Newspaper Clipping of the Day

Via Newspapers.com

The following item was something the editors of the “London Times” did not expect to find advertised in their paper.  May 10, 1861:

Coblentz, April 25, 1861. In an almost impenetrable ravine in the declivity of Mount Rheineck, which is situate immediately on the banks of the Rhine, between Brohl and Nioderbrel (a district of the Tribunal of First Instance of Cobleutz, Rhenish-Prussia), on the 22d of last March, was found the body of some person, a female, from 20 to 30 years of age, or thereabout, concealed in a recess, covered with large stones. The period of decease cannot be precisely determined. Death was caused by a ball shot from a gun, which traversed the breast and back. Description --height 5ft. 2 or 3 inches hair, fair; teeth, sound, small, and somewhat irregularly set in the lower jaw. Chemise, cambric, 3 ft. 6 inches long, the upper hem forming a running string, with two eyelet-holes, two fine and even cords passing through in the centre of the round breast of the chemise, and below the eyelet-holes, the initials " A. E. 36" are embroidered in Gothic characters, in relief, half an inch long.

2. A nightgown of fine white dimity, collar turned down, 2 ft. 3 inches, with white mother-of-pearl buttons; some remains of a fine material, with brown and white stripes (jaconot muslin); in the white stripe is a small winding white line, with red spots. In the vicinity of the body have been found the remnants of a petticoat, 3 feet 2 inches long; it is composed of fine white dimity, striped, the same material as the nightgown. On the upper edge, which is an inch and half broad, with white riband strings, are embroidered in white letters, 2 1/2 lines, in relief, and in large characters of the German printed alphabet, the initials “M. R., 6.” The bottom hem is finished with cord in linen thread.

The fine quality of the materials and the elegant make of all these articles indicate that the victim belonged to a rich class. In consequence of the state of putrefaction and external destruction it is impossible to notice other marks of recognition. I request of any person who can give information concerning this unknown individual, and the circumstances of her death, to be so good as to furnish me with the particulars, else to communicate them to the nearest magistrates. The articles of dress above mentioned, together with the lower jaw, are deposited for inspection at my office. The Crown Prosecutor-General, DE RODENBERG.

I have been unable to find if the mystery of the woman’s identity--let alone who murdered her--was ever solved.

The Enigmatic Death of a Diplomat

On June 14, 1904, Kent Loomis, the brother of Assistant Secretary of State Francis R. Loomis, sailed from New York aboard the Kaiser Wilhelm II.  His mission was to travel to Addis Ababa in order to deliver an important trade treaty between the United States and the Ethiopian King Menelik.  This treaty had, for some time, been a matter of intense interest among the European powers.  His traveling companion was a wealthy, flamboyant entrepreneur named William H. Ellis.  Ellis was a frequent visitor to Ethiopia, and had campaigned to be given this mission himself, but the State Department declined to entrust him with the task.  This was a bitter disappointment for Ellis.  He had hoped to use delivery of the treaty as a signal to King Menelik that Ellis had the backing of the American government in his various ambitious business ventures in Ethiopia.  There are even suggestions that he hoped Menelik would appoint him as heir to his throne.

Loomis never made it to his destination.  Sometime on June 20th, he vanished from the ship.  There was conflicting evidence for what had happened to him.  Soon after he disappeared, the Kaiser Wilhelm made a stop at Plymouth, England.  One passenger swore later that he saw a dazed-looking Loomis go ashore at that time.  The captain and head steward, however, were equally positive that Loomis could not have disembarked.  Ellis claimed that Loomis had been drinking heavily during the voyage, and had an unfortunate habit of sitting precariously on the ship’s railings.  (This was not corroborated by any of the other passengers.)  Ellis expressed his opinion that his cabin-mate, while in a state of intoxication, had accidentally fallen overboard.  A further oddity was when it was noted that the tags on Loomis’ luggage had all been altered.  They showed the initial “E” instead of “L,” and the first name had been erased.  In Loomis’ mysterious absence, Ellis was given possession of the treaty, enabling him to complete the diplomatic mission after all.

Loomis’ whereabouts remained a complete mystery until a month later, when his body was found washed up on a beach fifteen miles from Plymouth, with an ugly wound on the back of his skull.  An autopsy found that this blow on the head had killed Loomis before he entered the water, but they were uncertain whether this injury came from an attack, or from striking his head on some part of the ship’s ironwork when he fell overboard.

The mystery of Loomis’ death has remained unsolved.  Ellis died in 1923 in Mexico City.  His obituary in Time magazine called him “one of the most remarkable men who ever acted as agent for the State Department.”

One certainly cannot argue that.

Death of a Lighthouse Keeper: The Strange Case of Ulman Owens

A lonely, isolated lighthouse.  A raging nighttime thunderstorm.  The lighthouse keeper suffers a violent, mysterious death…

If Ulman Owens isn’t perfect Strange Company material, I don’t know who is.

Since 1911, Owens had been the keeper of the Holland Bar lighthouse, off the Maryland coast.  The 53-year-old widower normally performed his duties with efficiency, so when on the night of March 11, 1931, the lighthouse suddenly went dark--and during a hurricane, at that--the nearby community of Crisfield was naturally alarmed.  As soon as the storm was over, the local Sheriff and a few other law enforcement officers went to the lighthouse to investigate.  They assumed something had gone very wrong, but possibly the little group still wasn’t prepared for what they found.

Owens’ dead body was lying at the top of the circular staircase leading to the lighthouse cubbyhole.  He was wearing only a shirt, and his body was covered in bruises.  The rest of his clothing was in a bloody heap nearby.  A deep gash was on his side, and a large welt was on his forehead.  The lighthouse itself bore witness to what must have been a long and extremely violent struggle.  Furniture was overturned, a chair was smashed to bits, and there were splotches of blood everywhere.  A blood-stained knife was found on top of the stove.

All of this naturally led to the initial assumption that Owens was the victim of an unusually brutal murder.  However, a further search of the lighthouse cast some doubt upon this theory.  Three now-empty bottles of spirits of ammonia were found in the dead man’s bed, causing police to wonder if the lighthouse keeper, driven to madness by his isolated existence, poisoned himself with the ammonia and then tore apart his quarters during his death agonies.

Holland Bar Lighthouse, circa 1950

The coroner, after a casual examination of the corpse, concluded that Owens had died of a heart attack, and the following day the body was buried in a nearby churchyard.  Nothing to see here, move along.

Local residents felt otherwise.  The prevailing opinion was that Owens had been murdered, and people became increasingly noisy about saying so.  Such talk was further amplified when details about Owens’ surprisingly colorful private life began emerging.  It turned out that Owens had been romantically involved with one Minnie Shores.  Minnie was married and the mother of three, but she had been planning to get a divorce and marry her lover.  However, Mrs. Shores may have been unaware that she was far from the only woman in Owens’ life.  As unlikely as it may seem, our supposedly reclusive lightkeeper was quite the ladies’ man, surrounded by an army of infatuated women.  According to the gossips, at least one of them was so jealous of Owens’ relationship with Minnie Shores that she was overheard making threats against his life.  The question was asked:  Did one of his many lady friends get a bloody revenge against Owens?  Or was he murdered by a resentful husband?  (Before you ask, the most obvious suspect, Minnie Shores’ estranged husband, had an unassailable alibi.)

The possible motives for why anyone would want to murder Owens began to grow quite impressively.  His job as a lighthouse sentinel made him the natural enemy of the rum-runners who had to ply their trade literally under his nose.  Furthermore, it was said that Owens had reported a number of these smugglers to Federal agents.  Did one of these lawbreakers decide to shut Owens’ mouth…permanently?

Owens’ two adult daughters were adamant that someone had murdered their father, and insisted that the authorities reopen their investigation into the case.  They pointed out that Owens had never suffered from heart trouble, and the extent of his injuries was so great, it would have been impossible for him to inflict them all on himself.  Enough of a ruckus was raised for two agents from the Department of Justice to involve themselves in the mystery.  Owens’ body was exhumed and a complete autopsy was finally performed.  It showed that he had suffered a head wound brutal enough to crack his skull.  Despite the presence of the bloody knife, Owens had no stab wounds.  No poison was found in his organs, but he had an enlarged heart, which allowed local authorities to stick by their curious assertion that the lightkeeper had died a perfectly natural and unsuspicious death.  All the blood found around the lighthouse?  It was obvious: Owens must have had a nosebleed!

The two Federal agents were less convinced of this.  They nosed around for a while, but wound up shrugging their shoulders and going back to Washington in defeat.  And the Ulman Owens case was--however unsatisfactorily--closed for good.

Too Many Clues: The Puzzling Death of Elias Purcell

"Chicago Tribune," December 1, 1935, via Newspapers.com

Many murders go forever unsolved due to a complete lack of clues.  On certain rare occasions, the opposite happens: the victim left behind so many clues--many of them either contradictory or just plain incomprehensible--that it is impossible to make enough sense out of them to conduct a successful investigation.  Anyone who tries winds up feeling like they are spinning in a room of funhouse mirrors.

With a few cases--such as the one we will examine in this week's post--it even remains uncertain if the dearly departed was murdered at all.

Elias H. Purcell had a varied, and largely successful career.  In the late 1800s, he toured America with the Schubert Concert Company, where he was both director and pianist.  The company included Purcell’s wife Lavinia, who was a singer, and their son Thomas, a precociously talented banjoist and violinist.  In 1899, the family, which by then included a daughter, Virginia, settled in Hibbing, Minnesota.  Thanks to an iron range, the local real estate market was booming, and Purcell invested in land to such a profitable degree that by the time WWI broke out, he was worth an estimated $75,000.  (Approximately $1.5 million in today’s money.)  After the children grew up and began their own lives (Virginia married one John Sheehy and Thomas became the leader of a touring jazz orchestra,) Purcell sold most of his holdings in Hibbings, and in 1918, he and Lavinia moved to Chicago.  The pair moved into an apartment building Purcell owned.

Life for the Purcells appeared to roll on quietly enough until Monday, September 22, 1919.  Purcell was temporarily on his own, as Lavinia was visiting friends in Sterling, Illinois.  That morning, the building’s janitor, Henry Van Vaerender, asked his wife and another tenant, a Mrs. Wegener, to accompany him to Purcell’s apartment.  He said he had a feeling that “something funny” was going on with their landlord.  He explained that Purcell was a man of very regular habits, but the day before, all his curtains had remained down, and Purcell failed to take his usual early morning walk.  In short, Vaerender felt uneasy about going in search of Purcell alone.

When the trio approached the door of Purcell’s kitchen, they found that it was closed, but the key hung on the outside.  When they cautiously peered through a window, the women began screaming.  Purcell was sitting bound to a kitchen chair, very unmistakably dead.

When police arrived on the scene, they noted that the body was rigid, suggesting that Purcell had died some hours before.  A shattered glass was on the floor about two feet away from him.  His wrists were bound to the sides of the chair, but very loosely and carelessly.  Over his head was a towel spotted with dark stains.  When this towel was removed, everyone was further unnerved to see that the dead man’s eyes were wide and staring, as if he had passed away while looking at some horrifying sight.  Stranger still, there were no marks of violence anywhere on the body.

The entire house had been completely ransacked.  Furniture had been displaced.  The beds were stripped of their blankets.  Drawers had been pulled out of dressers, with the contents dumped on the floor.  Despite all this chaos, nothing appeared to be missing from the apartment.

In the dining room, the table had been set for three.  Fingerprints on the dishes did not belong to Purcell or any members of his family.  One egg--and one egg only--had been boiled and distributed in three pieces.  One slice of toast was also cut into three pieces and put on separate plates.  There was a bit of coffee in each of three cups, and on three knives was a small lump of butter.  There was something oddly staged about everything that was found in the apartment--including Purcell’s corpse.  But who did the staging, and why?

Although police were able to establish that Purcell’s wife and children were not in Chicago at the time of his death, there were indications that he had not been in the apartment alone.  A milkman named William Hornung told police that around 4 a.m. the previous day, he was walking to the back porches behind Purcell’s building when he saw a shadow cross the curtain of a rear bedroom in Purcell’s flat.  He heard a noise that he thought was either a groan or a snore.  Then, the curtain was pulled aside, revealing the head of a man wearing an officer’s army cap.  The police took particular interest in this detail, as among the items found in Purcell’s apartment was an officer’s cap belonging to Purcell’s son-in-law, who was a lieutenant in the army.  A neighbor of Purcell’s stated that some time around 2 a.m. that same Sunday, she had heard footsteps either in the backyard or the passageway.  Another neighbor said that early Sunday, she had heard a woman’s voice in Purcell’s flat, along with the sounds of a piano and a violin being played.  Yet another tenant heard voices and saw a light from the Purcell bedroom around that same time.

Meanwhile, ten days after Purcell’s body was discovered, the coroner finally learned what had killed him: nicotine.  There was enough of the poison in his system to “kill half a dozen men.”  The dose was so high, it would have ended his life within just a few minutes.  This just added to the puzzle, as deliberate nicotine poisoning was extremely rare.  It would have been hard for anyone to get hold of enough to kill someone, and only a chemist or someone who was an expert in poisons would even think of using it.  Also, nicotine poisoning would cause extreme convulsions before death, but Purcell’s bound body showed no sign of any such seizures.  Could he have already been dead when he was tied to the chair?

The sheer weirdness of the whole death scene led some investigators to propose that Purcell had committed a suicide elaborately faked to look like murder.  They believed Purcell’s hands were tied loosely enough to enable him to drink the poison from a glass and then throw it to the ground, shattering it.  It was pointed out that Purcell had recently lost a good part of his fortune in the stock market, and that he had recently purchased $15,000 worth of life insurance, which would have been invalidated if his death was ruled a suicide.

This theory brought a storm of criticism, not least from Purcell’s family.  They declared that despite his financial losses, he still had a good deal of money, leaving him with no reason to kill himself.  And what about all the witnesses who saw and heard other people in his flat?  In short, both the suicide and murder advocates had enough material to make a plausible case.

The inquest jurors tasked with making some sense of the whole mess delivered the only reasonable verdict:  

"Elias H. Purcell came to his death in the kitchen of his home at 661 Roscoe street from cardiac and respiratory failure due to nicotine poisoning.  From the evidence presented we are unable to determine how or in what manner or by whom said nicotine was ingested.

“We recommend that the state’s attorney and the police make further inquiry into this mysterious case.”

If any “further inquiry” was made, it proved to be utterly useless.  Elias Purcell either committed suicide in a manner worthy of the cleverest detective fiction, or he was murdered in one of the most brilliantly baffling ways imaginable.

In 1920, the insurance company paid Purcell’s widow the full $15,000.  And everyone moved on.

The Strange Death of Nora Smithson

"Arizona Daily Star," January 19, 1932, via Newspapers.com

Every now and then, I find in the old newspapers some case that was little-noticed even at the time and soon forgotten, but which is so hauntingly weird, I feel it deserves a second look.  The following death mystery is one of those stories.

60-year-old Nora Smithson was one of those people who seem fated to aimlessly drift through life without leaving any kind of mark behind them.  Even her relatively few acquaintances could say little about her.  She never married, had no known living relatives, and, although she was apparently a pleasant enough woman, no real friends.  She moved from town to town, working as a cook for various families in exchange for board and lodging.  She once told one of her employers that she had money in the bank and didn’t really need to work, but being a live-in cook gave her “a family.”

In early 1932, Nora was in Tucson, working for a family named Fine.  It was apparently a congenial relationship on both sides.  Nora was an excellent cook, with an amiable disposition, and she seemed fond of the family.  Around noon on January 18, Mrs. Fine left to attend a meeting, leaving Nora alone in the house with Fine's small son.  When Mrs. Fine returned sometime after 6 p.m., she was a bit surprised to find the house unlocked and unlighted.  She was even more surprised that Nora failed to answer her calls.  In the three months that Miss Smithson had lived with the Fines, she rarely left the house during the day, and was always at home in the evenings.  When Mrs. Fine failed to locate Nora anywhere in the house, she took her son to a neighbor’s and drove to a drug store, where she called police.  She told them that she felt very uneasy about her cook’s disappearance, and wished an officer would go to her home.

When three policemen arrived at the home, Mrs. Fine told them what had happened.  She said that the only place in the house she hadn’t looked was the cellar, and she was afraid to go down there by herself.  It turned out that she had reason to be scared.  When the officers went down into the basement, they found, wedged into a corner behind the furnace, the body of Nora Smithson.  The cause of her death seemed obvious.  The upper half of her body was badly charred, although portions of her legs and her shoes were undamaged by the flames.  Although the body had been exposed to an intense heat, there was little, if any fire damage on the wall behind it.  In the extreme corner was a small web containing a spider, alive and quite undamaged.  Examination of the furnace showed that Nora could not have been burned inside of it, and no indications that she fell against it.

Ten burned matches were scattered in front of the body, and between the bent knees was a tin can containing a small quantity of a “sweetish smelling liquid.”  It is not clear if this liquid was ever identified, but it was apparently  not flammable.  A search of the basement uncovered a small bottle that contained the same sort of liquid that was in the can.  The Fines did not recognize either the bottle or the can, and had no idea what the liquid could be.  

The first assumption was that the poor woman had chosen a particularly ghastly method of suicide, but the Fines knew of no possible motive for such an act.  When Mrs. Fine last saw Nora, she was in a cheerful mood, playing cards and checkers with Fine's son, and saying that she wanted to stay in Tucson for a while, because she enjoyed the country and the mountains.

A search of Nora’s few belongings failed to provide any clues about what had happened.  No suicide note was found.  Everything in her room was tidy and well-arranged.  Two of her sweaters had been washed and dried, then spread neatly over the foot of her bed.  The kitchen showed no sign that she had begun dinner, so it was presumed that the gruesome tragedy--however it came about--happened quite some time before Mrs. Fine returned home.

So, did the police have an accident, a suicide, or a murder on their hands?  No one could say.  The coroner remarked to a reporter that at first glance, there was nothing pointing to any of the three possibilities, and nothing to disprove them.

The inquest proved to be an utterly unsatisfying affair.  The coroner’s jury reached the inevitable verdict that Nora had died from burns and carbon monoxide poisoning, but how she had come to such an end remained unknown.  The county attorney threw up his hands and said that unless new information came to light, “we can take no other stand” than that “Miss Smithson put some highly inflammable matter on her clothing and set it afire.”

It was found that Smithson had a total of about $500 in two different bank accounts, with the money going to pay her funeral expenses.  And that, as they say, seems to have been that.

Newspaper Clipping of the Day

Via Newspapers.com

Ghosts may be alarming, but they’re usually not hazardous to your health.  This following tale may be an exception.  The “Altoona Times,” October 27, 1884:

New York, October 25.--Dr. Charles C. King, of Buffalo, who is now here, tells a curious story. A month ago two men entered his office.  One said he was suffering from a physical injury inflicted by a ghostly assailant. The doctor was incredulous, but examined and found a couple of severe bruises on his chest, one round, as if inflicted by a club, and the other long and narrow, like a knife cut. The fourth rib had been broken and the right lung injured. The surface of the body was not injured, beyond discoloration. 

"How the injuries could be inflicted I could not guess," said the doctor. "The patient said he was asleep, felt himself suddenly seized by the throat, struggled to get away, but only succeeded in getting enough liberty to scream.  He was immediately struck in the chest, felt the bones crush and was stabbed. The blade entered his side several times. He was found lying on the floor senseless, the moon shining upon him, the windows and doors all locked on the inside, and nothing disturbed." 

The patient recovered finally, and the doctor went home, thirty miles, with him. He had gone to bed, when he heard a horrible shriek, followed by a heavy, crashing sound. He found the man lying on the floor senseless, bleeding from the mouth, with his rib broken afresh, his body bruised all over, and evidently in a dying condition.  He recovered consciousness a short time before death, and asserted that he had been picked up by an invisible foe, hurled against the wall and then thrown on the floor. 

"I believe he could not have injured himself on either occasion," concluded the doctor.

Fake Telegrams and a Genuine Death: The Elizabeth Cook Mystery

In February 1932, a twenty-year-old Bostonian named Elizabeth Barrett Cook was sailing in the steamer Chinese Prince from Naples to Gibraltar.  However, when she received a cablegram from a Helen James, announcing the death of Cook’s fiancé, St. George Arnold, the young woman naturally planned to head home as soon as possible, although the message, rather oddly, told her “on no account” to return to America.

She never made it.  Soon after she received the tragic news, she fell ill, and soon afterward was found dead in her cabin, with the cable lying beside her.

And here the story turns from mere tragedy to dizzying insanity.  It soon transpired that the cable was a hoax.  No one in the Cook family had ever heard of any “Helen James.”  And Mr. Arnold was alive and in perfect health.  It was also discovered that this was not the first time Miss Cook had been the target of such a cruel stunt.  Found among her papers was another cable she had received the previous June, alerting her to the serious illness of her mother.  That statement had been another ghoulish fiction.

How did this young woman die so suddenly, you may be wondering?  Good question.  Some reports said traces of a sleeping drug were found in her system, indicating either accidental or deliberate overdose.  Other reports discount this, saying she died of pneumonia.  An autopsy was performed, but it was unable to show the cause of Cook's death.  However, no sign of drugs were found in her organs.

Who sent the sadistic “joke” cablegrams?  You tell me.  A theory was floated at the time that, out of a peculiar sense for the dramatic, Miss Cook sent the messages to herself.  The Boston Post ran a story alleging that on a previous cruise, Cook had sent herself a fake telegram announcing the death of her mythical sweetheart, “Malcolm,” after which she staged a melodramatic scene threatening suicide.  

Many people are fond of hoaxing others, but hoaxing yourself would be something of a first.  

"Sheboygan Press," February 24, 1932, via Newspapers.com

The “Post” alluded to reports that sleeping pills had been found in her cabin, and hinted that Cook had used them to stage what she intended to be a fake suicide attempt that, unfortunately, proved to be more realistic than she had expected.  According to one story, it was discovered that the bogus messages were not cablegrams, but telegrams that had been sent from Italy, which suggested she had sent them from Naples just before boarding the “Chinese Prince.”  However, as far as I can tell this was never corroborated.  Having only the conflicting contemporary news stories to go by, it is hard to tell how much of what they printed was solid fact or fanciful fiction.

An intriguing detail was that it was well-known that Cook was an heiress.  The very next year, she was due to receive two legacies that would have made her an extremely wealthy young woman.  It was never made clear who would receive this money in the event of her death.  It is impossible to tell what, if any, connection this had to her strange demise.

If there was any solid resolution to this peculiar case, it evidently was never disclosed.

Newspaper Clipping of the Day

Via Newspapers.com

It's "Mini Mysteries" time again, where I present an intriguing crime case from the past that doesn't provide enough information for a full blog post.  The "Richmond Palladium-Item," April 21, 1910:

Hagerstown, Ind., April 21. Interest has been revived in an unsolved murder mystery by the discovery of a sign nailed to a telephone post near the place where the body of an unidentified man was found six years ago. 

The sign reads: "The man who was found dead in these woods six years ago was murdered in the Hindman Hotel." Another sign has been added, reading: "It won't do any good to tear this sign down, as it will be put back as often as it is torn down." Six years ago a body was found in a woods west of town and near the German Baptist church. It was so badly decomposed that identification was impossible. It was presumed by the coroner that death had resulted from a bullet wound in the head. The Hindman hotel was operated by Mr. and Mrs. Arch Hindman at the time the murder is alleged to have occurred there and the citizens of Hagerstown think they do not know anything about the case and that the posting of the signs is a hoax. The authorities are investigating.

The signs found on the telephone post near the German-Baptist church, west of Hagerstown, recalls one of the most mysterious murder cases in the criminal history of Indiana. The authorities have never been able to identify the victim, learn who his slayer was, or why the crime was committed.

The man, so the records of former coroner, Dr. S. C. Markley show, had been dead at least five months before the body was accidentally discovered by a young farmer's boy. Before the grewsome discovery people in the neighborhood had complained of an offensive odor.

It is thought that the man was shot, but the authorities were never able to substantiate this theory. The man's body, at his back near the spine, showed a puncture the size of a bean, but probes made for the bullet were fruitless. The outer shirt and the undershirt worn by the man were also punctured, but his coat had no hole in it.

When the body was found the flesh on the skull had nearly all dropped off.  There was one small patch of black hair remaining. The man apparently weighed about 135 pounds but owing to the badly decomposed condition of the body, his color or nationality could not be ascertained. He wore a dark suit of clothes. 

Deputy Prosecutor Sells at Hagerstown this morning stated he had inspected the signs and would make an investigation of the case but that he had no hopes of unraveling the mystery. He said that in his opinion the signs had been posted by some enemies of Mr. Hindman, one of the most respected citizens of Hagerstown and who, for years, managed the Hindman house. He said that Mr. Hindman was positive that no murder had ever been committed in his hotel. Mr. Hindman has also inspected the signs. 

From the coroner's report it is learned that the only papers found on the murdered man's person were some lottery tickets on a hotel in Florence, Italy, and a couple of letters which offered no clue as to the identity of the man on whom they were found. 

As far as I can tell, that was the last word on the mystery.

Newspaper Clipping of the Day

 

Via Newspapers.com

This eerie little news item appeared in the "Cleveland Plain Dealer," November 20, 1909:

NEW YORK, Nov. 19.--Wilkie Collins never wrote a piece of fiction more uncanny than the facts revealed by the finding of charred skeleton of woman in the attic of an abandoned insane asylum at Newark. 

The hospital and Essex county authorities tried today to find some solution of the mystery but the records of the asylum for the last thirty years were searched in vain for the trace of a missing patient.  That the woman was an inmate of the asylum is about the only fact established. 

Of all the many theories advanced. ranging from murder down, the most reasonable seems to be that the woman was trying to escape, perhaps two years ago, perhaps forty, and in lighting a match to show herself the way under the rafters in the dark, she set fire to her clothing and was burned to death.

The woman was later identified as Christina Schmidt, a patient at the asylum who vanished in 1891. The cause of her death was never determined, but as foul play was, for whatever reason, immediately discounted, evidently no serious investigation was ever made. To be honest, it sounds like no one was particularly interested in what happened to the poor woman.

Weird Times at Muncie High

Fortunately, most schools avoid being the site of a weird and inexplicable death, but it has been known to happen.  However, when one school is known for two such unsolved mysteries, well, you know you’ve just enrolled in Strange Company U.  The institution boasting such an unenviable record was Muncie Central High, a four-story building in Muncie, Indiana.

Sixteen-year-old Perlie Guelsby Hogg was a sophomore at Central High.  His was one of those lives that seem destined to be defined by tragedy.  Just before he was born, his father, Ben Hogg, vanished.  As Ben was never seen again, it is unclear whether he deserted his pregnant wife, or was the victim of foul play or some accident.  In any case, Perlie’s mother Mary was left to fend for herself and her baby as best she could.  When Perlie was only two, Mary died.  The boy was shuffled between various relatives for a couple of years before settling in with his aunt and uncle, Minnie and Charles Cooper.  Perlie told another aunt that Charles was an overly strict guardian, to the point of being abusive.  The household was also extremely poor.  Not surprisingly, Perlie became a deeply unhappy boy, who occasionally threatened to run away, or even kill himself.

On the morning of December 16, 1922, Perlie left for school, telling his aunt and uncle he’d probably be home late.  (He had an after-school job as a grocery delivery boy, and as it was the Christmas season, he had recently been working overtime.)  Because of this, Minnie and Charles were not alarmed when he failed to return home that night.  However, when Perlie did not turn up on the following morning, Minnie contacted the police.

Investigators soon learned that two days before Perlie disappeared, he and several other boys had gotten into a physical fight with a teacher who had allegedly threatened them.  The following day, Perlie withdrew himself from the school, vowing never to return.  However, many people who knew the boy expressed the firm belief that he would never have run away while Minnie, who was in poor health, was still alive.  She was apparently the one person in the world the boy loved.

Despite that, police classified Perlie as a runaway, and the official search for him soon sputtered and died.  Minnie and Charles continued doing what they could to find what had happened to the boy, but eventually, they too were forced to give up.

Nearly ten years after Perlie vanished, some plumbers were doing repairs at Central High.  After climbing down a ventilation shaft, one of the men was stunned to realize he was standing on human remains.  At first, the identity of the corpse was unknown, but after local newspapers published photos of shoes and a pocket knife found with the body, Charles Cooper recognized them as belonging to his long-missing nephew.  Perlie had finally been found.

"Evansville Journal," July 11, 1931, via Newspapers.com

The ventilation shaft could be accessed by students from the back of broom closets in the boys’ restrooms.  Boys would often enter the shaft to smoke cigarettes, or just lounge around.  Pearlie’s body was found in a “crouched position” at the bottom of the shaft.  He had died holding his open pocket knife, and his shoes were at the opposite side of the little chamber.

The autopsy did little to clarify how Perlie died.  The coroner found no broken bones, suggesting that he had not accidentally fallen down the shaft.  However, he could not rule out that possibility.  Or did the miserably unhappy boy use his knife to follow through on his many threats to commit suicide?  Or were Charles and Minnie correct in their belief that Perlie had been murdered, and his body subsequently hidden in the ventilation shaft?  In July 1931, a grand jury was brought in to examine the mystery, but the lack of evidence led to the case being dismissed, and that, as they say, was that.

Life at Central High went back to normal.  And then on the night of April 13, 1948, a Muncie painter, 36-year-old Nelson Dull, was having a hard time getting to sleep.  (He suffered from “painter’s colic,” what we today would call “lead poisoning.”)  He told his wife Marian that he was just stepping outside for some air.  Around 1:30 a.m., Nelson left his home and started walking down the street.  He never came back.  Marian realized quite quickly that something was wrong--a few months before, Nelson had suffered a leg injury which left him unable to walk for very long--and she called the police.  A search was made, without finding any sign of Nelson.

On the morning of April 26, Central High’s custodian, Aramis Joris, turned on the ventilation system for the first time that year.  When staffers subsequently entered the school, they were greeted by a hideous stench which filled the entire building.  As the day went on, the smell only got worse.  Joris went in search of the source of the odor.  When he opened a little hatch leading to a three-foot-tall attic above the school, he found it: A decomposed human corpse was lying on the attic floor.

"Muncie Evening Press," April 26, 1948

The body in the attic was soon identified as Nelson Dull.  However, what nobody could say was what in hell it was doing there.  Dull was found completely naked and lying face up.  His clothes were piled up near him.  However, his wedding ring and silver “lucky piece” were missing.  (They were later discovered scattered elsewhere in the attic.)  A few other items were found nearby--jars of food, a straw hat, an old newspaper, and a small chair that police thought was used to climb in and out of the attic.  As had been the case with Perlie, the autopsy was unable to determine how Nelson died.

Joris told police that several times in the recent past, when he looked up the shaft leading from the boiler room to the roof, he had seen a man staring down at him.  (It is unknown why he apparently had kept this interesting information to himself.)  This led police to theorize that, for reasons best known to himself, Dull had formed the habit of “hanging out” in the attic.  During one of these visits, Nelson took off all his clothes, lay down, and died.  The sort of thing that could happen to anyone.

Dull’s family rejected this scenario, arguing that he simply wasn’t the sort of weirdo who would camp out in school attics.  Besides, they asserted, his leg injury rendered him incapable of climbing into the attic unassisted.

The investigation into Dull’s death ended on this frustratingly inconclusive note.  In 1973, the Central High building was demolished, taking all its secrets with it.  Good riddance, I say.

Newspaper Clipping(s) of the Independence Day

Via Newspapers.com

Normally, I honor this nation’s birthday by posting an assortment of various holiday-related disasters, but this year, I am focusing on one story, and one story only.  Because, boy howdy, it’s a doozy.  The “St. Louis Globe-Democrat,” July 8, 1894, told with the subtlety and good taste we have come to cherish from newspapers of that period:

From the Cincinnati Times-Star.

Shortly before 10 o'clock last night Henry L. Driver, a politician, peculator. bookmaker and general sport, was blown to pieces at the northeast corner of Sixth and Main streets by the explosion of a package of nitro-glycerine which he carried.

The victim of this remarkable explosion, which has no parallel in the Fourth of July records, was popularly known as Jack Driver.  He was 50 years of age and lived with his second wife and daughter at 429 Main street. Tuesday night two strange men stopped him in front of the Moselle building on West Seventh street, and he drove them off with a knife. They said they would get even. Yesterday morning as he sat in Pat Russell's saloon on Main street, over which he lives, a bullet fired by some unknown person on the street struck his watch charm, but as it had evidently glanced from somewhere, and was almost spent, it did him no harm, but called to his mind the threats of the two men.  He believed they fired the bullet. In the evening he was seated with a friend in front of the Court House when his daughter asked him to go and get her some more fireworks. He promised to do so, and went downtown. About 10 o'clock he was seen walking up Main street on the east side, and when just above Sixth several persons who observed him say he suddenly felt his right-hand coat pocket and then, putting his hand into it, drew out a bottle which slipped from his grasp and fell to the pavement. The explosion immediately followed. There are those who believed the man who fired the bullet slipped the bottle of nitro-glycerine in his pocket in a crowd, expecting him to find it with the result which followed. Others hint at suicide, and advance the theory that he was in a bad financial way, and that an accident policy of $3000 which expired July 5, 1894, could only be collected for his family by his taking himself off in a way that would seem accidental.

However the explosive came to be touched off, the result was horrible. For an instant there was a roar like a sharp clap of thunder. Buildings for blocks around shook, and hundreds of panes of glass were shattered, and pedestrians were thrown off their feet. Then a fearful silence succeeded, while the astonished people were getting to their feet.  Dozens of people rushed to the spot, but a sudden shower fell upon them. Those in the glare of the lights were horrified and sickened when they saw that it was not rain, but a shower of blood and bits of flesh that was falling, and the timid ran away from the red deluge. The smell of burnt flesh arose, and the sharper odor of burnt chemicals mingled with it.

Face downward lay Driver, his body apparently intact, but when a bystander rushed to lift him up the body fell all to pieces. The head rolled over, with the mouth still gasping for breath.

As the body fell apart and the spectators realized the awful effect of the explosion, many drew back in horror.  A boy came running up with the right arm of the victim, which he had found some 50 feet away on a doorstep.   The walls of the house were spattered with fine bits of flesh like sausage, and across the street, like a festoon, on a cornice, were draped several yards of intestines. The telegraph wires were laden with bits of intestines and flesh, and dripped blood. On a pole nearby were embedded a silver dollar and the open-faced watch of Driver's, while other articles that had been in his clothes were scattered for a square about. There were no remains of fireworks.

A patrol was called, and the officers shoveled the fragments into a stretcher and, hunting up all the parts of the body that could be found in the dark, carried them to the Morgue. 

Driver was well known in certain circles of the city. In former years he dealt in patent rights, and realized thousands of dollars from a corrugated stovepipe elbow.

He next inherited a large sum of money from his mother, but spent that in fast living, and was worth but little when his aunt, Jemima Driver, started him in the Globe Varnish Company on Sycamore street. Two years ago she died, leaving him considerable money, but regarding that a suit is still pending in court. He made a pile of money out of a book at Latonia this spring. He also dealt in Florida real estate and Texas property for a time.

The “Cincinnati Enquirer,” July 7, 1894.  Note the considerably more subdued tone from the article above.

The awful death of poor Jack Driver, who was blown to pieces at Sixth and Main streets Wednesday night, is still shrouded In mystery. The second day's investigation by the police and Coroner has not developed anything definite that throws light on the subject. It is generally conceded that the explosive which killed Driver was either in his pocket or under his arm, or was thrown at him and struck him in the abdomen. It could not have fallen on the ground without tearing up the pavement and also tearing Driver’s legs to pieces.

His limbs below his knees were not injured, and the effect of the explosive was confined to his abdomen and the upper part of his legs, from the fact that his left hand was blown off just above the wrist it is positive the explosion occurred in his left side, which was also badly torn to pieces, while the right tide is not nearly so badly injured. 

Nothing positive has yet been ascertained as in the character of the explosive.  Some persons think it was a bomb or "flower pot.’”  which explodes with a loud report, and their theory is that Driver was carrying one or more of them home to shoot off. It is also supposed to have been nitroglycerine,  dynamite, or a common firecracker. It is also suggested that Driver had an infernal machine under his arm.

All of Mr. Driver’s friends are unwilling to believe that he committed suicide. They say he was not the kind of a man to do that, and they feel certain he would never resort to that awful method to end his life.  Mr. Frank Armstrong, Secretary of the Board of Supervisors, said to an Enquirer reporter yesterday that he had known Driver for 25 years, and he is confident that Jack would not take his own life.

Mr. Armstrong is inclined to believe that Jack had bought some dynamite with the intention of shooting it off a little bit at a time in order to make a loud noise, just for a joke. He said that Jack always was a great man for playing jokes, and this leads him to this theory.  The remains of the dead man will be removed from the morgue to his late home, at No. 422 Main Street this morning, and the funeral will be at 2 o'clock this afternoon. It has often been Mr. Driver’s wish that whenever he died his remains should be laid alongside those of his first wife in Wesleyan cemetery, and this will be done. 

Tiie inquest in the case was begun by Coroner Querner at 3 o’clock yesterday afternoon, and his office was crowded with friends of the dead man and persons who were at the scene of the explosion shortly after it occurred.  A number of prominent citizens and county officials were also present.  Attorney Otway Cosgrave sat beside the coroner and suggested questions now and then. He was the attorney for Jack Driver, and he was present in the interests of the family to assist in unraveling the mystery surrounding the death.  Detective Schnucks, who is investigating the case under direction of the Coroner, was also present. The United States Mutual Accident Insurance Company, in which the deceased was insured for $5,000, was represented by its District Manager.

Mr. A. J. Thorpe, who listened with care to every word uttered by the witnesses.

The testimony of the different witnesses was quite contradictory on a number of points. Messers. Goodman and Haywood agree that the body was lying near the center of the pavement with his head toward the liver and his feet toward, the north, while Messrs. Cumming and Crotty testified that the body was lying across the pavement with the head toward the house and his feet toward the gutter.

The two former swore that they were the first persons beside the body after the explosion, while the two latter testified under oath that they were there first. Crotty testified that the body was lying between the Corner of Sixth street and the telegraph pole, while all the other witnesses claim that it was lying about five feet north of the pole. Mr. Heywood and Mr. C.S. Weatherby both testified that they saw the body blown about five feet in the air after the explosion, while Cumming and Crotty both swore that the body was not blown up in the air, but fell right down on the pavement after the explosion. 

Mr. Patrick Russell, the saloonist at No. 422 Main street, in the house where Driver lived, was the first witness. He said he knew Driver 25 years. He saw him last about 6:15 p.m. on the Fourth of July on the pavement, in his shirt sleeves.  Driver said he was going upstairs to get supper. His little girl came along just then, and he gave her a quarter and said that after supper he would go downtown and get her some fireworks. He was not drinking and did not complain of any trouble. Mr. Russell was told that Jimmie Baldwin handed Driver two letters at the courthouse shortly after this. He did not see any firecracker in Driver's pocket, and Driver had never intimated to him that he would suicide. 

Mr. Walter B. Alvorn, the barkeeper of Andy Gllligan's saloon, on Vine street, said he saw Driver about 9 o'clock on the evening of the 4th in the saloon. He had no package with him. He drank a whisky, but he was sober and all right. He sat down at a table and talked with him 15 minutes.  He said he was going to Main street to get some fireworks for his little girl. He left the saloon about 9:30 o'clock. Driver took two drinks altogether. He was not excited or worried in his action or conversation. Witness had known him 20 years.  He said Driver was at Rugby, Tenn., at one time, but did not know that he ever was engaged in the mining business. Driver never intimated suicide, or that he was in financial difficulties. He always understood that Driver had a good income. He remarked after the explosion that if Driver got any explosive he would very likely have got it at Keeshan's drug store at Sixth and Walnut streets, as he had traded there many years, and used to live in that neighborhood.

Mr. G.W. Schuler, proprietor of the Merchants' Hotel, at 248 Vine street, said he knew Driver some years.  He saw him about 9:30 on the night of the 4th, in his place. Driver said to him: "Sit down, Billy, I want to tell you one thing that happened to me in front of George Hobson’s house." He then told how he drove off two fellows who wanted to hold him up, and about being struck by a spent bullet, as already published in the Enquirer.  Driver spoke of some patent right he was interested in. He said he was going to get some skyrockets for his daughter. He took one drink and left in about 5 minutes. He never intimated that he was going to commit suicide. He had no firecracker in his pocket and he had no package with him.

Mr. Henry Bodeker, the saloonist on Main Street, between Fifth and Sixth, knew Driver 15 years. He saw him shortly before 10 o’clock in his saloon.

Driver said he was not feeling well and complained of rheumatism in his legs and feet.  He drank one whisky. He was alone.  He had a little round package, three or four inches in circumference and about 10 inches long, wrapped up carelessly in a newspaper.  He put it on his left side on the counter. He stayed only about five minutes, and then took his bundle and left. He was perfectly sober and acted as he usually did.  He said he had such an awful pain in his feet that he could hardly walk. The package was a little longer than a mineral-water bottle. It was not heavy. He laid it down very carefully.  There was no noise when he laid it down. He did not say anything about fireworks. The explosion occurred about five minutes after he left. 

The next witness was Mr. Henry Goodman, manager of the Bandle Arms Company, 256 Main, four doors north of Sixth street. He was not acquainted with Mr.  Driver. He was not in the Bandle store on the Fourth of July.  Goodman first observed him shortly before the explosion, about eight steps from the telegraph pole. Witness was sitting on a box in the gutter, facing the store. Dr. Heywood was standing in the door facing him.  Goodman looked south and saw Driver coming up Main street. Just as he passed Sixth street he stopped in front of the telegraph pole.

The awning of the Wellman hardware store at the corner was down, causing a shadow on the pavement where Driver stopped.  He stepped to the curb stone and stopped on the north side of the pole, about 50 feet from where Goodman sat.  The latter happened to look into the store just then, and at that moment there was a terrific explosion which caused him to shut both eyes. There was no firing of pistols or firecrackers at that time. Goodman said he done no shooting since 9 o’clock.  The explosion occurred about 10 o'clock. He did not notice Driver smoking a cigar, and Dr. Heywood recovered from the shock before he did.  He was stunned by the shock. It was louder than a gun or any common cracker that he had ever heard. He did not notice a smell of gunpowder or see any flame or smoke after the explosion. As soon as he saw the man lying on the pavement, he ran into the store and telephoned for the patrol wagon. If the explosion had been caused by a giant cracker there would have been an odor, flash and smoke, and he did not notice any of those. He said persons sometimes wait for the cars at the telegraph pole.  Goodman said he did not know the difference between dynamite and glycerine. He did not know of any thing called "dynamite firecracker" that is being manufactured. He did not see anybody in any windows on either side of the street, and had no idea of how the explosion occurred. 

Dr. Harry D. Heywood, the veterinary surgeon, who was standing in front of the Bandle store, testified that several minutes before the explosion there was shooting of Roman candles on the porch on the second floor of the Galt House at Sixth and Main.  He did not see Driver until the explosion.  He first thought the awning had blown up, but when he looked up he noticed the man in the air five feet above the pavement. He yelled to Goodman, "Look at that." The man fell flat on his face.  When he ran up to him he gave a few gasps and died. A number of persons ran up as he was bent over the man, but the first person he spoke to was Sergeant Grimm.

Waller Cummings of 179 Spring street, a painter, said he was standing in front of Colter's grocery with W.M. Crotty about 10 o'clock waiting for a lady with whom Crotty had an engagement.  He was there 15 minutes and before that sat in front of the Galt House. He saw no fireworks, but heard some on Fifth street shortly after 9 o'clock. While on the corner he first observed Driver in front of the hardware store at the opposite corner.  He was staggering and thus attracted his attention. He was south of the telegraph pole when he staggered toward it. He said that he and Crotty made fun of his staggering. He thought that Driver was under the influence of liquor. He got about a foot beyond the post when the explosion occurred.

He noticed that Driver had something that looked like an Apollinaris bottle under his left arm and carried his cane in the same hand. It looked like it had a blue wrapper on it. Cummings saw it drop from under his arm onto the pavement. It exploded as soon as it struck the pavement. He did not notice a flash or smoke.  It was about two seconds after the explosion when he ran over to the body. It was lying crosswise on the pavement, his head was to the east and his feet to the west, close to the gutter. Cummings said he was the first person there. He touched the man on the arm and asked him whether he could speak. Just then Crotty told him, "Be careful, there might be another one on him.”

Crotty was then placed on the witness stand. He said he was from Greenwich, Ohio, and a porter at the Galt House four weeks, and worked under Cummiings at the Beckel House in Dayton a year ago.  He had an engagement with Edith White, of Springfield, Ohio, who was working at the Stratford Hotel.  He was to meet her at the Galt House, but she did not come, so he went across the street with Cummings. While standing at the corner he noticed Driver staggering over the sidewalk on the other side, and remarked: "That fellow has a pretty good jag on." He saw Driver but a minute, and the latter took but three or four steps before the explosion occurred.  Crotty said he heard a lot of shooting around, but did not see any.

He noticed a package under Driver’s arm which looked like an Apollinaris bottle. It had a blue label. It was under his left arm, and he also had a cane in his left hand.  He saw the bottle fall, but did not see any flash or smoke.  The body was not thrown in the air, but fell right down on the pavement. He never saw Driver before. Crotty said the body was eight or ten feet south of the pole. He fell right down on the spot.  Crotty said he is out of work at present, and that he was discharged at Dayton for drinking.

The next witness was James P. Murray, who lives with his wife on the third floor of No. 252 Main street, in front of which the explosion occurred.  He said it was 10 o'clock, and he was just going to bed when he was startled by the explosion. He hurried to the window and looked down and saw a man lying on the pavement. He then called his wife. The only other persons he saw on the pavement were Dr. Heywood, stooping over the prostrate form, and Mr. Goodman, getting up from a box in the gutter. He did not see any other person. He then hurried downstairs. He said the body was lying in a northeasterly position on the pavement, with the head more toward the gutter than the feet. He appeared to be a little mixed up about this, and corrected himself, saying that the feet were more toward the gutter than the head.  The body was lying downward, and he saw Dr. Heywood turn it over. He noticed the back of the coat and white shirt were turned up. 

Mr. C.S. Weatherby. the well-known retired dry goods merchant, testified that he and his family were on a Price Hill car coming up Main street. He was on the second seat in front, on the east side of the car. Just as the car was about to turn west on Sixth street the trolley came off the wire, and it was stopped there.  Mr. Weatherby was looking east out the window up Main street, and he noticed a man on the east side of the street about 40 feet above Sixth street and about five feet beyond the telegraph pole. He did not notice any other person near there. The man had no bottle under his arm as far as he could see. While he was looking at the man there was a terrific explosion, and he saw the man blown five or six feet into the air. The shock of the explosion made the car vibrate, and it was the loudest report he had ever beard. Mr. Weatherby testified also that he had known Jack Driver intimately for 25 years. He met him just before the Latonia races, and Jack said he had been hunting him for several weeks in order to borrow $2500 from him to invest in poolrooms across the river.  Jack said he got the money from someone else. 

The last witness was James J. Sheehan, the conductor on the Price Hill car, which stopped at the corner. He said he noticed Driver about five feet north of the telegraph pole. He was standing still and his left side was partly turned toward him.  He did not notice any bundle under Driver’s arm. After the explosion he ran over to the dead man with Mr. Weatherby, and when he returned to the car, the motorman, Mr. Hill, said he saw the fellow have a package under his arms and felt sure it was dynamite.

Both the conductor and motorman saw a large ball of fire at the time of the explosion. The inquest lasted until nearly 6 o'clock. It will be resumed Monday at 3 p.m.

After performing what sounded like extremely hazardous experiments with various explosives, the coroner concluded that Driver was “probably” killed by a large firecracker that he carried, which may have been set off from ashes dropping from Driver’s cigar.  However, most felt the case was not quite closed.  Several years later, when reporting on the suicide of one of Driver’s relatives, a newspaper recalled Jack’s grisly death as “still mysterious.”

When Mr. Swope Met Dr. Hyde

Thomas Swope

A classic plot device in murder mystery novels is when the rich, elderly head of a family announces that he or she is updating their will.  Naturally, all hell subsequently breaks loose.

It is a great pity that Thomas Swope was evidently not a connoisseur of such books.  It might have saved him from disaster.

Swope was born in Kentucky in 1827.  When he was thirty, he moved to Kansas City, where he immediately saw the area’s potential for growth.  He snapped up every bit of real estate he could get his hands on, eventually owning most of the land which is modern Kansas City.  From subdividing his land and reselling it to others, his prescience soon made him an extremely rich man.  As so many wealthy entrepreneurs do, he “gave back” to the community--and got himself good publicity in the bargain--by donating generously to hospitals, civic organizations, and the local Humane Society.  He gave the city 1,300 acres of land which became the massive Swope Park, which still remains one of the largest municipal parks in the country.  (It must be said that cynics mutter that Swope’s motive for this particular gift was a desire to avoid paying property taxes on the undeveloped land.)

Swope was a shy, reserved man who never married.  He lived alone for much of his life until, in his later years, he moved into the Independence, Missouri mansion which had been owned by his late brother Logan Swope.  There, he had plenty of companionship in the form of Logan’s widow Margaret and her seven children.  (However, he spent much of his time alone in his upstairs bedroom, drinking and smoking cigars.)

The Swope mansion

As Swope aged, his thoughts naturally turned to how he would dispose of his $3.6 million estate.  He drew up a will leaving generous bequests of $140,000 (about $4 million in 2024 money) to each of his nieces and nephews, with the rest of his money going to various charities.  If any of the beneficiaries died unmarried and childless, their share of the estate would be divided among the survivors.  However, late in 1909, just a few years after writing this will, Swope began expressing a change of heart.  He made no secret of the fact that he was now thinking that the charities should be getting a greater share of his fortune, with his nearest and dearest accordingly getting much less.

If you wish to find a reason for Swope’s sudden reversal, it might be wise to look at the other major figure in our little tale:  31-year-old Kansas City physician Bennett Clark Hyde.  Hyde was a good-looking fellow, with a suave manner that delighted the ladies.  He sang beautifully and was fond of reciting Shakespeare’s soliloquies.  Alas, Bennett balanced out these attractive qualities by being a complete dirtbag.  He had a history of charming elderly women out of their life savings.  In 1898, he was arrested on the charge of hiring a gang of grave-robbers to procure corpses for the local medical college.  (He somehow managed to talk his way out of that trouble.)  When serving as Kansas City’s police surgeon, he was accused of physically abusing Annie Clemmons, a woman he was supposedly treating for a morphine overdose.  (The scandal caused him to be discharged from his position.)

In 1903, Hyde met Thomas Swope’s 23-year-old niece Frances.  Frances apparently didn’t know or didn’t care about Hyde’s unfragrant past, because before long, Frances was hopelessly infatuated.  When Margaret Swope--evidently a better judge of character than her daughter--refused to allow Frances to marry Hyde, the young couple eloped to Fayetteville, Arkansas, where they were wed in June 1905.  The infuriated Margaret cut off all communication with her errant daughter.

The newlyweds remained family outcasts until October 1907, when Margaret’s brother was badly injured in a mining accident.  For reasons that frankly completely escape me, it was Hyde that Margaret turned to for her sibling’s medical care.  After that, Mr. and Mrs. Hyde were both accepted back into the family fold.  Thomas Swope bought the young couple a house, and thanks to his influence, Hyde was made president of the Jackson County Medical Society.

After the prodigal couple’s return, things seemed to jog along quietly for the Swope clan.  And then Thomas Swope began dropping those comments about revising his will.  Soon afterwards, on October 1, 1909, Swope’s cousin and closest friend, J. Moss Hunton, suffered a stroke.  Hyde and the family doctor, George Twyman, were immediately summoned.  The two physicians decided on a course of bloodletting--a slightly antiquated practice even then, but still occasionally used.  Hyde made the incision, and Hunton’s blood began to flow.

That was not considered the alarming part.  The alarming part was that once Hyde began bleeding his patient, he did not seem inclined to stop.  Even though the Swopes--including Frances--began to express unease about the amount of blood Hunton was losing, Hyde did not bandage his patient until about two quarts of blood had been removed.  Minutes later, Hunton died.  Tragic, of course, very tragic, but, well, these things happen.

Two days after Hunton’s demise, Thomas Swope’s personal nurse, Pearl Virginia Keller, brought Swope his breakfast, along with a digestive pill Hyde had prescribed.  About twenty minutes after finishing his meal, Swope suddenly broke into a cold sweat, and began shaking violently.  He told Keller, “Oh my God, I wish I were dead.  I wish I had not taken that medicine.”

Those were his last words.  Swope fell into a coma, from which he never emerged.  The 81-year-old died that night.

Two sudden deaths in a family within 48 hours is unusual enough for people’s minds to wander in some uncomfortable directions.  Swope’s kinfolk recalled Thomas’ plans to change his will.  They reflected on the fact that J. Moss Hunton had been the executor of Swope’s current will, the one leaving his fortune firmly in the hands of his family.  Nurse Keller found herself dwelling on how, before Hunton’s body had turned cold, Hyde was volunteering to be Swope’s new executor.

And then it emerged that, two weeks before Thomas Swope ate his final breakfast, Hyde made two calls to a local drugstore.  In the first call, he put in an order for Fairchild’s Holadin, a common digestive compound.  In the second, he asked for several capsules of potassium cyanide.

Despite all this interesting information, the Swopes--apparently not fond of making a fuss over life’s little issues--went on as usual.  Then, just one month after Hunton and Swope died, tragedy again struck the family.  Two of Margaret Swope’s children, Margaret and Chrisman, fell ill with typhoid.  The dread disease quickly spread throughout the whole household, including the servants.  The family was so afflicted, they were forced to bring in not just doctors Hyde and Twyman, but five nurses.  No one else in Independence had come down with typhoid for many months.  The outbreak was exclusive to the Swopes.  Odd, that.  The family's water supply was uncontaminated, so it was a mystery how everyone became sickened.

31-year-old Chrisman was the sickest of the family, with a high fever.  On December 5, Hyde gave him a pill that he said would control the fever.  In a sense, it did.  Within half-an-hour, Chrisman went into convulsions and fell into a coma.  By the following night, he was dead.

When a bacteriologist named Dr. Edward Stewart heard of the plague striking the Swope family, he felt uneasy.  Typhoid was a common ailment at the time, but it was rarely fatal, especially for young people like Chrisman.  Dr. Stewart had not forgotten that in early November 1909, Hyde had requested his help in setting up his own laboratory.  To get Hyde started on his research, Stewart gave him samples of common bacteria--including salmonella typhi, which causes…typhoid fever.  One day when he knew Hyde was out of town, Stewart went into Hyde’s lab, just to see what he could see.  He was appalled to find that Hyde’s entire supply of typhoid culture had disappeared.

While Stewart was playing amateur detective, Nurse Keller was becoming increasingly unnerved by Dr. Hyde’s way with a sickbed.  She, as well as the other nurses, were particularly troubled by Hyde giving the patients frequent shots of strychnine.  In those days, strychnine was given in small doses as a stimulant, but the nurses felt that with the Swope invalids, such measures were unnecessary.  Keller and the other nurses went to Margaret Swope and stated flatly that if Dr. Hyde was not banished from the house, they were quitting en masse.  Margaret agreed to their terms.  It did not go unnoticed that as soon as the patients ceased to be treated by Hyde, they began to recover.

The Swopes had been hoping to avoid a public scandal, but after what must have been a singularly grim Christmas, the family decided they had no choice but to have Chrisman and Thomas Swope exhumed and autopsied.  These examinations found that both bodies were chock-full of strychnine.  When this news reached the ears of the public, along with the revelation that Thomas’ nephew-in-law was the prime suspect in their deaths, newspaper editors across the country wept with joy and slept with sweet dreams of lurid headlines and booming circulations.

In February 1910, a coroner’s jury affirmed that both Swope men had died of strychnine poisoning.  The following month, a grand jury indicted Hyde on eleven charges, including first degree murder and (in the case of J. Moss Hunton) manslaughter.  He was also accused of poisoning a number of other Swopes with typhoid germs.  

Hyde during his trial

Hyde’s trial--solely for the alleged murder of Thomas Swope--began in April, 1910.  The prosecution’s argument was exquisitely simple and glaringly obvious: Hyde wanted wife Frances to split the Swope loot with as few people as possible.  Accordingly, he plotted a wholesale massacre of his in-laws.  The defense was equally straightforward.  Hyde--with his wife remaining loyally at his side--asserted his complete innocence.  He declared that all the incriminating testimony against him was either taken out of context or a simple pack of lies.  He explained that he had bought capsules full of poison solely to kill some dogs.  After deliberating for less than three days, the jury found him guilty.  However, his lawyer immediately filed an appeal with the Missouri Supreme Court.  The Court overturned the verdict, ruling that the prosecution had not found “causation” (that is to say, they failed to prove that Hyde’s actions directly and deliberately led to Thomas Swope’s death.)  The Court also disapproved of the fact that, although Hyde was essentially on trial only for the demise of Thomas Swope, evidence relating to the other deaths was allowed to be presented to the jury.

The state of Missouri resolved to try, try again.  However, the second effort to convict Hyde abruptly ended on a bizarre note, when a juror became homesick and fled the hotel where the jury was sequestered.  The judge declared the escapee to be "mentally unsound" and declared a mistrial.  Trial number three had a hung jury.  After that, Margaret Swope--who had spent $250,000 trying to get Hyde convicted--threw up her hands and gave up.  Early in 1917, Hyde was officially a free man.

Frances divorced Hyde in 1920.  She gained full custody of their two children, and reconciled with her family.  She told her divorce attorney that she wanted nothing more to do with her husband, as he had become increasingly “sullen and irritable.”  However, she maintained her conviction that he was not a murderer.  Hyde moved back to his hometown of Lexington, Missouri, where he worked as a truck driver and mechanic before returning to the practice of medicine until his death in 1934.  As far as is known, he left no further suspicious body counts in his wake.

The Swope Mystery has remained a well-known part of Kansas City history, with a solid number of people willing to argue that Hyde was an innocent man who unfairly suffered a seven-year legal ordeal.  However, I suspect that Frances Swope Hyde made a very fatal elopement.