stories of murder compiled and refined from the posts on Murder by Gaslight and represents the best of the first five years or the blog.

The Bloody Century— it may seem arbitrary to label the nineteenth as America’s “bloody century” when all of her centuries have seen a fair amount of blood, but a murderous atmosphere pervaded nineteenth century America unlike any before or since. For the most part, these are not stories of hardened criminals for whom murder was a way of life, the killers were ordinary Americans, of every class and occupation, who had concluded that their lot in life could be improved by the death of someone in their circle.

 

It was an era of second chances; while some traveled west to start a new life, others looked for their second chance through violence. Harvard professor John White Webster thought he could relieve his debts by killing his creditor. Frankie Silver and Roxalana Druse murdered their husbands to escape abuse, while Henry Green and Adolph Luetgert got rid of their inconvenient wives. Jealousy drove Daniel McFarland to murder his rival, and Laura Fair to murder her lover. Greed drove the Knapp brothers to plot the murder of their rich uncle.

 

Then there were the murders committed for no reason at all. While still in his early teens Jesse Pomeroy tortured and killed two young children and could not explain why. Thomas Piper murdered two young women before senselessly killing a five-year-old girl in a church belfry. Theo Durrant, who also did his dirty work in a church belfry, murdered and mutilated two young women from the Christian Endeavor Society which he led. Lydia Sherman and Sarah Jane Robinson poisoned their husbands and children in murder sprees that went on for years. And of course, the infamous H. H. Holmes systematically tortured and killed an estimated 230 men, women, and children.   

 

The Bloody Century tells all their stories, sticking closely to the facts, but with a nod to the rumors as well. The book is profusely illustrated with portraits and murder scenes from nineteenth century pamphlets, newspapers and magazines, and it includes ballad lyrics, poems and verses composed at the time of the murders.

 

The days of our distant past, the time of gaslights and horse drawn carriages, are often viewed as quaint and sentimental, but a closer look reveals passions, fears, and motives that are timeless and universal, and a population inured to violence, capable of monstrous acts. A visit to the bloody century may well give us insight into our own.

 

The Bloody Century will be available some time in the coming month. If you would like more information or advance notice of the books release, please email info@murderbygaslight.com

 

Guest Blogger: ExecutedToday

It is always a pleasure to present a guest post from our friends at  ExecutedToday.com who have just competed their seventh year of daily execution reports.   Here is the story of Elizabeth Van Valkenburgh who killed at least one husband and was hanged while sitting in her rocking chair, originally posted on ExecutedToday.com.

1846: Elizabeth Van Valkenburgh, in her rocking chair

Originally posted January 24th, 2013  by Headsman

On this date in 1846, a 46-year-old woman lamed from a fall got noosed in her rocking chair in Fulton, N.Y.

Elizabeth Van Valkenburgh had been widowed at 34 with four children, when her first husband died of dyspepsia and exposure. “There is no foundation,” the prisoner explained, “for the report that I had in any way hastened his death, nor did such a thing ever enter my mind.”

She remarried shortly thereafter to John Van Valkenburgh, apparently a violent drunk, whose depredations eventually led Elizabeth to get rid of him by spiking his tea with arsenic. “To this act I was prompted by no living soul,” she said in her confession. “I consulted with no one on the subject, nor was any individual privy to it.” She may have been keen to clear any public suspicion from her oldest children — they were old enough to try to get mom to move out of the house with them and offer to help take care of the younger kids. She suffered a fall from a barn’s hayloft as she was hiding out, which crippled her leg.

The key original documents from her trial, including the death sentence and the rejection of clemency (a petition to which 10 of Valkenburgh’s 12 jurors subscribed) are preserved here.

Oh, and one other thing. On the eve of her hanging, the condemned murderess produced a germane revision to her aforementioned confession, recalling that there may actually have been some foundation for the report that she also hastened her first husband’s death.

With respect to my first husband I should have stated that about a year before his death I mixed arsenic, which I purchased several months previously at Mr. Saddler’s in Johnstown, with some rum which he had in a jug, of which he drunk once, and by which he was made very sick and vomited, but it did not prevent his going to work the next day and continuing to work afterwards, until the next June. His feet and the lower part of his legs became numb after drinking this, which continued until his death, and his digestion was also impaired.

I always had a very ungovernable temper, and was so provoked by his going to Mr. Terrill’s bar where he had determined to go and I had threatened that if he did go he should never go to another bar, and as he did go nothwithstanding this, I put in the arsenic as I have said.

Right.

Because of the her impaired mobility, the condemned poisoner was carried in her rocking chair to the gallows, and stayed right in it for the whole procedure. They noosed her up sitting in the rocker, and dropped the platform to hang her as she rocked away in it.

Unsolved.

The most fascinating murder cases of the 19^th Century are the ones that remain unsolved. Their stories have inspired writers and criminologists and seem to bring out the amateur sleuth in everyone. Every new theory brings a new round of debate but leads us no closer to resolution. Here are the Murder by Gaslight cases that will remain forever unsolved:

	Mary Rogers The body of New York cigar store clerk, Mary Rogers, was found strangled on the New Jersey shore of the Hudson River. Police were at a loss but the newspapers published several theories, with multiple suspects, none of which proved true. This unsolved murder was the inspiration for  Edgar Allan Poe's classic detective story, "The Mystery of Marie Roget."
	Amasa Sprague When Rhode Island industrialist, Amasa Sprague was found shot and beaten to death on New Year’s day, 1844, police suspected the Gordon brothers, Irish immigrants with a grudge against Sprague, and John Gordon was executed for the crime. It has since been proven that John Gordon was innocent and he was posthumously pardoned in 2011. Who really killed Amasa Sprague remains a mystery.

Professor Strunk.

Prof. Ira G. Strunk

In 1885, Professor Ira G. Strunk was a model citizen of New Albany, Indiana. He was the Principal of the New Albany Business College, a member of the Episcopal Church, and a happily married man with two young daughters. His wife Myra sang in the church choir, under the direction of Strunk’s friend, Charles V. Hoover. But behind Strunk’s back, the relationship of Myra and Charles went far beyond choir practice. Although the affair was common knowledge in New Albany, Ira Strunk was oblivious until he, quite literally, read about it in the newspaper. A small item in the gossip column of the local paper rocked Strunk’s world and set him on a course that could only end in murder.

Fanaticism and Murder.

Little Murders

(From Centinel of Freedom (originally published in The Troy Times), May 10, 1859)

Fanaticism and Murder.

The Quiet Sabbath was broken in upon yesterday by the commission of a horrid murder, in the town of Sandlake, about fourteen miles from Troy, of a daughter by her father and only surviving parent, a man about 60 years of age named John Belding. The scene of the homicide is about four miles East of Sliter’s tavern, and near the steam saw mill on Sandlake road. The parties lived in a little house, in which the father earned a livelihood for himself and daughter by following the trade of a shoemaker. The daughter’s name as Christina. She is about nineteen years of age, and is described by the neighbors as a quiet and well-behaved girl. She had been unwell for some time, and, it is said, had been under the care of a female doctress residing in Berlin, in this county, named Weaver. Her mind, it appears, was somewhat affected, but whether from religious excitement or from some other cause, we are unable to say. She labored under the impression that the devil had possessed her, and used to pray very frequently for deliverance from his grasp. A day or two before he murder, the old man and daughter went over to the house of David Horton who resided opposite the Beldings, when Christina said she had taken medicine of Mrs. Weaver, and it made her feel as if “the devil was in her, and she would scratch him off; but that she had thrown the medicine away, and drove the devil away too.” The old man had not done much work recently, as it affected the  girl’s head, and it is supposed that in consequence of his care of her, want of sleep, &c., his own mind had become temporarily affected, and while under the delusion that “Dena,” as he calls her, was the devil, he killed her.

The account which Belding gives of the affair is, that he saw the devil lying on the bed and he struck it in the face. The girl, it appears, was lying down in the back room. Belding followed her from that room to the front room, in which the murder was committed with a shoemaker’s hammer. Her skull was completely smashed to pieces. Portions of the hair were scattered about the room, and pieces of the skull were lying over the floor. Her face too was considerably bruised and disfigured, but no marks of violence were discovered on the other parts of her body. Belding says he thought she was the devil—that she appeared to him to be four times as large as “Dena”—and from his previous and subsequent conduct there can scarcely be a doubt that the old man imagines he had a fight with the devil, or he he expresses it, with “three devils, and he had all he could do to kill them.” They lived alone in the house.

More Scenes from the Burdell Murder.

The 1857 stabbing of Dr. Harvey Burdell, one of New York City’s most sensational murders, occurred just in time to save Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper from bankruptcy. The weekly paper featured lurid illustrations from the murder in several issues and sold enough copies to keep the paper afloat.

Murder by Gaslight has already posted the story of the Burdell murder (The Bond Street Tragedy) as well as a collection of illustrations from Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper (Scenes form the Burdell Murder). This set of illustrations portrays the murder itself, as theorized by the post-mortem physicians. The paper came out shortly after the lengthy inquest which indicted Emma Cunningham and John Eckel for the murder of Harvey Burdell. In the pictures the assassin is depicted as a man but he does not resemble John Eckel.

Scene No.1. The assassin approached from behind as Burdell sat at his writing desk. He stabbed over Burdell’s right shoulder and plunged the dagger into his chest, leaving a considerable amount of blood on the floor near the chair.

The Long Island Murders.

A series of violent home invasions in and around Brookville, Long Island in November 1883 and the  months that followed left two people dead and four more seriously injured. The normally serene farming community was thrown into a state of confusion with at least a dozen false arrests, two perjured eye-witnesses, a false confession, lynch mobs, a jailbreak, and for a time, two independent and equally valid lines of inquiry that could not be reconciled.

Love, Lust and Murder.

Little Murders

(From The New York Herald, March 29, 1871)

Love, Lust and Murder.

Mysterious Affair Near Chillicothe, Ohio—Murder or Suicide—Sad Ending of a Disgraceful Liaison.

A special reporter from Chillicothe, Ohio, to-night brings intelligence of a the preliminary examination of John S. Blackburn, charged with the murder of Mary Jane Lovell in Ross county, last week. The case is one of the most mysterious and dramatic on record. Blackburn took the young woman riding along a lonely country road terminating at a ford where two streams merge and then go brawling among wild forbidding cliffs. Here, in a lonely glen, so unfrequented even by domestic animals that the ground was covered with a dense undergrowth of hardy shrubs, Blackburn stated that the girl swallowed poison and flung away the bottle, and by incessant importunity made his kinsman go and seek her dead body. It was found, an inquest held and a post-mortem made, but the actual cause of death remains undetected, as the stomach and its contents were sent to this city for analysis. The evidence to-day clearly proved the criminal intimacy, and disclosed a sickening correspondence, in which Blackburn gave unbridled expression to the most consuming lust. He makes appointments with the girl and stimulates her to promptness with glowing descriptions of their mutual pleasure and hints at rich presents as her reward. These promises are not made good, for she asks for money and nowhere acknowledges receiving any.

The popular construction of the case was that the pair went to the glen, eight miles away from home, to take poison together through sheer despair; but it now turns out that the girl never manifested the least unhappiness; on the contrary she was in high spirits when last seen alive, and was in excellent health. Blackburn will undoubtedly be committed to jail to-morrow for the murder of the girl. In court he wears a downcast, stolid look and is evidently suffering intensely, mentally and physically. What give the case intense interest her is the fact that Blackburn is a brother to Major C. H. Blackburn, ex-Prosecuting Attorney of Hamilton county and at one time very popular in this city.

 

---

"Love, Lust and Murder." New York Herald 29 Mar 1871

Murder among the Shantyboats.

Colonies of shantyboats around cities the on the banks of the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers provided cheap housing for low income workers and unemployed transients. Shantyboats were just what the name suggests, handmade one-room shacks floating in the river. The colonies were densely populated, the boats were crowded, and they were often the homes of unsavory characters—conditions ripe for violence and murder.

Inartistic Murder.

Inartistic Murder.
 

A marked difference between science and art, that has escaped the attention of writers upon intellectual development as manifested in human handiwork, is that while science is all embracing, art confines itself largely to trivialities. Science is continually announcing endeavors and successes so vast that the ordinary eye needs to be about as far distant as the moon in order to take them in, whereas art is often satisfied with efforts so tiny and vague that only the feeblest mind can see anything in them. We have artistic door knobs, fire shovels and spittoons in bewildering abundance, but he who yearns to see art reach forth in a grandly sympathetic way and supplement human action in the greater phases of live must take it out in yearning. For instance, there is murder. No one will deny that taking of human life is a deed of momentous import to the killer and the killed; yet what has modern art done for murder? Nothing, except to make sickening and inaccurate pictures of an occasional sanguinary taking off. After twenty-five centuries of art development there is no absolutely new method of slaughter except that of shooting, and of two murders reported yesterday one was committed with a bedpost and the other with a poker! To the truly artistic mind many sightly substitutes for these commonplace weapons suggest themselves. The persons whose lives were doomed might have been killed with equal success and almost as much celerity by being compelled to stare at blue china, or listen to certain musical compositions, or try to make themselves comfortable in artistic chairs, or be confined in a room decorated entirely of Japanese fans, but these means are not at the command of every one. Art will not have done its duty by murder until it has devised tasteful and cheap appliances with which to help a man out of the world. An aesthetic flatiron, or a decorative bootjack, or a gracefully turned club with a tasteful obituary suggestion engraved upon it in early English letter might be made cheap enough to be within the means of the poorest, and any public spirited rumseller should be willing to have within reach of his customers an antique dagger with “Hark, from the Tombs!” etched upon its blade. Let art awake to a sense of its responsibilities to the more important departments of human effort.

---

"Inartistic Murder." New York Herald 4 Jan 1882.

The Courthouse Riots.

When William Berner was tried in 1884 for the cold-blooded murder of his boss, William Kirk, the people of Cincinnati expected a hanging. When the verdict returned was only manslaughter, the city was outraged. It was the last straw, breaching the limits of tolerance after years of political corruption, driving an angry populace into the streets for three days of violence that took fifty-four lives and left public buildings in rubble -- an uprising known as The Courthouse Riots.

John Greenwell.

Little Murders:

From Defenders and Offenders:

John Greenwell.

"Crook, burglar, and finally murderer, is the man who was ultimately convicted of the murder of Lyman S. Weeks of Brooklyn, N.Y., into whose house he had broken with the intention of robbery, on the evening of March 13, 1887. Weeks hearing noises below, descended to the dining room and was immediately shot and killed by Greenwell, who had as accomplice his pal named Dutch Miller, who was also arrested."

---

Defenders and offenders. New York: D. Buchner & Co., 1888.

A Shrewd Rascal.

Samuel Smith and his wife Emma appeared to the world as a happy and affectionate young couple. She was pretty and vivacious with a dazzling wardrobe, and he was energetic with a winning personality. But beneath the surface was a hidden turmoil that did not come to light until Emma was found dead in their apartment, her head blown apart by a shotgun blast, with Samuel nowhere to be found.

The “Rough on Rats” Murder.

Little Murders

(From The Kalamazoo Gazette, February 20, 1884)

The “Rough on Rats” Murder.

A Woman Found Guilty of Murder in the First Degree—Her Husband Awaiting Trial.

Muskegon, Mich., Feb. 19—The Jury in the case of Mrs. Korun Larson, after being out eighteen hours, brought in a verdict of murder in the first degree.. She poisoned John Guild on the first of August last with “Rough on Rats.” Her husband awaits trial on the same charge. She was remanded for sentence until March 3.

The Larsons lived on a farm owned by Guild, who was a single man, sixty years of age. In 1883 he deeded the farm to Mrs. Larson on condition that she should furnish a home during life. On the first of August in that year Guild died suddenly, and the contents of his stomach being analyzed, ten and a half grains of arsenic was found. During the trial a neighbor of the Larsons testified to having purchased a package of “Rough on Rats” for Mrs. Larson, a few days before the death of Guild. It was also shown that the Larsons paid a number of bills that they owed and had considerable money after Guild’s death, and that not a dollar of several hundred that Guild was known to have in his possession a day or two previous to his death could be found by his friends.

 

---

"The "Rough On Rats" Murder." Kalamazoo Gazette 20 Feb 1884: 1.

Mariticide and Uxoricide.

In the years before divorce was common, mariticide—the murder of one’s husband, and uxoricide—the murder of one’s wife, were often seen as the only way out of an abusive or loveless marriage, especially of one was interested in retaining the spouse’s fortune. Here is Murder by Gaslight’s list of mariticides and uxoricides:

	Elsie Whipple Elsie Whipple wanted to run off with her servant, Jesse Strang, but all of her money was controlled by her husband John. She persuaded Jesse to shoot him.
	Reverend Henry Budge Priscilla Budge was constantly fighting with her husband, Reverend Henry Budge. When she was found in bed with her throat cut, the Reverend became the prime suspect.
	George Swearingen George Swearingen murdered his wife Mary by pushing her off a horse. He wanted to marry his mistress, Rachel Cunningham. .
	Mary Sheedy To end her tumultuous marriage, Mary Sheedy enlisted the help of her hair dresser, “Monday” McFarland to murder her husband John.
	Lydia Sherman Lydia Sherman poisoned three husbands (and several other family members) primarily for financial gain.
	Minnie Wallace Walkup Minnie Wallace was sixteen years old when she married forty-eight year old James Walkup. A month later he died of arsenic poisoning. Her second husband died the same way.
	Emma Cunningham Emma Cunningham may or may not have been married to Dr. Harvey Burdell and she may or may not have strangled and stabbed him to death. .
	Lucretia Chapman Lucretia Chapman conspired with her Latin lover Lino Mina to murder her husband William.
	Henry Green Henry Green was infatuated with Mary Ann Wyatt and they married in haste. But when Henry’s mother did not approve he poisoned his new bride.
	Frankie Silver After enduring years of abuse, Frankie Silver snapped and took an axe to her husband Charlie.

 

 

Determined on Murder.

Little Murders

(From The National Police Gazette, October 16,1886)

Determined on Murder. 

Bent on Murder.
James M’Cambrick, After trying several ways of killing Mrs. Cline,
finally succeeds by throwing her out of the window.

About two o’clock the morning of Sept. 26, James McCambrick came to his house on Morgan street, Chicago, and engaged in a quarrel with the woman living with him as his wife. After threatening to shoot her he poured oil on her linen and said he would burn her alive. He then reached for his revolver, and, failing to find it, seized the woman and threw her from an open window to the ground, eighteen feet below. The woman’s back was broken by the fall. She will die. Mrs. Cline was married to her husband two years ago, and until last year lived with him on Cottage Grove avenue. He then became so cruel that she was driven to McCambrick, who offered her shelter. McCambrick is a rather good-looking fellow, but is a brute when under the influence of liquor. Mrs. Cline is a pretty woman, twenty-three years of age.

---

The National Police Gazette, October 16,1886.

The Wrong Victim.

Little Murders

 

Matt Rollinger.

Matt Rollinger and his wife Abbie separated in the fall of 1895 and Matt moved out of their home on Mohawk Street in Chicago. Though Abbie allowed Matt to visit their three children, in her mind the separation was final and by Christmas had rented out a room in the house to Fred Mueller, a bicycle maker from Germany. Mueller had been in the house less than one day when he gave his landlady a new tablecloth as a Christmas present. During the winter months Mueller took Mrs. Rollinger to masquerade balls and other entertainments.

The Sailor and the Spiritualist.

Alfred and Althadine Smith had been married for more than twenty years but over time their lives had grown apart. He became a Great Lakes sailor interested more in drinking and carousing than in raising a family; she became a professional clairvoyant. When Alfred’s neglect turned to physical abuse and Althadine filed for divorce, she had the foresight to send the children away and bring in a friend for support and protection, but her clairvoyance failed when she was unable to predict the tragic consequence of letting Alfred stay just one more night.

Unique Murder in Missouri.

Little Murders

(From The Cincinnati Daily Enquirer , January 2, 1871)

Unique Murder in Missouri.

Diabolical Treachery.

On Tuesday morning a young man named brown killed one Dean, near New Market, Platte County, under the following atrocious circumstances:

About two months ago Dean and Brown had quarreled, but shortly after made it up, and apparently became friends again. On Monday night there was a dance at New Market, at the house of a man by the name of Smith. Brown and Dean both came to the dance riding one mule. During the night Dean borrowed Brown’s knife, for what purpose he did not state. The dance lasted until daybreak, when Dean and Brown both left Smith’s, seemingly good friends.

Now, right here is where this case proves to be one of premeditation and cold blooded murder; Dean, apparently to give Brown the best place on the mule, compelled, him to ride on the saddle while he rode behind. A little distance from Smith’s he stabbed Brown through the back, killing him almost instantly. Brown was about twenty-one years of age, and a single man. Dean is described as being slender built, about six feet high, sharp feature, and very large, prominent teeth. In features he is rather repulsive. He is twenty-five or twenty-six years of age, and unmarried. The murderer is still at large. Let our detectives up this way look out for him.

---

"Unique Murder in Missouri." Cincinnati Daily Enquirer, 2 Jan 1871: 2.

John J. Delaney

Little Murders:

From Defenders and Offenders:

John J. Delaney.

"John J. Delaney is only 17 years of age and is a self-confessed murderer. On June 3d, 1887, Mary Jane Cox was found dead in the kitchen of the house where she worked in Brooklyn, and in the pocket of her dress was found a bottle one-third filled with a preparation of arsenic. Delaney afterwards confessed that he had purchased the poison and given it to Mary, with the intention of getting rid of her, and telling her it was a harmless preparation which would do her good."

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Defenders and offenders. New York: D. Buchner & Co., 1888.

Murder at Bloomingdale.

Harvey Keith

While boating on Max Lake in Bloomingdale, Michigan in August 1885, Frank Lackey and his companions saw what they thought was a dead sheep floating in the water. Closer inspection revealed that it was the body of a man, wearing only a white shirt and a pair of socks. The body was soon identified as Harvey Keith who had been missing for several days. With no signs of violence on the head or upper body, the death would probably have been ruled a suicide except that the man’s genitals had been cut off.

A Modern Macbeth Murder Case.

Little Murders

(From New York Tribune, March 26, 1877)

 

A Modern Macbeth Murder Case.

 

An old man named Thomas J. Poyntz, living at Bay Shore, was found dead in a bed at the house of Nathaniel Evans, near Thompson’s Station on the Long Island Railroad, Jan. 29, with a deep wound in the left side, apparently inflicted with a carpenter’s gouge. Evans was a cabinetmaker and upholsterer, and apt to be in possession of such a tool. This, with other circumstances, excited strong suspicion against him. After an investigation by Coroner Preston of Amityville, in which it was shown that Evans and Poyntz—possibly Kennedy and others—had been carousing on the day previous. Evans was held for the murder, although there was doubt of his guilt, and there seemed to be a probability that the Grand Jury would refuse to find an indictment against him. There has been a suspicion, strengthened by the actions of the woman herself, that Evans’s wife knew more about Poynitz’s death than Evans himself—who, according to the evidence at the inquest, was very drunk on the night of the occurrence, and probably incapable of committing the deed. The Grand Jury, which has just adjourned, indicted both husband and wife for murder in the first degree. The impression is strong that though Evans may have a guilty knowledge of the crime, his wife is the principal criminal. They are both now in the County Jail at Riverhead awaiting trial at the next term of the Oyer and Terminer, which will be held in April. This is the first indictment for murder in the first degree found by a Suffolk County Grand Jury since Nichols Behan for the Wickham murder 22 years ago.

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"A Modern Macbeth Murder Case." New York Tribune 26 Mar 1877: 8.

Cain and Abel.

Hiram Sawtell

Like the Biblical brothers Cain and Abel, the Sawtell brothers of Boston took divergent paths through life. While Hiram settled down and raised a family, supported by his successful fruit business, Isaac was doing time in Charlestown prison. And as with the Bible’s first murderer, Isaac’s jealousy of his brother became unbearable. Upon his release from prison, he lured Hiram from his family and killed him in cold blood.

A Gambler Shot Dead.

Little Murders

 

(From The National Police Gazette , January 13, 1894)

A Gambler Shot Dead.

 

 

City Attorney James Butler shot and killed a gambler known as Seven Up Jim O’leary, at Ada Huntley’s house of ill-fame in St. Louis, Mo. At 4 o’clock the other morning.

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"A Gambler Shot Dead." The National Police Gazette 13 Jan 1894.

Elmer D. Morrill.

Little Murders:

From Defenders and Offenders:

Elmer D. Morrill.

“In the early part of 1887, the good city of Lewiston, Maine, was thrown into considerable excitement by the discovery of a young woman dead on the street, with her newly born babe beside her. Upon investigation by the police, Elmer D. Morrill was arrested for the crime of murdering her, and the grand jury found an indictment against him for murder. The cause of the murder was at first considerably shrouded in mystery; but subsequent events pointed to the above individual.”

 

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Defenders and offenders. New York: D. Buchner & Co., 1888.

Guest Blogger: ExecutedToday

ExecutedToday.com  has been posting an execution story every day since Halloween 2007 so it’s not surprising when they come up with a murder not covered by Murder by Gaslight. Here is the story of the Blanc brothers, driven to murder by reading sensational books.

1897: Ernest and Alexis Blanc, brothers in blood

Originally posted April 2nd, 2013  by Headsman

         

On this date in 1897, some 4,000 residents of Lafayette turned up to watch the hanging of two Parisian-born young men.

It had been nearly a full year since Martin Begnaud was discovered bound, gagged, and stabbed over 50 times in his general store at Scott, Louisiana, just outside Lafayette. That was on April 22, 1896. The motive was self-evident: the prosperous late burgher had been plundered of several thousand dollars. But who did it?

The matter remained a mystery for many months, although two men were indicted for the deed — and blessedly never brought to trial.

But a few days after the murders, brothers Ernest and Alexis Blanc, teenage French orphans who were sharecropping on a plantation in April 1896 also abruptly disappeared without even bothering to sell their crop shares. This naturally raised suspicion as well, but their whereabouts were totally unknown and as months passed any hope of finding them had practically vanished.