In Part 1 of the H.H. Holmes story last week, we joined the chase of America’s First serial killer using the words of his pursuer, Pinkerton Agent Frank Geyer. Obviously for his victims, including 10-year-old Howard Pitezel who Holmes murdered in Irvington, the curse began when they met the deadly doctor. The cursed aftermath of that dastardly event lingers today at the site of the young boy’s murder and the details are recounted every October on the ghost tours. But for conspiratorialists, the curse of H.H. Holmes began after the murderous doctor’s arrest and incarceration.
While in prison, Holmes said this of his Irvington crime: “On October 7 I called at the Irvington drugstore and purchased the drugs I needed to kill the boy in the following evening. I again went to the same store and bought an additional supply, as I feared I had not obtained a sufficient quantity upon my first visit. On October 10 about 6 PM I called him (10-year-old Howard Pitezel) into the house and insisted that he go to bed at once, first giving him the fatal dose of medicine. As soon as he had ceased to breathe I cut his body into pieces that would pass through the door of the stove and by the combined use of wood and corncobs proceeded to burn it with as little feeling as though it had been done some inanimate object… After I had finished the cremation of my victim I made the excavation in which the few remaining portions were found at the time the horror was brought to light… To think that I committed this and other crimes for the pleasure of killing my fellow beings, to hear their cries for mercy and pleas to be allowed even sufficient time to pray and prepare for death – all this is not too horrible for even me, hardened criminal that I am, to again live over without a shudder. Is it to be wondered at that since my arrest my days have been those of self-reproaching torture, and my nights of sleepless fear? Or that even before my death, I have commenced to assume the form and features of the Evil One himself?”
Holmes was the first to identify the curse while stewing behind bars in Philadelphia’s Moyamensing prison. In what must surely be one of the earliest examples of tabloid “pay-for-play” journalism, H.H. Holmes was paid $7,500 (over $213,330 in today’s money) by the Hearst newspapers in exchange for his written confession. “I am convinced that since my imprisonment I have changed woefully and gruesomely from what I was formerly in feature in figure. My features are assuming a pronounced satanical cast… My head and face are gradually assuming an elongated shape.” Holmes confessed, “I believe fully that I am growing to resemble the devil – that the Similitude is almost completed.” H.H. Holmes had become convinced that he was slowly transforming into the devil.
He was also embarking on a slow, twisting spiral towards insanity: “I was born with the devil in me. I could not help the fact that I was a murderer, no more than the poet can help the inspiration to sing…I was born with the evil one standing as my sponsor beside the bed where I was ushered into the world, and he has been with me since.” Holmes wrote, “The inclination to murder came to me as naturally as the inspiration to do right comes to the majority of persons.”
“Where others’ ears were touched with pity, mine filled with cruelty, and where in others the feeling was to save life, I revealed in the thoughts of destroying the same.” Continues Holmes, “Not only that, I was not satisfied in taking it in the ordinary way. I sought devices strange, fantastical and even grotesque. It pleased my fancy. It gave me play to work my murderous will, and I reveled in it with the enthusiasm of an alchemist who is hot on the trail of the philosopher’s stone.”
In October 1895, one year after his villainous walk through Irvington, Holmes was put on trial for the murder of Benjamin Pitezel. He was subsequently found guilty and sentenced to death on November 30th. On the morning of May 7, 1896, H.H. Holmes was hanged at Moyamensing, also known as the Philadelphia County Prison, for the murder of Irvington victim Howard’s father Benjamin Pitezel. Until the moment of his death, Holmes remained calm and amiable, showing very few signs of fear, anxiety or depression.
Holmes last evil act came as stood before the trap door of the gallows and denied everything. “Gentlemen,” he said, “I have very few words to say, in fact, I would make no statement at this time, except that by not speaking I may be made to acquiesce in my execution. I only want to say that the extent of my wrongdoings in the taking of human life consisted in the death of two women, they having died at my hands as the result of criminal operations. I wish to state also, however, so that there will be no misunderstanding hereafter, that I am not guilty of taking the lives of any of the Pietzel family, the three children or the father, Benjamin F Pietzel, of whose death I am now convicted, and for which I am today to be hanged. That is all.”
Holmes then stepped forward and stood upon the trap door that would soon leave him hanging between Heaven and Earth. “Take your time; don’t bungle it,” Holmes remarked. These were almost his last words. The cap was adjusted, a low-toned query, “Are you ready?” came from the hangman followed by H.H. Holmes equally low-toned response, “Yes, good-bye,” and the trap was sprung. The trap was sprung precisely at 10:12-1/2, Holmes’ neck was not broken, and the next 15 minutes were filled with convulsive twitches of the limbs and painful gasps for breath before Holmes was pronounced dead 20 minutes later. Conspiratorialists believe it was at during these final strangling moments that H.H. Holmes swore his cursed oath to the devil to punish any and all who had damned him to this grave annihilation.
The body was not cut down until 10:45. When it was laid out on the stretcher, it was discovered that the knot had become badly jammed, and the efforts of the doctors failed to loosen it as they attempted to remove the noose from about the neck. The dead man’s inanimate head was jerked from side to side in the attempt, and finally it was decided to cut the rope. Superintendent Perkins objected, however, and the knot was finally undone after several minutes of trying work.
The body was placed in an ordinary cheap pine coffin, wide enough and deep enough to have held two men of Holmes’ size. The coffin was put aboard an undertaker’s wagon and conveyed to the receiving vault. The only persons at the cemetery were the undertaker and his assistant, two grave-diggers, two watchmen and a couple of newspaper men. This small impromptu committee were pressed into service as pallbearers. They then witnessed H.H. Holmes’ last macabre request. Once in the temporary vault, the lid of the coffin was taken off and the body was lifted out and laid on the ground. After the bottom of the coffin was filled with cement, the body was then replaced inside and covered with a second layer of cement. It was Holmes’ idea that this cement would harden around his body like a cocoon and prevent any attempt at grave robbery. The coffin was left in the receiving vault under the guard of two watchmen, who remained on duty all night until the mixture hardened.
The curse as it affected others started the day after young Howard Pitezel was killed. On October 11th, 1894, during a parade to dedicate the Knights of Pythias Hall in Lebanon, George W. Powell, Superintendent of the Indianapolis police force and the man in charge of the Circle City chase for H.H. Holmes, was thrown from his horse, hitting his head against a curb. For a time it was thought he would not survive, but he eventually recovered. He dealt with the after effects of the injury for the rest of his life.
The first to die was Dr. William K. Martin, a coroner’s physician who had been a major witness against Holmes at the trial. He suddenly dropped dead from blood poisoning shortly after Holmes’ body was buried. The trial judge, Michael Arnold, and lead coroner, Dr. Ashbridge, were soon stricken with previously undiagnosed, deadly illnesses. The prison superintendent at Moyamensing, where Holmes spent his final days and who presided over Holmes’ execution, Howard Perkins, committed suicide by shooting himself in the head. Then, the father of one of Holmes’ victims was horribly burned in a gas explosion and the remarkably healthy Pinkerton agent, Frank Geyer, suddenly became ill. Thankfully though, the diligent detective pulled through.
Next, the office of the claims manager for the insurance company that Holmes had cheated, caught fire and burned. Everything in the office was destroyed except for a framed copy of Holmes’ arrest warrant and two portraits of the killer. Mrs. Anna Harvey of Chicago, who lived in the Murder Castle, committed suicide. The fiance of Holmes’ lawyer, Samuel P. Rotan, died suddenly. A priest who had prayed with Holmes before his execution was found dead in the church courtyard. The coroner ruled the death as uremic poisoning but according to reports, his body was found badly beaten and robbed. The jury foreman, Linford L. Biles, was electrocuted in a strange accident involving power lines above his house. On New Year’s Eve 1909, the “Handsome Bandit” Marion Hedgepeth, who had been pardoned for informing on cellmate H.H. Holmes, was shot and killed by police officer Edward Jaburek during a holdup at a Chicago saloon at 18th and Avers Avenue.
Then, Holmes’ Chicago Murder Castle was mysteriously gutted by fire in August 1895. According to a newspaper clipping from the New York Times, two men were seen entering the back of the Castle around 8 to 9 p.m. About a half an hour later, witnesses saw them run from the building in a dead sprint. The mysterious duo’s hasty retreat was quickly followed by several explosions and within moments, the building was in flames. Afterwards, investigators found a half-empty gas can underneath the back steps of the building.
Some believed that the Castle fire was started to destroy any remaining evidence that the police hadn’t discovered yet. Others believed the inferno was started by outraged citizens to prevent the Castle from becoming a future tourist attraction. As evidence for the latter, on August 5, 1895 a carnival sideshow exhibition known as “Kohl & Middleton’s Clark Street Dime Museum” opened featuring an exhibition centered around Holmes. The brochure/leaflet advertised: “H. H. Holmes! Come and see a lifelike representation in wax of this most noted criminal. Suspect of modern times. This figure is the work of the most skilled artists in America, who have been engaged for weeks in modeling a perfect counterfeit presentment of this alleged Wholesale Murderer of Men, Women and Innocent Children! Many interesting relics of Holmes and his supposed victims.”
Despite the attempted obliteration by arson, the building at 63rd & Wallace (601-03 W. 63rd to be precise) in Englewood on Chicago’s rough Southside survived the fire and remained in use until it was torn down in 1938. The site is currently occupied by the Englewood branch of the United States Postal Service. The Holmes curse lingered in Englewood long after the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair (located three miles away in Jackson Park) and the deadly doctor departed. Today, the three square mile neighborhood is one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in the city. Plagued by crime, drugs, gang activity, and violence, it suffers from a number of serious problems plaguing poor inner-city communities across the United States. It would seem that the curse of H.H. Holmes had struck again.
Next week: Part 3 — The Curse of H.H. Holmes.
Al Hunter is the author of the “Haunted Indianapolis” and co-author of the “Haunted Irvington” and “Indiana National Road” book series. His newest book is “Bumps in the Night. Stories from the Weekly View.” Contact Al directly at Huntvault@aol.com or become a friend on Facebook.
