1/ Abilene, Kansas, (Suicide by Nail in Head) January 1894
Mrs Frank Roadson killed herself by hammering a two-inch nail into the top of her head. She became partly paralysed due to brain injuries but she remained alive. Doctors found the nail, removed it, but she died a couple of days later.
2/ Benton Murder, Arkansas, August 1879
A desperate affair between two men named Dudley and Owen occurred at Benton. It appear’s that Dudley’s sister warned him against the introduction of a cousin to Owen and Owen asked Dudley for an explanation, which he refused to give. Owen then drew a pistol and snapped it at Dudley, who retaliated by shooting Owen four times, cutting his throat, then jumping on his head till he was dead.
3/ Harris Double Murder, Marquette County, Wisconsin, April 1859
4/ Brooklyn Bridge Disaster, May 30th, 1883
5/ Belleville Convent Fire, Illinois, January 1884 (The final death toll was thirty-two)
6/ Mobile, Alabama, September 1907 (Boating Disaster)
A dreadful boating disaster has occurred on the Tombigbee River in Alabama. A boat capsized and fifteen passengers were precipitated into the water and drowned. The majority on board were negroes and fourteen of the dead are indeed of ethnic origin, with the other being a white boy.
7/ Englewood, New Jersey, November 1907 (Level-Crossing Horror)
A car with New York lumber merchant, J.H.Eckstein as a passenger, along with his wife and ex-Justice Steckler who was accompanied by his wife, was hit by a locomotive at a level-crossing at Englewood in New Jersey. There was little left of the motor car and Mr Eckstein was killed on the spot, with the other three in a critical condition.
8/ San Francisco Chapel Body, California, April 1895
The body of a murdered woman was discovered in the closet of the Emanuel Baptist in San Francisco. The deceased was a member of the choir and reports are coming in of another girl from the church congregation is also missing and a search for her is being made, with the cellars at the church being visited. A Sunday School Superintendent named Durand was arrested on suspicion but claims he is innocent. The pastor is also suspected of the crime and is currently under police surveillance. A former pastor has committed suicide and another arrested on a charge of assaulting a female member of his congregation in the chancel. As is normal with sexual criminals, they keep a memento of the victim and in Durand’s possession was the purse of the murdered girl, but he claims to have found it in the street. (What was her name?/ Was it Durand?)
9/ Redbluff Level-Crossing Deaths, California, November 1908
A train travelling at high speed smashed into a car that had tried to run a level-crossing. There were five passengers, one of them being the chauffeur with four of them killed at the scene of the accident. Amazingly one of them is in the hospital and looks likely to recover. The main reason for the accident was due to the gates being left wide open.
10/ Lake City, Colorado, August 1886 (Horrible story of Cannibalism)
11/ Chicago, Illinois, October 1897 (Sausage Factory Murder)
The trial of German wife murderer, Adolph Luetgert, was delayed as the jury hadn’t reached a verdict and the four jurymen who believe Luetgert to be innocent are accused of taking a back-hander. The sausage-maker from Chicago is thought to have killed his wife in order to marry a younger model. He coaxed her in the sausage factory one evening, then bashed her over the head, cut up her body and put it into a vat of acid, along with other pieces going into the furnace and the little bits being mixed together and placed in the sausage machine. A gold ring was discovered in the vat of acid and was identified as Mrs Luetgert’s.
12/ Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, January 1902 (Prison Break Helper?)
John and Edward Biddle, brothers, were interred in the County Gaol at Pittsburgh, awaiting the trial for murder while they were committing a hold-up at Mount Washington. They managed to escape early one morning, with the Bittle’s sawing through the bars of their cells, then armed with guns they overpowered three guards, throwing one over some railings and causing him severe injuries, they then shot another and held one hostage. They locked them up, told them to undress and then wore their gear along with the keys and just walked out the building. They obviously had inside help, but who was it? It seems that the wife of a warder named Soffel had a crush on Edward Biddle and visited him, then handing over saws and guns. Here’s how good a mother a wife she was; she left the house late one night, leaving hubby and the four kids and ran off with the two Biddles. (Was she ever caught?/ Were they captured?)
13/ New York Murder, April 1859
14/ Batesville, Ohio, (Quadruple Murder/Suicide) November 1880
15/ Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, March 1898 (Seven Bodies in Cellar)
A grisly discovery was made at the Congregational Chapel in Philadelphia whilst the sexton and his assistant were cleaning up in the cellar. Several cartloads of debris had been cleared out when the assistant fell in a hole and whilst the sexton was helping him out, he spotted seven boxes, all of which had a child’s body in them. (Secret burial?/Where were they re-interred ?)
16/ Syracuse, New Jersey, June 1891 (Multiple Suicide Attempts)
Bertha Kettel aged nineteen was due to have wed a farmer named August Waggoner. A year ago she tried to kill herself by taking morphine but it failed. Then after this attempt, another eleven efforts to end her life, all failed as well. She started seeing Waggoner after the second go at killing herself and seeing him seemed to cheer up the young lass. This was short-lived, no pun intended! Then she tried to hang herself and an effort with a cut-throat razor also went badly wrong. Then when she took some rat poison that too ended in a failure, with her life being saved on each occasion. Then the bright idea of self-destruction on the railway, ended when the driver stopped the engine just before he ran her over. While all this was going on Waggoner decided to move in with her, thinking that this would make her a bit happier and possibly put a stop to the suicide attempts. If I was him, I’d have pi**ed off long ago! Either she was crap at killing herself or she didn’t really want to. One thing Waggoner forgot when he moved in, was that he owned a gun and Bertha found it, went to the shed, and at last, successfully killed herself. Her family had a history of madness in it. Her mother who died mad and her two brothers, along with a sister, who was incarcerated in a lunatic asylum.
Niagara Falls Suicides (New York/Canada)
17/ Niagara Falls November 1870
A lady from out West arrived at Niagara Falls on the 19th November and checked into the Spencer House. That morning she had breakfast, then asked how to get to the Falls. She went to the Goat Island bridge, which is near the U.S.side of the Falls, climbed the railing, then precipitated herself off the edge. Letters found in her room suggest she was from Chicago and had planned to commit suicide at the Falls, due to her mental condition which had been getting worse. The lady had also come straight to Niagara after she managed to evade her nurses, which were keeping an eye on her.
18/ Niagara River, July 1881 (Double Suicide)
A double suicide took place at Niagara Falls, with Mrs Sadie Stewart along with her family doctor, E.H.Howie, who both vanished from the face of the earth some days ago. Both of their corpses were found in the Niagara River.
19/ Niagara Falls, October 1869
A man in his mid to late twenties, registered under the name of Carl Schurz from New York, got in a carriage and headed for the suspension bridge, but changed his mind and went over to Canada. While on the ferry he told the ferryman that he could walk over the edge of the Falls. Passing this off, the ferryman ignored him. He then went to Table Rock, took off his coat, gave his watch to a young boy standing nearby, then walked into the water, which near the edge is fairly shallow, about ten feet deep. He appeared to slip, then he plummeted over the edge and onto the rocks at the base. His corpse stayed on the rock for a couple of minutes, while crowds looked on in disbelief, then it was washed off.
20/ Niagara Suspension Bridge September 1877
Last month (August 1877), Dr Edward Stein an ex-navy surgeon killed himself at French’s Hotel in New York. There was a dispute between the father, Louis.M.Stein and the woman who was supposed to be his missus. The woman eventually got the property of Edward Stein and the father was apoplectic. The Superintendent of New York police got a message a few days later saying that the father had committed suicide by jumping off the Niagara Suspension Bridge and down into the rapids. The loss of his son and losing his property had made him suicidal.
21/ Niagara Falls Tragedy, August 1890 (Murder/Suicide?)
22/ Columbia, South Carolina, December 1895 (Lynching Tragedy)
Four drunken white men went to the cabin of a Negro in Colleton County, who was accused of pinching a Bible, then dragged him out along with his elderly mother who is believed to have known about the theft and beat and tortured them to death. The young wife of the Negro escaped by the skin of her teeth, from being subjected to the same treatment.
23/ New York, (Suicide by Swallowing Love Letters) March 1874
A novel method of committing suicide was practised by a young New York girl, who rammed the love letter’s of her sweetheart down her throat. She suffocated from this rash act and the theory was that couldn’t swallow his unkind words and so ended it all.
24/ Harpswell, Maine, Drowned near Mother’s Grave) May 1864
Two girls were drowned at Harpswell in Maine. They had been to get some sea-shells to put on their dead mother’s grave and the tide came in and swept them under. They were discovered clasped in each other’s arms.
25/ Gates County Lynching, North Carolina, October 20th,1822
26/ Kankakee Lunatic Asylum Fire, January 1885
William Reid an attendant, saved twenty-four patients on his own, and James Coyne who was an inmate of the Asylum, saved four other inmates. The victims were named as follows:-
Henry Brown, Rock Island/H.W Belden, Galesburg/George Bennett, Morris/Joseph Colbert, Chicago/C.Strotz, Chicago/J.W.Taylor, Chicago/Orlando Ellis, Pontiac/J.W.Galloway, Macoupin/Thomas Hickey, Springfield/Matthew Hague, Chabanse/T.Hachner, Stevenson County/Thomas Herely, Chicago/John Johnson, Vermilion/Michael Jordan, Chicago/J.Nathan, Chicago/A.Raynard, Winnebago County/F.Weymouth, Putnam County.
The remains of the seventeen victims were gathered up, and in the case of ten of the victims, were placed on a two-foot square table, such was the extent of the fire this was all that was left of them.
27/ Little Rock, Arkansas, March 1899
A telegram from Little Rock, Arkansas, when disorders have broken out there resulting in the lynching of a Negro on Tuesday. Six persons were killed in various affrays today.
28/ San Francisco, California, (Chinamen Killed in Explosions) November 1879
A telegram from San Francisco reports that three explosions following in quick succession occurred on the San Jose-Santa Cruz Railway during the excavation of a tunnel. Twenty-five Chinamen were killed and seventeen Chinamen and two whites were injured. After the first explosion, twenty Chinamen rushed into the tunnel to rescue their countrymen, when two other explosions occurred, killing many of the rescuers.
29/ East Saginaw Bridge Fall, Michigan, October 1885
30/ Medford, Wisconsin, April 1890 (High Street Murder)
A semi-lunatic by the name of Willard Williams stepped in front of the local belle, Maggie Pritchard and asked her straight up,”Are you Maggie Pritchard?”, to which she replied, “Yes, of course, I am”. Williams whipped out a revolver and shot her there in the street in cold blood. An angry mob then rushed at him but he turned the weapon on himself and blew out his brains. He remains alive, but in a critical condition. (Did he die?/What did he do it for?)
31/ Richmond, Kentucky, October 1845
The Honourable John White, the late Speaker of the American House of Representatives, committed suicide on the 22nd ult.by shooting himself at Richmond, Kentucky.
32/ Sunnyside Lynching, Texas, April 1897
Seven negroes were lynched at Sunnyside in Texas last night, on a suspicion of having violated and murdered two children and their father.
33/ Brooks County Lynching, Georgia, December 1894
I think Georgia has the most clippings of any U.S. state when it came to instances of lynchings. Was it the worst state for such criminal acts? This is from Quitman and an armed Sheriff’s posse who were trying to arrest a Negro charged with murder shot and killed seven other negroes. Now a civil riot is going to break out, as between 300-400 blacks and whites face off with other. Authorities in the area fear a race war will erupt.
34/ Bath Murder/Suicide, New York, September 1880
35/ Harlem River Bridge Deaths, New York, April 1899 (How many died altogether?)
While the Edgwar Bridge Works of Wilmington, Delaware, was erecting a bridge over the Harlem River, some falsework (temporary frame) collapsed and threw twenty-two men into the river, forty feet below, with the iron and wooden frame going with them. Six men were killed at the scene, four are missing and twelve are badly injured. The cause of the accident is attributed to the fact that the timber used to carry the derrick was far too light. The superintendent of the works, Mr Headrick, was arrested.
36/ Fall River Mill Fire, Massachusetts, October 1874
Poor little Fall River would forever go down in the history books as being the town where Lizzie Borden supposedly killed her family with an axe, but this was eighteen years before the mass slaying of her family occurred. The story begins at a cotton mill with 700 employees busily working away, when a fire broke out. The fire cut off the means of escape for the one hundred and forty persons working on the fourth and fifth floors, mainly women and girls. Many of them jumped out of windows, then the roof caved in. Approximately forty people were killed or burned to death in the resulting inferno and eighty had severe burns or injuries. (What was the death toll?)
37/ Reno, Nevada, March 1879
The business quarter of the town of Reno in Nevada, was on Sunday destroyed by fire. The loss of property is estimated at over one million dollars and unfortunately, five people died in the flames.
38/ Crawfordsville Execution, Indiana, October 1885
39/ Boston Church Suicide, Massachusetts, December 1892
During a Mass in the Church of the Most Holy Redeemer in Boston, Massachusetts, a man calmly made his way to the altar, then pulled a razor from his pocket and slit his throat. He slumped down onto the carpet with blood drenching the area and died within a few moments. The Mass was stopped and there was a great deal of panic as women ran out, unable to comprehend what they had just witnessed. He was identified as William Sloane, a sailor, who was literally insane on the subject of religion (It is believed that around a quarter of schizophrenic sufferers have some kind of religious delusions.)
40/ Great Falls, Montana, November 1909 (Kidnap a Corpse)
At Great Falls, Montana,”Resurrectionists” took a coffin from a family plot, in which were interred the remains of the little boy of a well-known millionaire politician. The scumbags that performed this sacrilegious deed then demanded that the father pay a huge ransom to have the dead body returned to its original resting place. (Were they found?)
41/ White Meadow Lake, New Jersey, September 1885 (Dominoes Murder)
42/ Egan Skeletons, South Dakota, June 1894
A discovery of a tomb containing the skeletons of twenty-two men who are all around eight feet in height has caused quite a sensation in South Dakota. Also found with them were some bronze utensils and a roughly made altar. (Where are they?)
43/ Tampa Church Murders, Florida, July 1910
Will Ellison, a negro, had been taking cocaine to excess, then went on a rampage armed with a shotgun, entered the Methodist Church and began shooting at the congregation. He first shot his mother-in-law, then the Reverend Avery and finally the organist, Mr Clark. He wounded his wife, his sister-in-law and a policeman who was at the scene. Finally, he turned the gun on himself and blew out his brains.
44/ New York Central Railway, (Murdered Telegraphists Last Message) November 1903
45/ Cincinnati Murder by Priest, Ohio, April 1894
A gorgeous young Irish girl named Gilmartin, arrived from Sligo in Ireland to Cincinnati, Ohio, in a bid to escape the creepy attentions of a certain Father Dominick O’Grady. Despite her travelling over three a half thousand miles, he followed her, then when he saw her they talked a short while and it was after this, he shot her dead. The priest then tried to kill himself, but unfortunately, he didn’t do a very good job, as the chances are he will recover.
46/ Richmond, Virginia, April 1870 (Forty Killed in Court Collapse)
On the 27th April, while the Court of Appeal at Richmond was crowded, the floor fell through to the Hall of Delegates below. Forty people including several members of the Virginia Legislature are supposed to have been killed and around one hundred and fifty injured, some seriously.
47/ Georgia State, January 1868 (Loses to negro- kills himself)
Robert S.Pringle of Georgia committed suicide because he didn’t want to suffer the humiliation of being beaten by a Negro, as a candidate for the office of sergeant-at-arms, to the Reconstruction Convention of Georgia.
48/ Kittery Point Murder, Maine, October 1822
49/ Newhall near Los Angeles, California, August 1890 (Brothers Suicide Pact)
Two brothers named Louis and Philip Andeget, French nationals, both attempted to kill themselves at little Canyon near Newhall. They were both discovered under a tree both dying from gunshot wounds to the head which were self-inflicted, Louis with three in his head and Philip one serious wound. They came to Newhall to live several months prior to this and bought a large chunk of land. A fire broke out on the land, so in a bid to prevent the house from being torched, they started another fire somewhere else but the two fires suddenly became an unstoppable inferno and it spread to other tracts of land even burning down a neighbour’s farmhouse. They were grief-stricken and firmly believed that they’d be arrested and put into gaol for starting the fires, so they agreed on a suicide pact. They went to the place where they were found gave each other a Gallic hug and Philip went first. He put the gun to his head and dropped to the ground and after seeing what he thought was his brother’s suicide, Louis fired three bullets into his head. Louis died, but Philip may come out of his coma and live another day.
50/ San Antonio, Texas, September 1894 (Lynched in Error)
Two negroes named Elias Davies and James White were lynched near San Antonio in Texas for the supposed rape of a white woman in April. They were nowhere near the alleged crime scene at the time and a white man named Edward Ellis, who was up on a charge of murdering a policeman admitted his guilt in the case, with him admitting to raping her, not the two black men. Surely the victim could have stated that it was a white man and not two black men that had outraged her! A subscription has been started for the relatives of the two dead men, with one of them, a father to five kids.
51/ Astoria, Oregon, August 1885 (Lost at Point Reyes, Astoria, Oregon)
52/ Omaha Hotel Fire, Nebraska, March 1899
53/ Sheffield, Vermont, November 1880 (Triple Murder/Suicide)
Possibly the quietest and having hardly any crime to speak of, Vermont suddenly became the scene of a triple murder and suicide, in the peaceful town of Sheffield. A lunatic named Byron Blake murdered his mother, Mrs Parks aged sixty-three and his stepfather, Mr Parks aged seventy-four, along with his sister, Mrs Williams and him taking his own life by hanging. The house was about a mile from Wheelock Hollow and the school-teacher who resided there left at nine a.m. and then the neighbour, Mr Ingalls, who found the bodies turned up at ten a.m. He stumbled upon the corpse of Mrs Williams first, then as he went through he found Mr Parks near the living room door, with Mrs Parks in the sink-room where she had been doing the dishes. He smashed them all over the head with the butt of a gun and breaking it on Mrs Williams’ head with fragments in her hair. Blake had gone to the barn obtained a rein from a harness and hung himself from a beam. The husband of Mrs Williams had gone to Lyndonville at eight a.m., so had avoided the massacre, but was tracked down just outside of it and told of what had occurred.
Blake himself was only twenty-six-years-old but when he was twenty he had a spinal difficulty and this caused an illness, whereupon he was removed to an asylum for a couple of years, but when he came out he had become nasty and resentful. In 1876, Lyndonville had a very similar massacre take place when Wilder killed his parents and then committed suicide, only a couple of miles from here.
54/ Brooklyn Suicide on a Grave, New York, September 1889
A woman was seen to be acting in a rather odd fashion at the Lutheran Cemetery in Brooklyn. Frederick Silleg saw her hovering around a grave, then she suddenly collapsed and fell onto it. He rushed over and found the woman with an empty bottle of arsenic in her hand and on trying to resuscitate her, she just groaned in pain. He got help and they returned to the grave, which was of her baby daughter and her husband, while she was ranting and raving. They took her to Hospital but she died soon after being admitted. A short letter was found on her person, and it read:-
“I, Margaret Koerber, widow of the deceased Karl Koerber, give here my last will. I ask that I be buried by the side of my dear dead, so that in death we will not be parted, and if this is not possible, any other way will suffice. The pain and loneliness which I suffer after my dear departed ones, no-one can imagine.” (Is Koerber grave in Lutheran Cemetery?)
55/ McAlester, Oklahoma, March 1885 (Indian Territory was renamed Oklahoma)
A gas explosion occurred in a colliery at McAlester, in the Indian territory, on Friday last, and killed everyone in the pit-in all eleven persons.
56/ Mountain View, Oklahoma, May 1899 (Town built in Three Days)
57/ Reno, Nevada, July 1883 (Tarring and Feathering)
Nevada still occasionally tars and feathers its criminals. The other day at Reno, a coloured man named Jones, whom the local vigilance committee had convicted of several outrages, underwent the punishment. The negro was stripped and tarred from head to foot by means of a broom, farmers afterwards pouring ladlefuls of tar over him. An old feather bed was cut open and Jones was rolled in the down until he resembled a weird looking bird. Then having dressed him again he was dragged to the nearest railway station, thrust into the goods waggon and informed that if he ever returned to Reno he would be promptly hanged.
The punishment of tarring and feathering not infrequently leads to the death of the victim, the tar as it hardens, encases the little hairs all over the man’s body and renders the slightest motion inexpressibly painful.
58/ Portsmouth Triple Murder/Suicide, New Hampshire, September 1890
A cooper named Fred Hein has committed two murders then killed himself at Portsmouth in New Hampshire. He had become depressed at his wife leaving him and his eldest daughter was spending time with a bad crowd. He lost it one day and shot all three of his girls, killing the eldest aged fifteen and the youngest, with the other badly wounded. He then ran into the street where a mob had gathered to try and capture the madman, but he escaped. He made his way to the house of Charles.W.Taylor of State Street, who was the man who was having it off with his missus. He shot him in the back twice, then going back home, he blew his own brains out.
59/ Steubenville, Ohio, February 1888 (Actress Burns to Death)
60/ Salt Lake City, Utah, May 1896 (Double Murder-Minister Charged)
Reverend Francis Herman, the pastor of the Lutheran Church in Salt Lake City, has had a couple of wives, both of whom died rather mysteriously. His first wife Helen died in 1895 from poisoning, with Herman getting engaged to another young lady shortly after his wife’s death. She was Annie Samson and with history repeating itself she vanished in the February, with nobody seeing or hearing from her again. The remains of Annie Swanson were discovered in the furnace of the church, located in the cellar. Annie was completely naked and although badly charred, it was not totally unidentifiable. Next to the corpse was a razor, a butcher’s knife and a pair of garters. Kinky! As soon as these items were found, Herman had legged it. More searches found a barrel with the chopped up remnants of his first wife Helen and on looking through his paperwork, they saw some letters, jewellery and items of clothing from the two women. The Reverend was born in London and around forty-years-old. (Was this double wife murderer ever found?)
61/ Charleston, South Carolina, January 1863 (Execution of Negroes)
Reports came through from Charleston, South Carolina, that nineteen negroes were hung in the streets in a mass execution. The white population had become slightly suspicious of the amount of funerals that the black community seemed to be having. A white bloke disguised himself, then followed a funeral procession, then spotting that the coffin contained guns and rifles when they arrived at the burial ground, they were deposited in a vault. The result of this discovery was the wholesale execution of nineteen black men.
62/ Nebraska, (Frozen to Death) January 1885
63/ Cape Henlopen, Delaware, January 1888 (What the hell happened?)
The captain of the “C.G.Cranmer” stated that fifty miles E.S.E. of Cape Henlopen, Delaware, he found the abandoned schooner “D&E Kelly”. The mate and two seamen from the Cranmer boarded the vessel and discovered the body of Captain Taylor with finger marks around his throat and his head covered in deep lacerations, which told them that a dreadful tragedy had occurred. Taylor’s pockets had been rifled and his pistol was lying on the quarterdeck, with one chamber empty.
64/ Albion, Indiana, January 1894 (Unlucky Family)
In the small town of Albion, Indiana lives the unluckiest family in the whole of the United States, who goes by the name of Weeks. Sherman Weeks was killed when he fell from a tree; his brother died from lockjaw; Cornelius swallowed a coin and choked to death; Thomas jumped from a moving train and was killed; with another brother called Charles who killed himself by taking poison.
65/ Corvallis Murders, Montana, August 1889
66/ Asbury Park, New Jersey, August 1910 (Parachutists Death)
A fatal accident at Asbury Park, New Jersey, where the aeronaut Benjamin Prince was giving a demonstration of his parachuting prowess. He jumped out at 5000 feet and was seen to have problems with the parachute while he was in mid-air, he plummeted to the ground where he died on impact with a tree just as he neared the ground. There were hundreds of spectators who witnessed the tragedy.
67/ Weston Insane Asylum Neglect, West Virginia, September 1891
Reports have come in of the terrible neglect that has taken place at the Weston Insane Asylum in West Virginia. Torture of inmates is common-place and several suicides at the establishment have had no investigation or inquests. There are reports that some of the patients hanged themselves, while guards and staff looked on and one inmate even drowned himself in a vat of boiling water with no inquest into the matter.
68/ Madison Square Garden Murder, New York, June 1906
The Madison Square Garden in New York was the scene of a terrible tragedy, when millionaire Stanford White, a well-known architect was shot by millionaire Harry Thaw, the husband of Miss Florence Nesbitt, a famous English beauty. Jealousy was the supposed motive of the crime. (Anything to do with Miss Nesbitt?)
69/ Tupelo Triple Murder, Mississippi, January 1881
70/ Freeport, Long Island, September 1904 (Suicide from Dishonour)
The discovery of a girl’s dead body at Freeport on Long Island last April was that of Miss Martha Lynch, daughter of a wealthy Brooklyn contractor. Sadly she has betrayed an elderly relative and the fact of her dishonour drove her boyfriend mad. She was ignored by friends and family alike, so went to Freeport last April and killed herself. Her mother and the relative went to identify the body in the morgue but didn’t claim it was her in order to save the family from disgrace. A large amount was donated to the morgue for the burial of the “Jane Doe” and the death was also hidden from her own father. What a family!
71/ Gadsden, Alabama, August 1884 (Two Sisters Suicide)
Lucy and Texana Jones were sisters from Etowah, Alabama, who were aged seventeen and nineteen respectively. They had a high social status in the town and were the typical Southern belles. However, the boyfriend of the elder sister suddenly fled town and she didn’t take it too well. Depression set in and she and her sister never spent any time apart from each other. The elder sister committed suicide as she couldn’t bear to live anymore when she hung herself from a tree in the orchard. The other sister was found hanging by a bedsheet on an attic room beam. The parents returned home and discovered their two lovely daughters, dead from suicide.
72/ Lake Minnetonka Yachting Disaster, Minnesota, July 1885
73/ New Hampshire Train Crash, October 1885
A collision has occurred on the Boston and Lowell railway in New Hampshire. Three persons were killed and five others were seriously injured.
74/ Pennsylvania Train Crash, October 1885
A western bound express ran into the rear of an emigrant train, also going west, within a few miles of Jersey City. The debris fell on the eastern track and was struck by another train. Five emigrants were killed and a large number injured.
75/ Sandusky Infirmary Fatal Fire, Ohio, November 1885
The Infirmary at Sandusky, Ohio, was burnt down on Friday night. Of the ninety-eight inmates, all were rescued but five insane women who were burnt to death. The superintendent was also severely injured.
76/ Glendive Flood, Montana, April 1899
77/ Wheeling, West Virginia, February 1896 (Four Miners Found- Vanished Thirty-Two Years Ago)
An amazing story of how four men disappeared thirty-two years ago and were found in the dark nooks of a coal mine. John Ewing from Liverpool, England; Joseph Olney from Manchester, England, along with two Americans, Benjamin Ayres and Thomas Ackelson, all were found albeit their skeletons, with one of them sat bolt upright. A piece of paper was lying next to the skeletons and read:-
” November 26th, 1863. Should this ever reach the world, let it be known that we are prisoners here, owing to the caving in of the mine. Our food and water are gone. This is about the eighth day of our imprisonment.
“November 4th. Ewing and Ackelson have just killed Ayres, and are eating him.I have already eaten a bootleg. The oil in our lamps is getting scarce, and the air is foul.
” November 6th. Ewing has just killed Ackelson, and has cut off his feet, and is eating them. He is dancing around with a drawn knife like a maniac.
” November 7th. I am alone with the dead. I had to kill Ewing in self-defence. I have just finished eating the other bootleg. I am going to enclose this note in a flask to preserve if possible, so that my fate may be known- Joseph Olney”
All the old residents of Wheeling remember the men disappearing but gave it up as an unsolvable mystery.The British Consul inquired as to the whereabouts, but unable to learn a thing.
78/ No144, West 36th Street, New York, March 1899
79/ Langham Hotel Death, Chicago, March 1885
The Langham Hotel in Chicago, Illinois, was burnt down on Saturday night. A woman jumped from a fourth storey window and was killed. Eight firemen and policemen were buried under the falling walls,and several were fatally injured.
80/ Cincinnati, Ohio, May 1885 (6th Street Fire)
A fire broke out in a printing office in Sixth Street, Cincinnati on Thursday afternoon. Many of the work-staff were in the upper stories and eight girls jumped from the windows, five were killed. In all seventeen persons were burned to death or killed by jumping down.
81/ Oscoda, Michigan, April 1885
Seven persons were buried by a falling factory chimney at Oscoda in Michigan. Only two were extricated alive.
82/ New York Tenement Collapse, April 1885
Eight five-storied tenement houses in the course of being constructed in New York and near completion, fell in yesterday owing to their insecure foundation. A number of workmen were buried in the debris, seventeen being injured, some of them fatally.
83/ Malden, Missouri, April 1899 (Family Murdered)
84/ Near Cherryvale (The Benders), Kansas, May 1873
Two men and two women named Bender from Cherryvale, Kansas, committed a series of horrendous murders. Thirteen mutilated corpses were unearthed in the garden of the house where they lived. The Benders had fled the scene. It was used as a wayside tavern and was in the middle of the Kansas prairie. The building itself had a couple of rooms, one of which was a sort of cafe/restaurant and the back room was used as a sleeping quarter where travellers could get their head down for a few hours sleep. The locals knew the Benders as a “bad lot” and very rarely visited the establishment. Johanna Bender, better known as Katie, had a terrible reputation and all of the victims were killed only for their valuables and money. (How many killed?)
85/ Union Pass, Wyoming, (Princeton Students Kidnapped) July 1895
Thirteen students of Princeton College who were proceeding to Yellowstone Park to study the geological formations have not been heard of since the party reached Union Pass, Wyoming, a fortnight ago. It is feared that they have been captured by Bannock Indians who have assembled in force along the route. The Indians are enraged at the Government’s efforts to prevent their killing game.
86/ Howard City Triple Murder/Suicide, Michigan, May 1899
87/ Titusville, Pennsylvania, July 1872 (Justifiable Suicide?)
This could be the case that justifies committing suicide in certain instances. This note was left in the boot of a victim :
“I married a widow who had a grown up daughter. My father visited our house very often, fell in love with my step-daughter and married her. So my father became my son-in-law and my step-daughter my mother because she was my father’s wife. Some time afterwards my wife had a son-he was my father’s brother-in-law and my uncle, for he was then the brother of my step-mother. My father’s wife-i.e. my step-daughter- had also a son; he was, of course, my brother and in the meantime my grandchild, for he was the son of my daughter. My wife was my grandmother, because she was my mother’s mother. I was my wife’s husband and grandchild at the same time; and as the husband of a person’s grandmother is his grandfather, I was my own grandfather”
88/ New York Fire, April 1899
It is known that thirteen persons perished in the fire here yesterday. The origin of the outbreak has not yet been discovered, but it is hinted that it may have been due to incendiarism.
89/ Paterson, New Jersey, June 1899 (Fatal Practical Joke)
A difference in the sense of jokes, has had a fatal result. Some employees in a street railway machine shop at Paterson, New Jersey, connected a metal faucet with an electric trolley wire so that their “butt”- a man named Magill- should receive a shock when he turned the faucet to get water. Magill put his mouth to the faucet to get a drink and was immediately killed by the current. His comrades, horrified at the result of their trick, have been arrested.
90/ Chicago, Illinois, June 1885 (Lunatic in Charge of Train)
91/ Mississippi Lynching, September 1909
At Clarksville, Mississippi, Nathan McDaniell shot a policeman named Walter Marshall. McDaniell made his escape and when he was to be arrested, he could not be found anywhere. A large mob gathered and they were determined to catch the cop-killer. The mob spotted the murderer’s brother, Hiram and they hunted him down and caught him. Hiram pleaded with them that he had nothing to do with the murder and had no idea where his brother had vanished to. Then a cry of “Never mind, it’s the same family anyhow!” and with that, they cheered and before anybody could talk some sense into them, they strung him up and hanged him from a tree in the main street. Nathan was shortly afterwards apprehended in Jackson, Mississippi and put in gaol. Mississippi State Governor is outraged by the mob’s home-grown justice and wants to make an example of them, but this is extremely unlikely.
92/ Nebraska/Iowa,(Bodies in a Box) January 1894
The corpse of an elderly man and a pretty young girl lie in a morgue at Omaha, Nebraska and police are closely monitoring how on earth they got there. A stranger took a two-hundred-pound box to the Pacific Express office saying that it was stationary and then ordered it to be shipped to Iowa. The chief agent was suspicious and opened the box and found himself staring at a body of a blonde woman. Police were summoned and they discovered the old man’s cadaver underneath and both were naked, tied up with wire. There was no sign of violence upon the bodies, no bruises or lacerations, with the authorities now having filled the box with rubbish and forwarded to the address in Iowa. When he picks up the parcel he will be arrested.
93/ New York, (Snakes By Post) April 1899
94/ Tennessee Murder/Suicide, July 1891
Thirty-year-old, Mrs Lockridge from Maury County, Tennessee, killed her three children while her husband was at church. The children were aged four, three and four months. After slaying them she then killed herself. Unusually for a multiple child murder, the weapon of choice in this instance was a shotgun, which she placed on their chest and fired into them, then reloaded and killed the last child, then herself. A letter was found explaining that she was depressed and that this was not her first effort at self-destruction, having taken laudanum before but that failed miserably.
95/ Kentucky Crucifixion, August 1894
Clay County was the scene of a distressing discovery, where several lumberjacks were felling timber in the woods in the Kentucky countryside. They stumbled upon the corpse of a beautiful young woman, completely naked and who had been crucified to a wooden cross. Large nails were hammered into her hands and feet and she showed signs of extreme torture and ill-treatment. When found she was barely alive. She had been on the cross for a number of hours but she was rushed to a local hospital and given the best of treatment. It turns out that the perpetrators of the crime were a group of local women who were very jealous of her youth and good looks. The police have been searching for them but at the present time, they remain undetected.
96/ 132nd Street, New York, (Bridge Deaths) April 1899
A large derrick used in the construction of a bridge over the River Harlem on 132nd Street, New York, overturned this afternoon, with the workmen on it being thrown off. Three of them were killed outright and nine injured, while several others drowned. Trustworthy reports place their number at ten, though the estimates vary from six to twelve.
97/ Rochester, New York, (Train Crash) May 1899
Two cars of an excursion train to Rochester on the Lake Ontario Railway, filled with passengers, then went off the rails and were wrecked this afternoon at a curve when the train was going at full speed. The accident occurred half a mile north of Rochester. Fifty persons were injured, a dozen fatally. Three are already dead.
98/ Georgia Lynching, April 1899
99/ Washington, Pennsylvania, February 1891 (Execution Goes Wrong)
A negro murderer who had wiped out an entire family was due to be hanged at Washington, Pennsylvania, for his horrific crime, but had somehow got hold of an iron bar and tried to stab himself in the neck several times, but with little success. He left a few cuts and lost a pint or two of blood, but on the whole, he was OK. The powers that be decided to continue with the hanging. On being dragged back to the cell he suddenly began to lash out and became extremely erratic. They thought that it would be best if he a few opiates to calm him down, but these only worked partially and he was strapped to a board. More drugs were pumped into him just before he got to the scaffold. What authorities hadn’t considered was the extra weight of the plank and the rope snapped at the moment of execution and he fell to the ground. He struggled to get free, kicking and screaming. He was lifted up once again and the noose put around his neck and this time he was hanged. However, after a few seconds, the suicide wounds tore open and blood began to squirt out, drenching him and the ground surrounding him.
100/ Exira, Iowa, (Saloon Blown Up) March 1885
101/ Philadelphia (Seven Murders) April 1866
An appalling massacre took place at a farm near Philadelphia, with the victims being Christopher Dearing, his wife and their four children and a niece who was a young lass of about twenty-five years of age. The place was discovered empty by a friend of Dearing’s and the house itself was not the blood-drenched murder scene you’d expect it to be. The outbuildings were visited next and here he spotted the foot of a man jutting out from a hay-stack. Underneath were Christopher Dearing and his niece, Elizabeth Dolan. His pockets had been rifled and both of them had their throats cut from ear to ear. Further searching found the bodies of his children, his sons John aged eight and Thomas aged six, with the daughters, Anna aged four and two-year-old Emily. His forty-five-year-old wife Julia was next to them, having had her skull smashed in. An axe was found close by covered in blood and hair. The murderer was identified as Anton Probst, born in Germany and part of the hired help. Cornelius Cary aged seventeen was also missing. (Was he murdered?)
102/ Cincinnati Murder, April 1885
103/ Greenville Suicide, North Carolina, December 1882
A large number of cotton bales were received at Greenville from Bell’s Ferry and inside one of these was a corpse of a negro male, compressed out of shape. He was identified as James Bradley of Bell’s Ferry and he was about to get married to a girl from Pitts County, when a couple of other women turned up. Each one had a baby with them and they stated that Bradley had been spreading it around a bit and he was the father of these kids. He legged it to the cotton gin house, while the others were at work and then he simply vanished off the face of the earth. Next time anybody saw him, it was the contorted mess in the cotton bale. It could be the case that he threw himself in the press to commit suicide, but another theory is that somebody grabbed him and tossed him in, squashing him to pieces.
104/ Texas Lynching, March 1885
105/ Indianapolis Court Murder, October 1885
A brother’s revenge, of his sister that was raped, created a strange scene in an Indianapolis court in October. That morning a negro named Harrison Taskell, was up in front of the judge on a charge of having raped a young German girl named Helen Huendling. He said he wasn’t guilty, so the case was arranged for next week and just as they were taking the prisoner out, the girl’s brother, Mainhardt Huendling pointed a gun at him and fired. He hit Taskell in the chest and then he ran off. Taskell died on the spot and Meinhardt was arrested. When questioned as to his motives for the murder he explained that his sister is suffering greatly and his mother was in deep sadness and depression. He “got what he deserved” was the reply.
106/ U.S. Disasters (S.Carolina/ Iowa/ South Dakota) May 1899
107/ Ellaville Lynching, Florida, May 1895
Three negroes were accused of kidnapping eighteen-year-old Mannie Armstrong as she walked through a pine grove. Her lifeless corpse was discovered by a group of school children, with her throat slashed and her head caved in, limbs were broken and severe bruising and lacerations all over her body, as well as having been raped. Under the nails were flakes of black skin, proving it was a negro assailant and a prime candidate was a man named Echols. He confessed to keeping her in a hut in the woods, along with two others for a couple of days. Her clothes had been torn off her then burned. A hoard of white men gathered weapons and horses and hunted them down. They were taken to a swamp and here a dreadful scene was created as they were flayed alive with the skin cut off in strips, then nitric acid poured into the wounds. If that wasn’t enough, a bonfire was built and the nearly dead men were thrown into the inferno. There have been several instances of white women being attacked by black men in Ellaville and this was meant to be the ultimate deterrent to any others
108/ Massachusetts Parricide, June 1885
109/ JeffersonvilleMurders, Indiana, December 1863 (Human Remains)
An old brick building that stands in Jeffersonville and that was once used as a hotel and frequented by lower classes, was bought by the Jeffersonville Railway Company to be used for its head offices. During repair work, some workmen took up the floorboards and found the remains of several young ladies, who appear to have met their end by foul means. They appear to have laid there for a number of years, maybe thirty or so and alongside one of them was the skeleton of an infant wrapped in calico. During this period, it has been a house of some notoriety and managed by several owners. The post-mortems reveal that the women are older in years, whereas the child was at its peak of life and as mentioned before, they look to have been murdered.
110/ Cincinnati Fire, Ohio, May 22nd, 1885
A fire broke out in some printing works in Cincinnati, by which seventeen persons perished, most of them by suffocation. The damage caused by the conflagration is not great.
May 25th, 1885
111/ Lebanon, Kentucky, (Mob Justice) December 1895
A mob from the town of Lebanon burned a widow named West to death, then blew away with gunfire an old fella named Devers with whom she co-habited. A few months ago, Devers had shot West’s husband after he accused the pair of having an affair and shortly after this occurrence, he moved in with her. The neighbourhood was infuriated with the brazen attitude of the couple and the shooting and burning are said to be the action of Mrs West’s relations. The unmasked mob refused to listen to her plea’s that she was pregnant and it is expected for the violence to escalate.
112/ New York Murders, September 1870
One night in New York, an Irishwoman who resided in the lower part of New York in comfortable circumstances, asked a few men to have a drink with her. Then she took them upstairs and led them to her lodger’s room and ordered the men to kill him. They carried out her orders and after the slaying, they lobbed his body downstairs, then went back to get their drinks and finished supping them.
In Fishkill, a bank teller was on his way to the train station with a bag containing $10,000, when he was accosted with pepper thrown into his eyes and then a robber took off with the cash. A coachman named Jones saw everything and caught the thief, when the criminal pulled out a gun and shot him three times, with one being the fatal wound in his stomach. The heroic fella kept hold of the thief, who was arrested and taken to a police station.
113/ Philadelphia Explosion, June 1885
114/ St Louis Catholic Church Fire, Missouri, March 1885
115/ Pocasset, Massachusetts, May 1879 ( Daughter Sacrificed)
Charles Freeman, a member of the Second Advent Congregation, had recently become insane from excitement at revival meetings. He said a week ago that he had received an amazing revelation and that he hadn’t slept or eaten in that week. Things were not all well in the Freeman brain and when he told people that God had told him to sacrifice his five-year-old daughter, Edith, saying she would rise again in three days, that was the icing on the cake.He used the kitchen table as a makeshift altar, then killed her as promised. He drove the family out, then locked the doors and closed the curtains awaiting her resurrection. Authorities are ready to storm the building. Later on, he was arrested with his wife and put in Barnstable Gaol, Cape Cod. The killing took place with his wife’s agreement and then them both saying a prayer next to their dead daughter. There were several arrests made of members of the Adventists in Pocasset, who were accessory to murder.
116/ Texas Lynchings, July 1885
117/ Greensburg Murders, Kentucky, May 1840
A letter from Greensburg, Kentucky, gives the following details of several murders committed in the area and the perpetrator. In July 1838, about seven miles from that town was an old woman named Lucinda White who had two sons aged thirteen and fourteen, and a daughter-in-law with an 18-month-old infant residing together. They were going to move, so a bloke named Carrington Simpson agreed to help them convey their belongings. The first night he took the young Mrs White and the baby and the 13-year-old lad. About a mile out of town he smashed their heads in and buried them in a shallow grave. The elder boy then set off from the mother’s house and the mother was then killed and buried with the others. A week later, the boy returned and he was then coshed over the head and buried in the mass grave. He was suspected of the murders and was arrested. He confessed to the crime after the bodies had been discovered by locals.
118/ Fleer’s Gum Factory Explosion, Philadelphia, April 1899
119/ New York Double Suicide, July 1886
A strange double suicide occurred in New York. Adrian Cruey was a member of the Produce, Maritime and Metal Exchanges and had been doing business with a firm that went bust, so he decided to go it alone. He lived with his sister Lucy in the same house in a smart suburb and they were both French Catholics, in good health and about fifty or sixty years of age. Servants told police that something was wrong, so they forced down Adrian’s door and gas poured out of the room. They found the two siblings lying dead on their separate beds, with each of them having a large bullet wound in their temples. They more than likely turned the gas on to make sure of their death. A note was found and it said they had agreed to premeditated suicide and how they wanted their cash and property to be dealt with, along with where they should be buried etc. Financially they were very well off and there was no hint of a scandal, they were just tired of life.
120/ St Louis Tram Strike, October 1885
121/ Palmetto Racial Disturbances, Georgia, March 1899
122/ Oakdale, Long Island, (Vanderbilt’s House Burned) April 1899
Burnt down April 15th, 1899- my paper was dated the 12th April 1899. Go figure! Called “Idle Hour”- Nine hundred acres estate with a 110 room mansion. Rebuilt after the fire for the princely sum of $3 million.
123/ Tyler, Missouri, March 1899 (Steamer Sinking)
124/ Norwood Cyclone, New York State, August 1885
Another heat wave with cyclonic features is passing over the country. A cyclone at Norwood in northern New York has destroyed many buildings, killed eight persons and injured several. A cloudburst about the same time and washed away 500 feet of the New York Central Railway, west of Albany. A waterspout in Dakota has drowned six persons.
125/ Cookville, Texas, (Eight Murdered) April 1889
