Murder of George Scott

29-year-old James Hartley and George Scott and other soldiers from the first regiment of guards decided to go for drinks at the Black Lion Pub on 123 Bayswater Rd, Bayswater, London, England. George invited James Hartley a soldier from the third regiment to join them. Henry Kendrick did not seem to like James.

Everyone was nearly drunk by 10 p.m.George insisted on splitting a parting pot. It would cost everyone a penny. Henry stated that James needed to pay a penny to and it was heard that James said "I'd be damned". A patron at the pub told James to watch his language. And In order to avoid any conflict, George said he'd pay James's penny because he invited him.

George needed to go to the bathroom. He got up and was about to the outside door when James stabbed George with a short sword. George collapsed on the floor screaming "Oh Lord, Kendrick I am killed, I am dead! James tried to escape, but he was stopped by a Hawker named William Davis by being hit in the face. Then a soldier named Rudkin helped stop him.

On 19 Feb. trial began. James claimed that he was attacked by  George Scott, Henry Kendrick, and Rudkin attacked him. He said that he was merely trying to defend himself. Henry and Rudkin claimed that there was no roughing up James, but Rudkin stated to another witness that Henry and James argued over a game of Dominos right before the stabbing. This was denied by Rudkin and Henry though. A barista was supposed to testify on James's behalf but wasn't able to. William Davis the patron that stopped James and had no ties to the soldiers agreed with Rudkin and Henry's stories.

James was convicted and was hanged at Newgate on 24 Feb 1800.

SOURCES:
The Exeter Flying Post or, Trewman's Plymouth and Cornish Advertiser 06 Feb 1800

Murder Houses of London by Jan Bondenson

Death Diary: A Year of London Murder, Execution, Terrorism and Treason by Gary Powell
British Executions
Capital Punishment UK

Missing: Sigmund "Sig" Myers

Sigmund "Sig" Myers 1920 was last seen in Portland, Oregon. He was reported later by family and it was believed he was last seen in 1920. He would have been 44 years old at the time if he disappeared in 1920. He is a white male. It was estimated he was 5'9" and around 165-175 lbs. Everything is in Estimated though.
SOURCES:
NamUs
National Missing Person Directory 

Torture Techniques: Thumbscrews

17th-century thumbscrew, Märkisches Museum Berlin

Thumbscrews are a non-lethal torture device designed to crush and break the fingers of the victim. Historians believe that the thumbscrew may have been created by the Russian Army and a Scottish man brought the device to western Europe.

The victim would place their fingers or thumbs in between three upright metal bars. The middle bar would contain threads for the screw that would push down a metal or wood bar. Some devices had spikes to cause bleeding. Their thumbs or finger would be placed between the bars and the screw would be tightened and begins to crush and break the fingers. This was very painful and was either used to extract forced confessions and information or to show enemies what they are capable of. 

SOURCES:

Wikipedia
The Vintage News
All That's Interesting

The Greenbrier Ghost: The Murder of Elva Zona Heaster Shue

In 1896 20-year-old Elva Zona Heaster who went by her middle name Zona met her future husband Erasmus (or Edward) Stribbling Shue who also known as Trout. He was a drifter and came to Greenbrier County, West Virginia to start his life as a blacksmith. 

It was known that Zona's mother didn't approve of him. Even though her mother didn't approve of them she still married him soon after. They moved in together in a two-story log home. 

On Jan 23, 1897, an 11-year-old boy who did chores for the Shue's came to their home. He had found the young Zona laying at the end of the stairs. She was dead and the boy ran to his mother and told her what he found. His mother then called the Dr and Coroner George W. Knapp.  The boy went on and then told Erasmus at his blacksmith shop. 

When the Doctor arrived Erasmus had brought his wife upstairs and cleaned and dressed her. Which was found strange because traditionally the women would do this. This would also be done after the coroner or Doctor looked at the body. 

Her husband cradled her head crying. Doctor Knapp tried to inspect the body, but when he would make it up to Zona's neck and head her husband would start getting agitated. So he was unable to do a full autopsy. He believed that Zona had died from everlasting faint or later changed to childbirth. It was unknown if she was pregnant, but a few weeks before she was having woman problems. 

Mary Jane Heaster Zona's mother was heartbroken from her death. 

Everyone found that Erasmus was acting weird at the funeral and wake. He was insisting that he help with funeral and placing her body inside the casket. Especially being gentle with her head. He was also standing towards her head at the casket and would fiddle with the pillows and claimed to make her more comfortable. 

Mary had claimed she saw Zona's spirit. That Zona had visited her four nights in a row. Zona told her mother that she was murdered by her abusive husband. She had told her that he got mad she didn't prepare any meat for dinner. 

Looking at Erasmus's history it was found he was married twice previously. Those two had died tragic deaths much like Zona. One broke her neck when she fell from a haystack, and the other died from a broken neck when she helped him repair a chimney. Another source states he divorced his first wife because he was cruel to her and his second died mysteriously. 

They exhumed Zona's body and found she had been strangled to death. Her neck was broken and bruises of fingers were on her neck. Mary's ghost sighting was what helped with prosecuting Erasmus. 

On June 22, 1897, the jury came back after 2 hours with a guilty verdict. He died on March 13, 1900 from an unknown epidemic at the West Virginia State Penitentiary in Moundsville. 

SOURCES:
Find A Grave 
America's Most Haunted
Little Things 
Appalachian History
Baltimore America
Wikipedia

The Wonnangatta Murders: Murders of Jim Barclay and John Bamford

Government Gazette page 6

On December 14, 1917, James "Jim" Barclay hired a cook named John Bamford worked for the Wonnangatta Station he managed in a secluded valley in the Victorian Alps in East Gippsland, Victoria, Australia. The two workers were last seen when they left Talbotville on December 21, 1917, after voting. They then returned to the Wonnangatta Station. 

On December 28th the Goold brothers went by the station. They didn't see neither worker but heard them and a dog moving cattle. They were out of sight and the Goold's left a note for the two in the Station. 

On Jan. 22, 1918, Harry Smith, a good friend, and stepson of the original owner of Wonnangatta Station went to the station to drop off mail. He found that Jim and John were not there. The crops had been cut which Jim stated he was going to mid-Jan. Their bedroom doors were locked and "Home Tonight" was written on the kitchen door in chalk. The note the brothers left weren't there and the note on the door wasn't there when they visited almost a month before. It's assumed Jim and John had been at the Station between Dec. 28th and Jan. 22nd.

Harry had stayed for two nights and they never arrived. He left on the 24th thinking they were probably doing work in another area. When he arrived back on Feb. 14th and the mail he left was still untouched and the message on the door was still there. The dog that Jim owned looked bad as he had been starved. The next day he arranged for a telegram to be sent to Arthur Philips the current owner. He was afraid something had happened to the two.

A search ensued and lasted several days. On Feb. 25th Jim was found in a shallow grave near the Conglomerate Creek which was 420 paces from the Station. Jim was shot in the back possibly with his own gun. Jim's clothes and a handgun he recently purchased were missing, but they left other valuables and Jim's shotgun at the station. John's horse was missing also. Food in the homestead was found to be covered in strychnine, but neither one (Johns body hadn't been found yet) was found to have been poisoned.

It was initially thought that John with his short temper had gotten in a fight with Jim and killed him. But in November his body was found buried under some logs near Howitt Plains Hut on Mount Howitt. He had been shot in the head. It was possible that John and Jim had stayed at the Hut to fix a fence.

It's unknown what had happened to the two or even the motive as some of Jim's personal items had been stolen(including a handgun he recently purchased), but other valuable items were left behind. If Jim and John were killed by the same person or person's why did they take John so far away to be killed and Jim so close to the Station? Or did the murders start at the Howitt Plains Hut while they stayed there to fix some fencing? Or it could be possible that Jim was at the Station while John was at the Hut and the murderers knew this and used the opportunity to kill both. 

Some assume that John had killed Jim and Jim's friend killed him in retaliation. But there's no proof in this and why would they allow it to take so long for them to be rediscovered. Jim also wrote to a friend that he was in fear of his life and hearsay claims he said he was scared of "three blokes". He had bought a handgun to protect himself. The crops he planned in mid-Jan. Were cut when Harry arrived on Jan 22nd and it's believed he may have been killed around that time. 

No one will really happen that night and it may never be known.

SOURCES:

Wikipedia

The Line Up

Harry's Hut

ABC

UNIDENTIFIED: January 21, 1955 Cadiz, California John Doe

On January 21, 1955, a skull belonging to an Asian male was found in the desert near Cadiz Beacon in Cadiz, California. The skull could have been there for years. The skull is believed to belong to an Asian male between 30- 50 years old. No estimated weight, height, or hair and eye color. No images are available.


SOURCES:
NamUs
Doe Network

Murder Terms: Filicide

Filicide is the term used for parents who have murdered either their own children or stepchildren. The murder victims do not have to be children but do have to be the child of their killer. The parents who kill their children may have different reasons, to it is to protect, harm or get rid of their child.

According to one U.S. study that was done in 2014 used 32 years of data. They found that at least 500 filicides happen in a single year. At least 50 of the cases of filicide was from the last five years of the study were done to the disabled. And within the last three decades, the act of filicide has decreased and did not increase with the '90s with the population increase.

Filicide on children 6 and under have taken up 72% of the murders and 10% was between 7 and 18 and 18% were with adult children. 1/3 of Infants who were killed were less than a year old.  It was found that during times of higher economic stress that there are more cases of filicides (infanticide) involving infants.

A father killing their son is more possible (29.5%) than a mother killing her son (22.1%) In the cases involving daughters a mother will more than likely kill her (19.7%) than a father (18.2%). The rarest cases are with stepmothers killing their stepson (.5%) or stepdaughter (.3%).

Parents were more than likely to use their hands when murdering their children. Some examples are forced drowning, beating and or choking which is the case with 69% of infanticide. As the victim gets older weapons like guns are used which is the case with 72.3% of adult victims. Contact weapons like bats and edged weapons like knives were less likely used. Men were more than likely to use a gun than women. Stepparents are more than likely to use guns (40%)  than biological parents (21%).



SOURCES
Brown
Dictionary
Autistic Advocacy 
NCBI

What Are Serial Killers?

The term Serial Killer was first termed in 1974, but they've been around long before that. A Serial Killer is someone who commits a series of murders of at least two different people or two separate murders over a period of time. The time could range from hours to years. 

The definition has changed over the years. It used to be defined by the FBI as four different events separated by a cooling-off period but was lowered to 3 by the '90s. It did exclude people who were caught before continuing on their murdering. 

There is a fantasy they want to establish and enjoy at the risk of hurting others. Most time they d

It's been a popular topic among law enforcement, mental health experts, academia, and the general public. It's also been the topic for many t.v. shows, moves, plays, stories, and books. People know that serial killers are the things of nightmares. Many people don't even realize that serial murders take up only 1 percent of all homicides. Currently, there are 35 active serial killers at any given time in the U.S.

Serial killers aren't a new thing. There have always been terrible people since the beginning of time. The documentation of the serial killers wasn't adequately documented, meaning that there is very little information out on serial killers in history. There are many that are well known such as Jack The Ripper and H.H. Holmes. 

There are many myths that come with serial killers that people commonly believe.

Serial Killers are loners and a weird.

In reality, many serial killers were not loners and seemed completely normal. Most of them don't appear to be reclusive or to be misfits in their public lives. Many even hide in plain sight in their communities. Even Law Enforcement has overlooked some serial killers due to how put together they seem.

For example, serial killer Dennis Rader or BTK was married with two children. He was a boy scout leader, served in the U.S. Air Force and was employed by the local government and was the president of the church. No one suspected he was BTK who had killed 10 victims and sent 16 taunting letters to the news media in a 30-year span in Wichita Kansas until he was caught. It's believed most serial killers fit in well much like Rader.

An example of someone who does fit these criteria was Ed Gein. He was awkward and was a hermit and outsider. It's known that he had killed two women and had been robbing graves in order to make a mother suit for himself.


All Serial Killers are white males.

This is not true as serial killers are of all races and sexes. The diversity of serial killers correlates to the races of the population. Women are not immune from being serial killers either. 52. 21% of Serial killers are White, 40.3% are Black, 6.1% are Hispanic, 0.7% is Asian, and 0.8% is Native American. 90.8% are men and 9.2% are women.

Charles Ng is an Asian serial killer and was a native of Hong Kong, China before becoming a serial killer in Northern California with Robert Lake.

Derrik Todd Lee is an African American male who killed at least 6 women in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Rory Conde,a Colombian native was a Hispanic serial killer who killed 6 prostitutes in Miami, Florida.

Nannie Doss was a female serial killer who poisoned 11 people between the 1920s to 1954.

Serial Killers are only motivated by sex.

This is a big reason for 46. 11% (including thrill, lust, and power) of serial killers, but there are other motives. 31.68% did it for financial gain, 8.12% did it for multiple reasons, 7.84% did it out of anger, 3.28% did it for a criminal enterprise, 1.21% did it to avoid arrest, .62% did it for attention, .73% did it for convenience, .41% did it due to a hallucination, and .21% did it due to a Cult.

Amy Archer-Gilligan did it for financial gain as she killed many of her boarders after they named her in their life insurance. Between 1911 to 1916 she killed at least 48 people.

Anthony Garcia killed 4 people due to revenge.

Richard Kuklinski killed for the mob.

Zodiac killed for attention.

Son of Sam or David Berkowitz had paranoid schizophrenia. He believed a dog was telling him to kill.


Serial Killers travel and operate on interstate. 

Serial killers have defined comfort areas that they kill within or at. Once in while they will kill outside of their comfort zone after they built their confidence. Many of them do not include them traveling on the interstate to kill.

All Serial Killers are insane and or evil geniuses. 

This is a common misconception as many of them do have personality disorders, but are not considered insane. The intellectual levels of serial killers also vary from below-average to above-average levels.


Serial Killers want to get caught.

Serial killers committing their first crime/murder are inexperienced and then learn to develop their skills and get better at not being caught. It isn't until they get too confident that it is their downfall. As in they begin taking short cuts and or have the mindset that they won't get caught. This is what eventually gets them caught.

Albert Fish had sent traceable stationery to the mother of one of his victims. He easily overlooked the envelope he had used which had the emblem of the boarding house he was staying in.

Joel Rifkin had been driving around with no license plates and when the police tried to pull him over he started a high-speed chase. He eventually got into a crash and the police found the body of his last victim in the trunk.



SOURCES:
Britannica 
Statistic Brain
FBI
Psychology Today
Wikipedia
Ranker
Psychology Today

Missing: Eetu Vainonen

Eetu Vainonen went missing sometime between 1935 and 1936 from Gorham Township, Ontario, Canada. He was last seen in the Thunder Bay (Port Arthur) area. He was a white male and would have been  30 or 31-years-old at the time. He had grey eyes and brown hair. He was 5'7" and 150 lbs.

SOURCES:
Canadas Missing

Murder of Sam Townsend

The families of Sam Townsend and Peter Leach who was close to 30-years-old  lived together in a house in Lumberton, North Carolina. The two suspected that the other was cheating with their wives. They did not show any signs of hostility to each other till the night of Jan 6, 1879.

There was a neighborhood party involving others of the African American Community that night at their house everyone seemed to have been enjoying themselves. That is until Sam and Peter began to fight. Words were exchanged between the two. Sam left the home and Peter followed behind with his gun. 

"Do you mean it?" was shouted by Peter before he pulled his gun on Sam. He then shot Sam in the thigh near the groin. Sam was taken to a physician for the injury, but they couldn't do anything but stall his death. He died three days later. 

It took around four weeks to arrest Peter. Even though it was said he wasn't doing anything to avoid. Peter was arrested on Feb. 1, 1879, at the Irvine Oxendine in the bar room.

On September 11, 1879, Peter's wife 21-year-old Olive came and brought him a Ginger molasses cake. The next day Peter ate a large portion of the cake and he shared with fellow prisoners. He was found frothing from the mouth and in pain others who ate the cake also got sick. It had turned out his wife had poisoned the cake. This left him paralyzed and hardly able to speak.

On September 24, 1880, Peter was set to hang. He was able to speak by this day and claimed to repent his sins and was not scared because of his trust in the Mercy of God. He was still paralyzed and was hung in a chair. His neck did not break and it took 11 minutes to die.

Peter was not the only one to have killed someone in his family. One brother Tom murdered a Sherrif Deputy and another brother unnamed in articles had also killed someone. The unnamed brother was also hung for his crime and I couldn't find if Tom had been caught. 

SOURCES:

The Wilmington Sun

The Kansas Daily Tribune 

The Great Bend Register

The Daily Review 

UNIDENTIFIED:1947 Calico California Jane Doe

The skull was claimed to have been found in Calico, California sometime in 1947. The person who found it kept it and after their death, the skull was turned over to Bureau of Land Management by a friend. Skull belongs to a young woman between 15 and 25-years-old.

SOURCES:
NamUs

Murder of Joe The Quilter

Joseph Hedley better known as Joe the Quilter was a master at Quilting. He was known for his quilts so much so that some of his quilts were sent to America from his Northumberland, England Cottage. When people described the 80-year-old he was welcoming, harmless and an inoffensive man. He would even allow people to stay at his cottage with him.

He was last seen on Jan. 3, 1826 and it was believed that the horrific crime happened right after he returned home as the stuff he'd gotten that day was found.

The attack began in the cottage as he was attacked with a coal rake. He was able to escape his home and had gotten to at least across the street. The killer followed and continued to beat him. They then dragged him back to his home as it left his shoes and torn clothes showed. They beat him and then took a knife to the elderly man. They slit his throat and mangled his face. He had self-defense wounds on his hands from the knife.

Having not seen Joseph for a few days neighbors got worried and went to check on him. What they found was a bloody mess. The room seemed to have been covered in his blood. The killer even wiped his hands and then folded the towel and placed it upon a quilting frame. The cupboards and drawers seemed to have been rummaged through. Money may have been stolen.

It was believed that Joseph knew his killer and this case will remain unsolved.

SOURCES:
New Castle Weekly Courant
The Bury and Norwich Post 
Caledonian Mercury 
BBC
Unsolved Murders

Murder of Hannah Latham

18-year-old Hannah Latham was an orphan who lost both of her parents when she was young. She was taken in by William Blenkinsopp and his wife. When she was old enough she worked for Nellie Jackson and her family in Brignall.

Hannah spent New Year's Eve of 1812 in Barnard Castle, England. She had saved some money to buy little presents for the family and was carrying the money in her purse.

She spent some of the evenings at the Ship Hotel on The Bank. She had left before 10 p.m. to walk four miles home through the snow to Brignall. She was able to travel two miles past the Holy Trinity Church in Startforth and up to a narrow road towards Cross Lanes. This is where she met her killer.

There was evidence she fled from her killer escaping into a field before returning to the road. He had caught up to her though. Unfortunately, she had been raped and her throat was slit. One article stated that her head was nearly cut off.  She was found on New Years morning.

Crowds came and trampled the scene destroying any evidence that may have been there. Many wondered if the killer had attended the funeral and if they knew the killer. It was never found out who had ended the young girl's life so viciously.

SOURCES:
The Times
The Northern Echo