Month: March 2018

1/ Leabridge Road, Leyton, August 1898 (Father Slaughters Four Children)

William Viney, a labourer, had gone to each of his children while they slept on the floor and stabbed them in the neck. He had taken them for a rest and himself too. Another child who was fourteen, saw the father commit the gruesome deed and ran to his mother, from whom Viney had separated a week ago and in turn, she sent for the police. It all happened at between nine and ten at night, with the victims, Mary aged eleven; Bertie aged five; Fred aged eight and little Annie only two, stood no chance. Rather calmly Viney had gone out to a group of locals who had assembled and gave himself up and told them where the bodies lay. Viney and his wife lived from hand to mouth and despite his seventy-five years, he still did odd jobs for people but it wasn’t enough to survive on. They had eleven kids together and Viney’s wife was only fifty. (But considering they had a two-year-old as well !). He did it because of the desperate situation they found themselves in, all with a common pen-knife. (Did this bastard hang?)

2/ Walthamstow, (Singular Death) July 1858

William Simpson, a pupil of Dr Greig at Walthamstow died under the strangest of circumstances. Simpson was walking around the garden with Mrs Greig, when she mentioned the cherry tree and how fruitful they were, so he climbed up the tree to get some down. He leaned forward on one of the boughs when he fell off and fractured his skull, with death being instant. The poor lad was an orphan and only fourteen years of age.

3/ Temple Mills, Leyton, October 1904 (Five Skulls Found)

A rather grisly discovery was made at Temple Mills, Leyton, by a group of schoolboys. They were messing about on a refuse heap near to the Great Eastern Wagon Works when they came across five human skulls. They took a specimen to their schoolmaster, who immediately contacted police. The police began searching and throughout the day they found several more human bones and other remains.

4/ Chingford Suicide, December 1885

5/ Leytonstone, September 1892 (Dead Husband Turns Up)

Walter Edwin Westcott, a schoolmaster from Glencoe Terrace, Worsley Park in Leytonstone and Ada Agnes Emma Roe of Burdett Road in Mile End were in Thames police-court trying to explain their side of the story. They met several years ago, then got married. Westcott then got word that his wife’s first husband was still alive. He took her into custody and she was committed for trial. Westcott was under the impression that her husband was dead when he married her and indeed there was a section in the papers about a suicide with the same name as her ex. Her story was that she wed George Roe in 1880, then in 1881, he left her. Then in  1887, she married Westcott thinking he was now dead. Then in 1888, a baby girl was born and he gave her £8 a month allowance. Then in January, her old hubby turns up out of nowhere. It turns out that the kid was his and Westcott said he knew nothing of the illegitimate child when he married her. Another thing that he mentioned was another child that she said was her cousin, but in fact was her first child, was living at her mother’s. So the poor bloke had been deceived on all fronts.

6/ Leytonstone/Stoke Newington Infanticide, March 1885

7/ Walthamstow (Rats Eat Body) March 1887

This one is a bit gruesome. The body of the wife of George Rason of Maria Terrace, Carisbrook Road in Walthamstow, was found under a brick archway under Ferry Lane which crosses a water-flow known locally as “Puddle Dyke”. A horrific sight met the police, as her head and neck were completely devoid of any flesh, as it had been eaten away by the rats.  They had left the right earlobe, which had an earring in it. Her hands were bones, but the wedding band remained on her finger and her knees were in a similar condition. His wife left nearly a month ago and left this short note to explain her situation:-

My dear husband and baby. God bless you. My poor head is so bad. Goodbye.”

It is believed that she drowned herself in the ditch which is near the East London Water Works Company’s reservoirs and the current brought her down to the archway when she became lodged in there and was for the next three weeks a ready meal for the local rat population.

8/ Leyton Triple Murder, January 3rd, 1903. ( Sorry about the condition of the clipping, but it is 95% readable)

9/  Leyton Triple Murder, January 1903.

10/ Leyton Triple Murder, (Funeral of the Victims)  January 10th, 1903

11/ Fatally Attacked by Hooligans, Walthamstow.  April 1904.

12/  Owner Squashed by an Elephant, Hoe St Goods Yard, Walthamstow.  January 1904

13/  Suicide of a West Ham Guardian, James Street, Walthamstow.  November 1906

14/  Murder/Suicide at Leyton.  December 22nd 1906

Early yesterday morning, at Leyton, two revolver shots were heard in Moyer’s Road, and in the doorway of No.5, a man and woman were discovered in a dying state. The man had a revolver in his hand, and both were shot through the head. Death occurred in each case before a doctor arrived. The bodies have been identified as those of Walter Suttle, aged twenty-seven, of Waltham Cross, a mechanic at a Small Arms Factory, and Henrietta Howard, aged twenty-four, of Moyer’s Road, Leyton, one of the manageresses at the Great Eastern Railway restaurants, Liverpool Street.

December 25th, 1906  (No. 7, Moyers Road is still there- behind Leyton Midland Road Station)

1/  Globe Inn, Tredegar, (Manslaughter? Globe Inn now demolished, was down Church St, Tredegar, near the corner of Stockton Way)

2/ Bala Lake Drownings, July 1904

Edwin Baker from London and George Eliott from Nottingham, both photographers, hired a boat from Claudius Twinney to go fishing on Bala Lake. The group had apparently been for a few beer’s beforehand and this could account for the following disaster. Richard Jones was passing by and heard cries for help coming from an upturned boat on the lake. He went to rescue them in his boat but only Eliott could be found. Baker and Twinney clung to the boat for about twenty minutes, but couldn’t hold on. The lake was dragged but no bodies were found, but a week or so later, 70-year-old Twinney’s corpse was floating on the surface.

3/ Usk Murder, June 1869 (Murder in 1867)

 

4/ Dunraven Castle Skeletons, December 1910

A bank was washed away at Seamouth near the entrance to the grounds at Dunraven Castle and revealed three skeletons. Locals around the area believe they are the bodies of sailors washed up on the shore. (Where are they?)

5// Dunraven Castle (Fatal Fall) August 1885

A young man by the name of Matthews was walking along the rugged coastline of Wales when he decided to climb the cliff (shown above). The problem was he slipped and dropped to the rocks below, causing his death. Matthews was a 22-year-old Bristolian and there on holiday.

6/ Dunraven Castle, (Teenagers Death) October 1836

A freak accident took place in the gardens at Dunraven Castle, as the gardener, with help from the game-keeper and his son, were picking the apples. The young lad fourteen-years-old was climbing the branches of the apple tree when he got his head lodged between two branches, then to cap it all, the branch he stood on snapped off. It acted like a small gallows and his neck was dislocated. The father of the lad and the gardener didn’t see anything for a few minutes and by the time they got him down, he was dead.

7/ Chirk Castle near Wrexham, (Pool Death) August 1915

This castle (above), was the seat of Lord Howard de Walden, and it was he who was having a few guests stay over at the Castle. The niece of Lord Knollys, who was King Edward’s private secretary, was one of those guests and she was having a swim in the pool when she suddenly vanished. Lord Howard’s sister was there, along with another lady and she saw her disappear. Guests and staff went to the spot where she went down but could not find her. In the end, Lord Howard had the pool drained and her body was found. She was only twenty-eight-years-old. (Is the pool still there?)

8/ Cardiff Castle Suicide, October 1869 (Butler’s Self Destruction)

William Nash was a 32-year-old butler to the Marquis of Bute at Cardiff Castle. He’d only been in the job for four months or so, but he was a conscious and diligent worker. He started ranting and raving during the week that all the “ornamental plate” was stolen and he thought the police were pursuing him. His workmates managed to allay his fears that everything was OK, but he wouldn’t have it. They sent for a doctor and he was kept in his room, along with a young man named John David to keep an eye on him. Meanwhile, the plate had been checked to see if any was missing, but it was all there. John David went to check on him and saw him on his knees, then he realised that Nash had hung himself with some cord. Nash had put the cord through a ring attached to the ceiling. He was cut down, but he was dead as a dodo. The verdict was that “Deceased destroyed himself while in a state of temporary insanity”.

9/ Llangibby Quadruple Murder, (Llangybi?) July 1878

10/ Bardsey Island Lighthouse (Lighthouse-Keeper Death)  July 1897

Head lighthouse-keeper of Bardsey Island, Mr Jenkins, met with a nasty accident which resulted in his death. It is believed he was out shooting rabbits with his assistant lighthouse-keeper when he fell over a hundred and twenty-foot cliff. His skull was fractured and it was a full four days before they could get any medical help to him, but he died in the end, anyway.

11/ Efenechtyd Rectory near Ruthin, September 1888 (Churchyard Suicide)

A report of a suicide at Efenechtyd Rectory near Ruthin was called in to police. They discovered that Mr E.Owen, the third son of the Reverend Elias Owen, the rector of Efenechtyd and St Asaph, was found hanging by a rope from a tree in the churchyard.He had been troubled by his course at college and thought that he’d failed. His sister found the body. Apparently, he was an excellent goalkeeper and was one of the best in Wales, but he sadly left a wife and two kids were now fatherless.

12/ Taff Vale Railway Fatality, February 1899

Rees Thomas an engine-driver aged thirty-one, who was residing at Stuart Street in Aberdare, was killed on the Taff Vale Railway yesterday morning. He leaves a widow and two young children.

13/ Tondu Yard (Porthcawl) March 1899

Trains were delayed at Tondu Yard from some unknown cause. A messenger was consequently sent to the signal-box, where he discovered the signalman, fifty-year-old David Roderick, dead at his post.

14/ Aber Waterfall Fatality, near Bangor, April 1885

15/ Rhyl Station Fatality, June 1885

On Saturday evening an inquest was held at Rhyl on the body of Elizabeth Davies of Abergele. The woman and her husband were returning from an excursion. The husband left the train at Rhyl and it moved off without him. The wife, who saw his failure to catch it, opened the door, leapt out and was killed. The jury returned a verdict of “Accidental Death”.

16/ Penllyn Castle area (Child Death) July 1898

Charlie Grove aged six, the son of the butler at Penllyn Castle, was riding on a horse and waggon, when he fell off, with his head being smashed to atoms between the wheel and the axle. He also had several ribs crushed and a broken collar-bone. He died at the scene of the accident.

17/ Grangetown Drowning, Cardiff, December 1885

A fatal ice accident occurred at Grangetown in Cardiff, when a number of people were skating on the roach pond when the ice gave way and a man named Grant, who lived at Penarth, was drowned. He leaves a widow and a large family behind.

18/ Powis Castle Fatal Accident, near Welshpool, May 1899

19/ Lower Deep pit, Blaina, (Father Killed) December 1885

At the Lower Deep pit at Blaina on Thursday, a man named James Fox and his two sons, Robert and William, were at work together when a fall of roof took place and almost buried them. The father was killed on the spot and his sons were very seriously injured. The deceased man had only recommenced work that morning after a severe illness.

20/ Hay-on-Wye Suicide, June 1907

This was an inquest into the suicide of 42-year-old Elizabeth Prosser, the wife of John Prosser, the farmer at Brilley Court Farm near Hay. Her mother, Mrs Weale, explained about how she went into the granary over the cider-house and saw her daughter suspended by a rope, which was attached to a wire stretched between two beams. Apparently, she had been suffering from depression and also had a heart condition, so these two things contributed to her thinking that suicide was the best way out.

21/ Cwmbria Murder, October 1896

At Swansea, an inquiry held into the circumstances attending the death of Jesse Hill, who was missing from his home since September the 26th and whose body was discovered in a pond near a cabbage field at Cwmbria, showing signs of brutal treatment before death, was concluded on Thursday. A verdict was returned that deceased was wilfully murdered by some person or persons unknown.

22/ Vine Inn Pub Explosion, Ystalyfera? December 1872

23/ Tintern, (Body Found) November 1896

The body of an unknown man was found in bushes near to the roadside in a dreadfully decomposed state. The verdict of the inquest at the Ship Inn, Tintern, was “Found Dead”.

24/ Llandovery Station Fatality, December 1885

A shocking accident occurred on Monday evening at Llandovery railway station. Two cattle dealers named Thomas Jones and David Davies of Penlan, had been loading cattle waggons at the station and were crossing the line for the purpose of booking when they were knocked down by a train which was shunting. Jones was killed on the spot and Davies sustained very severe injuries.

25/ Chepstow Rugby Death, October 1896

In a football match under Rugby rules at Chepstow on Saturday, a player named Johnston aged nineteen was so badly hurt that he died on Monday afternoon. Another player, Williams, had to be carried from the field, but he is progressing favourably.

26/ Carnarvon Murder, May 1885

27/ River Monnow Drowning (Monmouth) April 1885

The Reverend J.Gregory, Primitive Methodist minister at Monmouth, fell into the Monnow while fishing yesterday and was drowned. He leaves a wife and two children. The body has not yet been recovered.

28/ Ferndale/Mardy (Tourist Cliff Fall) April 1885

The body of a man, supposed to be that of a tourist, has been discovered at the foot of a huge rock between Ferndale and Mardy in Glamorganshire, in a mutilated condition. The man appears to have fallen over the rock- a distance of about a hundred feet. The body has not yet been identified.

29/ Carnedd Dafydd Suicide, August 1882

A body of a smartly attired tourist was discovered on the side of Carnedd Dafydd, a mountain midway between Bangor and Capel Curig. Judging by the decomposition he had been up there a few days and had shot himself in the temple with a revolver, still clutched in his hand and a bottle of whisky laced with poison also there. He had £5 in gold on him but left nothing that would help in identifying the gentleman, other than a watch made in Liverpool.

30/ Llanberis, (Shocking Death) October 1885

31/ Rhos Drowning, near Wrexham, July 1885

On Saturday morning three young men went to bathe in a pool at Rhos near Wrexham. One of them, Josiah Jones aged twenty-six, employed at the Bersham Colliery, while swimming across the pool, was seized with cramp and sank.

32/ Sciont River Body Found, (Carnarvon) July 1885

A youth named Owen aged sixteen, youngest son of Mr John Owen, a coal merchant in Carnarvon, was drowned on Saturday evening whilst bathing in a pool in the Sciont river. He was able to swim and it is supposed he was seized with cramp. The body was recovered soon afterwards.

33/ Hirwain, (Man Crushed in Fall) August 1833

A miner at Hirwain, Thomas Davis from Rumney, was pushing an empty tram into the carriage of a balance pit, when he missed the track and fell with the tram over 120 feet, to the pit bottom. He was discovered in a mangled condition, with a section of his skull about the size of a man’s palm that was found in the area. He leaves a widow an three children.

34/ Mountain near Cowbridge? (Murder Confession) November 1885

35/ Dinbryryn Hall Suicide, Llangollen, November 1884 (Now Dinbren Hall)

A suicide was committed at Dinbryryn Hall, Llangollen, the seat of Timothy Kenricks. The wife of Jonathan Hughes, the gamekeeper, loaded a gun in the hallway and blew her brains out. Her husband heard the gunshot and went rushing to the spot and found his wife lying dead on the floor. There was nobody else at the Hall but those two, as the family were away. The only feasible excuse for her suicide was that she had been getting severe migraines and various other pains in her head.

36/ Pontypridd, (Frozen to Death) December 1885

A cattle drover named William Butler about fifty-years of age was found yesterday frozen to death near Pontypridd. It is supposed that he fell from his horse, became insensible and perished in the intense cold.

37/ Wrexham, (Attempted Murder/Suicide) August 1896

On Monday at Wrexham, Hugh Annesley Edwards was charged with attempting to murder his wife and with attempting to kill himself on July 3rd. The prisoner was eating gooseberries in the garden and his wife complained of his doing so. He struck her and cut her throat with a razor, afterwards cutting his own throat with a knife. He was committed for trial.

38/ Welshpool/Montgomery, (Two Women Killed on Railway) September 1885

39/ Brecon (Ship Street Death) May 1836

The Pig Fair at Brecon had a slightly melancholy tinge to it, when news of a fatal accident was being talked about. The son of John Price from Brecon, aged around fourteen-years of age thought he would try and stop the “Swing-Swang” in Ship Street, but the apparatus struck him in the throat and he died almost immediately from his injury.

40/ Halkin, Flintshire, (Fatal Shooting) July 1885

Mary Robartes, daughter of a farmer of Halkin in Flintshire, was accidentally shot dead on Friday afternoon. Her brother placed a loaded gun on the table and during his temporary absence from the room, it is supposed that the girl must have handled the weapon, which suddenly went off. The contents were lodged in her left breast and she expired immediately.

41/ Llantwit Major (Accidental Death) August 1896

Mr A.Davies, son of Mr D.H.Davies, J.P., was killed on Monday through his gun accidentally going off while he was shooting at Llantwit Major.

42/ Cardiff Murder/Suicide, June 1889 (Did she make it or did she die?)

43/ Ogwen Lake Drowning, near Bangor, September 1885

Three gentlemen were fishing from a boat on Ogwen Lake near Bangor yesterday when a sudden squall arose and in making for land the boat upset. Mr Parry an architect from Bangor, one of the party, was drowned.

44/ Magor, Newport, (Bodies in Pond)August 1885

On Sunday afternoon two farmers named Booth and Duffey of Magor, Newport went with the wife and sister of one of them for a walk. The men left their relatives and proceeded to a deep pond to bathe. As they were absent a long time the women went out to look for them. Nothing could be seen of them but on the pond being dragged, their lifeless bodies were recovered.

45/ Boughspring Suicide, near Chepstow, September 1835

A young lass named Sarah Howell, a domestic servant to Captain Hall of Boughspring near Chepstow was told off by her master for having a bloke in the house the previous night. She was so distraught, that while the family were sat down eating their dinner she went and hung herself in her bedroom.

46/ Tredegar Murder, (Death Sentence) November 1902

47/ Llanberis July 1885

A young man named Owen Jones was drowned on Saturday night while bathing in the river at Llanberis.

48/ Port Madoc Drowning, September 1885

During a gale yesterday afternoon on the Carnarvonshire coast, a fishing boat making for Port Madoc was capsized on the bar. One sailor was drowned and two others had a narrow escape.

49/ Aberdare, (Childs Body Found) June 1866

The dead body of a child was discovered within the walls of a churchyard. It was taken to the police-station and an inquest, later on, gave the straightforward verdict of “Found Dead”. Up until now no trace of the people who left it there have been discovered.

50/ Cardiff Wife Murder, March 1899

51/ Llanelli Drowning, August 1892

On Thursday afternoon a number of boys were bathing at Llanelli when Mr Frank Rowlands, the son of the Reverend Dr.Rowlands, minister of Morich Chapel in  Llanelli, got beyond his depth and being unable to swim was drowned in the presence of his companions.

52/ Port Madoc, (Four Drowned) February 1885

A telegram dated Saturday reports the Spanker, a barque from Glasgow, bound from Jamaica to Liverpool, got ashore on Friday night on Harlech beach, close to Port Madoc Bar. The master, steward, boatswain and boy were drowned. The remaining seven were rescued by the Criccieth lifeboat and landed at Criccieth. The vessel is a total wreck. The Spanker was a wooden barque, 506 tons, built at Dumbarton in 1881 and owned by Mr R.Whitehill of Renfrew.

53/ Penyrhoel-Gerrig, (Squashed by Boulder) October 1841

The workman William Megrick aged thirty, working for W.Crawshay, was about to leave work when he pointed out to a fellow workman, a 500 hundredweight boulder and jokingly said: “I wonder whether this will hold till morning?” No sooner had he said that when the huge stone crushed him to death.

54/ Berthgym Murder near Holywell, November 1885

55/ Conway, (Fatal Accident) September 1885

Mr Bevitt, a late member of West Bromwich Board of Guardians, has met with a fatal accident at Conway. Mr Bevitt aged sixty-five was walking with his wife along the quay at night when, in the dark, he fell over, alighting on a pile of stones. He sustained such severe injuries that he died shortly afterwards.

56/ Plastynaston Collieries, Ruabon, (Lad’s 500 foot Fall) February 1885

A shocking accident occurred at the Plastynaston Collieries, Ruabon, yesterday. A boy named Mark Davies who was employed in the pit-bank, by some means pushed a small waggon into the pit and fell in with it, right to the bottom, a distance of 500 feet and was dashed to pieces.

57/ Aston Suicide, near Churchstoke, June 1830

A young woman from a respectable family committed suicide at Aston near Churchstoke in Montgomeryshire, in consequence of a trifling family argument. She walked out the house to go to her uncle’s house but was found the next day hanging from her apron strings. Her first effort at self-destruction was with her garters, they snapped, so she got the apron strings and hung herself.

58/ Holmes Island/Cardiff, (Six Drowned) July 1885

59/ Boughroad Shooting, (Radnorshire) January 1885

A railway porter named Charles Davies was shot dead at Boughroad, Radnorshire, on the Mid-Wales Railway on Friday night. He was shot by a fellow employee who took up a gun without knowing it was loaded and pointed it at the deceased, when it exploded.

60/ Abergorkey Colliery Double Fatality, March 1899

On Friday afternoon two miners, Llewellyn Powell of Treorky and William Clark of Treherbert, Rhondda Valley, were killed by a fall of roof in the main level in Abergorkey Colliery. Both men were married.

61/ Newport (Childs Suicide) May 1846

At six a.m. one morning, a boy who worked for Mr Oliver, a printer of Newport, named David Davies aged twelve who lived with his parents at Hill Street, hung himself in a privy (toilet) with a handkerchief. His sister found him and he was cut down immediately. He had a temper on him and every time he as told off, he threatened to do himself in and this stemmed from a petty argument with his brother.

62/ Cardiff/Rome Murder, December 1885

63/ Newport Road, Cardiff, (Dead Infant in Chapel) April 1890

This is the inquest into the body of an infant whose body was found at the Newport Road Congregational Chapel, behind one the doors. The autopsy suggests that the child was stillborn and the investigation continues into the identity of the parents or parties who placed the child there in the first place.

64/ Lake near Bethesda Drownings, January 1885

Two boys named Jones were drowned yesterday while sliding on the Lake above Bethesda.

65/ Rhyl, (Body Found near Pier) September 1885

On Saturday just before noon, the body of a young lady was discovered on the sandbank near the pier at Rhyl, having been left by the ebbing tide. The body was conveyed to the Queens Hotel and inquiries led to its identification as that of Miss Cooke about twenty-six-years of age who had been for several years in partnership with her sister as a milliner and dressmaker in High Street, Rhyl. Nothing is definitely known as to how Miss Cooke got into the water.

66/ Tallarn Green, (Vicar Pitchfork Death) September 1885

67/ Cyfartha (Crushed by Rock) September 1833

Evan Jones, a miner from Cyfartha, was working in the mine when a three-ton mass of rock fell on him and crushed him to death. He left a wife and three kids and on the night he died, she was confined of a fourth.

68/ Cowbridge (Copycat Suicide) July 1846

After his father, John Thomas had committed suicide last month, his 7-year-old son was found swinging from the same beam as his father hung himself from. It is believed that the boy’s curiosity was heightened by people talking about his father’s act of self-destruction and he had wanted to test the theory, but had got it horribly wrong.

69/ Anglesey Shipwreck, March 1899

A telegram from Holyhead states that during a severe storm yesterday morning, the French schooner Mignonne, bound from Dunkirk to Swansea with a cargo of pit-wood, went ashore on the Anglesey coast. Four of the crew got safely ashore but the captain was drowned.

70/ Hugh Lloyds Pulpit, Festiniog, (Lady Killed) August 1885

71/ Newport, (Horrific Accident) November 1839 (Did he survive?)

A lad by the name of George Wright, who was an apprentice with a Mr John Young, a Newport ship-builder, was working on the outside of a schooner while another shipwright was working on the inside of it, drilling a hole just where Wright was on the outside. When Wright bent down to look at his work, the drill came through straight into his eyeball, pulling it from the socket.

72/ Kidwelly, (Accidental Suicide) June 1832

The sixteen-year-old footman to Richard Maliphant, a Kidwelly solicitor, hung himself with a coupling strap in his master’s stable. The theory is that he was messing about with the strap and put his head through it for a joke, then became scared, had a fit and accidentally strangled himself.

73/ Cardiff Murder, December 1872

74/ Llanvaelog, Anglesey, (Body Washed Ashore)  March 1878

The district coroner of Anglesey held an inquest on the body of the unknown man who was discovered on the seashore at Llanvaelog. It was thought to be one of the crew of the “Elizabeth Closterboer,”which was wrecked off Rhosneigr a fortnight ago.

75/ Kile near Fishguard (Epileptic Falls into Fire) June 1846

An awful accident occurred at Kile near Fishguard, to a young lass who lived there who suffered from epilepsy. The girl, Phoebe Thomas, was left by her father to make hay in a field next to their house, but she had a seizure and fell into the fire. When pulled out she was charred black and she has survived the accident but remains in constant excruciating pain.

76/ Ruthin Road, Wrexham, (Three Drown) January 1885

A shocking accident occurred at Wrexham yesterday afternoon. A number of boys were skating and sliding on a pond in Ruthin Road when the ice gave way. Three brothers named Robert Jones, Edward Jones and Hugh Jones, aged between twelve and fifteen years of age were drowned. The boys were sons of Sergeant Hugh Jones of the borough police force.

77/ Cader Idris, (Lady Lost) September 1885

78/ Hay-on-Wye (Fatal Mill Accident) January 1843

A seventeen-year-old girl named Harris who worked at the carding-mill in Water Lane, Hay, was busy trying to do some D.I.Y. repairs to the machinery and she got tangled up in the mechanics of it. She was mangled to bits and literally cut into two pieces, causing her instant death.

79/ Boncath, (Gored to Death by Bull) July 1885

A youth named Sayce aged about seventeen has met with a shocking death near Boncath in South Wales. He was taking some cows to a field to graze, when a bull suddenly turned upon him, knocked him down and gored him in the stomach. Medical assistance was procured as soon as possible, but the poor lad died in a few hours.

80/ Alps Quarry, Wenvoe, (Three Dead at Quarry) August 1889

An inquest was held at Cardiff on the bodies of three men, George Richardson, Charles Cavill and James Wills, were killed by a fall of stone at Alps Quarry at Wenvoe. In the course of the inquiry, the Coroner rebuked the solicitor who appeared for the relatives of the deceased for his manner and tone of voice in questioning the witnesses. Verdict of “Accidental Death”.

81/ St Davids, ( Fatal Lamp Accident)  December 1885

82/ Trefeilir, Anglesey, (Cart Fatality) April 1870

Mr O.John Owen from Trefeilir on Anglesey was with a servant driving a colt and cart, in the process of training the animal, when it suddenly bolted. Each man had a rein in their hands thinking they they could calm the animal down but they were thrown out of the cart onto the ground. The servant got up to see if his master was alright, but he lay motionless face down on the gravel. During the accident Owen had been run over the head by the cart and he died twenty minutes later.

83/ Trevor Rocks (Fatal Fall) February 1888

On Saturday an inquest was held at Llanymynech on the body of Edward Morris, labourer, who met his death by falling over a precipice. The deceased, who was going to work at Blodwell, took a short cut over Llanymyneck Hill and with the morning being dark he missed the footpath and fell over Trevor Rocks, a distance of fifty feet. A verdict of “Accidental death” was returned with the recommendation that the rock should be fenced off.

84/ Carnarvon Child Murder, July 1885

At Carnarvon Assizes on Saturday, Sarah Roberts, indicted for the murder of her child by cutting its throat, was declared insane and will be detained during Her Majesty’s pleasure. The prisoner after killing the child, cut her own throat and was for a long time in great danger.

85/ Maritime Colliery, Pontypridd, (Colliery Deaths) April 1899

86/ New Inn Public House, Treherbert, (Dynamite Explosion)April 1885

A shocking accident occurred last evening at the New Inn public-house at Treherbert, Rhondda Valley. A young man named Morgan, the son of the landlady, was holding over the fire a saucepan containing dynamite for the purpose of tempering it, when it exploded, shattering his arm and leg and killing his mother who was standing near him. The house was completely wrecked.

87/ Carmarthenshire, (Hemlock Poisoning) ,  ? 1883

Much excitement prevails in the outskirts of Carmarthenshire by a wholesale and fatal case of poisoning which has just occurred in the district. Several children while going home from school ate some leaves (??) which they found in the hedge-rows. The leaves were those of hemlock. One child was immediately taken ill and died soon after from the effects of the poison and another child has since succumbed to the same cause, while others are more or less seriously ill.

88/ Huntsholm Disembowelling, (Monmouth) May 1847

A chap named William Watson who worked for a Mr Ambury of Hunstholm, was at his work when he was coming down from a hay mow, which he had been cutting some of it, then tried to ease himself down by using a pike, he slipped and fell onto it, with the prongs entering his bowels, which in turn pierced his intestines. (Did he make it?)

89/ Minerva Mines near Wrexham (Two Killed) August 1885

90/ Bodorgan Railway Station Fatality, Anglesey, March 1878

Mr William Williams, a farmer residing at Tyddyn Bottwm near Bodorgan, was with the lad who was employed by the miller at the railway station, shoving a truck into the sidings. All was going well until a Liverpool goods train shunted another truck and the two were squashed between them both. Mr Williams hung onto life for a few more hours, then died. The boy is doing fine.

91/ Pembroke, (Broken Neck) December 1885

A shocking accident occurred near Pembroke on Christmas Eve. Mr George Young, one of the leading farmers and deputy receiver of wrecks of the district, was proceeding homewards after dark when his trap came into collision with another trap, which was going in the opposite direction. Mr Young was thrown violently out and when picked up it was found that he had broken his neck in the fall and life was extinct.

92/ Simolde Dyllvan Copper Mine, (Fatal Explosion)  May 1834

A miner who worked at the Simolde Dyllvan Copper mine was ramming down a charge when it prematurely exploded taking the forehead of the miner with it.

93/ Fairy Glen Fatality, near Bettws-y-Coed, August 1885

94/ Penmaen (Gower) (Church Discovered) July 1861

The excavation of sand from near the Reverend J.K.James’s house unearthed the remnants of a long-buried church. The workers who were digging were moving the earth for the foundations of a new Gower Union Workhouse and since finding the building, the Reverend has been overseeing the rest of the excavations. It is only a small church, with the font and communion table also dug up and also an incense burner was found. It is thought to be centuries old. (Was it left unearthed or buried again?)

95/ Vauxhall Colliery, Ruabon, (Hundreds Buried) March 1899

An estimated three hundred men were imprisoned in a pit accident at Vauxhall Colliery at Ruabon. The accident to the pit cages was due to the guides breaking. The lives of the miners are imperilled, as at a late hour last night they were still imprisoned in the mine and hundreds have flocked to the pit-bank, eagerly awaiting news to see if the cages have been repaired in order to enable the men to be raised to the surface. There are approximately three hundred men buried at this time.

96/ Swansea Abortion Death, July 1895

97/ Llanelli, (Infants Body Found) October 1876

Between the Carmarthenshire Dock and Copperworks Dock, Llanelli, the decaying remains of a baby girl were discovered on the bank of slag waste. It was wrapped in a section of a woman’s dress, which suggests it was alive when put there but must have died of suffocation from the way it was tied. It is believed that the baby was like this for a couple of days while it lived, then dropped into the water, where the tide washed it up to where it was found.

98/ Pwlldu/Abergavenny, December 1876 (One Family has Three Suicides in a Month)

John Davies aged twenty-four, son of the surveyor to the Blaenavon Company, killed himself by drowning. He lived at Pwlldu and was seen in bed by his sister on Sunday morning, as she went to light the fire. He then got dressed, calmly walked out of the house with no one noticing and drowned himself in the pond near the house. A month ago, his father committed suicide whilst he was an inmate at Abergavenny Asylum. Then his brother, who went to Abergavenny to pay the funeral bill, threw himself under a train at Abergavenny Railway Station the week after.

99/ Llandudno Drowning. August 1885

100/ Brecon Hunting Fatality, April 1885

A coroners jury have returned a verdict of “Accidental Death” on the body of Mr Frank Green Price, son of Sir R.Green Price, M.P. who died at Brecon Infirmary from the effects of an accident in the hunting-field. The deceased was at Brecon races last week and while riding his horse, fell in clearing the hurdles and received fatal injuries. The jury passed a vote of condolence with Sir Richard and Lady Green Price.

101/ Old Cemetery (Cardiff) (Illegal Burial) January 1879

A box was found in the Old Cemetery with the remains of an infant inside, supposedly put there illegally. The person who is in charge of the cemetery has no record of it being buried and has no death certificate either. The child was buried only a handful of inches from the surface, so it is clearly not the normal depth of grave that a gravedigger would adhere to.

102/ Cardiff Cemetery, (Child Homicides Buried Illegally) January 1885

Another one similar to the above and this was found by Thomas Pullen, who was in the Catholic section of Cardiff Cemetery when he spotted a roughly made wooden box wrapped in brown paper, laid in a grave. He thought it looked suspicious, so he went to get a policeman. The policeman opened the box and inside were two bundles tied up with bits of an old blanket. In those were the two bodies of baby girls. They were not decaying, so had died recently. The box resembled that in which groceries are usually in; an orange box for example. The umbilical cord was cut but not tied up and the chances are that they bled to death because of this. The police are treating this as a double homicide and are looking for evidence as to the mother of them.

103/ Aberystwyth Murder, June 1st, 1885

104/ Aberystwyth Murder, July 20th, 1885

105/ Aberystwyth Murder, August 3rd, 1885

Aberystwyth Murder, August 4th, 1885

The Governor of Carmarthen Gaol received a telegram last night from the Home Secretary respiting John Price, a sergeant in the Cardigan Militia, who was to have been executed tomorrow (Wednesday) for the murder of his wife at Aberystwyth in May last.The telegram intimated that a letter would follow.

106/ Rhyl Station, (Lift Death) October 1910

Joseph Jones aged thirteen, the stepson of Thomas Evans, No.2, Bedford Place, was killed when he became entangled in the luggage lift on the north platform at Rhyl Railway Station. There are several unanswered questions at this time, such as how did he get in there, what was he doing in there and how he got the lift to move, is another. He must have seen it open and unmanned so thought he’d play about with it for a while. When it was on its way up, he tried to climb on the platform but he miscalculated the speed of the lift and he became wedged between the edge of the floor and the descending railings which bar the opening at the bottom when the left is in motion. Part of his face was ripped off and he was badly mutilated, so death must have been straight away. Rescue workers were nearly an hour getting his little corpse out of the lift shaft. He sold newspapers in the evening, which explains why he had dozens in his possession when found.

107/ Pontypool (Head Squashed in Machinery) February 1833

A lad of fourteen years of age was with another lad who had a cart laden with vats from Langwm, which were unloaded at the Company’s stable, where a horse propelled machine was going around. The curiosity factor was ten on the young man’s scale, so he looked through a gap in the wall, when a beam attached to the machinery jammed his head against the wall and crushed it to bits.

108/ Swansea Pierhead Murder (West Pier) December 7th, 1885

Swansea Pierhead December 8th, 1885

The coroner’s jury at Swansea yesterday, returned a verdict of wilful murder against Thomas Nash, Corporation labourer, for throwing his daughter aged six years over the side of the West Pier on Friday night last.

109/ Usk Church Suicide, August 1881

The churchwarden of Usk church, W.H.Slade, was walking through the churchyard when he spotted 80-year-old William Lewis sitting up near the centre of the churchyard, against some railings around a tomb. Thinking he had been drinking and passed out, he went closer. On getting to him he saw that a cord was tied to the railings and then around his neck, hence the sitting position, as it was not high enough. He had told some children in the churchyard to leave as he was tired and wanted to sleep, so they did. He had a prayer-book next to him. The body was still warm.

110/ Tenby Infanticide, February 1894

There was quite a buzz in the town when word got around that the body of a newly-born infant was found in a cistern at No 4, The Croft, which was the home of Captain Payne. This is normally when you look at the domestic staff, as it is usually one of them that has got rid of an unwanted birth. This occasion was no different and Emily McKay the Payne’s maid said that a fellow servant, Kate Hickley, who was the cook, had complained of being ill and that later on, she had suddenly become thinner. Sherlock Holmes was not needed!  Another house-maid, Helen McSweeney said that she saw her put a parcel under the press in the kitchen, then went out the back. When McSweeney saw footprints on the toilet seat, she checked the cistern. That was cause to tell someone and then police were involved, then the child was discovered in the water closet. (Did she go to prison?)

111/ Crwys Road, Cardiff, (Infants Body Found) July 1909

David Archer saw a bundle wrapped in a shawl in a lane at the back of Crwys Road in the Cathays area of Cardiff. He opened it and found the corpse of a little girl, badly decomposed, with death taking place some time ago. It was estimated to have been dead for around eight months. This was a popular area for kids playing about, so how it hasn’t been discovered before now, is amazing.

112/ Swansea Murder, August 18th, 1885

Swansea Murder August 22nd, 1885

Swansea Murder, August 25th, 1885

The inquest into the death of Mr W.G.Smith, a grocer of Swansea, who was shot dead in his house on Saturday week, terminated yesterday in a verdict of wilful murder against Walter Jenkins, the deceased’s assistant. Jenkins, who is suffering from a bullet wound supposed to be self-inflicted, is lying in a hopeless condition.

Swansea Murder, October 1st, 1885

Walter Jenkins, aged twenty-three, has now recovered from his self-inflicted wounds and was yesterday formally charged by Swansea police, with the murder of his master, Mr Smith, a grocer of Swansea. Since the murder, the accused has been under medical treatment.

Swansea Murder, November 7th, 1885

At Swansea Assizes yesterday Walter Jenkins, who was found guilty on Thursday of the manslaughter of his employer, William Graham Smith by shooting him in August last, was sentenced by Mr Justice Manisty to fifteen years penal servitude.

113/ Llanerch-y-medd Windmill Deaths (Anglesey) February 1841

Ann Jones was taking some oats to the mill and was delivering the sacks to the warehouse when she ventured a bit too close to the sails of Llanerch-y-medd Windmill. Her head and the sail collided, slashing a massive cut wide open. She died immediately. This wasn’t the last person to die at the mill that week, as a child of five years of age was also struck by the sails of Llanerch-y-medd Windmill and died at the scene of the accident. Both cases were viewed to be “Accidental Death.”

114/ Pontypridd Shooting, September 1885 (Did any of the girls die?)

115/ Llanwern, Newport, (Naked Body Hanging in Woods) January 1881

Near to the place where 27-year-old Eliza Waters was found dead and the husband was accused of her murder late in 1879, another body, this time a man, was discovered in a wood, hanging from a tree. He was completely nude and had hung himself with a section of rope. He was estimated to have been suspended there for a few days as his clothes were damp and had frost on them. He was identified as a local carpenter by the name of George Morris. (Anything to do with Waters murder?)

116/ Swansea Pier Suicide, July 1880

A young confectioner’s assistant named Charles Edward Holcombe only nineteen, killed himself by jumping off the pier near the lighthouse at Swansea and drowning. The un-Welsh name is because he originated from Bath in Somerset. His mate David Jones was ambling along with him on the pier at around 9-30 p.m. when he suddenly walked away and he heard the words “Goodbye Dai”, then a splash in the water. The lighthouse keeper threw him a lifebuoy but he never tried to grab hold, suggesting he wanted to end it all. He was fished out twenty minutes later but it was too late, he was dead.

117/ Ruabon, (Fatal Quarrel) April 1885

118/ Aberdare Suicide, November 1837

A forge engineer at the Aberdare Iron Works, Evan Howell, killed himself by hanging from a low beam in a cow-shed at his home. The reason for his suicide is unknown, as he was earning a good wage, nice home, plenty to eat and he and his missus got on like a house on fire. He leaves his wife and his five children to fend for themselves now.

119/ Worcester Street, Brynmawr, (Infants Body in Sewer Pipe) April 1867

The body of an infant was discovered in a sewage-pipe at the back of Mrs Chamberlain’s house in Worcester Street in Brynmawr. Thinking the pipe was blocked with the usual gunk, it was checked out and then the little corpse of the decomposing child was found. The coroner said it was nearly impossible to determine whether it had been alive for a period of time, or was still-born. The police are trying to find a clue as to the parentage but as yet nothing has turned up.

120/ Llandilo (Anglesey?) (Accidental Shooting) July 1836

An accident at a farmhouse in Llandilo resulted in the death of a 15-year-old domestic servant. She and another servant of the same age as her, had been left in charge of the farm while the owners went out. The young girl was sat reading a Bible with a kiddy on her knee, when the lad started to mess about with the firearm, then it went off and the bullet embedded itself into her neck/throat area, killing her almost immediately. The servant realising what he had done, was going to kill himself but was secured and taken to Beaumaris Gaol to await his fate.

121/ Queensferry Ferry Accident, January 8th, 1885

Queensferry, January 22nd, 1885

Queensferry, January 27th, 1885

122/ Pontarddulais, Carmarthenshire, (Sliced Open Stomach) July 1846

John Moore from Merthyr committed suicide in a most original way possible, at Pontarddulais in Carmarthenshire where he was doing a bit of recuperation. He had bowel pains for quite a while, but one day he had enough and he just sliced open his bowels and pulled them out, then also tugged out a section of his intestines and he let them all drop out. After all this, you’d think your body would be in shock, well it was getting that way. He tried to slice open his throat to finish it all off, but couldn’t manage it. His last sentences stated that it was because of the pain he was in, that caused him to do this to himself.

123/ Portskewett Station Fatality (Monmouthshire) November 1909

A domestic servant named Ethel Parry, only sixteen years of age, who worked for a Mr Parsons at Southbrook Farm, went to meet a passenger at Portskewett Station. She was crossing the line to go back to Sudbrook when an express clattered into her and sliced off her legs and smashed her skull into fragments, leaving the brains spread over a wide area. The autopsy revealed that no bone in her body was left intact, and it was recommended a bridge be installed at Portskewett Station.

124/ Cwm Bridge near Bridgend (Decomposing Suicide) November 1876

A man named Gibbs was in a field at Cwm Bridge, when he stumbled across the corpse of a man hanging from a tree in a terrible state of decomposition. It is surmised that he had been there for some weeks as the flesh on his face and hands had been literally eaten away. The clothing too was decaying and a couple of pawn tickets were found with the name “Stephen Lewis, Hirwain” on them. They had been used at Eli Joseph’s shop in 17, Lewis Street, Aberaman and Edward Barckle of Aberdare.

125/ Morfa Colliery Explosion, March 1890

The death toll, in the end, was eighty-six dead.

126/ Trosnant near Pontypool, (Sliced Own Tongue Off) June 1832

A freaky suicide took place at a lodging-house at Trosnant near Pontypool, when the deceased cut a couple of inches from his tongue and died the next day. He was found sitting on his bed, drenched in blood, only ten minutes after he made the first slice. He was attended by medics but they just managed to prolong his life by a few hours. (What was his name?)

127/ Cyfarthfa Manslaughter? April 1835

Two men were having a scrap at Cyfarthfa, one was William Morgan aged nineteen and the other was John James. While the fight near the river-side was well under way, another bloke smacked William Morgan and he picked up a stone to throw at him, but he instead hit an eleven-year-old boy named James Fox on the temple with the stone. The young chap died of his injury within the next few days.

128/ Llanddowror Mill, Carmarthenshire, (Epileptic Seizure into Mill Wheel) November 1838

The daughter of David Wilkin of Llanddowror Mill, Miss Margaret Wilkin, met with a fearful accident at the Mill. It appears she suffered from epilepsy and was of weak intellect too, and while she was washing the spuds near the wheel of Llanddowror Mill she had a seizure and fell into the wheel. Her father rushed to the spot when the mangled remains of his daughter came into view. The wheel was stopped but she had already been through the mill several times and was already extinct.

129/ Holyhead Steamer Missing, Anglesey, January 1885

 

130/ Beaufort Iron Works ((Burned to a Cinder) October 1846

A disturbing accident took place at the Beaufort Iron Works when Thomas Jones, an assistant filler, was throwing some cinders into the furnace when he overbalanced and fell in. He was would have been a pile of ashes within a few minutes, such was the heat and temperature of the crucible. No trace of his body was found. His mother’s first husband died in an explosion of molten iron in a metal-works nearby and his father, the second husband of his mother, lost an eye and one of his brothers was burned to death on a cinder tip.

131/ Ystradfellte Cave Suicide, February 1893

A couple of men were exploring the cave at Ystradfellte in Breconshire when they were approximately fifty yards into it, they found the dead body of a man who had killed himself. He was about thirty-years-old and a strapping six-footer, wore a black felt hat, grey coat and dark trousers. He had some coins on him, an aluminium watch and a miniature boat on a chain. He shot himself with the Colt revolver that lay by his side, through the rib-cage into the heart. He was badly decomposed and probably committed the act several months ago. Identity as yet unknown.

132/ Aberdare (Tragic Fatal Accident) May 1859

An accident at the Llwycoed lime-kilns near Aberdare led to the death of a young man. William Thomas was working there and while burning lime, then having fed the kiln, he climbed on top to level the stones. Underneath was heavily calcined and the mass gave way under his weight, propelling him into the burning mass below. Upon impact, he began to scream and tried to wrangle his way out. Despite aid from fellow workers, he just sank into the fire. Hie remains were sought and only a charred mess was brought out.

133/ North Wales Murder, September 24th, 1885

North Wales Murder, October 1st, 1885

North Wales Murder, October 5th, 1885

134/ Cardiff Station, (Infants body in Toilet) August 1898

A porter named Franks, who worked at Cardiff Station lavatories, was told of the ladies toilets being blocked up. He went to sort out the problem and found that the leg of a newly-born was the object that was bunging up the pipe, which had been severed in a rough way from the trunk. A plumber and police were sent for and they found more pieces of the child, the other leg and some entrails. The police surgeon determined they were the remains of a baby girl and this had been done with a hatchet or similar cutting implement. Also, the child must have been put down there a few days ago, as the pieces had worked themselves down to the pipe where they lodged. It was a Bank Holiday the previous day, so it can’t have been then, so presumably the day before.

135/ Llangerniew Murder, March 1899

136/ Aberdaron/Bardsey Island, January 1889 (Haunted Farmyard)

Bodurdda Farm near Aberdaron and Bardsey Island has been the scene of some extraordinary happenings, thought to be ghosts or phantoms. The cowman went to milk the cows one morning when he saw them all running about the place. The bull knocked him over and gored him in the cheek, leaving him at death’s door. Police were sent to observe the place and during the night, three of the cow-shed doors opened and slammed shut all at once. The officer ran out saying that nobody was nearby when the doors slammed. Also, strange sounds have been heard at the property.

137/ Swansea Fatality, October 1896

138/ Newport Manslaughter, September 1885

A shocking murder was committed on Friday night in Newport. During a quarrel between Margaret Driscoll aged sixty-two and her daughter, the latter picked up a paraffin lamp and threw it at her mother, whom it struck on the right leg, severing the main artery. Medical aid was summoned but the woman bled to death. The daughter, a single woman aged thirty-one, has been arrested.

139/ Llandudno Fatality, August 1892

During a rush of visitors at Llandudno on Monday to see a brig which was in distress near Little Orme Head, a man named Robert Whalley of Manchester, was knocked down by the lifeboat waggon and killed.

140/ Point Lynas, Anglesey, August 1892

The steamer “Architect” of Liverpool, put into Holyhead on Sunday afternoon and reported that Joseph Proctor of Birkenhead, an able seaman, fell from the mast-head when the vessel was off Point Lynas in Anglesey and was killed.

141/ Barry/Cardiff Boating Deaths, August 1892

Thomas Rice of Barry, took a boat called Lalk Jane and towing another boat went for a sail on Saturday afternoon. He reached Cardiff without mishap and took on board his sister-in-law. Later in the evening, the boats were found bottom up with no traces of the occupants.

142/ Milford Haven (Attempted Murder in Court) October 1897

143/ Abernant Works Fatality, July 1839

One night at the Abernant Works, Thomas Davies a 19-year-old rougher-down was caught in the roller and whirled around the spindle, with his head, an arm and a leg, being ripped from his body. The mangled corpse of young Davies was taken out and sent to the mortuary and after the inquest jury had viewed his body, he was buried in the evening. His father has worked at the same factory for thirty-three years.

144/ Blaenau-Ffestiniog, (Mountain Tragedy) March 1898

145/ Bagillt Suicide, near Holywell, (Near Chester) October 1877

This is the gory suicide of fifty-three-year-old Elizabeth Roberts, whose lifeless body was found at the bottom of a shaft at Wern Colliery, Bagillt near Holywell. Her husband Henry told of how she had depressed of late and had gone to bed on Thursday evening as normal, but when he woke up at three a.m., he found his wife had gone. He sent the two sons to go and look for her but they were unsuccessful. Then at about five a.m., Robert Williams, a fireman at the colliery, went to a furnace at the bottom of Powell’s shaft which was over 120 yards deep and saw her lying in a pool of blood. She was decapitated, had an arm missing and her eye was knocked out. Roberts had left her bonnet and shawl on the railings outside and managed to scale an eight-foot safety fence when she did it.

146/ Rhondda Colliery, (Three Killed) August 1892

147/ Brynmawr (between Abergavenny and Merthyr) (Suicide Premonition) November 1867

George Whatley, a twenty-year-old collier, was found drowned in a pond known as Black Pond, approximately half a mile from Brynmawr which is a feeder for Nantyglo Works. Last week at the Petty Session, Harriet Spratman was in court to prove that Whatley was the father of their child and how he owed them child support, but he didn’t turn up. He was meant to leave home, which was next door to the Brecon Arms pub, to go to work, but he wasn’t seen that day. That night his father dreamed that his son was drowned in the Black Pond, then telling his son-in-law the next morning they decided to act on the dream and went to take a look. Lo and behold, the lad’s cap was discovered on the pond-side and when it was dragged by police, they snagged his body and brought it to the surface. As suicides were not given normal Christian burials, he was buried at Brynmawr Cemetery at night-time, but around 200 villagers and friends turned up to see him interred.

148/ High Street Murder, Swansea, June 1899

149/ Coed Alice Wood Suicide, Panteg, November 1857 (Weird!)

One afternoon, a lad was walking through Coed Alice Wood when he saw a man hanging from a tree by a handkerchief. He ran off scared to death, to George Joshua. He then went back with him to the crime scene. The man was identified at Nathaniel Betts, who was fairly well-known around the area, but hadn’t been right in the head for quite a while. Here’s the bit I get confused with! He was illegitimate and brought up by a woman named George (he was better known as Nathan George) and when her husband died a few years later, she married the deceased. She married her adopted son? No wonder he hung himself, he must have been screwed up. The autopsy revealed a gash in his throat which he had done himself, prior to hanging, just to make ultra sure of not being saved. There were no marks on the ground, which would indicate a scuffle and possible murder.

150/ Abersoch Lead Mines, (Three Killed) February 1885

151/ Kidwelly, (Abandoned Child at Pub) December 1850

This is an extraordinary story from Kidwelly. The omnibus stopped at the Pelican Inn, from Swansea and a nicely-dressed woman holding a baby got off the bus. While they were changing the horses the woman went into the Castle Inn and sat by the fire, then asked the landlady, Mrs Thomas, to hold her for a minute while she got something from the bus. She did and after a few minutes everybody got on the bus and left the place, with no sign of the woman returning for her baby. When they asked about the woman, it appears she had got back on the Carmarthen carriage and headed off that way. Mrs Thomas looked after the baby for a time but then got a nurse to take care of it, as she had an inn to run. Nothing more was heard of the mother until Christmas Day, when a box arrived with baby linen and twenty sovereigns in it. If this wasn’t a surprise, then a woman turning up wanting the baby was another. She was a nurse-type of employee and the child was whisked off to who knows where. There was a rumour circling Kidwelly that the woman had an illegitimate child and entrusted Mrs Thomas when she had no other option.

152/ Churchstoke (Montgomery) (Farmer Burned to Death) May 1899

153/ Pumsaint, August 1876 (Victorian Killing Spree)

This is a Victorian equivalent of one of those American killing sprees that you see every now and again, in a shopping mall in Oklahoma for example. This one is the butler going around shooting those whom he thinks have done him wrong. The butler was named Tremble and his master was seventy-six-year-old Mr Johnes, a Carmarthen county court judge and he was first to be shot, then it was Mrs Cookman, Mr Johnes married daughter, then two dogs in the kennels and then onto the landlord of the “Dolaucothy Arms”, who fortunately was out at the time. Tremble went home and dropped a letter off for the vicar, saying how he wanted his estate handled, then threatening to shoot a couple of coppers who were trying to arrest him. Tremble held them off and went up to his room and there he sent a note to a vicar nearby asking if Mr Johnes was dead or not. He was still alive, only just, so they decided to tell him that he was dying and in a critical state, then there was the sound of a gunshot. The police burst in and found Tremble had shot himself in the chest and death came to him within half an hour. An act of heroism reported, later on, was when Mrs Cookman was about to be blown away by Tremble, the cook stood in front of her to protect her mistress, but he eventually shot Mrs Cookman and she too lay in a precarious condition.

The reason for this killing spree was that he had previously owned a pub in Cayo and wanted the “Dolaucothy Arms” which was owned by Mr Johnes, but was refused it. He handed his notice in about a month ago, as a result of the decision and saw it as a kick in the b***s for all the long service that he’d given him. Tremble left a widow and six children.

154/ Llanelli Fire, (Four Killed) March 1892

155/ Gresford Murder/Suicide, near Wrexham, May 1893

A groom by the name of Shellard turned up in Gresford after being in Liverpool for a while. When his mistress, Mrs Whittle, went up to bed he followed her. The other servant in the building, Prudence Taylor, heard a gun go off and found Shellard standing over the blood-soaked body of her mistress. He wafted the gun in her face and told her to go away, but while she was literally scared stiff and motionless, he chanted what was described as a prayer, then put the muzzle in his mouth and fired. She ran downstairs and later on she mustered up the courage to re-enter the room. In the room, to her amazement were the two corpses, both laid on the bed and the mistress had her throat slit. It is thought that he’d seen signs of life in his victim and did this to finish her off. This was premeditated by Shellard as a letter was found stating that he was going to kill Mrs Whittle, then himself. It turns out that she, Nellie Norris Whittle, was the wife of a Chorlton town councillor and she was sent there by her husband to stay away from Shellard, as her conduct was unbecoming. In modern-day terminology, they were shagging each other! She was twenty-eight and he was forty and had previously been her parent’s groom.

156/ Llanfallteg, (Three Killed on Railway) August 27th, 1885

157/ Llanfallteg (Fatal Railway Accident) September 1st, 1885

158/ Beaufort (Monmouth) (Weird Suicide!) April 1858

I don’t think Wales will ever have a stranger suicide than this for another 150 years or so. George Screech, in his late forties and from Somerset, had gone to Wales to get a job in the mines. He was lodging at a relatives house, Richard Greenland, who also worked in the mines. Screech had mentioned to Mr and Mrs Greenland that he would rather be dead than work in the mines but they just passed it off as idle chatter. Mr Greenland kept a couple of casks of explosive powder in his house for work purposes, but it seemed that Screech thought it too much of a temptation. While Mrs Greenland was out of the house he got a hot coal from the fireplace and put it next to the fuse and sure enough, the place exploded. Screech died several hours later of his injuries and told medics that the Devil had tempted him. The Greenland’s little baby survived the explosion. Screech was buried at night with no funeral rites on unconsecrated ground, as was the norm for suicides.

159/ St Brides Bay/Stack Rock (Pembrokeshire) March 1899

160/ Llansawel Suicide, December 1862 (It is still there!)

Llansawel was abuzz with the rumour that Thomas Thomas aged forty-four, a watchmaker, had killed himself by hanging himself in a stable that is next to the Angel Inn. The landlord of the Angel Inn said at the inquest that Thomas had been round and had a pint and a natter, then left him in the kitchen. He never saw him again until he went into the stables at 6-30 p.m., when he spotted a hat, then looked around to see if anyone was in there and found him hanging from a cord which was fastened to the manger, then thrown over a beam and then around his neck. He had been dead for several hours and had recently been very despondent in his mood. He seemed to deteriorate more each day.

161/ Aberystwyth College Deaths, July 1885

162/ Port Dinorwic, (Suicide Leaves Sad Letter) January 1917

A sad story of a 45-year-old lady who thinks herself a failure, then kills herself, with all explained in a suicide note she leaves behind.

Miss Annie Williams, a school teacher from Holyhead on Anglesey, was found decapitated next to the railway tracks at Port Dinorwic. She was staying at relatives in the area and had been under the care of her doctor, Lloyd Roberts for about five years, for nervous depression. The postmaster said he saw her come in at 6-10, then she took fifteen minutes to write this telegram- “Met a friend; shall not return tonight”. The man who found the body at nine p.m. saw a hat next to the rails and then saw the headless body of Miss Williams and went to fetch the police. The letter was addressed to her aunt and uncle (Evan Thomas, Menai Bridge) It read:

“My Dear Uncle and Aunt- By the time you read this letter, I shall have gone beyond recall. To ask forgiveness would be a farce. But since I realised some weeks ago there is no cure for my nerves, and that I would never be capable of good work, physical and mental. I have been very miserable. It has been my lifelong ambition to get good results in school, and for that reason, I have tried everywhere to get on well. But all my efforts have been failures and the knowledge of that has come as a shock that everything since then has gone wrong-or, at any rate, I have gone wrong with everything, and have lost my prestige in and out of school. Such being the case, it is out of the question for me to go back, and besides, I have worried so much about it, that I don’t think I could do anything there. You will find a few remarks about my affairs on a separate sheet. I have nothing to worry me except that I am a neurotic, and never can be anything else. I know what the strain of mental work has been in the past, and I never wish to go through it again. I also know how incapable I am of hard physical work, having tried it, and there is no room in the world for those who can’t work in the future, when times will be so hard. Before closing, I should like to express my thanks to those who have tried to help with their advice, which, owing to my delusions, I was unable to use at the time. I include in them the doctor (Lloyd Roberts) who did his best for me; also yourselves, whose tenderness at all times has been very great, and I know you will do your best again for my dear mother. I am afraid that mother and W.will be heartbroken, and it is a cruel fate that necessitates a daughter doing such a deed. I am doomed to it, wherever I shall be. With apologies from your dear niece- Annie”

Also on the body was a plain envelope with these words written on it -“Enclosed is what I had in my purse. Please don’t judge me hard. I really have had some hard times to get right. It is terrible fighting so hard.” (Poor lass- is she buried locally?)

163/ Bettws-y-Coed Tragedy, June 1891

164/ Westminster Hotel Suicide,  Rhyl, September 1892

The Westminster Hotel is still there in Rhyl on East Parade and was the scene of a juicy tale in 1892. The Reverend Joseph Weedom of Morton Vicarage in Bingley committed suicide by shooting himself in the head whilst at the Westminster Hotel in Rhyl.

A couple of weeks previously the Reverend and a young lady booked into the hotel as “Rev.Mr and Mrs Weedom” and they enjoyed the time in the Welsh seaside town enjoying each other’s company, but when it was time to check out of the hotel the Reverend didn’t have the £18 needed to settle up. He was told to wait for the proprietor and he went into a waiting room. That was when the young woman rushed through saying that her husband had cut his throat. Two things were wrong in her statement, the first was he had shot himself, the second was that she wasn’t Mrs Weedom. It turned out that she was Beatrice Broadbent the twenty-six-year-old cook of Reverend Weedom. While she had been working at the vicarage, the two had become very close and he had even told her that he would divorce his wife and marry her. The Reverend was off on holiday and told Miss Broadbent to meet him at the train station in Leeds, so they could have a “dirty fortnight” together. While in Rhyl the Reverend got a message from his mother in Chester, telling him to come and see her. He did and came clean about the cook and his wife. The mother told Weedom that wife already knew all about them both and was going to divorce her husband on the grounds of infidelity. He came back to Rhyl depressed and went out and got drunk one night. Then when they were about to check out, he never had any money at all, plus no wife now and everything was crumbling around him. He took out his revolver, while Miss Broadbent waited for him in room No 42, and blew his brains out.

165/ Graig Pit Explosion, near Aberdare, February 1892

166/ Chepstow Shooting,  September 1870.

On Tuesday evening an accident occurred at a shooting party. Charles Jones, a keeper to Mr Kerr, of Itton Court, Chepstow, was shot by a gentleman named Richards. As Captain Cowburn and his friend Mr Richards, with other gentlemen, were sitting down to luncheon, one of the party cried out, “There is a rabbit running”. On jumping up to fire the gun went off, and the charge lodged in the keeper’s leg. He died of his injuries yesterday morning.

167/ Aberdovey Drowning,  July 1870.

The Pall Mall Gazette reports a distressing accident from Aberdovey, a well-known watering place on the west coast of Wales. A party of five young ladies were bathing, and two of them-Miss Lavelle and Miss Ellen Edwards- who remained in the water some time after the others came out, got out of their depth. Loud cries for assistance were raised, and a police constable who was on the beach plunged into the sea and succeeded in rescuing Miss Edwards. The other young lady was drowned.

 

168/Llansamlet Colliery Explosion,  July 1870

 

169/  Pengam Pit Fatality,  August 1870

170/ Between Briton Ferry and Swansea  (Three Sisters Drowned)   August 1870.  Two bodies were recovered near Port Tennant, by receding tide.

1/Austin, Texas, 1884-1885  (Servant Girl Annihilator)

This is one of my favourite unsolved cases of all time. Similar to the “Jack The Ripper” murders in London but they occurred three years before he even started. The Servant Girl Annihilator is a bit misleading name, as some of his victims weren’t even servants, but they were all killed with an axe in Austin, Texas. He killed eight in total, five black women and two white also included was the murder of one black man. The modus operandi was one of creeping into their rooms while they slept, attacking them and then hauled them outside and raped, then mutilated them. The victims were:

Mollie Smith aged 25, murdered on 30 December 1884

Eliza Shelley aged 30, killed on May 7th,1885

Irene Cross aged 33 years old, was attacked by a man with a knife, not an axe as was the norm, murdered 22nd May 1885.

Mary Ramey aged 11, killed on 30 August 1885, with her mother, Rebecca, who was badly wounded.

Gracie Vance killed on 28th September 1885

Orange Washington was the only male victim, but this was thought to be an accident, as his girlfriend Gracie Vance was also killed on the same night, the 28th September 1885.

41-year-old Susan Hancock was murdered on 24th December 1885.

Eula Phillips killed on the 24th December 1885.

2/ Bridgeport, Connecticut, 1890  (The Suicide Club)

Wendell Baum was the secretary of the infamous “Suicide Club” of Bridgeport in Connecticut. In 1886, five men of German descent met in a bar.  As they were in low-spirits, some unemployed, they jokingly agreed to form a “Suicide Club”, where one member of the club would kill himself every year. They decided that lots would be drawn and when they got around the table for the first time and a bloke named Schwartzenheim was the first to go. Then after another killed himself within the allotted year. Then the next slit his own throat and then Wendell Baum shot himself. The weird part of the story is that nobody backed out or tried legging it when their lot was drawn. As time went on the “Suicide Club” branched out to New York, Hawaii, Vienna and San Francisco. They even had a young girls suicide club as well. Totally bizarre, but interesting all the same.

3/ Aiken Lynchings, South Carolina, April 1877

4/ Nevada Desert (Thirty Bodies) February 1904

A group of railway surveyors in Nevada accidentally came upon the corpses of around thirty men, all in different stages of decomposition. They were discovered near a place called Dead Man’s Well and it is thought that they became delirious through lack of water. (What the hell happened here?)

5/ Chicago, Illinois, December 1894 (Body in Container)

A shipping container was opened in Chicago and the mutilated corpse of a man dropped out. It looked as though he had been hacked to death with a meat cleaver or butcher’s knife. The case had a French stamp on it. The man was around forty-years-old, balding, with a fair moustache and dressed smartly. The plot thickens! (Who was he?)

6/ Livingston Sextuple Murder, Montana, August 1890

A man residing near Livingston in Montana, in a case of homicidal mania, went and killed his missus and five kids. They tried to capture the clearly insane individual, but he resisted all efforts and during the struggle, he was killed. (Names?)

7/Bruceport, Washington, (Abandoned Child) March 1885

8/ Virginia, August 1889 (Double Suicide)

Anita and Miriam Boggs were not blessed with sexy names. That has nothing to do with why these two young lasses killed themselves, but it wasn’t far off the mark. They didn’t want to become wizened old maids and they couldn’t find a boyfriend at that time, so they wrote a letter saying they would kill themselves.

9/ Lake Shore near St Paul, Minnesota November 1889 (Who was it?)

A shocking discovery was made at Lake Shore near St Paul, Minnesota. A mangled corpse was found in the soil and this was encased in a barrel, on which was inscribed “A.Traitor”. Police are investigating the matter but as yet there are no leads.

10/ Saratoga, California, (Suicide over Kitten) November 1848

An elderly lady named Lois P.Smith, hanged herself at Saratoga, California. Was she ill? Was she penniless? No, it was the fact that her kitten had died. The letter she left, it read:
“Oh dear! Bury my poor little kitten with me, as it is to as an angel from above. O, grant me my wishes. Bury me in my backyard until the time expires that I have paid for the house. Lay my little angel by my right side on my right arm. Don’t deny my wishes.”

It is believed that the death of her feline companion brought on temporary insanity, then the suicide.

11/Alabama/Georgia Cyclone, November 1885

A destructive cyclone passed over the counties of Dallas and Perry in Georgia and Alabama. Thirteen persons were killed and dozens more injured. A great deal of property was destroyed.

12/Gainestown Lynching, Alabama, December 1885

13/White Haven, Pennsylvania, July 1893 (Buried Alive)

Mrs Charles Bozer was married nine months ago to a prominent merchant of the town, but died suddenly a week ago. The husband then got word from a close friend that she prone to fainting fits and couldn’t get the idea out her mind, that she was buried alive. (Catalepsy? Narcolepsy?) He passed it off in the beginning, but as he thought about more and more, he too convinced himself that she was still alive, but underground. He ordered the coffin to be exhumed and amazingly there she was face down, with bruising and lacerations on her skin and pieces of hair in her hands. Apparently, it was true and she was buried alive. In despair, the husband tried to kill himself, but was stopped just in time.

14/Denison Murders, Texas, May 1892

A serial killer was loose in Denison, Texas, with reports that a fifth attempted victim, was hit by a bullet and received only minor wounds. Soldiers are patrolling the entire area, 24/7  and there is a curfew in place, that anybody seen on the streets at night is immediately arrested. There is a large reward for anybody with any information. (Who the hell was it?)

15/Keasbey, New Jersey, January 1904 (Dynamite under Dance-Hall)

Dozens of men and women were severely injured, some so badly that it is feared that lives will be lost, when an explosion occurred at a dance-hall at Keasbey, New Jersey. It is not believed to be accidental but a deliberate act by a maniac. The estimated four hundred crowd was engaged in a party, who incidentally, was an enemy of the proprietor of the place. (Two birds with one stone-insurance money and get rid of your worst nightmare!) In the basement of the building was a gas tank and it is believed that a large amount of dynamite was put there on purpose. (Was it the proprietor or an accident?)

16/Saguache, Colorado, October 1885 (Murders and Lynching)

17/Nashville Slave Girl Suicide, Kentucky, June 1849

The wording of this story just about sums up the era in question. A negro girl, BELONGING (?) to Mr Louis C.Lisby hanged herself last week. Her mother had escaped and the young negress was threatened with severe punishment if she didn’t tell her owner where she had gone. The pressure proved too much. The article goes on to say that if she had been a white slave, her conduct would have been considered heroic. As she was just a “n****r” in Republican America, it was just put down to the stupidity of the African race. Unbelievable! I’m sure there are thousands of stories just like this one.

18/Coney Island Sword Murder, New York,  July 1899

New York’s favourite place of entertainment was the scene of a horrific murder when an Asian man became violent towards a young lady attendant. He lost control and armed with a sword (Where did he hide that?), he rushed towards her and began hacking away at her body. There were an estimated two hundred on-lookers and before they could react, the girl was cut to shreds and very dead. Police managed to get the truncheons out and batter him into submission. As to the reason why he did this grisly act, nobody is quite sure. (Names of the victim/perpetrator?)

19/Cole City Lynching, Tennessee, October 1895

An awful lynching has taken place at Cole City, Tennessee when an unruly mob took a negro lad from the gaol. The negro was supposed to have assaulted a white girl. The father of the girl, who was part of the mob, mutilated the lad by cutting off his ears. When he confessed to raping her they smashed his fingers with a hammer, so that hardly any bones were left unbroken, then to finish him off they shot him in various parts of his body. They buried him straight after torturing him.

20/Exeter near Reading, Pennsylvania, (Train Crash) May 1899

21/Asheville Haunted Prison, North Carolina, April 1908

The county gaol at Asheville was due to be abandoned, due to the fact that it may be haunted. The prison population of two hundred, handed in a petition to the authorities explaining the noises that they hear along with paranormal experiences they have encountered. The trap door from which a negro was recently hanged from, would open with a loud crash. Then at midnight the spirit would manifest itself and go along the cell grating, grinning at inmates, but never uttering a word. (Is it still there?)

22/ Seymour, Indiana, November 1893 (Quadruple Murder/Suicide)

Clinton Jordan and his wife had split up the previous week and now he had hunted her down again. It was an acrimonious separation and he found her at her mother’s house in Seymour. He entered the place, shot his wife, the mother-in-law, the father-in-law and his sister-in-law, then popped the muzzle in his mouth and blew his brains out. There were no survivors.

23/ North Dakota Train Crash, October 1885

24/ Mount Vernon Mystery, New York, October 1889 (Starved to Death in Church)

The Church of the Sacred Heart in Mount Vernon, was haunted by a ghostly figure. Father Coles heard moaning coming from the cellar, then ordered a search as a result. The body of an Irish looking girl was discovered, dressed in plain clothes and having some small change next to her. She was wearing a scapular, which meant she was true Catholic. It appeared that she had starved herself to death. She was seen about the place for two months previous to her death but no-one said anything to her, nor did they give her any food. None of the church officials thought of looking on the premises for her. A quick chat with the locals, who also said that she never bought anything in town, nor did she speak. The whole affair is a complete mystery.

25/ Barbourville Lynching, Kentucky, March 1894 (Lynch Mob Skin Man Alive)

Another in the long list of 19th Century lynchings in the U.S.A. This lad was a negro named Tye who was accused of assaulting an eight-year-old girl. He was stripped naked, then skinned alive in front of the lynch mob who were baying for blood. Then they tied him to a stake and burned him. Authorities are outraged by the occurrence and Federal Government is keeping an eye on matters. It thought that severe action will be forthcoming.

26/ Silver Cliff Explosion, Colorado, November 1885

A fire occurred at Bull Domingo Mines at Silver Cliff in Colorado, owing to an explosion of gunpowder. The shaft was burnt and ten miners were killed.

27/ Cherokee Gulch Avalanche, Colorado, February 1899 (Twenty-eight Dead)

28/ No 231, West 22nd Street, New York, May 1910 (Servants Murdered)

The house of a well-known physician, Dr Cannon of 231, West 22nd Street, was the scene of a double murder. The butler and the house-keeper disturbed burglars while they were ransacking the joint and in a bid not to be identified, they murdered the unlucky pair. They shot them first and then clubbed them to death. The robbers escaped with $200 worth of loot. The doctor was out at the time and it was police who found the bodies, but police have a very good idea who committed the murders.

(Who killed them both?) 231, West 22nd Street is between 7th and 8th Avenues and is still there!

29/ St Louis, Missouri, December 1889 (Suicide on a Saw)

Edward Kerittner aged nineteen, who worked in a box factory, decided to kill himself. Well, you would normally jump off a building, shoot yourself or go for poisoning? Nope! Edward thought it would be painless and swift self-destruction if he put his head under the upright saw in the factory. He did this and it cut the scalp and skull on the right hand side of his head, with the blade penetrating the brain. The shock, which must have been intense, threw him on his back away from the blade. Miraculously, he got up and put the other side of his skull on it, injuring himself in the same way. He again rose from the saw and put his wrist under the saw, which hacked through it with consummate ease. Eventually, he dropped to the ground having accomplished his goal.

30/ Wardner, Idaho, (Rioting, murder) May 1899

31/ Chicago, Illinois, March 1890 (Robbers Wild Rampage)

32/ Oakland Murders, near Manchester, Connecticut, August 1865

The murders were committed on the 31st of July at Oakland, Connecticut, on a woman named Starkweather and her fourteen-year-old daughter, Ella. The mother had been savagely attacked with an axe, with injuries that included a deep gash in the face, sinking into her brain, the nose was divided in two and with severe marks on the temple and the rear of the skull. Then the murderer had got a butcher’s knife and stabbed her in the chin and throat, along with knife wounds in each of her breasts. Ella had her right eye missing, with gashes over her eyes and cheeks. The axe wound in the skull was so deep that brain matter had seeped out. She too was stabbed in the breasts with the butcher’s knife. The son Albert Starkweather, found the corpses then rushed to Mr Whites’s next door, but he breathlessly exclaimed “Get up! I don’t know but I think our folks are all killed and the house is on fire!”

Indeed the bed was on fire and Mr White threw the mattress out of the window. Albert stayed downstairs crying and Mr White found Ella still clinging to life, although badly mutilated. As he lifted Ella up, an axe fell onto the ground, so he cleverly used it to prop up the window to let out the smoke. Ella only lasted a few more minutes and it was the son who was taken into custody.

33/ Alta Avalanche, Utah, February 1885

 

34/ Archie Murder, Missouri, April 1891

A man by the name of Soper, left Archie but never came back. Police became suspicious and forced entry into his residence. To their horror, they discovered the dead bodies of Mrs Soper and their two kids, with all of them having been dreadfully axed to death. The murder weapon was left nearby and was covered in blood and hair. He left a note behind explaining to the police why he had committed this grisly deed. It appears that rather than leave his wife and kids, he’d butchered them instead and he also didn’t want them to be destitute, as he couldn’t earn a living. Well, that makes sense! NOT!

35/ Middletown Quadruple Murder, New York State, October 1905

Three people were killed with one in a precarious condition, at a lonely farmhouse near Middletown, New York State. When his wife passed away, Willis Olney aged sixty-two, hired Mrs Ingerick to be house-keeper to him and his brother. She was happy to get the job and came with her two daughters, Lulu aged thirteen and nine-year-old Alice. It was Lulu who returned home one evening and found the place deserted. Further searching came up with the bodies of her sister in the cellar, with her head pounded to a pulp and her mother in a barn unconscious. The two Olney brothers were discovered half a mile away in a woods with their watches missing and pockets inside out. It is feared that Mrs Ingerick will not recover. (Who did this quadruple murder?)

36/ Oak City, Texas, January 1888 (Family of Murderers Lynched)

anything he had to say would be heard. The old man commenced talking in an almost inaudible voice and made a brief statement. Preparations were at once made to hang him. In a few minutes, his body was swinging in the air. He was then let down and asked to confess to the crime. This he did. He and all the members of his family were equally guilty. He said they had killed and robbed nine men and two women. He told where the money was hidden that had been taken and gave up what he had on his person, but professed not to know where the murdered persons came from. He was again swung up. The accident to his wife ended fatally and made her execution unnecessary.

37/ Wilson Murders, North Carolina, July 1907

A resident of Wilson in North Carolina named Rexford, found out that his wife and his brother were seeing each other behind his back. He found the couple kissing and cuddling each other, so he burst in and pulled out his revolver and shot them both in the blink of an eye.He was arrested for the murders, but the “unwritten law” will probably be enough to get an acquittal.

38/ McDowell County Triple Murder, West Virginia, August 1889

The Hollis brothers were suspected of the murders and a posse went after them. They were hunted down and discovered near Pikeville, Kentucky. They were hung upside down from a tree and shot by the vigilance committee. (Was it them that committed the murders?)

39/ Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, (Eight Drowned) February 1899

A group of male and female students were rowing on a pond, when the occupants changed boats, the boats capsized and all of them were precipitated into the water. The death toll was six girls and two boys drowned.

40/ Linden, Ohio, Level-Crossing Horror) February 1895

A group of settlers whilst on their way to church at Linden, were struck by a freight train on a level crossing. The vehicle was smashed to atoms and two of the passengers were killed outright. Two young ladies were injured but later died of those injuries. The driver came out of the accident virtually unscathed. (What level crossing?)

41/ Greensburgh, Pennsylvania, December 1910 (Explosion at a Dance)

A Christmas dance was in full swing at the house of a local miner, when all of a sudden a massive explosion ripped through the building. Three guests were killed on the spot and eight others were taken from the rubble, in a dangerous condition. The whole thing was caused by someone dropping a cigarette among some blasting powder under the staircase.

42/ Nashville, Tennessee, (Murderer Burnt Alive) October 1882

43/ Carlisle Murder Spree, near St Paul, Minnesota, January 1891

An atrocious crime was committed in Carlisle, Minnesota, by a local shoemaker named Carl Reher. He lived in Carlisle with his wife, son and three daughters, when a few weeks ago things changed. He and his wife had a quarrel and Carl left the home and went to the next village and opened a shop there. He came back one night with some sweets for the kids and a bottle of whisky. He handed the sweets out and poured a couple of measures of whisky, then whipped out a pair of revolvers and started indiscriminately shooting his own kith and kin. He was drunk at the time and most of his shots missed the mark, but he brought a knife along just in case he missed. He stabbed his son, then his wife whom he cut to shreds. One daughter was injured, but died later. Reher then hanged himself and shot himself just as the noose tightened around his neck. The other two daughters managed to run free from the scene of the horror and informed the police.

44/ Murfreesborough Lynching, Arkansas, September 1885

45/ Murfreesboro’ Lynching, Tennessee, September 1875

The alleged murderer of Mrs Jarratt, a certain Jesse Woodson, was dragged from the gaol at night by a lynch mob of around a hundred men. They took him to Salem turnpike and hanged him from the “hanging tree” where two others met the same fate a number of years ago. The mob consisted of the most prominent men in Rutherford County and they believed that the courts were taking far too long in passing the death sentence on him, so they decided to speed up the process. Woodson confessed to the murder of Mrs Jarratt and when he was tied up, they fired seventeen bullet wounds in his corpse. They then hung his dead body from the tree where Joe Woods, a black man who raped a woman and Copeland, a horse thief, met the same fate.

46/ On 14th Street, New York, January 1910 (Bank Robbery Tunnel Collapsed)

A carpenter went missing in the area of 14th Street in New York and had now been gone for a couple of days. Searching the area police came upon a secret tunnel in his backyard and this had been constructed for the sole purpose of gaining access to the 14th Street Bank, which held £300,000 in cash. Just a bit short of his goal lay the body of the carpenter, under tons of rubble and earth. He had planned to carve his way into the bank, via his house nearby, but the structure had collapsed and buried him under it, suffocating him to death.

47/ Near Atlanta, Georgia, December 1885 (Railway Horror)

48/ Fire Island, New York, (Fireman Suicide) November 1893

Michael Fit was an eighty-seven-year-old fireman who worked at the fish factory on Fire Island. When staff walked into work one day they saw Michael swinging from a noose. He killed himself because he could not speak English and could not chat to anyone. Back in England (where they speak English!) he had sixteen children to his name. (Eighty-seven-year-old fireman?/ Sixteen kids?)

49/ Columbus, Ohio ? (Prison Suicide) 1894

Charles Murray was a black man in prison for burglary and serving a twelve-year sentence. He tried to kill himself by thrusting a poker down his throat and bashing his head against a brick wall at the same time. He thought that he didn’t have long left on this earth and he had also admitted to killing a farmer and his wife at Xenia in Ohio back in 1887.

50/ Pittsburgh Music Hall, Pennsylvania, April 1907 (Music-Hall Suicide)

Whilst Miss Ethel Levey was singing “Unrequited Love” on stage at the Pittsburgh Music-Hall, Robert Crow stood up in one of the boxes and shot himself in the temple with a handgun. Apparently, Crow suffered from hallucinations (Schizophrenia?) and despite being only twenty-two-years-old, he thought he was a failure, as he hadn’t got as much money as Mr Carnegie. He lies in hospital in a dangerous condition and there is little hope of him pulling through.

51/ Forks of the Kennebec, Maine, (Mass Fight) October 1885

52/ Chicago, Illinois, July 1895 (H.H. Holmes)

Police are now digging in a cellar at a house in Chicago, which was rented by a man named Holmes, who is now in custody on a charge of murder. They found two vaults, both six feet by three feet, filled with quicklime. Human hair was discovered and this is thought to be the last resting place of Minnie Williams and her sister. Police were also handed the skeleton of a female, by a person who deals in them. He was given it by Holmes to be buried or cremated, but as Holmes didn’t pay him for the work, he kept it. Holmes is said to be connected with the disappearance of thirteen people.

53/ Long Island, New York, August 1910 (Level-Crossing Tragedy)

A horrific accident at a level-crossing at Springfield on Long Island, resulted in multiple fatalities. The motor-car in which were two ladies and two children, with the chauffeur who was driving, collided with a train. The two children and the chauffeur were killed on impact and the two women lie in a precarious state in hospital, with their chances of survival virtually nil. The chap who was supposed to be in charge of the level-crossing was arrested, pending inquiries.

54/ Jacksonville, Florida, February 1885 (Train-Wreckers)

55/ Wytheville Lynching, Virginia, February 1885

Twenty-five disguised men broke down the door of the gaol at Bland County after twelve o’clock and took out Ivy Jackson (a coloured man) and carried him 150 yards, tied him hand and foot to a fence, then riddled him with bullets, shooting him 15-20 times in the face and body. He had murdered a tramp for the sake of the clothes he was wearing.

56/ Shaw’s Island, West Kentucky, (Sheriffs Burn House of Suspect) February 1885

57/ “Haunted Oak” Murder, Bronx, New York, September 1905

A gorgeous young woman was found strangled in an area that most New Yorkers consider to be haunted and is known locally as “Haunted Hollow”. Close by is an oak tree that was supposedly the place where several British spies were hung from during the Revolutionary War. Police believe that she was murdered in New York and transported here by a motor-car, to this lonely spot. Any clue to her identity was carefully removed, even the initials on her linen. Jewellery had been removed and she was covered in bruises, but death was from suffocation caused by strangling her. She had been dragged through the thicket from the road, where tyre marks of a vehicle were left. The body was later identified as that of a Miss Pfeiffer, the daughter of a New York businessman of German birth. An arrest warrant was issued for Joseph Girard, a driver, charging him with Miss Augusta (Gussie) Pfeiffer’s murder at the “Haunted Oak” on Pelham Road near the Bronx. Also arrested in connection with this dreadful act is a Mrs McMahon, who lives nearby on Pelham Road and was thought to be involved with Girard. The bloody clothing that Girard wore when he killed Gussie was found at her residence.

September 25th,1905

Police have cornered the accused murderer, Joseph Girard, in woods on Spitzenberg Mountain near New York. They have closed off all possible escape routes and campfires are lit at night to help police find the killer. He is also believed to be involved in two other murders. (What happened in the end?)

58/ Gates County Hangings, North Carolina, December 1885

59/ Bloomington Matricide/Suicide, Indiana, April 1891

Ward Demaree aged twenty-five, used to be a hard-working, quiet sort of bloke, who lived with widowed Mum and his little sister. What got into him to one day, when he cut her to bits with a carving knife, is a mystery. He then slit his throat, which was such a deep cut that it nearly decapitated him. All this occurred while his sister looked on in horror and disbelief, but she had managed to flee the scene despite being in shock. The child is far too young to be a credible witness and can barely speak. The neighbours found the bloodbath when they hadn’t seen either Ward or his mother for a while.

60/ Fall River Explosion, Massachusetts, June 1895 (Twenty-nine Feared Dead)

61/ New York, July 1895 (Victorian Transvestite)

This would have produced a certain amount of outrage in Victorian times. The American steamer “New York” arrived at her home port, a passenger named Nystrom who had travelled as a man, was discovered to be a woman instead. When it was time for the vaccination jabs she refused to let the doctor do it and this aroused a bit of suspicion. When she allowed medical staff to inject her, they found that her arm, for a bloke, was unusually soft and sleek. Then she spilled the beans and said she boarded at Southampton as a man, to escape from her violent husband. The story spread among the passengers and they all chipped in to help her, raising over £20. A handsome sum in those days!

62/ Leesburg Lynching, Georgia, February 1899

A message received at midnight from Leesburg, Georgia, stated that a mob there had taken out of gaol and lynched six negroes. Three of them were concerned in the murder of a white woman.

63/ Wallingford Church Fatality, Connecticut, December 1885

64/ Yankton Insane Asylum Deaths, South Dakota, February 1899

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Also added later on was the fact that the asylum was only a small one, no more than the size of a cottage, but it took less than an hour to burn down to the ground.

65/ Dover, Delaware, January 1873 (Weird Insurance Murder)

Professor West of Dover in Delaware, had been doing some experiments with a type of gas that he thought would be a cure for consumption. It was during this tinkering about in his laboratory, that an explosion occurred and what was believed to be the remains of West, lying on the ground. His skin was burned off and his hands, feet and head were missing. Weird, eh! The wife identified the body as that of her husband, due to the shreds of a lab coat he was wearing. The post-mortem examination, however, revealed, that the corpse wasn’t Professor West at all. No sh*t Sherlock! The hands and feet were sliced off with a scalpel and the skin had been peeled off. Delving deeper into the Professor’s life, they found he’d just taken out life insurance, to the tune of $25,000 and that a negro lad that had been hired some days ago, had simply vanished. This being the U.S. in the 1870’s, the local population thought that the black lad had killed West, not the other way around. Police captured West and he admitted to skinning and dismembering the body of the coloured lad, then blowing it up, probably for the money.

66/ Kirksville/Lancaster Cyclone, Missouri, April 29th, 1899

67/ Kirksville/Lancaster Tornado, Missouri May 1st,1899

68/ New York, February 1895 (Suicide in a Confessional)

Two women were in a church in New York when they heard a dull thud coming from one of the confessional’s. The assistant sexton was asked to examine what it was and he opened the door, only to find the body of a woman with her wrists and throat slashed. Next to her was a cut-throat razor, the suicide weapon. The lady was alive for approximately twenty minutes after being found but then expired. On her person was an envelope and written on it was the following:

“I am Catherine Morrison of 179, East 108th Street”. When police asked at that address, she was described as a religious enthusiast and extremely well off. Miss Morrison had resided there for the past six years. (What church was this?)

69/ New York Execution, March 1899

Mrs Place was executed at New York by electricity at a quarter past eleven yesterday morning, for the murder of her step-daughter in Brooklyn about a year ago. She made no scene, but went calmly to the electrocution chair, leaning on Warder Sage’s arm.

70/ Brooklyn, New York, March 1899 (Pyromaniac Teenager)

A boy named Irving Taylor aged fifteen years, who has been arrested at Brooklyn, has confessed to starting at least a dozen fires there. The police expect to trace responsibility for at least forty mysterious fires to Taylor, including one at a flat in which the prisoner’s own family live.

71/ Rock Springs, Wyoming, September 4th,1899 (Attacks on Chinese)

72/ Rock Springs, Wyoming, September 14th, 1899 (Attacks on Chinese)

73/ San Antonio Lynching, Texas, March 1894 (Overkill!)

A horrendous lynching took place in San Antonio, Texas, of a negro woman who was the supposed murderer of a white child, in the city. A lynch mob grabbed her and as the baying mob howled and hooted about revenge, she simply and with dignity, told of her innocence. It fell on deaf ears and she was dragged to an open lot, leading to a steep incline, nearly a quarter of a mile. The accused woman was then made to look as they drove large nails into an empty barrel, so they pointed up inside it. Then she was tossed into the barrel and the ends were shut tight and she was then rolled down the hill. At the bottom the barrel was opened and barely clinging to life, the bloodied remnants expired shortly after. Just to make sure and as a deterrent to any other blacks, they hanged her up to a tree and fired dozens of rounds at her lifeless corpse. Apparently, there was some doubt as to whether she had indeed committed the crime at all. (Name?)

74/ Poughkeepsie Suicide, September 1874

A bizarre suicide near the Hudson River happened near here. The deceased, James Cramsey, was on a rock about eighty feet high, drunk as a skunk. He then got tired, so he put his head down for an hour and fell asleep. When he woke up he said to the chap who was with him,”I’ll give you a lesson boys and show you how to leap”, then he walked to the edge and trying to ascertain the best place in the water to land, then took a run up as though he was going to precipitate himself off. Two others stopped him and then again he tried it and again was pulled back. Cramsey was p****d off and began scuffling with them, shouting out “If you don’t let go, I’ll take you with me”. After five minutes he calmed down and rested for a while. All of a sudden he sprang up and hollered “Now I’m off” and jumped the eighty feet into the Hudson.

75/ Atwater Cyclone, Minnesota, July 1882

Intelligence received at Atwater in Minnesota, reports that a violent cyclone has passed over that town doing great damage to property. Twenty carriages were blown off the rails and eleven persons were killed. Many were injured. A cyclone has also ripped through the town of Emettsburg in Iowa, causing huge destruction and loss of property.

76/ Chicago Murder? March 1885

77/ Hotel Windsor Fire, New York, March 24th, 1899

Forty-eight persons who are believed to have been in the Hotel Windsor at the time of the fire, are still missing. Mrs G.E. Williams and her daughter of London, who were guests in the hotel, sailed for England on Saturday. They lost all their personal effects.

March 27th, 1899

Four more bodies and a number of bones have been discovered in the debris of the Hotel Windsor. The number of missing is now reduced to fifty-three. During last night, a quantity of valuable jewellery was found in the ruins and taken to the police station.

April 3rd, 1899

Several more bodies have been recovered from among the ruins of the Hotel Windsor, bringing the total number of victims to forty-three. Of these thirty-two have not yet been identified.

78/ Chestnut Street Fire, Philadelphia, February 1885

The great fire in Chestnut Street in the city of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, has finally been put under control. The estimated damage to the property is approximately a quarter of a million dollars.

79/ St Paul Train Crash, Minnesota, October 1885

A serious railway collision has occurred near St Paul in Minnesota, by which five persons were killed and many injured. The victims are principally members of a circus company.

80/ Okolona, Mississippi, May 1899 (Four Killings)

A terrible affair is reported from Okolona, Mississippi. Two leading members of the community named Charles and Walter Clarke, brothers, quarrelled with their next-door neighbour Dr Marfee, about a bill for medical attendance which he had sent in. The dispute was renewed in the street and then Dr Marfee’s son joined his father. After violent words, pistols and knives were drawn and all four gentlemen were killed.

81/ Connecticut’s Big Baby, April 1885

82/ Tyler Lynching, Texas, October 1895

A lynching outrage has occurred in the little town of Tyler in Texas. Not unsurprisingly, it involves the murder of a white woman, Mrs Bell, who was shown to have savagely raped and then mutilated after the crime. The sheriff hunted the suspect down, a Henry Hilliard, with a pack of dogs and some locals. On getting into Tyler a mob greeted them and they took the prisoner away. What happened next defies human logic, as they dragged him to the murder scene, then lit a fire and roasted the guy for about an hour. A large crowd was there to witness the torture. Hilliard was burned in the public square and there were around seven thousand people watching this. He wasn’t put on a spit and roasted, but stuck on a huge bonfire which the husband of the victim lit. Hilliard managed to scrawl a note to his wife, it read: “I have been arrested by Wig Smith. You know what they will do to me. If you don’t see me any more, goodbye.”

83/ Johnstown Opera House, Pennsylvania, (Twelve Dead) December 1889

A disaster struck at the Opera House in Johnstown in Pennsylvania, culminating in the deaths of twelve people and injuring scores of others. A false alarm went up during a performance of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” and the audience of six hundred rushed for the exits. Some of the people were just coming into the building and the mass panic of those already in there was amplified. They trampled over the others and were squashed to death in the melee. Apparently, the theatre was always regarded as a bit of a death-trap and was condemned in 1877, but reopened recently to replace the one destroyed by flooding last year.

84/ Springfield, Minnesota, March 1892 (Five Kids Burn to Death)

85/ Cando Massacre, North Dakota, July 1893

Miss Anna Krieder crawled into Cando in North Dakota half demented and with her clothes torn from her body. She gave the alarm to get to the farmhouse of her father, David Krieder. A posse was assembled and they discovered a scene of total carnage. Krieder, his wife and their three daughters aged thirteen, eleven and nine years, along with their nine-year-old son, who all lay dead. Miss Krieder explained that a nephew of her father, a young man named Baumberger who worked on the farm, went on a mad rampage slaying anybody who got in his way. He calmly let three other brothers go and told Miss Krieder to make him some breakfast, which he consumed, then attacked her, hence the ripped clothing. He tied her up and then got on a horse and rode northwards. Virtually the entire town and district is on the hunt for Baumberger. (Was he captured?)

86/ Waycross Lynching, Georgia, July 1908

Two negro men, Albert Baker and Walter Wilkins, were charged with assaulting a white woman. They were on their way to gaol, whereupon a mob of white men who were seeking vengeance, grappled hold of them, tied them up and then rode off with them. The sheriff had shackled them together for transportation purposes, but the mob tore them off and hanged Baker to a telegraph pole, with the chain, then hung Wilkin’s to Baker’s feet. The local population turned out to witness their form of retribution and children witnessed the grisly spectacle, while women fainted at the hideous sight. Then to top it all, they fired round after round of bullets into the already dead corpses. A third man was implicated in the crime who was captured at Hickox and the same was done to him.

87/ Owatonna, Minnesota, (Five Kids Burn to Death) May 1885

88/ Eureka, Nevada, (Great Fire) August 1880

A fire alarm was sounded at Eureka in Nevada, when a plume of smoke was seen coming from a fruit and veg store on Main Street. The flames took hold of the premises next door and they enveloped another pair of buildings, and so on and so on. The flames were fanned by a healthy breeze and the fire spread to Gold Street, crossing Buel, then carrying on to Paul Street and Spring Street. Approximately three hundred houses and businesses are now reduced to ashes and the centre of town, around fifty acres of land, was swept away. A handful of buildings are left standing, the “Leader” offices, Oddfellows Hall, Theatre, International Hotel and the Methodist church. The Jackson Hotel is standing but is just a charred shell. Hundreds of citizens fled the area carrying possessions and other valuables. The losses are estimated at three-quarters of a million dollars.

89/ Nashville Slave Suicide, Tennessee, May 1857

An Asian named Levi and a black man named Allen, ran away from Nashville and were heading to the Chattanooga train, but were just too late. They worked as servants for Mr Jones who was the proprietor of the Union Hall in Nashville. The escapee’s walked down the train tracks and got to Antioch, where Levi bought two tickets, one for himself, the other for his slave. This little ruse worked and Levi managed to get away with posing as a white guy, but was detected by Charles Fox, a merchant on his way to New York. They were both apprehended. Levi managed to draw a gun from his person and instead of firing on the crowd, he shoved the muzzle in his stomach and fired. The passengers screamed in horror as they thought he was shooting at them, but when Fox spun around, he saw Levi finishing the job and slitting his throat with a bowie-knife.

90/ Grant, Kentucky, (Two Murders) March 1885

91/ New York Fire, May 4th, 1885

A fire broke out in a tenement house in this city last night and resulted in the death of nine persons through suffocation, or from injuries sustained in the panic which ensued on the fire alarm being raised. A number of other persons were also hurt.

May 6th, 1885.   New York Fire

92/ Fort Smith, Arkansas, (Slays Family Then Commits Suicide) December 1890

A terrible tragedy occurred at Fort Smith, Arkansas, when William Joplin arrived there in order to marry a local farmer’s daughter named Miss Miller. The father wasn’t too keen on the union and grabbed his daughter and whisked her off home. Something clicked in Joplin and he went ballistic, swiping a shotgun and heading for the farmhouse. It was a long way, so he asked a farmer named Dell if he could borrow a horse, but he was refused. Joplin blew his head off, then pinched his horse and rode off towards Old Jenny Lind, where the Miller’s lived. On arriving he entered the chemist’s shop and promptly shot him, then went to find his bride-to-be. Weirdly, he met her first and shot her, killing her where she lay. The old man was next, he quickly fired off a couple of shots, taking him out.The total tally was five dead and one fatally wounded.

93/ Maine Shipwreck, February 1885

94/ No.643, Sixth Avenue, New York, (Family Massacre) August 1898

A family massacre, then the suicide of the perpetrator occurred at No.643, Sixth Avenue in New York City. Henry Hawley was a policeman and he had been out on a pub crawl, which in turn had sent his mind a bit mushy. He wasn’t thinking clearly when he got home and shot his mother, his wife and the two children. (The daughter who was five and his son, barely three years of age). A couple of policemen on the beat heard the volley of shots, knocked at his door and asked him what was going on. The pale looking murderer simply cackled at them and yelled “I’m only cleaning my pistol”, then slammed the door in their face. Within five seconds another gunshot was heard. As they broke down the door, they were greeted with the sight of Hawley laid on the floor with the top of his head missing and the brains decorating his walls. The mother may survive.

95/ Tennessee Tunnel Collapse, June 1885

The new river tunnel on the Cincinnati Southern Railroad in Tennessee, about a hundred miles from Chattanooga, fell in on Thursday night owing to the vibrations caused by a train which was passing through. The tunnel fell upon the cars, six persons being killed outright and twenty severely injured.

96/ Memphis, Tennessee Murder Trial, August 1892 (Lesbianism)

Alice Mitchell slit her lover’s throat on January 25th,1892. She brought lesbianism into the public domain. Died on March 31st,1898, aged twenty-five, in Tennessee State Insane Asylum at Bolivar, Tennessee.

97/ Flatbush Suicide (Brooklyn) March 1881

Philip Truschel had a very novel method of committing suicide and that was to roast himself alive, in a furnace. He was a German national, only eighteen and he had only been in the U.S. for a year or so. He was working as a labourer, when his uncle Louis Schmutz, found him a job at his greenhouses in Clarkson Street. Truschel was more of a book-worm than a manual labourer, but he was true to his job and never asked to leave. Also a bit of a loner, his English skills were at a minimum due to him not mingling or talking to anybody else. A fellow work colleague, Alfred Demensy, stayed with Truschel in a greenhouse and went to sleep in a chair for an hour. He woke to find Truschel gone, so he went to see if the furnace was burning well. When he peered in, he observed the lower part of his body and the legs jutting out of a narrow opening, with the top section of the head, shoulders, arms, etc. in the fire. A note was left by the teenager, saying:                            “Flatbush, March 1st,1881 – Goodbye all. If anyone is tired of life, he need only do as I am about to do- Philip Truschel.” The uncle said he often mentioned about shooting himself, but he thought he was messing about.

98/ North 9th Street, St Louis, Missouri, March 1885 (Murder/Suicide)

99/ Illinois Suicides (Elgin/Joliet) September 1884

Kitty Roddy, a young girl of fifteen, killed herself at the residence of W.H.Warden in Joliet, by taking a large dose of arsenic. She was brought here from the Home of the Friendless in Chicago, about three years ago, with her mother still residing in the city.

Elgin, Illinois,

A young lass barely in her twenties named Mrs Frank E.Dietsch, whose husband was the proprietor of the South Elgin Tannery, was found by her husband with her head blown away by shotgun fire. The infant child she had recently given birth to was next to her. She had been married a year and was previously known as Ida Miles from Westchester County in New York. The reason for her suicide, was one of homesickness and depression.

100/ Philadelphia Asylum Fire, February 1885

101/ No.224, East 75th Street, New York, March 1910 (Serial Killer?)

The charred and cut up remains of the sixteen-year-old Ruth Wheeler, who had been missing since last week, was found on a fire-escape next to the room occupied by the man arrested for her abduction, Albert Wolter. Miss Wheeler had just graduated from a business college, to which Wolter applied by postcard for a stenographer. The postcard was given to Miss Wheeler, who was last seen when she started to apply for the place. She had never been out after six o’clock and her family, her mother and two sisters, became worried when she had vanished for an entire evening. Her sisters who are stenographers and who work in local businesses, traced her to Wolter’s room and caused him to be arrested. Fifteen girls have vanished since Wolter started advertising for girls.(Was he a mass murderer?)

102/ Janesville, Wisconsin, (Marrys Witness) March 1885

103/ Seeley’s Crossing Fatal Crash, June 1905

Richard Sayer, a rich resident of New York, was with his wife and two sons in his chauffeur-driven car on his way to his brother-in-law’s, in order to spend the night there. While crossing the Erie Railway, a goods train rattling along at full speed and smashed into the vehicle. Mr and Mrs Sayer were killed on the spot and one of his sons died in hospital, with the other in a life-threatening condition. It is not likely he will make it through. The negro chauffeur was thrown clear on impact, suffering only minor injuries. He tells of how Mr Sayer knew the train was coming but told the chauffeur to speed up and try to make it across, resulting in the two impacting at that same millisecond.

104/ Audubon Co. Lynching, Iowa,  February 1885

 

105/ Boston, Massachusetts, (Human Remains) November 1872

Two barrels were discovered floating along the Charles River at the beginning of November, when opened they were found to contain human body parts, identified as that of Ebijah Ellis of 19, Dover Street in Boston. There was no doubt that he had been murdered, with robbery the prime objective. He was a pedlar who had several teams working for him, making him some serious cash, but now he was into real estate and a money lender. It was widely known that he carried a great wad of cash around with him, so anybody could have smashed him over the head and pinched his money. He was a non-drinker, extremely kind and a bit odd in his ways. A sort of Ebeneezer Scrooge after his visitations. He was last seen in Washington Street, South End. (Were his murderers ever caught?)

106/ Virginia Train Crash, November 1906

107/ San Antonio, Texas, (The Well Murders) August 1877

A horrendous discovery was made near San Antonio in Texas. About fifteen miles from the city lies an old well. This has been causing a rancid odour to emanate from it, which caused the surrounding properties and neighbours to complain about the smell to local authorities. The well, to everybody’s horror, was found to be filled with the rotting corpses of men, women and children. Various methods have been used to kill these persons, including slitting of the throats, stabbing in the chest and also of gunshots wounds to the head. A house nearby was searched and found to contain $15,000 in cash, jewellery etc. The only person living there was an old woman, who said her boys had saved it up. (Who were the boys?)

108/ Lawrence Murder, Massachusetts, September 1885

109/ West Grove Child Murder (Pennsylvania) June 1907

Mary Newlin’s body was found with bruises and various torture marks, as her body was dug up in West Grove in Pennsylvania. Apparently, a lovely looking child, blonde hair, brown eyes and fair skinned, would really point to some kind of paedophile abducting her. Mary was the illegitimate child of her mother and the young husband, who was just a farmer, loved her with a passion saying he didn’t care about her past and would she marry him now. The police were suspicious right from the beginning and searched the farm, house, ditches, barns and haystacks. They eventually found her little body in a shallow grave, a hundred yards from the back door. Explain that!  The girl had a rope tied around her neck and a bag over her head and was discovered face downwards, in the foetal position. The step-father was arrested and imprisoned, where a brutal mob is outside waiting to lynch the fellow. Post-mortem results show that she was punched numerous times in the face. To top it all the girl was still breathing when the rogue buried her, with death occurring from suffocation. (Hope this t*at was hanged?)

110/ East 67th Street Fire, New York, April 1899

111/ Lester, Minnesota, (Buried Alive) August 1894

William Ludwig from Lester near Northfield, Minnesota, was struck down with typhoid two years ago and was pronounced dead by medical men, two weeks later. Within thirty-two hours, the man was being buried in the local graveyard near to his house. A few weeks ago the church organization decided to revamp the Cemetery and this entailed several corpses having to be dug up in order for the improvements to be made. One of them would be Mr Ludwig. When he was dug up, the glass over the face on the coffin, accidentally smashed, revealing that Ludwig was still alive when interred. The interior was covered in blood stains and he had clumps of hair torn from his head. In his bid to escape he had scraped at the lid and drawn his legs up, to try and force the lid open.

112/ Thirteen Club, New York, April 1885

 

113/ St Louis Theatre Tragedy, October 1886 (Murder/Suicide)

The place where this murder and suicide occurred was Esher’s Variety Theatre in St Charles Street, St Louis. Initially, screams could be heard coming from a dressing-room, then there was silence. A watchman on duty went to find the cause and discovered the body of Josie Martel lying on the floor, with blood oozing from her chest. The murderer Frank Sandemeyer, stood over her with the murder weapon in his hand. He quickly realised that he’d prefer to die, rather than suffer the death penalty, he plunged the knife into his stomach and chest several times, then dropped down dead. Martel had been horribly mutilated with knife wounds in her breast, arms and sides, with her left arm broken by the force of the blow. Sandemeyer was a waiter at the theatre and although she was called Josie Martel, she was in fact, Mrs Sandemeyer. He had been drinking heavily all day and jealousy had kicked in, culminating in the frenzied attack.

114/ Johnson City Murders, Texas,  September 1885

115/ New York Tragedy, June 1874

A young man named Austin, from a respectable family in Leeds in England, fell in love with a young lady and requested her hand in marriage, but was refused permission by her parents. The solution was simple, let’s elope to America. They arrived in New York a couple of years ago and soon became destitute as they spent all of their money, as he was unable to get a job. Austin decided that highway robbery was the answer to his problems, but he was caught and was put in the slammer for five years. The wife visited him regularly and on one occasion brought him a fruitcake, which she handed over to him. The officer stuck his hand in to check it out and found a saw blade, knife blade and keys to the handcuffs; she was arrested and put inside for six months. On serving her term, she again visited her husband and told him that she would be faithful and wait for him to come out of prison. It turned out she was seeing another bloke while he was inside and he found out about this, then slit his throat with a knife. Mrs Austin was beside herself and in November 1873, some female remains were found next to the Pennsylvania railroad. A card on the body bore the name “Maria Elizabeth Austin”.  Just after she was buried, a letter was received from her parents asking the full details of what happened to their lost daughter.

116/ Lititz Tragedy, Pennsylvania, May 1885

117/ Bar Harbor, Maine, (The Caged Baby) August 1910

An eight-month-old child of Mr Edward McLean, which is heir to $20 million fortune, gets fresh air at Bar Harbor, Maine, in a steel cage on wheels. The cage had an eiderdown lining and complicated locks. The strange device is thought to be a sort of deterrent, as a few weeks ago there was thought to be an attempt to kidnap the infant, then hold it for ramsom. The child was sleeping in Mrs McLean’s room when they tried to snatch the infant, with a burglar alarm ringing out, which scared the would-be kidnapper. The man was spotted by Mr McLean on the balcony and he fired three shots at the criminal but failed to hit the target. (Emily Beale McLean and John McLean-their only son, Ned, (Edward Beale) spent twelve summers at Bar Harbor. Ned would take over the Washington Post from 1916-1933. Married Evelyn Walsh McLean in 1908, bought Briarcliffe on Shore Path in 1910, Ned bought the Hope Diamond for Evelyn in 1911.

118/ Kirksville Tornado, Missouri, April 1899

119/ “Suicide Hall”, New York, March 1899

A Bowery dancing saloon in New York has been given the monicker,”Suicide Hall”, where erring girls have been holding sessions of a “Suicide Club”. Four girls in six days, have committed suicide, with the proprietor, a man named McGurk, a Tammany politician. It must be noted that police refuse to arrest him.

October 1899

In the centre of New York, with the arrival of bad weather and influenza, crime has shot through the roof. Four murders in the Italian Quarter and two girls killed themselves in McGurk’s Bowery dancing saloon, nicknamed “Suicide Hall”.

December 1901

“Suicide Hall” owned by John H.McGurk  in the Bowery district of New York, has lost so much money since the election that it was sold to a gentleman who planned to turn it into a family resort, based on German ideas.

120/ McKenzie Murder, Tennessee, December 1885

 

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

 

1/ Croydon Road, Newcastle, January 1903 (Double Murder/Suicide)

William.A.Lauderdale was a 35-year-old book-keeper, who lived with his wife and son, who was twelve, at Croydon Road in Newcastle. Something clicked one day, sort of Amityville style, when Lauderdale went to his son’s room and shot him in the head, next was his wife who he also shot in the head. Then he turned the weapon on himself. When found the parents were both already dead, but the boy clung on to life for another hour or two. The reason for this strange act was probably due to the fact that they were a sickly bunch and illness had been rife in the household. Lauderdale had had consumption a while back.

2/ River Tyne, September 1851 (Seven Girls Drowned)

A steam-boat from Newcastle to Marsden Rock was on a pleasure cruise and stopped at Howden to take on some passengers. Another boat put off with eighteen people on board, but the tide and waves managed to tip the boat over and seven young girls aged between twelve and twenty-one were lost forever. Again, as is common in Victorian boat disasters, the boat was over-crowded, this too caused it to over-balance in the other boat wakes.

3/ South Shields Tragic Accident,  March 1888

4/ Newcastle-upon-Tyne, November 1909 (Butcher’s Shop Suicide)

A middle-aged woman walked into a butcher’s in Shields Road in the district of Byker, grabbed one of the knives and plunged it into her throat. She collapsed on to the floor and the butcher pulled the knife out, but she had done what she set out to do and died there and then. Unknown identity?

5/ Newcastle-upon-Tyne Suicides, January 1894

Two servants, totally unknown to each other, one named Hall, the other Thomas, committed suicide by taking carbolic acid. They were both nineteen years of age and had had a bust-up with their boyfriends which was the reason for the double deaths. Young girls were very likely to do this type of thing when their boyfriends split up with them or a simple argument.

6/ Hetton-le-Hole Murder, December 1872

7/ Sunderland Harbour, January 1885

The schooner Lady Ann Duff from Nairn drove ashore early on Saturday morning behind the south entrance to Sunderland harbour while a heavy sea was running. The master and mate of the vessel were drowned.

8/ Ship Hotel Murder/Manslaughter, Sunderland, April 1919 (What Happened?)

The manager of the Ship Hotel in Sunderland, Richard Miles Bell aged forty-nine, was charged with causing the death of 45-year-old Matilda Alban, a rivetter’s wife who was discovered dead, outside the hotel on a Friday morning. Bell was found in a room covered in blood spatters and with broken glass everywhere. He was drunk and covered in cuts around the face. A hatpin that belonged to Alban was found in the manager’s room and a cap that belonged to him was next to the corpse.

9/ Newcastle-upon-Tyne (This has nothing to do with murder or suicide or accidents, but just thought it gives you a good idea of police pay in Victorian times.) March 1872

10/ Gateshead Murder, March 1902

A murder in Gateshead was committed on a Friday night and the perpetrator, Thomas W.Wrightson,  aged twenty-seven and a time-keeper living at Fuller Place, Carrs Hill, went to a policeman and asked to be arrested. P.C. Joseph Graham was on the beat around Wellington Street when Wrightson came up to him and stated that he’d murdered his wife. Police went to Fuller Place and found Mrs Wrightson on the floor with her head bashed in with a hammer and her throat was cut too. Mrs Wrightson leaves five children with no mother and as to why he murdered his missus, there was no excuse from him.

11/ River Tyne Drownings, December 1900

12/ Pandon, Newcastle, April 1876 (Child remains)

Two women from Pandon were suspicious of a woman, Margaret Breeme, who lodged near them. The women, Scott and Sloane, saw that the keyholes had been bunged up with rags so they broke down the door and in their worst nightmares they couldn’t have anticipated what they discovered. The room itself was crawling with germs and vermin and the bodies of two children were on a bed, decomposed beyond recognition. Scott told police that Breeme had told her that the kids had gone to live at Shields with their step-father but that was obviously a lie. The children were an eight-year-old boy and a five-year-old girl and had lay dead for about three or four months.

13/ Newcastle-on-Tyne School Death, February 1908

It was the dinner break at school and no one should have been around, but a lad spotted some smoke coming from a classroom. He ran up there and found a burned corpse on the floor, thought to be female. Help arrived and it was discovered that the clothing had been burned off her and she had horrendous injuries. All the heavy items in the room (Lamps, etc) had been knocked over, so she clearly put up a fight for her life. (Who was she?/ What school was this?)

14/ Hetton-le-Hole Murder?, October 20th, 1885

Hetton-le-Hole, October 21st, 1885

Thomas Smith, who attempted to murder his wife and her mother and sister at Hetton-le-Hole on Monday morning, has been arrested, and, after being charged before a magistrate, has been remanded to await the issue of the injuries inflicted on his victims who are still in a critical condition.

15/ West Hartlepool, (Human Remains) April 1874

Human remains were found in a brick field, the property of Mr J.Richardson, Stranton, West Hartlepool. The men were excavating some clay about three or four feet from the surface, when they came across three human skulls, plus various other bones. More digging has revealed around twenty more skeletons. Theories suggest they could be the remains of sailors wrecked when the sea flooded there or it could be an overflow of burials from a church which lies adjacent. (What church?)

16/ Newcastle Lightning Strike, May 1885

Shortly before noon on Friday, a severe thunderstorm broke over Newcastle-on-Tyne. The lightning struck a girl named Gray, while she was standing at her father’s doorstep at 55, Prudoe Street, and it was found that she was deprived of her sight.

17/ Prince Albert Inn Murder, South Shields, January 1899

Thomas Potter, the landlord of the Prince Albert Inn, South Shields, died last night from the effects of wounds which, it is alleged, were inflicted by a Chilean seaman named Antonio Marin. The latter on New Year’s night was ejected from the inn but rushed back into the house, and it is alleged,  that he stabbed the landlord. Potter was a pensioned policeman. Marin is in custody.

18/ Sunderland Christmas Fair, December 28th, 1885

Sunderland Christmas Fair, December 29th, 1885

At Sunderland yesterday, a girl named Isabella Nutman was remanded on bail on the charge of wounding a boy named Daniel O’Connor at the Christmas Fair. It is alleged the girl, who was in charge of a shooting gallery on Saturday night, pushed a number of boys away with a loaded rifle which accidentally went off, with the charge entering the boy’s side. O’Connor is in a precarious condition at the Infirmary.

19/ Whitley Bay Mystery, April 1908

A forty-six-year-old retired school-mistress, Wilhelmina Dewar, was found dead in very mysterious circumstances. The post-mortem found that the skin on both her legs was completely burnt and there was a bad burn on the neck and on her breast. Both arms were burned, but the hands and feet had no injuries. It also revealed that she was suffering from alcoholism, as the stomach was tested. The bed showed no signs of scorch-marks, which leads them to think that she was taken by somebody, upstairs. Died from shock, resulting from the burns accidentally received whilst drunk.

20/ River Tyne Drowning, September 1885

A case of drowning occurred off the Tyne yesterday. The smack, Queen of Beauty of Buckhaven, was proceeding to the fishing ground, when one of the crew, William Robinson aged nineteen and the brother of the captain, was knocked over by a sail and lost.

21/ Jarrow Train Crash, December 1915

This was at St Bede’s Junction near Jarrow and the death toll was nineteen dead and eighty-one people injured.

22/ Tynemouth Bodies, November 1897

The bodies of a man and a woman were found in the sea at Tynemouth. A man’s overcoat was discovered on the pier and there was £5 in the pocket and a return railway ticket from Tynemouth to Alston. Why would you get a return ticket if you intended to kill yourself? The name “John Walton, Howburn, Alton, was written on a paper. The woman was identified as Jane Elizabeth Pearly from North Shields. She had been missing since last night. (Suicide Pact?)

23/ Stockton-on-Tees, September 1871 (£900 stashed away)

A woman by the name of Miss Mary Ann Pickering, alias Sudron, lived in squalor most of her life and was regularly seen begging and was removed as a pauper lunatic to Sedgefield Asylum. What wasn’t known at the time, was when her house was entered by bailiffs of the time, they found 800 sovereigns and 200 half-sovereigns in a drawer in the kitchen. When she was a young woman she was getting married to a sea captain, but the engagement was broken off and since then she had been in a demented state.

24/ Heddon Hall Suicide, near Newcastle, November 1903

25/ Newcastle, March 1899 (Attempted Murder)

Edith Morell, a barmaid, was charged yesterday at the Newcastle-on-Tyne Police Court with the attempted murder of James Rule on the previous night by shooting him with a revolver. A policeman saw her shoot the man, who is in the hospital in a critical condition. The prisoner was remanded.

26/ Gateshead, May 1851 (Burned in Molten Metal)

The accident at the iron foundry of Messrs Hawks and Co. has resulted in two fatalities. A ladle containing two tons of molten metal was about a yard away from the edge of a fifteen-foot-deep pit. A man was working in the pit, and (you can guess this next bit!) the earth gave way and the molten metal and a labourer fell into the pit. The man who fell in with the metal was taken out dead and the chap working in the pit died of his injuries the next day. (Names?)

27/ South Shields Pier Fatality, October 1885

28/ Sunderland Murder, August 1919

An awful murder has taken place at Sunderland by a step-father named, John George Turnbull, a shipyard worker, in full view of his other step-children. The eldest, a thirteen-year-old girl, described how he turned “little Tommy” round and round as he cut his head off. “He did not lay the head down gently when it was off, he dashed it against the fender”. When she was taken out of court, she went into a mad hysteria and screamed “He will come back; he will come back. Don’t let him get me”. After what she had witnessed it wasn’t surprising!

29/ Sunderland, April 1899 (Mutilated in Engine)

At the ropeworks of Messrs Haggie, Sunderland, Kenneth the youngest son of Mr D.H.Haggie, J.P., was yesterday found under an engine, terribly mutilated, having been entangled in the machinery. Death must have been almost instantaneous. He was a promising young man and well known in the North and at Oxford, where he was being educated.

30/ Newcastle, near the High-Level Bridge, December 1885 (Two Drowned)

31/ North Shields Murder, August 1900

A Russian seaman, Raminoff, handed himself into the police station as a result of police wanting to question him about the death of 19-year-old Mary Maguire. Raminoff was seeing her on a regular basis and police went to the house where they lived together and found Mary laid on a bed, with a handkerchief round her neck. She had been dead a few hours and cause of death was strangulation. Raminoff was remanded on a charge of murder.

32/ North Shields?  1883

Thomas Leathed, the man who murdered a fellow-prisoner in a police cell at North Shields by stabbing him in thirty places, was, at Newcastle Assizes, declared to be insane, and ordered to be confined during Her Majesty’s pleasure.

33/ Newcastle-on-Tyne ? 1883

34/ South Shields Triple Murder/Suicide, August 1906

 

35/ Bill Quay Murder, near Gateshead, November 1902

36/ Newcastle Double Suicide, October 1854

Two young sisters named Robinson, committed suicide by throwing themselves into the River Tyne about two miles from Newcastle. The older sister had been thrown out of the house by her father while he was drunk and the younger one went out to look for her. They were found locked in each other’s arms when they were fished out of the Tyne.

37/ Shields Harbour Fatal Explosion, June 25th, 1885

Shields Harbour, August 7th, 1885

The inquest on the three men killed by a boiler explosion on board the steam tug Guide in Shields Harbour, has resulted in the verdict that the explosion was caused by the fixing down of the valves, with the cognizance of the owner, J.Lawson; and the Jury expressed an opinion that the Board of Trade survey was very indifferently performed.

38/ Boldon Colliery near Sunderland, March 1896 (Haunted Church)

The population of Boldon Colliery are of the belief that the church at Hedworth is haunted. A ghost-like figure appears at regular intervals at the church windows. The apparition is plainly visible to everyone in church, and there is much chatter going around the neighbourhood as to the cause of it. It has been constant for over a month now, and some say it bears an uncanny resemblance to the former vicar. (What was it?)

39/ Sunderland Suicides, April 1889

40/ Stockton-on-Tees Asylum Murder, January 1903

A tragedy has occurred at Sedgefield Asylum, Stockton-on-Tees, on Tuesday afternoon. A group of inmates was digging in the gardens when a patient named George Hazell did something wrong in the eyes of one of the attendants named John Dixon. After a telling off from Dixon, Hazell wielded his spade in the air and struck Dixon on the back of the head. He killed him instantly, with the head spewing its contents on the ground.

41/ Newcastle-on-Tyne Shooting, July 1889

 

42/ Newcastle Murder, March 1898

Alexander Thompson aged thirty-six, a labourer, was remanded at Newcastle on Monday charged with the wilful murder of Annie Irving. Witnesses spoke to hearing noises in the house on Saturday and hearing prisoner leave it an hour and a half before the body was discovered. It occurred at 10, Cannon Street, Newcastle, and Irving was a lodger with Thompson and his wife for some time. Irving had apparently been attacked with a coal rake which was nearby, and she also had burned her arms which suggested she had fallen into the fire.

43/ Sunderland Death Sentences, November 1903

44/ Dalton-on-Tees, October 1844

At the village of Dalton near Croft, an accident to a young domestic servant has occurred. She was climbing up a plum tree to get the fruit when a branch gave way and she fell directly on to a hay-fork, that was pointing upwards and leaning against the tree. One prong entered her armpit and came out under the collar-bone, another appeared in the back of her mouth. She was helped down and is progressing favourably.

45/ Sunderland Fatal Fight, June 1885

46/ Gateshead (Dunston-on-Tyne) June 1902 (Murder/Suicide)

Thomas Pierce aged fifteen and Jane Thompson aged sixteen were both servants at a farmhouse at Dunston. Pierce attacked the girl with a hammer and she passed out as a consequence. In a fit of remorse, he went to an outbuilding and hung himself with a piece of cord. Mr and Mrs Hopper who owned the farmhouse, left the two servants and another girl while they went to chapel. She was doing the washing-up and he was reading a Bible when they went out, so what happened is a mystery.

47/ Jarrow Murder/Suicide, July 1889

48/ Bishopwearmouth Cemetery Suicide, Sunderland February 1870

On the 30th of January 1870, a London photographer, George Bigot, went to his wife’s grave to pay his respects. He wrote his name on the tombstone, then dropped down dead. His wife died a couple of weeks ago in London and she had interred in Sunderland. Mentally he had been in low spirits and he told someone that his nervousness would end in his suicide. It is believed he poisoned himself with the chemicals he had readily available as a photographer. Two letters were on his person, one to the cemetery superintendent, the other to his wife’s brother, Mr Phillips. He was about fifty years of age and leaves a daughter in London. (Is Bigot grave in Cemetery?)

49/ North Shields, June 1899 (Tragic Accident)

50/ Harrington Street Murder, Sunderland, July 1897

A house at Hartington Street, Sunderland, was the scene of a murder of a middle-aged woman named Elizabeth Hutchinson. She was laid dead on the floor, and the perpetrator, an engineer by the name Scott, was fast asleep beside her. She had been raped, then killed. On the way to the police-station, Scott tried to slit his throat but was prevented from succeeding.

51/ Newcastle Barracks Manslaughter, November 1896

52/ Monkwearmouth Suicide, Sunderland May 1867

A forty-two-year-old widow named Elizabeth Smith, living in Church Street, Monkwearmouth, made a concerted effort at suicide and planned it well. Her husband, Richard, had lost his job as a master mariner due to him squandering money and he then had to get work as a sailor. He decided to commit suicide and jumped off the vessel near the Isle of Wight. She became deeply despondent at this juncture and even told her teenage daughter to not be surprised if anything happened to her. A neighbour saw her hanging from the ceiling through a window and when they cut her down, she was already dead. Next to the body was a razor and a bottle of laudanum, just in case those two failed.

53/ South Shields Drowning, June 1899

54/ North Shields Railway Suicide, October 1889

The signalman at North Shields Railway Station, John Watson killed himself by hanging in the signal cabin. This was only discovered when the train from Newcastle to North Shields and Tynemouth was delayed due to the signals not being changed to let the train into the station. Maybe this was his plan so that his body would be found?

55/ Gateshead,  September 1906 (Boy Kills Playmate)

56/ South Shields Fire, July 1906 (Four Dead)

Alexander Mason and his three young children, Annie aged seven; Alexander aged five and Thomas Edward aged two, all died in a house fire. Another son, James just escaped from the flames. They lived in one room in Heron Street near the riverside. The alarm was raised just after 11 o’clock when Mrs Elliott ran out to see smoke coming from Mason’s room, she opened the door and was swamped in smoke. She tried to get the kiddies first, but her dress caught fire. Two men, Wildgoose and Ferguson, rescued the children and brought them out. The father died first, at the scene and the children died on Sunday morning. It was caused by the breaking of a paraffin lamp.

57/ Sunderland Fire, January 1890

58/ Trow Rocks near South Shields, August 1892 (Drowned)

On Thursday, while the salmon fishing boat, Jubilee of South Shields was fishing off Trow Rocks, the boat got into the surf and was capsized. Two of the men, Charles Wood and Henry Normandale succeeded in swimming ashore but the third, John Lowes, got foul of the nets and was drowned.

59/ Margaret Pit Disaster, June 1885

60/ South Shields Suicide, October 1862

Thomas Reed a chemist, took a small boat at the low part of town and gave the owner a shilling for lending it to him, then in the middle of a stream shouted “Goodbye”, then took it out to sea and then when it was deep enough he was spotted by some men to get undressed. He put the oars down, tied his handkerchief up the boat-hook to half-mast as if he was in mourning. He shouted at the steamboat men, who realised something was wrong and were rowing toward him at the time, but Reed jumped off the boat with a large stone tied to his neck and sank to the bottom. The crew of the steamboat found the boat covered with a chalk suicide note. It blamed his partner, Mr Taylor, for his actions.

61/ Hodgskie Street Murder, Sunderland.  January 1890

62/ South Shields Harbour, March 1885

63/ Ravensworth Colliery near Newcastle, March 1903 (Double Child Murder/Suicide)

Martha Peel, the wife of a miner, called on Mrs Adams, a married sister, taking four of her kids with her-Ruth, John, Norman and Martha. They had some tea, then afterwards Mrs Peel asked for a razor for one of her corns. Mrs Adams lent her husband’s razor, then placed it back in a drawer when she finished. Mrs Adams went to feed a pig and Ruth aged thirteen and John went with her. Mrs Peel walked across the kitchen with baby Norman in her arms and Martha was sat at the table. When Ruth Peel came back from the garden, she ran out screaming “Aunt Polly, my mother, my mother!”. There lying on the floor with his throat cut was little Norman and Martha had a terrible gash in her throat. The mother had slit her throat and held the razor in her hand, with the walls and furniture were covered in blood spatters. All three were dead.

64/ North Shields, (Foul Play) October 1880

65/ South Shields Murder, December 1885

66/ Sunderland Murders, May 1910 (Death on the doorstep- Five Dead)

A next-door neighbour heard a man groaning in Aylesbury Street, Sunderland and went to see if he was alright, but found William Jones aged thirty-three, lying on the doorstep with his throat cut. Inside the house was a scene of carnage; the bedroom contained the bodies of Mrs Jones and her four children, the baby and Polly, Susannah and James, aged from eight to two years of age. All their throats had been slashed. Mrs Jones, in her late twenties, had been cracked over the head with a hammer, before the slashing commenced. William Jones was taken to the hospital and kept muttering “What made me do it?”. He is not expected to recover. The reason for his mad outburst was that he had been out of work for three years and they lived in abject poverty, and how they survived this long is a mystery. (Did he die?)

67/ Corporation Fish Quay, North Shields, December 1904 (Fatal Struggle)

68/ South Shields Manslaughter, October 1896

At Tyne Dock, South Shields, a Jane Doe was discovered with a bullet wound in her left eye, lying in a bunk on the steamer Hildegaarde. She lingered for a while but died soon after and never said who she was or why she did it. She is thought to be from the unfortunate class (homeless?), and had boarded the ship and stayed in the cabin of the cook, Olfe Eide a Norwegian and the engineer’s steward named Archibald Harvey. They are under arrest.

Later on:-She was later identified as Jane Heywood aged eighteen. The cook, Eide, said he left Heywood and Harvey alone in the cabin and when he came back she had been shot in the head. Post-mortem evidence suggests that the position she was found in made it impossible to commit suicide, so both were convicted of manslaughter.

69/ North Shields Fire, August 1896 (Lady Burns to Death)

70/ Newcastle-on-Tyne Execution, March 1890

71/ Royal Artillery Barracks, Newcastle, August 1896

72/ North Shields, (Hanging Fetish Gone Wrong) June 1846

Seventeen-year-old William Bowman was living with his brother at North Shields when he committed suicide. His brother was out the house for a while and when he returned, all the doors were locked from the inside.They broke open a door and he was found hanging from the ceiling. The strange thing was, that he’d dressed himself in a convict’s attire and had become fascinated with it when he observed a hanging at Newgate. He had tied the legs together and a nightcap was pulled over his head. He was obviously re-enacting an execution, but it had gone horribly wrong and he accidentally hung himself. They were both from London and recently moved to North Shields, but he watched all the executions in London.

73/ South Shields, November 1903 (Lascar is a sailor/militiaman from Asia or Arabic)

74/ South Shields Double Suicide, February 1907

The death of two South Shields teachers, brother and sister, occurred under strange circumstances. Cunningham Henderson aged 24, went to bed on Saturday night and on Sunday morning, when police broke his door down, he was lying on the floor with a massive gash in his throat. His sister, Emily aged 25, went to visit some mates of her’s on Saturday morning and did not come back. The mother asked around but no sign of her. A group of holidaymakers found her body washed up on the beach and when the mother went to identify her daughter, she broke down and went into a wild mania. They were both found at nearly the same time. (Why did both commit suicide?)

75/ Newcastle Murder, January 1890

76/ Usworth Colliery Disaster, March 6th, 1885 (Death Toll -42 dead-Youngest was fourteen years old, the oldest was seventy-five years old)

 

77/ Usworth Murder, April 1899

At Gateshead yesterday a young miner named William Holland of Usworth, County Durham was committed for trial, charged with attempting to murder his wife, Jane, whom he had been married only three months. It is alleged that after stabbing the woman, Holland tried to cut his own throat, but his injuries were not as serious as his wife’s.

78/ Near Penshaw Station, (Childs Body Thrown Off) March 1894

A lamplighter named Burrell, who worked at Penshaw Station, found the body of a six-month-old child lying on the railway embankment early on Sunday morning. The infant had supposedly been thrown from a passing train.

79/ Walker, Newcastle  (Multiple Fatalities in Boiler Explosion)   September 1870

 

80/ Sunderland, (Confined for Nine Years)   September 1870

81/  Tyne Shipbuilding Deaths,  October 1870 (Four Killed)

82/  Brockley Whins Railway Collision,  December 1870.

83/ Murder on a Steamer?. River Tyne. March 1902

84/  Sunderland Murder, November 1903

Wednesday, December 9th, 1903

At Durham, yesterday morning James Duffy, aged forty0six, a labourer, was executed for the murder of a woman named Ellen Newman, at Sunderland, in September last. Death was instantaneous. The brothers Billington were the executioners. Duffy made no statement.

85/  Horrific Police Discovery, Newcastle.   December 1903.

The police on Thursday night broke into the house, at Newcastle-on-Tyne, of a plumber named Pattison. He lived alone and unattended in Marionople Street. His food was usually left for him at his house by neighbouring shop-keepers. On December 5th, some groceries were left. Since that day he had not been seen by anyone. The neighbours informed the police, who on entering the house found Pattison dead in an upper room. He had evidently been dead some time. The right arm was eaten away, apparently by a cat which had been shut up in the house.

86/  South Shields Murder, November 1903.

87/ Murder of his Son, Southwick.  November 23rd, 1903.

November 30th, 1903. (Reprieve)

The Home Secretary has reprieved Alfred Johnson, who was sentenced to death at the Durham Assizes for the murder of his son at Sunderland. The jury recommended Johnson to mercy, and Mr Justice Grantham expressed the approval of their actions.

88/ Fatal Fire in Sunderland,  February 1904

A fire which resulted in the death of a boy took place last night in Sunderland in a house in Crowtree Terrace. The fire broke out in the kitchen, then spread up the staircase, got a firm hold of an attic in which Ernest Reaveley, aged five, was sleeping in a cot. All the other occupants escaped, but it was impossible to rescue the boy. When the firemen gained an entrance through the roof they found his body shockingly burnt.

89/ Volunteer’s Mother Shot, South Shields.  May 1904.

A painful tragedy occurred in South Shields on Tuesday. Robert Usher, a young man belonging to the Durham Light Infantry Volunteer’s, was showing his father the working of a Lee-Metford rifle, and, in raising the weapon to his shoulder, pointed towards a door. There was a report and a bullet from the rifle sped through the door into the kitchen, killing Usher’s mother, who was working there, on the spot, the bullet passing completely through her body.

90/ Gateshead Murder/Suicide,  December 1904  (Hellifield St, off Coatsworth Road)

91/ Fatal Accident at Messrs John Lynn, Sunderland.  January 1904.

92/  Two Children Drowned at Gateshead,   March 1905.

93/  Teenager Electrocuted to Death, Backworth Junction.  February 1905

A shocking fatality occurred on Monday on the electrified portion of the North Eastern Railway near Backworth Junction. About eighty yards from a level crossing a young woman was found lying, having been in contact with a live rail and severely burnt on both wrists. She was conveyed to Monkseaton Station, where first aid was rendered, but on the arrival of a medical man, life was pronounced extinct. The deceased was Alice Maughan, aged eighteen, of Felling, near Gateshead. How she got on the railway has not been ascertained.

94/ Wife Murder at Whitley Bay,  August 1905.

95/ Murder of a Sister, Newcastle.  January 1906

Saturday, February 10th, 1906.

John Shiel, aged twenty-five, a labourer, was charged at Newcastle-on-Tyne on Monday with strangling his sister Martha, aged fifteen, in a field, in circumstances already reported. Deceased lived in a two-roomed house with six other persons, and until recently accused and a brother of eighteen, and deceased and a younger sister slept in separate beds in the same room. Owing to accused, when in drink, striking matches and disturbing the girls, their beds were recently removed to the kitchen. Sergeant Douglas said that when accused was taking the place to where his sister was lying, he said ” My father has married a second wife. She has not been good to my sister, who is soft, and would go on to the streets. I could see it coming, and wanted her out of the way before I went.”

96/   Newcastle Manslaughter, Pilgrim Street.   October 1880

1/ Whitechapel Murder, July 1887. (This murder occurred in Whitechapel the year before the Ripper. Did Lepski live or die?)

2/ Whitechapel Murder, August 31st, 1888

This is the low-key article on the first of the Ripper’s victims, Mary Ann Nichols, who was butchered at Bucks Row. Didn’t want to overdo the Ripper theme for Tower Hamlets, so here are a couple to muse over.

3/ Whitechapel Murder, August 1888 (Dry run for the Ripper?)

About five a.m, one morning, a body of a woman was found at 37, George-yard Buildings, Whitechapel, on the first-floor landing. Doctors arrived but it was far too late. The woman had been horribly mutilated. There were stab wounds to the chest, stomach and abdomen. She was about thirty-five years of age and not known in the area. No disturbance was heard. (This bears all the hallmarks of Jack the Ripper- the district, the modus operandi and the fact it was done with nobody seeing or hearing a thing. (It’s got to be, hasn’t it?) This was early August and Mary Ann Nichols, his first, was on August 31st.

4/ Whitechapel Murders, October 30th, 1889

This is more media hype I found, which is to do with the Whitechapel Murders. The letter was clearly a hoax. One thing I didn’t know about this, was that there was a Whitechapel Vigilance Committee.

5/ St Katherines Dock, (Lift Accident) March 1909

An awful accident took place at St Katherines Dock when a lift chain snapped and sent the occupants hurtling to the ground, a distance of forty feet. One died on the spot, another on his way to London Hospital and a third has died in Hospital. The group of labourers were on there way to dinner-break, when the machinery malfunctioned, the chain broke and sent the men to the bottom of the shaft. The names of the dead are- John Homer, John Harrington and Charles Hamton.

6/ Commercial Road, Limehouse, February 1899

7/ Britannia Music Hall Fire Fatality, High Street, Shadwell,  December 1858

Sad story about Emily Ann Harlow aged nine, who was on stage at the Britannia Music Hall, doing her ballet routine on Boxing Day. The stage is fairly small and during a pantomime scene, her little dress flicked the footlights and her dress caught fire. Before the flames could be put out, the little girl had received major burns. She was rushed off to London Hospital, but she died a couple of days later. (Is it still there?)

8/ Cubitt Town, Poplar, (Concealment of Birth) March 1890

A parcel was discovered in Cubitt Town, Poplar lying in the street. When opened, inside was a dead baby boy and a rather sad note, explaining the circumstances.

“Poplar- I had no means of saving my baby’s life. I fainted, and when I came round, my baby was dead. Its father turned me up, and I cannot let my mother or my mistress know, as I should then be done for-L.B.”

9/ North Britain Public House Suicide, Mile End, April 1888

The landlord of the North Britain public-house in Mile End was chatting to a customer by the name of Frederick Bunkworth. The place was chock-a-block when suddenly the 48-year-old put his handkerchief up to his face, then there was a loud bang and he dropped to the floor. Inside the hanky was a pistol and the contents of which was now lodged in his brain, causing instant death.

(North Britain pub was at 83, Bedford Street, which is now Cavell Street. It is in Stepney, near to London Hospital, Whitechapel)

10/ Queen Anne Street, Whitechapel,  March 1890 (Fatal Fight)

11/ The Bow Murder, November 1885

At the Central Criminal Court yesterday before Mr Justice A.L.Smith, Daniel Monahan aged twenty-eight, was indicted for the wilful murder of his wife Bridget. The jury, after a short deliberation, found the prisoner guilty. Mr Justice Smith having assumed the black cap, passed sentence of death upon the prisoner, who did not exhibit the least emotion and left the dock without saying a word.

12/ Poplar Fire Fatality, March 1885

During a fire which occurred on Saturday morning in a dwelling-house at Poplar, an old woman named Dipple, related to the occupant, was burned to death.

13/ St George in the East Skeleton, August 1886

While digging a trench for a gas pipe for the Commercial Gas Company, the workmen made an amazing discovery. Where Cable Street and Cannon Street Road cross and about six feet underground, they unearthed a male skeleton with a stake driven through it and with some pieces of an old chain lying next to him. It is thought to be the skeleton of a murderer who while imprisoned in Coldbath Fields Prison (Clerkenwell Gaol), had committed suicide by hanging himself in his cell and was buried as a suicide.

14/ Ocean Street, Stepney, August 1885

A fire was caused on Saturday night at 73, Ocean Street in Stepney by the occupier, Mr Merry, falling and upsetting a spirit lamp he was carrying. The flames catching his clothing burnt Mr Merry so severely that he died on Sunday morning.

15/ Cuba Street Husband Murder, Millwall, April 1885

16/ Brushfield Street, Spitalfields, July 1890 (Barbershop Suicide)

A stranger to the area walked into the barber’s shop on Brushfield Street in Spitalfields and inquired about the cost of a razor. He bought one, then he immediately slit his throat with it and expired within five minutes.

17/ White Hart Public House Murder, Shadwell, February 1879

James Sims, the glass-collector at the White Hart public house in Shadwell, appeared in court on a charge of murdering Annie Smith. He cut her throat with a razor in the bar of the above-mentioned premises. (Is it still there, or now a block of flats?)

18/ London Hospital Suicide, September 1850

This is how things have changed in British hospitals throughout the decades.Thomas Beckley aged thirty-nine was in for dyspepsia, or indigestion as we know it today, but his hypochondria had got the better of him as he thought it was life-threatening. While the other patients were eating and the nurses were busy with other things, he grabbed a knife and made a gash in his throat. He tried in desperation to tear the wound open with his bare hands but was stopped by a nurse. He passed away the next morning due to the severity of his injuries.

19/ Oxford Street Fire, Whitechapel, June 1885

20/ Tredegar Square Skeleton, Mile End Road, August 1880

There was a buzz in the neighbourhood of Mile End Road, by a rumour that a skeleton had been discovered in the centre of Tredegar Square. A gardener was digging in the patch of grass when he stumbled upon a human skull, which had been thrown there the night before. Police were called for and a couple of bobbies got digging in the general area and they found the skeleton about a foot under the surface. There is a hole in the skull, which looks as though it was caused by a blunt force. Tredegar Square is one of East London’s largest and most respectable squares.

21/ Hanbury Street Suicide, Spitalfields July 1895

22/ Whitechapel Church, (Child Bodies), August 1864

Near to Whitechapel Church, a horrible discovery was made early one morning. The area long had reputation for the burial scandals, whereupon the bodies of small children would simply be dumped somewhere, but the fee for burying would have been collected. This has stirred up a hornet’s nest again. Near to the Church were the corpses of eighteen children and they were simply covered over with refuse. Some were recently placed there, with some others that were decomposed and some without heads.

23/ Millwall Fatal Quarrel, August 1892

24/ Bow Lunatic Suicide, October 1862

40-year-old lunatic Benjamin Ward made an escape from Grovehall Asylum in Bow, was recaptured and then he committed suicide. He made his escape by squeezing himself through a vent in the window, then scrambled through the garden and over the wall. The alarm was raised, but he ran like a greyhound and was off the establishment premises. Unluckily while on Mile End Road he was spotted by Gilbert, the barber at the asylum and he managed to coax him back to the asylum. Once back inside the asylum, Ward was missed for a minute and thinking he had again made a run for it again, they searched the asylum and grounds. They found him hanging from his bedstead with a piece of rope he purchased while he was on the run. The deceased made a run for it, after having a vision that his wife had died. Amazingly in an asylum of 100-200 suicidal inmates, this is only the second instance of someone killing themselves, as they have a “cheerful unrestraining system”, which seems to be working wonders in this establishment.

25/ Gill Street, Limehouse, March 1890 (Fatal Fire)

26/ Bethnal Green, January 1917 (Suicide to help win War)

William Platt Ball aged seventy-two, killed himself by taking poison at Bethnal Green. He left a suicide note and thought he was helping the war effort. It read :

“I am taking poison to end my life, as my ailments are becoming unbearable, and as being by far the simplest of problems before me. I also wish to leave what little property I possess to my blind niece. If I were to live this would disappear. By my act I shall be economising by saving the whole expenses of living. I shall therefore in this be patriotic, although I confess it is not my deciding motive.”

27/ Poplar, (Fatal Accident Repeated) October 1833

A terrible accident at Mr Mellish’s premises at Millwall, Poplar, has resulted in the death of one man. John Skinner, a shipwright, was carefully moving around the warehouse in the dark when he fell through a scuttle-hole in the tank, which had forty tons of whale oil in it. He struggled for a bit and then sank to the bottom. Workmen dragged the body out but he was dead, from swallowing a gallon of the liquid which ultimately suffocated the poor chap. This is not the first such accident of this kind at these premises, as seven years ago a man died in the exact same way, in the exact same tank.

28/ Millwall Docks, August 1885 (Sweden to Hull Voyage- ends up in Millwall)

29/ Stepney Fair Death, June 1846

A young lad of about twelve years of age was having a great time at Stepney Fair by pretending to push around a “carousel ride”, and somehow he got caught in the workings of the ride, in particular, the chains which brace it together and this tore his leg clean off, from just below the knee. He was whisked off to the London Hospital, but his chances of survival are virtually nil.

30/ Society of Friends, Bakers Row, Whitechapel, March 1845 (Grave Fatality)

At the Society Of Friends burial ground in Bakers Row, Whitechapel, there was a dreadful fatality. The victim was the sexton, George Stevens who was aged about fifty. He had gone to the bottom of a freshly dug grave to check if it was level and when the maid called him into the house for dinner, there was no answer, so she went to the grave-side and found him lying there. The body showed no signs of life and a medic said he’d been dead quite a while.

31/ Poplar/Millwall Servant Suicide, March 1864

The inquest into this teenager’s suicide was held at the Black Horse Tavern in Poplar, so I presume she died somewhere nearby. This is about sixteen-year-old Mary Cooke whose mother lived in Millwall. Mary was a domestic servant but she had a short fuse and was liable to pack in jobs just like that. Her mother said that if she didn’t stick out this job then she shouldn’t come crying to her for help. Mary left the job because her Jewish employer had charged her two months wages for a cape. Instead of going home, she went and jumped into the Thames.

32/ Ettrick Street Murder, Poplar, December 1885

33/ Mare and Co.Foundry, Blackwall, July 1852 (Burned to a Crisp)

About a dozen men were busy at the Mare and Co Foundry in Blackwall preparing a huge casting, which meant that they had to melt the iron into liquid form. About twelve tons of the molten metal was released into a ladle, which is on wheels, while several men push it along to its final destination. Everything was going smoothly until a wheel snapped off and sent the liquid all over the shop. Most of the men suffered some major burns in some way or other, such as feet, arms, legs and faces being the common ones. One of the workmen was found burnt to a crisp under the liquid metal and as yet he remains unidentified.

34/ Bethnal Green, (Suicide in front of Daughter) January 1866

Living with her unemployed husband at No 2, Nottisford Street, Bethnal Green, was Mary Manning who at this time was ill in bed. Mary got her daughter, Ellen, to fetch her the razor from the bathroom. Alarm bells rang in Ellen’s head and she rightly refused. The mother got nasty and shouted at her “If you do not do so, the first time I get hold of you, I will cut your throat”. She was that scared she complied with her order. While her daughter stood in front of her, she calmly slit her throat from ear to ear. The girl screamed out and the neighbour came running in.While lying on the floor dying of blood-loss, Mary Manning stuck two fingers in the gash and began to tear it open. The neighbour, Elizabeth Madox, tried to stop her but Mary resisted and attacked her. Finally, she was overpowered and despite the attentions of doctors, she died within half an hour. (Is Nottisford Street still there?)

35/ Whitechapel Murder/Suicide, February 1888

36/ Pitt Street, Hackney Road, April 1868 (Dead Infant in Attic)

A new tenant who’d just moved into No 31, Pitt Street, Hackney Road, found the dead body of a small child between the ceiling and the roof of the house while repairing it. Another lodger at the property, William Powers, said he had lived there for two and half years and remembers a young lady had an illegitimate child while there. He thought that was alive when born. Then two women moved in but they were raucous in their behaviour, so he had them removed from the property. They refused, so he moved instead, a month ago. Post-mortem results suggest that the child had been dead for about seven or eight months and the cause of death is near impossible to determine.

37/ St Georges-in-the-East, (Suicide in Cellar) October 1880

A man named Hebbs, who resided in a lodging-house in St Georges-in-the-East called on a policeman, as he had just found a dead body in the cellar. Hebbs said he went to get some coal when he saw the corpse lying on the coal heap. After talking to it, then prodding it, he realised the chap was lifeless. The body was well-dressed and about five feet eight inches tall and in his mid-forties, with greying hair. He had no cash on him, but a piece of paper with”Oxalic acid-M.G.Buckner, chemist, High St, Whitechapel” on it. It is believed that this fairly well-to-do gentleman, bought the oxalic acid and then crawled into the coal cellar to commit suicide.

38/ Rutland Street Murder, Mile End, March 1885

39/ Mile End Road Suicide, November 1880

P.C. George Bishop was called to 409, Mile End Road, and when he arrived he saw the blood-soaked naked body of a woman in front of a mirror with her throat slashed. Next to her was a carving knife which was ascertained to be the suicide weapon. The woman was twenty-four-year-old Emma Jane Venables, whose father was an ex-policeman who died a few months ago. The theory is that she stood in front of the mirror, slit her throat, then fell down and bled to death. Emma had been rather sullen since her father’s death and it had been affecting her mind. The building at 409, Mile End Road is still there, it is directly across the road from Mile End Station, but now, as of 2016, it is a business involved in housing.

40/ Stepney Station Fatality, August 1892

 

41/ Clamis Road Murder, Shadwell, October 1902

A young girl was walking along Clamis Road in Shadwell minding her own business, when a man who was stood waiting on the other side of the road, suddenly ran across and stabbed her three times in the back, then a quick stab to the head. She was in a terrible state and was rushed off to the Children’s Hospital but died on her way there. Two passers-by overpowered the clearly insane man and held him until police turned up to handcuff him. The girl was identified as Emily Barrow and the murderer was the uncle of the girl, Thomas Barrow. Emily had obtained a summons against him for assault and it’s thought this was retaliation.

42/ Bethnal Green, August 1892 (Victorian Gang Fighting)

43/ Raven Row, Mile End, November 1844 (Double Suicide)

A double suicide occurred at No 9, Raven Row in Mile End, with two lovers committing the fatal acts, he being Charles William Duckett aged twenty-one and Elizabeth Williams aged twenty-two. They were childhood sweethearts and had been going out with each other for nine years, and during that time never a cross word was uttered by either of them. It was Charles’s father’s house that they killed themselves in. It was tea-time and they were now going to church. By eleven p.m. the family was frantic and two of her brothers turned up to Mr Duckett’s to see if either had been seen, but they replied in the negative. Now panic has set in and a search party was sent out to look in the immediate area, for the two lovebirds. At around two in the morning, Mr Duckett checked his son’s door, but it was locked from the inside. They broke it down and there lay the young couple on the bed, arms around each others neck. Cups on the bedside table smelled strongly of prussic acid. Charles had been unemployed for some time, so he must have talked Elizabeth into suicide.

44/ Grosvenor Buildings, Poplar, August 1896 (From Affluence to Want)

45/ Dorset Street, Spitalfields, July 1901 (Another Death in Same House )

Dorset Street in Spitalfields was the Victorian equivalent to modern day Bronx in New York. Really dangerous and with a high crime rate. This is the discovery of a body at No 35, which was the scene of the murder of Mrs Austin about a month ago. The corpse was that of a female in her mid-thirties and she was found in a locked cubicle, which was broken into by police to gain entry. The woman, who is a stranger to the area, arrived the previous evening at nine o’clock with a man in tow, and she was given cubicle 35 on the first floor. They both went upstairs and the next time she was seen the police were examining her. It is feasible that the severe bruising on her back was caused by having a seizure and this could be the cause of the poor girl’s death.

46/ Dorset Street, Spitalfields, March 1895 (Death from Starvation)

47/ Limehouse Suicide, May 1863

William Revell aged thirty-nine was caught with his trousers down, so to speak, as the husband of the woman he was seeing, Eliza Head, suddenly walked through the door after a trip to sea. The husband gave him a good kicking and a black eye then turfed him out onto the street. Eliza Head sent her little girl with sixpence for him, as she knew he hadn’t a penny to his name. This arrangement had been going on for about four years, that while hubby was at sea, Revell would go round and “plunge her depths”, to use a metaphor. He talked to the lock-keeper at Limehouse, about seeing her again and getting her to leave the husband and move with him to Bristol. He said that if she wouldn’t he would kill himself. The lock-keeper joked- “If you’re going to drown yourself, then do it in my lock, and I’ll get some money fishing out your body when you’re dead”. Strangely enough, he took that advice and his body was found near the lock of the Limehouse section of the River Lea.

48/ Whitechapel, July 1861 ( Girl’s Body Found in Church)

Workmen lifting up the floor-boards of a church found the dead body of a four-year-old girl, totally nude and lying horizontally. It is thought to be a body from a few years ago when the Secretary of State told them to clear the vaults out. It is also believed that it could have been due to be put in a coffin, but instead was left there. The surgeon stated it was a female aged four or five years old and hadn’t been there that long, but had been dead about a quarter of a century. The skin was hard and tanned and exposure to the atmosphere would not change the state of decay. He said it could stay in that condition for a few hundred years. There were no signs of violence, but her right foot was twisted. The little girl remains unknown. (What church was this in?)

49/ Spitalfields Murder, September 1885

50/ No25, Trafalgar Square, Mile End, January 1896

This is a sad story of the squalor and destitution that some people had to endure in Victorian London. James William Lacey, a thirty-five-year-old labourer died from natural causes, but when you read of the circumstances you’ll understand why. Both he and his wife lived at the above address with their eight-year-old girl. They were both mentally deficient and the genes of the little girl were made her in the same mould. The neighbours called the sanitary inspectors to take a look at the place and when they entered one of them passed out from the smell. There wasn’t a scrap of food anywhere, the walls were covered in mould, there was hardly any furniture and the place was just a s**t-hole. He died of heart failure but the conditions in which he lived, brought this on.

51/ Bethnal Green,  July 1862 (Insanity Suicide)

James Davey aged twenty-six decided to kill himself in the street as he was worried about the insanity that seemed to run throughout his family’s genes. His father had the same thing and it was hereditary. The witness to this outrageous suicide was William ward of no 25, Cambridge Road, Bethnal Green. He was walking down Mile End Road on Saturday morning and was opposite the almhouses, when he spotted Davey put a leather bag on the kerb, then put his head under the rear wheel of a huge cart. The wheel drove over his head, skidding it along and the back of his head became squashed and the brain matter came out. Death would have been nearly instantaneous.

52/ Bethnal Green, (Hysteria) March 1898

53/ Bethnal Green Workhouse Death, January 1916

54/ Sir George Osborne’s Head Tavern Suicide, Spitalfields, June 1866

It’s not a pub named after David Cameron’s Chancellor of the Exchequer, but the suicide of seventeen-year-old Ann Williams, over some milk money, is strange, even for Victorian times. Mrs Jane Bird, the landlord’s wife, would send out Ann to get milk with some money she gave her to purchase it. Ann thought she could make some profit by buying milk at three pence a quart instead of paying the fourpence a quart that Mrs Bird had budgeted her for. Mr Bird was ill and needed the quality milk, and when she found out about her pocketing the remainder Mrs Bird gave her a telling off, but said she would take it no further. Then one evening, Mr Bird could hear running water in the yard, and on inspection, there was Ann Williams upside-down in a water butt. It was thought to be the shame of being caught thieving that preyed on her mind and this had caused her to commit suicide

55/ Haremarsh, Bethnal Green, January 1916 (Gruesome Mystery)

56/ St Georges-in-the-East, December 1885 (Sister Murder)

57/ East India Docks/Poplar, August 1896 (“Dunvegan Castle” was part of Castle Line Fleet, of the Union Castle Line)

58/ Although not mentioned, it was in Spitalfields, February 1899

59/ Whitechapel Murder, October 1875

The two prisoners, Henry Wainwright and Thomas Wainwright have been committed for trial, were on Tuesday last removed from Horsemonger Lane Gaol to the prison at Newgate, preparatory to their trial, which in the ordinary course would come on at the next session of the Central Criminal Court, commencing on Monday the 25th inst. The prisoner Thomas appears to have quite recovered from the illness he was suffering last week and which prevented his removal at an earlier period.

60/ Shadwell Pub Murder, March 1879 (Execution at Newgate- James Simms)

61/ Poplar Murder Victim, December 1888

The woman who was recently found murdered at Poplar has been identified by the head nurse of the Bromley Sick Asylum as Rose Millet, or Mylett, who has been an inmate of the institution on several occasions and was discharged from it in March last. Millet is believed to be her real name, though she was known by other names in Poplar and Whitechapel.

62/ Whitechapel Murder, April 1888

At an inquest at London Hospital on Saturday, on Emma Elizabeth Smith aged forty-five, widow, who was waylaid then robbed and barbarously murdered in Whitechapel while returning home late on Easter Monday evening. A verdict of “wilful murder against some persons unknown” was returned. The evidence showed that deceased was set upon by a number of young ruffians who first robbed her, then outraged her and ruptured the perineum by means of a blunt instrument, causing fatal inflammation.

63/ Spitalfields Disaster Suicide, February 1887

64/ East India Dock/Poplar, November 1903 (Ships Surgeon Poisons Himself)

 

65/  Whitechapel Manslaughter,  August 1870.

66/ Shadwell Station Fatality,  August 1870.

67/ Mile End Railway Suicide,  August 1870.

68/  Fairfield Road, Bow (Two Boys Killed)  August 1870   Fairfield Road is still there.

69/  Whitechapel/Mile End Starvations   July 1870.  Victorian life in the East End in a couple of stories.

70/  Bow High Street Suicide, September 1870.   Drank acid in the High Street!

71/ Bromley-by-Bow Child Infanticide,   August 1870.

72/  Fatal Accident at Thames Iron Shipbuilding Co.   (Shipyard straddling the mouth of Bow Creek at its confluence with the Thames, at Leamouth Wharf. Often referred to as Blackwall)  December 1870

73/  Whitechapel Suicide (Church Lane?)  December 1870

74/  Death at Whitechapel Goods Station,  October 1870.

75/ Whitechapel Lynch Mob Kill Wife-Beater,  December 1870. (Osborn Street still there, next to Brick Lane)

76/ Fatal Fire in Minories Holy Trinity,  November 1902 (Minories Holy Trinity was abolished as a civil parish in 1895, and absorbed into Whitechapel)

77/ Fratricide in Old Church Road, Stepney,  December 1903.

78/ Newsagent Murdered at Stepney,  November 1904

79/ Stepney Man Starves to Death,   September 1904.

80/ Woman Murdered in Artichoke Hill, St George’s-in-the-East,  January 7th, 1904.

Thursday, February 11th, 1904  (Sentencing of John Colman)

81/  Father Murders Both Sons, Bethnal Green.  February 10th, 1904 (Actual murders took place at 49, Gibraltar Walk, Bethnal Green)

82/  Elopement and Death, Bethnal Green.   May 1905

83/  Three Children Die in Spitalfields Fire (Little Pearl Street)   January 1906

1/ Storrington Murder/Suicide, March 1840

A woman, the wife of a sailor, had been for some time labouring while under temporary derangement. She took hold of a razor and severed the child’s head from its body. She then repeated the act on herself. When someone finally entered the building, they found the body of the infant in a box and the head was on the floor next to it. The mother still had a pulse and they tried to restore animation but she died soon after. Verdict, was not surprisingly, “Insanity”.

2/ Crawley Downs, April 1903  (M.P.’s Wife Dead in Woods)

Mrs Brand was the wife of Hon.Arthur George Brand, M.P. for North Cambridgeshire, and it was her body they found in the woods which was next to their house “Huntsland” in Crawley Downs. The husband came back in the evening and was told his wife was missing, so police were called and a search was made. Two things about her were that she had an amazing singing voice and frequently sang at Liberal party meetings. Also, she had a heart condition, and that it is believed she was walking in the woods and had a fatal coronary,

3/ East Wittering, February 1899 (Bodies Washed Up)

4/ Angel Hotel, Midhurst, (Attempted Murder/Suicide) December 1919

A Canadian soldier, Charles William Brice was staying at the Angel Hotel, when he entered the bedroom of a barmaid named Kersey, who was from Elland in West Yorkshire. He had been seeing Kersey for some time and when she ran out, he fired the gun four times, then he shot at the landlord who had gone to help her. Brice then put the gun to his chest and fired, causing his instant death. Kersey is pulling through and expected to survive.

5/ Haywards Heath (Weird Suicide) October 1876

This is a strange method to do yourself in! A railway porter at Haywards Heath wanted to kill himself so he thought the best way would be to eat a newspaper. He actually suffocated himself with the unnamed paper, and as yet the name of the poor chap has not been revealed, nor has the reason for the suicide.

6/ Crawley Gun Fatality, April 1895

7/ Bognor Regis (Suicide on Wife’s Grave) April 1905

Bognor Regis had a tragedy on its hands when local butcher, Arthur Wagstaff, whose missus died about a month ago, went down to her grave with a double-barrelled shotgun and promptly blew his brains out while at her graveside, dropping down dead. (Does anyone know which cemetery/churchyard this is?)

8/  Ifield  (Former village in the neighbourhood of Crawley) April 1901

The White House at Ifield was the scene of a dreadful discovery the other day. The wife of the Reverend Loder Cother, Mrs Amy Henrietta Cother, was found hanging in her wardrobe and the suicide is thought to be down to her bout of depression recently. (Is White House still there?)

9/ Steyning (Horrific Death) May 1885

10/ Clayton Tunnel Suicide, May 1867

A shocking suicide was committed at the Clayton Tunnel on the London and North Brighton Railway. When the eight o’clock train from London to Brighton got to within a hundred yards of the tunnel, a man who was sat in a 2nd class carriage, who had got on at Three Bridges Station, flung open the door and leapt out. The other passengers tried to stop him but he managed to get out, when the next stop was reached they checked the place where it was supposed to have occurred. The body was in three bits, the head and one leg were severed off and the rest of the remains were taken to a pub in Pyecombe.

11/ Worthing,  (I know it says Woking, but it has no pier!)  September 1885

12/ Bognor Regis, July 1914

The coroner’s jury returned a verdict of suicide while of unsound mind on Edward Harrison, an actor, who was found dead in the sea with his throat cut from ear to ear. He was in an “Oh I say!” company who had only been in Bognor for a few days. Harrison was in severe financial difficulties and this was preying on his mind.

13/ Ashenground Woods Murder, Hayward’s Heath, April 1895

A man who was once an inmate at a lunatic asylum, murdered his wife in Ashenground Woods near to Hayward’s Heath, by stabbing her in the neck. The place was, in 2016, a public woods and is now called Ashenground and Bolnore Woods. The man’s name is Minaham and the scene of the crime showed that the two struggled and she put a fierce fight.

14/ Worthing, August 1889 (This was one that I couldn’t believe it had happened, a million to one chance)

15/ Chichester, April 1903

A doctor from Chichester, Dr Arthur Edward Buckell, was found dead by his own hand. He had been suffering from depression for a while and was going to London to undergo some treatment for it. He was going with his wife and son and had just got to the station when he vanished and went back to his surgery. There the 47-year-old had taken some poison. He decided he couldn’t go through with the special treatment.

16/ Arundel Suicide, July 1889

17/ Handcross near Crawley, (Fatal Bus Crash) July 1906

A Vanguard motor-bus, while travelling on the Brighton Road at Handcross near Crawley, was going downhill when the brakes failed and the bus tipped over. Six are known to have died and there are about twenty injured. Later on, the death toll rose to eight, with two more in a critical condition. It was a party of tradesmen from Orpington and they were going to Brighton and the total number of passengers was thirty-four. (Did any more die?)

18/ Hayward’s Heath Asylum, February 1885

Yseult Lucille Dudley was the English woman who tried to assassinate Jeremiah O’Donovan Rossa and was acquitted as being insane. He was a main member of the Irish Republican Brotherhood. The U.S. authorities said she could serve her time in a British asylum. She was discharged from Broadmoor.

19/ Bognor Regis (Four Drown) June 1888

Four fatalities were the result of a tragic boating accident near Bognor Regis in Sussex. James Barnes, William Rogers, Stephen Hewitt, and John Hewitt, all left Bognor in the boat, to go to Selsey Bill, which is approximately a six-mile row away. The sea was calm when they left, but nothing was seen of them, till the boat was found on the sands and the bodies of two of them nearby. The other two bodies have not been recovered as of yet.

20/ Worthing Child Murder, July 1895

 

21/ High Street, Horsham (Gun Fatality)  July 1870.

 

22/ Fatality off Littlehampton,  July 30th 1870.

 

                                                                         Monday, August 1st, 1870.

We have received two telegraphs relative to the accident. The first, from Lord Charles Hamilton, dated the 30th of July, is as follows;- ” With reference to your report in today’s paper, I wish to state that Lord Claud Hamilton had nothing to do with the very unfortunate accident which took place here with my boat on the 27th.- I remain, yours obedient, Lord Charles Hamilton, Norfolk Hotel, Littlehampton”   The other telegraph is dated the 30th, is from Captain England. It is as follows;- ” Captain England, brother of the late Mrs Saunders, wishes to state that the reward offered was £50 for the recovery of the body, not £500 as stated in the Times this morning”.

                                                                      Thursday, August 4th, 1870

23/ Crushed by Oak Tree, Upper Beeding.  February 1866.

24/ Bus Crash (Nine Killed) near Handcross, West Sussex.   July 1906

 

1/ Falmer Churchyard Suicide, January 1878

William Jackson shot himself in the above churchyard. Here’s his suicide note:

“Friends, dear parents and sisters, -I have journeyed on cheerfully till now, when the thought comes upon me of the immense anxieties of my friends concerning my future punishment, so that I decided to put an end to my existence, and release you, however painfully, of the contemplation of my awful condition. The strain upon my dear mother’s nerves was terrible to think of. There are many keepers about here, and I shall wait for one to seize his gun from the corner of the public-house & shoot myself. I feel the writing of this much more than I shall the act, and it is for your own good. I sadly fear I have mistaken my vocation in life. Please excuse me if I do not write in an affectionate strain as it would unman? me. Hamburger, I do not think he will continue telling such a tale upon my death. It was a fair duel, a long and severe quarrel. He had libelled me, and I was determined to be avenged. I drew part of the powder from the cartridge and did not think it would kill. I asked him which he would have, the dagger or pistol, and he said dagger. I threw it to the other end of the room, and when he rushed to pick it up, I fired.I then closed with him, and after a terrible struggle wrested the dagger from him, and threw him off. I repeated my act and asked to make terms. He offered me a sovereign to go, but I did not ask or wish for money. I said if he allowed me half an hour’s start I would leave him. He promised not to pursue or prosecute me, so I threw down my Knife and ran. He picked it up and followed me down the first flight. I made a stand, when he at once returned to the room. I ran down Andrew Street, jumped in a cab, and drove to Westminster.”

He also wanted to be buried where he was christened, as a last wish!

2/ Bodiam Castle Suicide, October 1897

Miss Elizabeth Dixon Simpson, fifty-two years of age, had recently been an inmate of the lunatic asylum at Rockhampton. She was released and went to stay with Reverend Theodore Johnson, vicar of Bodiam, at the vicarage. One Sunday while everyone was at church she trekked up to the castle and vanished. People looked high and low in the surrounding area, but it wasn’t until the castle moat was dragged that her body floated up to the surface. “Suicide while of unsound mind”.

3/ Beachy Head, East Sussex, May 1850

A sad accident occurred on what is primarily England’s suicide capital (A lot more later on).This accident involved the Reverend Henry James, Vicar of Willingdon, who took his daughter and another vicar from Levington, Henry Watson on a walk along the cliffs and beach. James was wanting to climb the rocks, but Watson wasn’t so keen, so while James descended Watson told the daughter to stay at the top. James, being a spritely 38-year-old, carried on down all the while calling to each other. Then there was silence. Watson called out and a reply came “For God’s sake, don’t come; I have hurt myself very much”. The two scrambled to get the coast-guard and when they located the spot there was his body lying on the sand, with blood oozing from his nose and mouth. It judged to be a case of “Accidental Death”.

Beachy Head Suicides/ Deaths.

4/ July 1892- The body of a man was discovered at Fort Beachy Head, it was terribly mangled. There was a letter on the body which stated that he intended to throw himself from a cliff which is over five-hundred feet high. He was identified as E.W.Smith, Claremont, Windsor, so had travelled especially to this spot for the purpose of self-destruction.

5/ August 1885- Jane Green was charged with having deserted her child, which was found dead in a meadow between Eastbourne and Beachy Head. The child was wrapped in some Birmingham newspapers and when police found the exact same papers in Green’s room, she was immediately arrested.

6/ June 1905- A man in his late fifties or early sixties was seen to fall off Beachy Head. Coastguards and police searched the area and found the corpse on the beach. The only clue to his identity was his underclothing marked with the name of “C.J.Page”.

7/  Beachy Head Suicide,  September 1906

​

8/ Pevensey Castle Death, May 1896

11-year-old John Wilton Allen from Bexhill was enjoying a visit to Pevensey Castle with his Dad and brother, when going under the arch he ran and jumped, with the idea of catching on to the keystone (centre stone of arch). The stone gave way and it flattened the lad’s skull. It was the property of The Duke of Devonshire and because of free entry, no guarantees of safety could be assured. The stone which fell on him was about six or seven stones in weight and hundreds of years old. A few years previously a young boy fell off a wall and was killed, so the notices around Pevensey were ignored by the public, on the whole.

9/ Bodiam Castle Death, July 1901

A group of day-trippers from Hawkshurst Nonconformist places of worship were visiting Bodiam Castle, when a member of the group, Fred Weller, climbed up the central tower of the ruins despite being told by staff not to, due to the crumbling brickwork it was deemed unsafe. While he was on the parapet of the tower when a portion of masonry crumbled from underneath him and he fell on to the lead roof of the armoury. Weller landed on one of the ladies who was below and she sustained serious injuries, but he suffered a fractured skull and broken legs.

10/ Wookeys Hotel Suicide, Ratton (Eastbourne) July 1846

A gentleman by the alias, Wilson, went to stay at Wookeys Hotel in Ratton and was there for six months, eating and drinking there, but the owner, Mr Wookey, never once asked him to settle up. When he first arrived he told Mr Wookey that he was from noble stock and had come to purchase land, but after six months of “extracting the urine”, he asked for some cash as he owed him approximately £70,(a huge amount in those days). “All right,” said Wilson,”I’ll ring the bell when I’m ready” and went upstairs to get him the money, then the bell rang and Wookey went up and heard a loud report from Wilson’s room. When his belongings were searched it was found that no money was present, but a load of begging letters to close friends and relatives.

11/ Brighton Suicide, November 1872

Opposite the Bristol Hotel in Brighton, a crudely made wooden box tied with rope was thrown by the sea on the beach. When police opened it, it was found to contain the body of a man in his late-twenties with trousers and a shirt on. The face and head had signs bruising and a thigh was broken. The surgeon stated that he’d been dead less than a day and tied to the box was a bag of coal, which presumably was meant to weigh it down. The body remains a John Doe but could be that of a missing tradesman from the local area. (Who was it in the end?)

12/ Danehill Parish Church Suicide, April 1901

Thirty-one-year-old Spencer Wood, a local bricklayer, was found hanging in the stokehole of Danehill Parish Church. He was hanging by his handkerchief, which was attached to a hot water pipe. He had been suffering from influenza.

13/ Hailsham Shooting Fatality, May 1899

14/ Cavendish Hotel, Eastbourne, September 1896 (Head Squashed by Lift)

An engineer at the Cavendish Hotel in Eastbourne has met with an appalling accident. The unnamed man was working on the hydraulic lift, when his head was crushed, resulting in his inimitable death.

15/ Eastbourne Pier, (Children’s Bodies Dumped) December 1891

The corpses of two little children were discovered wrapped in a parcel and discarded near to the rocks at Eastbourne Pier.

16/ Lewes Accidental Poisoning, December 1842

A dreadful error at the chemists has cost a lady her life, in the Sussex town of Lewes. Twenty-four-year-old Sarah Nash was feeling very ill, so she asked him to go to Mr Martin’s Chemist in the Cliff, for a shilling’s worth of “black draught”. The chemist thought the bloke had said “black drop” and passed him something completely different. Asked by the chemist if he knew how to use it, he nodded and walked out of the shop. He gave his missus a dose of the poison and not unsurprisingly, she died soon after. A verdict of “Accidental death”

17/ Patcham Railway Tunnel Suicide, near Brighton, September 1895

A young man’s mutilated remains were found in Patcham Railway Tunnel, a few miles from Brighton. The body was identified as that Harry Gunn aged twenty-six. Only last week another young man killed himself in the exact same spot.

18/ Hove Child Murder, September 1906

19/ Brighton Railway Station Suicide, June 1869

Frances Jane Bray aged twenty-four killed herself at Brighton Railway Station by leaping in front of a train. Bray was heavily pregnant when she did this and a carriage cleaner named Gould actually saw her milling about one of the lines. He shouted out and then was on his way to have a word with her when she dived in front of a tender and break. A porter named Pellatt ran forward and pushed her back and the wheels cleared her. Unfortunately, she was in a determined mood to commit self-destruction and she got up, laid on the rails and let the two back wheels run over her.

20/ Brighton Railway Station Suicide, October 1885

At approximately 7-50 p.m., a foreign-looking gentleman was seen to enter the waiting rooms and seconds later, two gunshots were heard. Porters and staff went to the room and saw him covered in blood. A doctor tried to revive the man, but he was already dead. The man’s identity is unknown.

21/ Seaford Golf Club Body, April 1903

The body, of what seems to be a golfer, was discovered near the East Groyne, Seaford, just below the golf links. He was about five feet ten inches tall, brown hair and clean-shaven. The police surgeon reckons that he’d been in the water for a few hours. He was dressed in golfing attire, tweed trousers, Norfolk jacket etc. There was a large bruise on his forehead which had been sustained before his death.

22/ Dyke Road Fatality, Brighton, June 1899

23/ Bedford Hotel Suicide, Brighton (Now is the New Holiday Inn) November 1865

Joseph Langley had worked at the Bedford Hotel for eight years with no blip on his time there. He was chamberlain there and was questioned, as was everyone else, about the robberies that had occurred. Three scarf pins, two rings and some cash had gone walkabout, and staff were questioned by Supt.Barnden. At 10-30 a.m. on Monday, George Beard, the under-chamberlain, was talking to Langley in the next room. The conversation through the wall having taken place, Beard left Langley alone, but when Beard hadn’t seen him for a while, Beard got worried and asked Barnden to check on him. They went in and sure enough, Langley was there on the floor and there were finger marks all over the wall as if he’d staggered about. He had cut the vein on his arm and bled to death with the razor laid by his side. An envelope had the words:

“I alone am guilty of the things you have lost, but I never saw the pins or ring. Mine is the hand”.

Beard said that Langley liked a flutter on the horses, but hadn’t incurred any major losses. (What room was it in?)

24/ Rye Railway Station Stabbing, April 1896

On a platform at Rye Railway Station, a chap named Brown stabbed his young wife. It was in full view of the public and when police arrested him they also had to prevent the large gathering of commuters from tearing him to shreds. Brown was running off with another woman when the wife turned up at the station and the following scuffle ended in him stabbing her.

25/ Walsh Manor, Jarvis Brook, March 1899

26/ Brighton Dome Suicide, December 1894

Superintendent Thomas Holloway was found dead in an office, almost beneath the organ at Brighton Dome. He had slit his throat in an act of self-destruction. He was an exceptional policeman and had been commended for bravery and also risen through the ranks due to his superb ability at police work. There was no letter left behind, so it remains a mystery as to why he committed suicide.

27/ Brighton, November 1905 (Murdered Child/Insane Nurse)

Emily Cason, a nurse at a Brighton nursing home, and afterwards declared to be insane by the doctor, had slit the throat of a five-month-old child. It was discovered in its cradle saturated in blood. Cason has been removed to the Workhouse Infirmary.

28/ Hove Murder/Suicide, November 1908

In the front room of a house at Westbourne Street, Hove was the dead body of a 40-year-old man and the bodies of his wife and child. A revolver was next to him. Later evidence suggests that the man was H.R.Wakley, an inspector in the Burma police. The couple rented two rooms at the premises and the child was only around a year old. Little is known about them, but the man’s strange behaviour had got the attention of the neighbours. Letters found there show that Wakley had premeditated the double murder and then to commit suicide. He had been asking friends if he could borrow some money as he was hard up and his pension wasn’t due for another six months or so. It is the financial situation, that is thought to have tipped him over the edge.

29/ Brighton Racecourse Suicide, August 1885

30/ Brighton, July 1851

Fifty-five-year-old James Wady killed himself by drowning because his 73-year-old brother had got hitched to an eighteen-year-old. His brother thought a certain property would be passed down to him, but now he was married it had scuppered his plans.

31/ Brighton, July 1851 (Long Suicide Note)

Another suicide in Brighton, this time by a lad from Shoreham who lodged at a beer shop in Gloucester Lane on the weekends, then on Monday he was found hanging in an outhouse. He was an opium fiend and in his hat, he’d left he’d written in a prayer-book. “Whoever finds my body, I will thank them to convey this book to Jane Nye, 23, Marine Parade, Brighton. Give her my dying love”. Jane was a servant he’d known for a few months and his letter to her read:

“For the last time, I take my pen to address. My hand shakes, and every vein in my body is well nigh bursting. Oh Jane! This is a very heavy trial indeed; and I little thought it would come to this. And now my dearest Jane, I must forever, bid you farewell. When this reaches you, the hand that writes it will be cold in death; and, Oh! my dear Jane, as a dying man, and about to enter the presence of an offended God, I implore you, I beseech you, to forgive me if at any time I have done or said anything to wound your feelings, pray forgive me. Strive to forget me, and forgive me. Pray, pray, do pray for your poor wretched Thomas. I know how this will grieve you. Be happy! May you meet with a partner for life that will make you as happy as you deserve. Oh Jane! I would to God I had been able to have married you; but it cannot be, and to live to see you the wife of another, I cannot, I will not.No, no.God bless you! God Almighty guard and keep you. Accept a dying prayer of your unhappy Thomas. Forget me, dear Jane. May we meet in Heaven. Farewell, farewell, dear Jane. Keep the little papers you have about you in your possession, also the prayer-book, for my sake. If I have offended you, forgive me. Pray, pray for me. You have been too kind, I am thankful for it. Once more, God Bless you, and God be with you. This is a hard trial, but I have sworn and do solemnly declare I will never love another. God bless you.”

32/ Woodbrook Farm, Chailey, near Lewes, June 1894 (Infant Remains)

A man was clearing out an ash-pit under an oven at Woodbrook Farm in Chailey when he raked out the skeleton of a child. The head and feet were intact but the remainder of the child was in a crumbling state. There are no hopes of identifying the infant.

33/ Eastbourne, (Two Die from Weird Car Crash), December 1915

34/ Newhaven Murder, April 1893

A farmer found the body of a woman on the Downs near Newhaven, she had murdered. Her face had been smashed in with some stones that lay near the murder scene. The woman was around forty and had her arm raised, and extended across the face as if to protect herself from the attacker. Locals told police that they had seen the woman with a man, the previous day, and they were also noticed in a couple of pubs. There were some letters in her bag and they had come from her father, who lived in Plymouth. The man they described her as being with was sort of a tramp-like figure. A local shepherd heard arguing on the hills at around midnight near to the place the body was found. A tramp and his wife came forward to say that they were out with the other pair and the other man’s name was Job Taylor, from Wivelsfield.

35/ Hove Baths and Laundry Co., Brighton January 1904 (Lift Fatality)

A shocking accident has occurred at the lift at the Hove Baths and Laundry Co., in Brighton. The hand lift had been pulled up to the first floor when it gave way and two laundry girls went with it and landed on Frederick Washington. He was dead when extricated from the mangled mess and the two girls were rushed to hospital with cuts and bruises.They are both doing well. (Where was the Hove Baths Company?)

36/ Brighton, (Freak Accident) July 1830

In typical Victorian fashion, an old man had gone out on a pleasure-boat with a group of others and he took a couple of guns so he could shoot some birds. This person was Mr T.Scharnell from Brighton and at sixty-six years of age, not exactly very sprightly. A flock of guillemots honed into view so he picked up a gun, but by a million to one chance a rope caught the trigger of another and the gun exploded. His throat took the blast and it looked as though he’d been cut across it with a knife. He was rowed back to shore but died before they could reach a doctor.

37/ Crumbles Beach Landslip, Eastbourne, December 1872

38/ Hellingly Accidental Hanging, April 1846

A fourteen-year-old boy by the name of Noakes, the son of a Hellingly farmer, met his end in an extraordinary manner. He was ploughing with his father and then went to get some straw from the loft. The father, not seeing his son for half an hour went to find him and saw the boy, or what he thought, to be in a sitting position.He asked him “What, Jim, are you asleep?”. He realised then that his son was hanging by means of a lantern rope to a beam. The boy was fond of swinging on the lantern rope, putting his head in a noose and holding on with his hands, above his head. “Deceased accidentally hung himself”

39/ Brighton Suicide, December 1862 (Caught Fiddling the Books)

The town of Brighton was abuzz with the rumour that the borough accountant, Mr Lewis Slight jun. had killed himself. He had resigned this post on Monday, due to allegations of the mismanagement of Pavilion money, said to be about £600. This was supposed to deal with it privately but it had been printed in a section of the local paper and thus it became public knowledge. Slight was apoplectic about it and he went to his bedroom one morning and hung himself with his sock. His wife, who was expecting their first child, is extremely vulnerable at the moment and may not survive. He was about forty-years-old.

40/ Eastbourne Charabanc Accident, June 1895

41/ Hailsham Bigamy Case, May 1855

This was supposed to be a case of bigamy, but with men going off and leaving her, then coming back, how can it be? The story is about Margaret Gravett and her first husband Stephen Richardson, and he was transported about thirty years ago, probably to Australia. After he had been gone about four years she thought he wasn’t coming back, so she married John Gravett in 1829 at Lewes. Then Richardson came back and claimed his missus again and she went to live with him. Then about twelve years ago (1843), Richardson again got transported for an offence, this time for fifteen years. A couple of years later she married an Eli Parsons at Ewhurst. So now she was getting done for bigamy, poor bugger!

42/ Brighton Railway Terminus Suicide, December 1893

A young lad at the Brighton Railway terminus went up to a policeman and said he had found a man hanging in the horse-box. On inspection, it proved to be true and he was cut down. He had a plaid suit on and was found hanging so that his knees nearly touched the ground. There was no identification on him or any letters or tickets, to help police gain a clue as to his identity.

43/ Elm Grove, Brighton, March 1908 (Father Shoots Children)

At a house in Elm Grove, Brighton a man named Ford who is a traveller was found dead with a gunshot wound to the temple. On the bed were his two children, Dorothy aged ten and Charles aged eight, both with bullet wounds to their heads. At Hospital they were in a precarious condition, but both alive. The mother said they all went to bed in a good mood last night,  so there is no motive for the crime.

44/ Polegate Junction Child Murders, Eastbourne, December 1889

45/ Polegate Junction Child Murders, Eastbourne, January 1890

46/ Hurst Green Suicide Epidemic, October 1835

A fourteen-year-old daughter of a man named Lusted who runs a beer-shop in Hurst Green committed suicide by hanging herself in the attic. The father was out and the younger sister was the only other person on the premises. About eighteen months ago her mother threw herself down a well and it was this probably caused her to do the same. Hurst Green has had twenty-one suicides in the past twelve years.

47/ Brighton, June 1850 (Bathing Machine Accident)

Mr Lewen took his kids to Brighton, then went to the beach for a paddle and a swim. Two of them, one a nine-year-old girl and the other a girl of seven years of age, left the bathing machine while the other children got into their swimming cossies. They climbed on the wheels and somehow the driver got the go-ahead to take the machine into the sea. They both went along with the machine as it moved, but one let go while the other one clung on. She was rotated and the wheel passed over her head and blood came out of her ears. The child was unconscious. (Did she live?)

48/ Brighton, February 1892 (Girl Drowns)

49/ Eastbourne Murder/Suicide, December 1901

The landlady and some lodgers at 64, Ceylon Place, Eastbourne, heard shots coming from the front room of which a man and woman resided in. A police officer on the beat ran to the scene and tried to open the door, which had been locked. He opened a window and got in, where he found a man lying on the ground with two bullet wounds in his chest. The woman was sat in a chair, with three or four bullet wounds. The woman was rushed to the hospital where doctors are hopeful that she will recover. It is believed the man shot the woman, then committed suicide. The woman is a lot younger than him and they are thought to be lovers, and while at the house she uttered the word “Violet”. He was later identified as Charles Osborne, about nineteen and a painter from Askew Crescent in Shepherd’s Bush. The woman is Alice Funnell who is the daughter of a tobacconist at High Street in Hailsham.

50/ Brighton, October 1885

A fisherman named George Guayden while assisting to bring a fishing smack into Brighton yesterday morning was washed out of the boat by the heavy waves, and before assistance could be rendered, he was drowned.

51/ Oxford Music Hall Fatality, Brighton, January 1882

A Chinaman, Ali Ling Look, was to be charged along with his wife with causing the death of the boy named George Smyth at the Oxford Music Hall in Brighton. They fired a cannon during their act and the paper pellet inside the cannon killed the boy. They were to be tried for manslaughter and when the verdict of “Not Guilty” was read out, there was a round of applause and Look said “I thank you my Lord” in broken English.

52/ Laughton near Lewes, (Murder/Suicide) January 1885

He was later identified as Gustave Bernhard Fischer, a 55-year-old florist from Belvedene Grove, Wimbledon.

BEACHY HEAD – Not only is Beachy Head England’s most popular suicide spot but also ranks as third in the world, only Golden Gate Bridge and Aokigahara Woods in Japan rank worse.These are the rest I found in the Victorian era papers.

53/ Beachy Head, September 1884

A man’s body was discovered in some brushwood on the South Downs near Beachy Head. He was identified as Dr Charles Palmer a surgeon from Yarmouth, visiting the area. There were surgical instruments nearby, which explains the cuts to the arteries in the groin. This was the skilful work of a surgeon and foul play was ruled out.

54/ Bell Lighthouse, October 1882

A young lady was walking along the cliff at Beachy Head when a gust of wind blew her hat off, she looked over the edge to see if it was there when she toppled over and fell over four-hundred feet.

55/ Beachy Head Mystery, April 1903

About a quarter of a mile west of Beachy Head, the body of a man was discovered. Aged about mid-forties, medium height with greying hair and a bald patch on top. The mouth was stuffed with tissue paper and his lower jaw and upper arm were fractured, probably from the waves washing the body against the rocks. He had on a dark suit, grey overcoat with velvet collar. He had been in the water approximately twenty-four hours.

56/ Off the coast near Beachy Head, April 1885

The Brigantine Charles George of Cowes, collided with a steamer off Beachy Head. The former sank and the master and mate were drowned.

57/ Beachy Head, (Fatal Fall) April 1892

58/ Beachy Head, April 1887

The body of a teenage girl was discovered on the rocks on the west side of Beachy Head and it is thought that she fell from the cliff where her umbrella was found. She was identified as a sixteen-year-old Eliza Legge from Reading and she fell five-hundred feet.

59/ Beachy Head, September 1902

A fatal accident occurred at Beachy Head when James Taylor, a  seventeen-year-old decided that after a walk along the beach and taking some photo’s, he thought it would be quicker to climb the cliffs. He and some companions proceeded to climb, when, as a witness stated, the coastguard began to shout at them. The witness looked over the cliff at who the coastguard was bellowing at and saw Taylor and a couple of mates standing on a ledge about thirty feet from the top. A rope was lowered for them and two were pulled up, but when it was Taylor’s turn he slipped and fell over three-hundred feet.

60/ Beachy Head, April 1914

Two lads who were delivering the post to the lighthouse at Beachy Head saw a bloke fall off the cliff, a height of some five-hundred feet. The body landed on a ledge and was later recovered by a group of coastguards. The man was Arthur Atlee, a thirty-five-year-old single man who worked in a chemist’s.

61/ Beachy Head, May 1899

62/ Beachy Head, October 1906

A young man by the name of Edward Barrow who was living in between the towns of Eastbourne and Sutton in Surrey was found by police on a ledge of the cliff at Beachy Head. The corpse was badly decomposed and mutilated and had been there about two weeks. He was about one-hundred feet from the ground on the ledge.

63/ Beachy Head, (Two Tragedies) January 1905

The first was the sad case of Lavinia Relf aged twenty-two, whose naked body was found at the bottom of the cliff. It is reckoned that she stripped naked and then jumped off the cliff, scattering her clothes as she fell. She told her father she thought she was going mad and had been in a strange mood for quite a while. She fell about 350 feet and left her purse at the summit with a card in it, which was to be posted to an address in London. – The next was a former Mayor of Wallingford in Oxfordshire, Mr James Morty, who was discovered on the foreshore below Beachy Head, where it is almost five-hundred feet in height. His wife said he went for a walk with the dog after reading about the suicide of Relf (above) and he wanted to see the spot where it happened. It is suspected of being an accident.

64/ Beachy Head, August 18th, 1885

65/ Beachy Head, August 20th, 1885

66/ Beachy Head Suicide, May 1906

This is a rather sad tale of a suicide at Beachy Head, by the lady Emily Kate Nash aged thirty-four, who was living at 41, Blenheim Gardens in Willesden Green. The husband said that she had anaemia of the brain and was getting treated for it. She slipped out of the house but the husband followed her. She went to Willesden Station, then went by tram to Baker Street Station. The husband stopped following her. Nash complained of severe headaches and pronounced she’d be happier dead. Her brother was told by her that she had “lost her love for her children”. When she stood on the edge of Beachy Head people were screaming at her to stay away from the edge, but a few minutes later there was a muffled scream and she had fallen the four hundred and eighty feet to her death.

67/ Beachy Head, November 1915 (Killed on Honeymoon)

At the inquest into the death of his wife, Lieutenant StJohn Sampson described how Isabel Mackenzie Sampson died. They were married at Edinburgh last week, then came down to Eastbourne on Monday. He took her for a drive in an American two-seater motor-car. She was fascinated with the self-starter motor and even tried it herself, stating “There, I know how to do it don’t I?”. They were on the cliff top with the car about twenty yards from the edge and she went back to the car, the next time he looked there was nothing there. He thought he’d left the brake off or the gear on.

“I realised that she had gone off the cliff and I think I became totally incapable. As far as I remember I ran to a cottage. I dared not go back and look over the cliff”. The cottage owner, Dorothy Hills said he arrived in a state of collapse and sat him on the sofa. It was judged to accidental death due to her starting the motor unintentionally.

68/ Beachy Head Suicide, August 1906

The way this woman killed herself at Beachy Head is slightly unnerving, to say the least. Laura J.Allchorn, a forty-four-year-old from Seaford had been unwell since the birth of her child a few months ago. She had been staying with friends near Eastbourne but slipped out without anyone noticing. She went to Beachy Head in a cab and kept asking the cab driver about the cliffs. The cab-man told a coastguard that she should be watched and he did so. A family from London saw her near the cliff edge and tried to coax her to come away from there, but she simply glared at them, then gently rolled over the edge and a 350 feet drop below onto a ledge.

69/ Horrific Accident near Lewes Railway Station, February 1866

70/ Dreadful Accident at Rottingdean Cliffs, near Brighton.  April 1866

71/  Strange Death in Brighton.  April 1866

72/ Fatal Accident in Eastbourne,  May 1866

73/  Couple Suffocated in Brighton (Black Lion Street)  September 1904.

74/  Acrobat’s Fatal Fall From Tightrope, Hastings.  June 1905.

75/ Young Lady Killed at East Dean, near Eastbourne.  June 1906

76/  Double Fatality near Hampden Park Station, Eastbourne.  November 1906

77/  Teenage Girl Poisons Herself, Brighton.   December 1880 (Laudanum plus a suicide note)

78/  Fatal Boating Accident, Hastings (Four Drowned)  14th October 1880

A sad accident occurred to a fishing party off Hastings on Tuesday afternoon. Thomas Rodwell, William Lindsay, Mr Docwra, a tradesman of Robertson Street, with two boatmen named Swaine and Burton, went fishing in Mr Howell’s yacht, the “Minstrel”, and when about a mile and a half off the East Cliff a sudden squall capsized the boat. The accident was witnessed by the crew of a fishing smack, which immediately bore down upon the yacht; but they only succeeded in saving the life of Burton and securing the body of Mr Docwra.

Friday, 15th October 1880. (Inquest)

Tuesday, 19th October 1880

A coroner’s inquest was held at Hastings yesterday evening on the body of the boatman Swain, who was drowned by the capsizing of the “Minstrel”. The body was recovered while the yacht was being raised to the surface. It was stated the deceased was a first-class waterman, but could not swim. He had held on to the bowsprit when the vessel was sinking. The bodies of Mr Rodwell and Mr Lindsay have not been recovered. The jury returned a verdict of “Accidental Death”.

79/  Man’s Body Found in a Field, Rottingdean.  December 1880

1/ Farnham Murder,  July 1878

2/ Albury Heath Child Murder, near Guildford, February 1852

The body of a three-year male old child was discovered in a well near Albury Heath, about 150 feet down. It was examined due to information that had been given to police. It appears that the child had gone missing about a year ago when the mother of the child said it was in London with relatives and later on told neighbours that he had died there. Tongues were chattering and suspicion always hung above them when police followed up a lead that suggested they killed the boy and his body was down the well. The kindly member of the public who grassed on the husband was the wife herself! The clothes were still intact and identifiable but the little body was not. (Was he found guilty?/Who was he?).

3/ Addlestone,  August 1910 (Strange Suicide Note)

Edward Guy Maunder’s body was found in the village by the road-side and in his pocket was this weirdly worded offering :

“I hope no worthy person will trouble me to wake up. I have selected this spot to take a good sleep out of doors, and see passing motors and bikes on awakening. A small dose of Chlorodyne will have the desired effect, about thirty drops more or less. When I get back I must remember to remind dear B—-. She is certain to recover. I must tell her this often, it encourages her, and it is also quite true.” -In another pocket was another bottle of chlorodyne and near the body was a pen-knife which he’d stabbed himself in the chest with. Verdict- “Suicide whilst temporarily insane”.

4/ Englefield Green Suicide, March 1898

5/ Woking Cemetery Murder, January 1884

An unknown female’s body was found at Woking Necropolis, with a bullet wound to the head. At first glance, it was thought to be a case of suicide, but the coroner now believes that because of the way the body was carefully laid out and the gun placed in her lap, is now being treated as a murder. She could not have shot herself then fallen in that exact position that she was found. The woman was well-dressed and in her mid-forties, and was found in a secluded, little -used part of the cemetery.     (Does anyone know who she was or where it was in the cemetery?)

6/ Staines Parish Church April 1901 (Corpse in Church)

A discovery was made at Staines Parish Church that literally shook the town to its core. William Kent, a jeweller, had been missing for a week or so. That little mystery of his whereabouts has now been cleared up when they discovered his dead corpse in the clock tower of the church. He had gone to wind the clock (it was his weekly job to do so) and then committed suicide. Another person who worked for Kent went to wind the clock due to his absence and they found him there.

7/ Banstead Fatal Fire, November 1885

8/ Redhill, September 1859

A terrible accident took place at Redhill in Surrey, at the country seat of Mr J.Thornton of Westbourne Grove, Paddington. His seven-year-old son was playing on a swing in the garden and somehow got the rope tangled around his neck and strangled himself. There was no-one around and his feet didn’t touch the floor, so it was a case of him slowly choking till he passed out and he finally died.

9/ Normandy Infanticide, January 1906

The village of Normandy in Surrey saw an awful act of infanticide committed by a mother on her tiny child. The woman cut the head off her little girl, after going for a drive with her husband and the nurse. She was alone for a minute with the child in the dining-room when she picked up a knife and slit its throat. The woman then told the nurse of her actions, and she was taken to Farnham and remanded. (Names?)

10/ Chertsey (Accidental Drowning) October 1908

An accident that ended up with a fatality occurred at Shepperton Weir near Chertsey. George Smith, who worked for the Thames Conservancy, was standing on a barge near the weir when he was knocked by the steering handle and fell into the water. A search revealed nothing for over two hours, but finally, his body was found.

11/ Godalming Suicide, July 1895

12/ Three Pigeons Hotel Suicide, Guildford, April 1898

A gentleman who was described as “foreign-looking”, had stayed at the Three Pigeons Hotel in Guildford for a night. When staff went to his room in the morning they found his naked body with a stab wound to the heart. He never gave a name the previous night, and he is currently a John Doe. It is thought to be a suicide, as he had a substantial amount of cash on his person and none was missing. (Who was he?)

13/ Sodenhalt (Child Remains) December 1889

A gardener was going about his work at a large house in Sodenhalt, Surrey, when he came across a parcel in the bushes, and when it was opened it contained the mutilated corpse of an infant girl. Police surgeons found that the head, legs and its arms, had all been cut off, the arms at the elbow. The missing limbs were not found or indeed part of the package. (What large house?)

14/ Reigate Park Suicide, December 1899

Reigate Park is a lovely valley near to Reigate town and it was here that the decomposed body of an old man was discovered by a shooting party. The body was well-dressed and had £1 in his pocket. The suicide weapon, a revolver, lay near the body with a couple of chambers having been discharged. The gunshot wound to the head was a fatal one. A paper was found on the body and was an issue from June, and also a card with “Charles K.Heather, Great Titchfield Street”.

15/ Ashford/Shepperton, June 1885 (Fratricide)

16/ Guildford, (Human Remains) February 1863

The road from Guildford to Merrow, now part of Guildford, threw up a surprise, while some men were digging for flint. About three feet from the surface were the skeleton’s, mainly of males but one female was in there. They are believed to be the skeleton’s of Anglo-Saxon soldier’s or Royalists and Parliamentarian’s from the 17th Century. Another theory which would explain the woman being there is that they could be plague victim’s from the Elizabethan era. The place was also renowned for being the execution spot for criminals and these could be the remains. (Where were they buried?)

17/ Woking Suicide, June 1890

Edwin Hellier aged forty-six was a caretaker of a house and let’s just say, he liked a tipple. He told a next-door neighbour that he was tired of life and then asked her to look after the house and that he’d leave the key for her. She was obviously worried by his comments but Hellier was later found suffering from the effects of the poison. He told someone that this was his third effort at suicide that day. Firstly he tried to hang himself and the rope snapped, then he drank some paraffin and that failed, but this time he drank some phosphorous paste and this proved to be the one that worked.

18/ Ashford Manslaughter, June 1885

19/ Warwick Tavern Suicide Pact, Redhill, November 1870  (See No 32 also)

The dead bodies of a young couple were found in their room at the Warwick Tavern in Redhill (Reigate), in what seems to be a suicide pact. The man had a thick beard and moustache, brown hair, about 5 feet 7 inches, and part of his clothing had “E.(or P) Recover, Reading” marked on the inside. The lady was approximately twenty-two years old, 5 feet 2 inches tall, brown hair and well-dressed. The chap came about a week ago and paid for a week’s accommodation in advance and told the owner that he had some luggage on its way, but that never arrived. The young lass turned up the same day and they went to bed at a reasonable hour and lived well. One morning, Mr Easton the owner, couldn’t get a reply from their room, so went to get the police. On police entering the room, they were found side by side on the floor in the night-clothes. A note on the table explained that neither killed each other and that they had both agreed to poison themselves. A church service book was found with “Maria Mason-the gift of her cousin”, along with the two empty phials of potassium cyanide as well. (Ever find the identity?)

20/ Protsham Grange near Dorking,  April 1892 (Holmbury St Mary)

21/ Esher and Claremont Station Suicide, June 1864

This is about the suicide of Miss Greenhow aged thirty, who dived in front of a train at Esher. Her sister, Miss Harriet Martineau, described at the inquest, of how she had been really ill recently. On the Derby day, she went with her five-year-old child and a female servant to Esher Station to catch a train to Weybridge. She seemed very nervy and twitchy at the Station and every time a train was passing she had to be tugged back by the servant as she seemed keen to get on the tracks. A train came through and she jumped off and fell across the rails. The wheels churned her frail body and all that was left was a “misshapen mass”, and it was fortunate that the servant managed to wrangle her away from her child, as she had a hold of the child when she went to jump and would definitely have taken the child with her. There were portions of her body spread about the station, which were collected and put in a room at the station.

22/ Godalming, October 1896 (Missing Bridegroom)

23/ Guildford Human Remains, August 1888

An employee was sweeping Guildford Railway station when he came across a package, which when opened and was found to contain a human foot and leg. Police think that it was thrown out of a train or off the bridge and landed near to where it was discovered. The police surgeon has examined it and states that it is a human right foot and part of the leg. The flesh has been boiled and some of the toenails were absent due to the boiling. Police are currently mystified as to why someone has done this grisly deed.

24/ Godalming, September 1885 (Lady’s Suicide)

25/ Chertsey, October 1859 (Romantic Suicide?)

An inquest was held on the body of 19-year-old, Miss Angelina Caroline Bosanquet, the daughter of the late Admiral Bosanquet. Her cousin, Miss Amelia Jane Harrington, said that they had just got back from Geneva and since her return, she had been in a despondent mood. Amelia mentioned this to her aunt, Mrs Fortescue, and she took her to see a doctor. She got better for a while so the medical assistance was withdrawn. Shortly after this she got a letter in the post but didn’t share the contents of it with anyone. The day after getting the letter she got “cold chills” and became seriously ill, so the doctor was called again but she died a few minutes after his arrival. Angelina had become depressed about not hearing from her boyfriend, Captain Beaufoy, and the letter was written by him explaining that he was in Florence, Italy, and suggesting that he would not return to Blighty. This caused her to take some laudanum and end her life prematurely.

26/ Thames Ditton Murder, July 1903

William Joseph Tuffin aged 23 and Mary Stone, a 22-year-old housemaid, were indicted for the wilful murder of his wife, Caroline, at Thames Ditton in April. Stone went to live with the Tuffin’s at their home in Alexandra Road in Thames Ditton, and she knew William before he wed Caroline. Mrs Tuffin was last seen on April the 23rd and William told her brother, a couple of weeks later that she had died and been buried. When police broke down the door they discovered the body of Caroline in bed, with her head smashed to atoms. An axe and a hammer were left in the room covered in blood stains, and Stone and William had carried on living there, even with a two-week-old corpse upstairs. When questioned Stone said she knew nothing of the corpse upstairs and thought that Caroline had gone away. The smell of the body would have set alarm bells ringing and they were both found guilty and sentenced to death.

27/ Ash near Guildford, January 1885

28/ Shalford Station Suicide, January 1870

Edward Ellsley’s decapitated body was found on the train tracks near Shalford Station. The lad was the porter at Shalford Station and it is being treated as a premeditated suicide. The body, apart from head missing, was also limbless. This all stems from a young lady who broke his heart. He started seeing a lovely young girl who was a domestic servant at Shalford Rectory and everything was going well when she decided to move to Basingstoke. He became love-sick and thought that she was seeing another man in Basingstoke, so he took a trip down there. He saw her and then he returned to Shalford and someone heard him utter the words “I wish a train would run over me”. That same night his mutilated remains were found on the line near to the station.

29/ Virginia Water Suicide, January 1852

James Nash’s body was discovered floating in a stream near Virginia Water in Surrey, and the circumstances leave no doubt that this was suicide. The 28-year-old left home in the morning to go to work and went off in the direction of Virginia Water. Around midday one of the park-keepers saw him throw himself off the High Bridge near the Black Nest entrance to the Royal property. A search was instigated, and an hour and a half later he was fished out. He had written on the wall “Goodbye all-J.N.”.  No reason can be assigned for the self-destruction but his family has a history of suicides in it. About twelve years ago, a brother jumped off the same bridge he did and drowned, then a year ago a cousin drowned in the same water. Several years ago an uncle hung himself in some nearby woods and seven years ago a cousin hung himself on a plantation on the Silwood Estate.

30/ Holloway Sanatorium, Virginia Water, June 16th, 1885

31/ Timberham Lunatic Asylum Fire, December 1861

A lunatic asylum, six miles outside of Reigate has burned to the ground, and there has been some loss of life. The asylum at Timberham on the London and Brighton turnpike road was ablaze early one morning and was a private establishment in the care of Mr Cole, his wife, and two sons. It was formerly a coaching inn and had four more staff and seven patients. An attendant named Harris discovered the fire and a message was sent to Reigate for the fire-engine to attend. The patients were woken, but one James Burrie Dixon aged thirty-two, failed to get out in time and another, Robert Anstruther, is missing. It is thought that Anstruther actually escaped the fire then climbed over the railings and ran away.

32/ Double Suicide at Redhill,  November 14th 1870  (See also No.19)

Double Suicide at Redhill (The Inquest)   November 17th, 1870

33/ Volunteer Fatality at Farnham,  October 1870

At nine o’clock one morning the 18th Surrey Rifle Corps assembled at the Town Hall in Farnham, for the purpose of proceeding to the annual inspection of the battalion at Betchworth Park near Reigate. While marching to the railway station, Volunteer Walter Box was observed to drop his rifle and fall suddenly on his face. Medical assistance was promptly rendered by the surgeon of the corps, but life ceased almost immediately and the body of the deceased was placed on a truck and conveyed home to await a coroner’s inquest. The remainder of the corps, preceded by the band, continued their march to the station.

34/  Ewell Powder Mill Explosion (Two killed)  November 1870

35/ Cheam Railway Suicide,  March 1866  (Could that be the Harrow Inn, where the inquiry took place?)

36/ Guildford Suicide, Tunsgate. June 1866  (Tunsgate is next to the Castle)

37/ Child Murder near Guildford,  June 1866.

Late July 1866.

The little girl, Jane Sax, whose throat was cut by a young man named Longhurst, in a lane between Gomshall and Shere, after laying in a precarious condition since the attack on June 28th, died on Wednesday of this week. Longhurst has now been charged with wilful murder.

March 27th, 1867  (The Guildford Child Murder Court Case)

38/ Gored by a Bull, near Guildford.  June 1866 (Chapel Farm House is behind the church  & the Anchor pub)

39/ Virginia Water Station-Master Suicide,  October 1866.

The inquest was at Virginia Water Station on the South Western Railway, respecting the death of Joseph Stokes. He was sixty-five and had been in the railway’s service for twenty years. He had been station-master at Virginia Water for around ten years. A short while ago he received a letter from Mr Scott, the traffic manager, saying that he was to be removed from Virginia Water, and to be placed at Fulwell, on the Thames Valley line. Deceased wrote back, stating his eyes were bad, and asking that he might have a boy to assist him at Fulwell. Scott replied that the deceased was unfit for duty at Virginia Water and that if he thought he was unfit for that at Fulwell, he must report that to the directors. This so affected the deceased, that he had a nap at night, woke the next morning, picked up his razor, and slit his throat. The jury found the deceased had committed suicide whilst of unsound mind.

40/ Fatal Gun Accident, Bletchingley.   October 1866

A most distressing accident occurred about 1 p.m. yesterday to Mr William Henry Sagant, of Redhill, (surgeon to the Reigate Union and also to the 19th Surrey Rifles), which resulted in the death of the unfortunate gentleman, who was well-known and much respected. Deceased and a party of friends were changing their shooting ground near Bletchingley, and Mr Sargant, who was in a trap, was in the act of taking his gun from an attendant when it is supposed that the cock of the gun caught in his gaiter, and, the gun exploding, the contents entered his right side and passed out his left shoulder. Death ensued in about two hours. Deceased’s age was about thirty-seven years.

41/ Warlingham Wife Murder,  November 1866  (Warlingham is near Croydon)

42/ Body Found in the Snow, Guildford.  March 1867  (Railway Arms- Parks Street, demolished in 1961)

43/ Fatal Accident at Caterham Junction,  May 2nd,1866.

Caterham Junction Inquest,  May 26th, 1866

44/ Murder/Suicide on Woking Train?  January 1902

45/  Fatal Accident to a Jockey at Epsom,   June 10th, 1905.  (Happened on Derby Day at Epsom Races)

46/ Horton Asylum Murder, Epsom.   May 20th, 1905

Saturday, May 27th, 1905  (The Asylum Murder- Husband in the Dock)

47/  Body Found in Merstham Tunnel, near Reigate (Mary Sophia Money)   September 1905

48/  Fatal Motor Accident at Windlesham.   December 1906  (Sunningdale and Wentworth golf clubs are down the road)

49/  General Killed in Car Crash, Frimley.  November 1907 (Frimley is on the border with Hampshire)

50/ Death on the Brooklands Racetrack.  September 1907 (Brooklands was opened on 17th June 1907 and closed in 1939. There were seventeen fatalities, three spectators, two motor crew, twelve were drivers. Apparently, ghostly sightings have occurred at Brooklands for over a hundred years)

51/ Attempted Murder/Suicide in a Hotel, Reigate. June 1907 (The Market Stores pub is still there on Reigate High Street.)

52/  Four Drowned in Shepperton Boat Accident.  November 1880

1/ Henham Park,  September 1844 (Two Gamekeepers Suicides)

This is a bizarre tale of two game-keepers who worked for one Earl, who killed themselves within a day of each other. Reports suggest that it was due “to their anxiety and dread of meeting their master, who was coming back from a trip to Ireland. Suicide or a telling off? He must have been a real iron-fisted dictator! Another suggestion was their love of their job and the game they preserved. Another of the Earl of Stradbroke’s gamekeepers has been restrained due to the recent occurrences.

2/ Foxhall Heath near Ipswich, April 1898 (Hanging Skeleton in Woods)

A boy was in a fir plantation on Foxhall Heath, when he came across the remains of a man hanging in a tree. It was clothed and facing the other way and the boy asked him to come down. The lad told a gamekeeper and he left it till the following morning. What presented itself was like something from a horror film. The skin was shrivelled and the clothes hung off him and it had been ravaged by various woodland creatures. Investigations came to the conclusion that it was the corpse of a man named Rose, a gardener from Woodbridge, who’d gone out a couple of years ago and simply vanished. It was positively identified by his son who recognized the trousers he was wearing.

3/ Suffolk General Hospital Suicide, Bury St.Edmunds, February 1872

The matron of Suffolk General Hospital in Bury St Edmunds, Miss Musgrove, committed suicide by throwing herself out of a window. She had already handed her notice in, but if you’re going to kill yourself, why bother? (Was it at the hospital?)

4/ Sudbury Suicide, April 1910

Mr Langdon J.P., the Mayor of Sudbury, was discovered in an out-house on his property with part of his head blown off. He asked a workman to take two guns to be cleaned, Langdon took another two, then sent the workman for a duster, during this absence a loud report was heard, so he rushed to the outbuilding and found him lying there with his head disfigured.

5/ Ipswich Barracks Murder, April 1895

 

6/ Oulton Broad near Lowestoft, February 1901

7/ Wortham Murder, near Eye, July 1899

A diabolical murder was committed in the village of Wortham, near Eye. James Dickson’s wife, Eliza went to the beer-shop(off-licence?) and was brutally slain. She was found on the common with her throat slashed and more cuts to her neck and face. A young man has been arrested and charged with murder. (Who was he?)

8/ Hundon (Octogenarian Suicide) February 1888

The Hundon postmistress, Mrs Hannah Potter, an 80-year-old widow, committed suicide by hanging herself. Apparently, she had near perfect sight and hearing but recently her memory had started to fail her. Could this be Alzheimer’s? One Sunday she went to church as usual, then called at a friend’s for tea, but the next day she complained of losing her purse with £2 in it. She took care of the incoming mail and sent out the outgoing one, then went upstairs, tied a handkerchief round her neck, and hooked it to a nail and hanged herself.

9/ Falkenham Double Suicide, January 1918

On returning home to Falkenham near Felixstowe, John Barham found his wife hanging from the bannister. She was dead. Later on, he was discovered at the bottom of a well. Their son was killed in action in France recently and this is what was thought to set the snowball effect into motion.

10/ Eye, (Fatal Shooting) June 1899

11/ Downham Hall (Dead Body Discovered) October 1841

The gamekeeper for Lord William Powlett of Downham Hall, Riches Dawson, went missing from home and was found four days later hanging by one leg, head down, from a notch in a fir tree about twelve feet from the ground. It is likely that he was at work and he climbed a tree one night to see how many birds were present, then got his foot tangled in the tree, passed out and consequently died. His hat and pitchfork were under the tree. The pitchfork was used to shake up the buckwheat for the pheasants.

12/ Wingfield near Harleston, December 1899

Two deaths have occurred at Wingfield near Harleston, one Lucy Gardiner, aged seventy-seven. The other, a child named Lily Collyer. The old lady and the child lived in a cottage which had no fire guard protecting the fire. It is supposed that Gardiner had a stroke and fell, causing flames to engulf them both. Dr Kirby said that the child was virtually roasted alive. It was judged to be an accidental death.

13/ Newmarket (Fly Poison)  September 1870

A singular fatality has occurred at Newmarket. A woman named Cooper, housekeeper to Mr.W.Boyce was sitting near a table on which were some poisoned papers for the purpose of killing flies. A fly was seen to go into one of these papers and then to alight on the woman’s nose, which was slightly scratched. The wound speedily became inflamed and in a short time, her whole system became affected. Within 24 hours the poor woman was dead.

14/ Bentley Station/Ipswich, (A Mother’s Suicide) September 1885

15/ Trimley near Felixstowe, January 1910 (Three deaths in one family)

Mrs Rouse, the wife of a villager, died suddenly around Christmas and then on the following Saturday, one of her kids passed away, then on Monday, another died. The father passed out in the street and was taken to Ipswich Hospital, where his condition is described as precarious. It is thought that they all got some kind of food poisoning over the festive period.

16/ Gislingham near Botesdale, August 1835 (Twenty-three poisoned)

Twenty-three people in the village of Gislingham have suffered the effects of arsenic poisoning, which had been mixed with flour, which was then turned into bread. Inquests have been held on those who ate the bread from time to time and have died. Who mixed the arsenic into the flour is unknown, but suspicion is fixed to one person in particular. (Who was that?)

17/ Friars Street Congregational Chapel Suicide, Sudbury, February 1883

71-year-old William Foakes was the keeper of the chapel at Friars Street in Sudbury. Just as the congregation were assembling one Sunday, Foakes was discovered hanging to a beam under the gallery. He had just had a charge of impropriety brought against him by a woman who is regarded as somewhat simple. The trustees were investigating and the pressure got too much for Foakes.(Is the chapel still there?)

18/ Lowestoft Wife Murder, December 28th, 1885

19/ Lowestoft Wife Murder, December 31st, 1885

20/ Ipswich Gaol Suicide, February 1894

The warder in charge of Ipswich Gaol, Mr Groves, was doing his rounds on Monday morning when he got to the cell of George Woods. When the door was opened he flew out and went to the third landing. Groves ran after him but Woods reached the landing first and threw himself over, falling twenty-five feet. The prisoner was instantly killed, with this being the second suicide in Ipswich Gaol in a month. He wasn’t on suicide watch and he was only in for breaking into a shop.

21/ Great Cornard (Suicide Letter) April 1889

John Shave, a twenty-one-year-old, killed himself by drowning in the River Stour. He had been seeing a young lass named Hetty Bruce and they had been engaged for eighteen months or so and never had an argument. His back used to play him up and when he lifted some iron up about a year ago it gave way and he used to get painful spasms as a result. He left a letter, it read:

“My Darling- When you read this letter I shall be in another land far away. I have not the conscience to meet you again on earth, so I have done away with myself; but my own dear girl, I do not want you to fret at all about me, for I am not worth it. I am exceedingly so to think I hurt your feelings last night; the Lord knows. You asked me to forgive you, but it was me that wanted forgiveness, but I was ashamed to ask you. What few things you have of mine, keep, and say nothing about them. The little money you have of mine spend on yourself. I beg you not to let this trouble you, for I do not know what to do with myself and this is what I have chosen. Love to mother. I cannot ask you to accept my love, for I am not worthy of it. My darling, I wish you goodbye and God bless you. P.S.-If you want to find me, I shall be down by Lady’s Bridge”.

Miss Bruce didn’t know what he meant by “Hurting her feelings”, but he said that the landlord’s daughter of where he lodged had irritated him, but she wasn’t jealous of her. A portrait of Miss Bruce was found on him and when Miss Bruce was shown his body at the inquest at the inn, she grabbed hold of the body, hugged him and kissed him passionately.

22/ Barsham Murder (Not Barham)  August 1870

 

23/ Lowestoft Drowning,  July 1870

 

24/ Clergyman Drowns at Lowestoft,  September 1870. (23 Wellington Esplanade, is on the corner of Claremont Road, opposite Claremont Pier)

 

25/ Claydon Railway Fatality, August 1870.

26/ Offton Hunting Fatality,  November 12th 1870

Yesterday the Essex and Suffolk Hunt met at Offton near Ipswich. Among the field was James Spall, the landlord of the Bell Inn, Ipswich. About 2 o’clock the hounds having drawn several covers blank, several members in the hunt were standing still, when Spall said he was cold and must be moving. He put his foot to his horse to start when it gave a sudden plunge and fell, rolling over its rider, and in trying to rise it fell twice upon Mr Spall, who was killed instantaneously.

November 16th, 1870. (The Inquest)

27/  Ipswich Woman Fatally Shot,  October 11th, 1870

October 13th, 1870. (The Inquest and Verdict)

28/ Suicide from a Steamer, Southwold.   February 1866

The master of the steam trader Rainbow, which plies between London and Great Yarmouth, reported on his arrival at the latter port on Sunday that at about 5 a.m. a gentleman who had taken a passage from the London-wharf had been missed at Southwold, Suffolk. It is believed the passenger committed suicide. /he was about seventy years of age, wore a beard, and was about 5 feet 10 inches in height. He wore a light skull cap, dark coat, and light trousers, and he left on board the steamer a hat and great coat, the latter containing a purse with five shillings in it and various other articles, which are now in the presence of Yarmouth police.

29/ Fatal Fire at Cavendish,  May 1866 (Two killed)

30/ A Sad End to an Ipswich Beggar, April 1866

31/ Ship Wrecked off Lowestoft,  December 1866 (Nine Men Drowned)

32/ Shooting near Bungay (South Elmham)   January 1867

33/ Helmingham Human Remains/Skeletons  (In 1900 the Rectory garden was excavated and twenty-five graves were unearthed)

34/ Peasenhall Murder Confession,  August 1904.

35/ Jockey Killed at Newmarket,   October 1906

36/ Fishing Boat Sinks Off Lowestoft (Loss of Eight Lives)  October 1906

37/  Wife Murder at Beccles.   16th November 1880. (Women have twelve pairs of ribs, of those eighteen, were broken)