Great American Crime Stories

by Bill Bowers

  The next day after the tragedy the boat was found floating bottom side up and the body of the decedent was recovered from the lake.

  Of the facts thus far stated most are undisputed and all are established in our judgment beyond any reasonable doubt whatever. And now with the light which they shed upon it we will revert to the crucial question, What was the cause of Grace Brown’s death? and that leads us to an examination of the condition of her body as it was disclosed by the autopsy performed July 14th by five physicians who were sworn as witnesses.

  According to their testimony there were found on her head and face many marks of violence, especially there being evidence of a blow near the left eye sufficient to cause blindness and of a blow on the side of the head three inches above the ear of sufficient severity to cause unconsciousness even if not more serious consequences, and it is the theory of the prosecution that these wounds were inflicted by the defendant in the boat with the tennis racket and thereafter the body thrown into the water.

  The accuracy and completeness of this autopsy and the candor and truthfulness of these doctors were assailed with unflinching vigor and with much ability on the trial by the learned counsel for the defendant. He sought to minimize the evidence of violence and to make the witnesses admit that there were present all of the prominent signs of drowning, thus combating the People’s theory and sustaining the defendant’s theory of suicide. We think that he failed of success. It may be admitted that at times on cross-examination the answers of witnesses were unsatisfactory and that in the form in which questions were put they were compelled to admit the presence of signs incident to drowning, this latter evidence many times when occasion offered being modified to the effect that such signs as were actually found in this body might result from death in other ways or from the embalming which had been performed. But aside from this, through the examination of these witnesses as an entirety, there runs constant, consistent and convincing evidence that the decedent bore upon her head the marks of violent blows. In the statement compiled from the notes of the autopsy within sixteen days after the death and before witnesses, even if they were willing, could intelligently prepare for this trial, we find this concluding statement: “From the findings of the autopsy the cause of death was primarily concussion, followed by syncope and then asphyxiation.”

  This testimony to the presence of marks of violence is no expression of opinion or theory. It deals with actual, visible conditions. The witnesses either saw what they describe or else with wholesale and wicked perjury they are attempting to sacrifice a human life by pretending to describe that which they did not see. We cannot adopt the latter view, and when we reject it and reach the conclusion that the body bore proof of external wounds, we are led directly and irresistibly to the next conclusion as to the authorship of those wounds. No reasonable theory sustains the possibility of their infliction after death, and no reasonable theory accounts for their infliction before death save by the hand of the defendant.

  And again, when we reach this second conclusion, we are necessarily driven to the third and last one. If in those final moments whose events were seen by no living eye save that of the defendant himself, he was beating the head of Grace Brown, there is no room for conjecture about the quality and intent of his acts, and it becomes a matter of small consequence whether he thus wounded her to insensibility or worse, or whether he flung her still partly conscious into the water, there for a brief period to maintain a feeble struggle for life and thus produce those signs of drowning whose presence is so earnestly asserted by counsel.

  Thus far we have tested the People’s case almost entirely by the weight of their own evidence. But limited as we are to a choice between two theories of the decedent’s death, the one advanced by the People is strengthened in our minds, if that were necessary, by the improbability and apparent untruthfulness of the one offered by the defendant, and to a consideration of which we now turn.

  He testifies that shortly before her death he and the decedent commenced a discussion of their situation, and after a while he said in substance that he would communicate it to her parents; that they could not keep on as they were, and that thereupon she stated, “Well, I will end it here,” and jumped into the lake; that after some ineffectual efforts to rescue her, and without any cry for help he went on shore and gathering up his property and without informing any of the cottagers or hotel guests on the lake of the accident, he proceeded to Eagle Bay and Arrowhead, as already stated, where he spent two days in various amusements, still giving no information of what had happened. So that by this evidence, offered by the defendant himself as the only innocent explanation of what transpired, we see him emerging from this catastrophe where he had made no outcry for help, and with apparent composure turning in other directions and to other pursuits while he left the body of the woman, whom he says he loved better than any one else and intended to marry, lying unrecovered and unsought at the bottom of the lake.

  And when we have passed beyond the impressive unnaturalness of some of the principal features of this account, we encounter much evidence which still further impeaches its truthfulness. According to the People’s witnesses there were several, and, by the admission of the defendant himself, some statements with reference to the tragedy made by him after his apprehension widely at variance with his present testimony. There was no satisfactory explanation of the dry condition of the suit case which he had taken in the boat, or of the condition of his clothes, or of the completely overturned boat with the decedent’s cape lying on top of it. And in addition to these inherent deficiencies and improbabilities of his evidence there are repeated contradictions by a large number of witnesses who apparently had no interest in telling anything but the truth.

  While incomplete in respect to minor details this summary of the evidence is sufficient for the purposes of this opinion, and as a basis for the statement of our convictions with respect to the merits of the prosecution.

  We are mindful at every step that this is a case of circumstantial evidence and that the only eye-witness denies that death was the result of crime. But in obedience to the most exacting requirements of that manner of proof, the counsel for the People, with very unusual thoroughness and ability, has investigated and presented evidence of a great number of circumstances for the purpose of truly solving the question of the defendant’s guilt or innocence. We might think that the proof of some of these facts standing by themselves was subject to doubt by reason of unsatisfactory or contradictory evidence and that other occurrences might be so explained or interpreted as to be reconcilable with innocence.

  But it is earnestly urged that material errors were committed in respect to, and upon, the trial whereby substantial rights of the accused were so prejudiced that for this reason he should be granted another opportunity to establish his innocence, and we take up the consideration of these arguments.

  Independent of the competency secured for decedent’s letters by reason of the fact that they were part of a correspondence which included letters from defendant also introduced in evidence, her letters were perfectly proper evidence upon the subject of motive. They forced upon his mind, after he had proposed a termination of their intimacy, a vivid realization of the fact that the decedent, distressed in body and agonized in mind as the result of his acts, was clinging to him and was looking to marriage as the only solution of her difficulties, and that while pleading that he should come to her, she was intimating at the same time in no uncertain terms that if he did not keep faith and come to her she would come to him to accomplish this. They must have suggested with irresistible force that he had arrived at a point where unless he was willing to publicly acknowledge his relations with the decedent as he never had done and permanently cement them by marriage he must escape by another way leading in a different direction and, as the People say, to the tragedy at Big Moose lake.

  In conclusion, we think that no error was committed which substantially impaired
defendant’s rights. We believe that the adverse verdict was not the result of any of those occurrences which are criticised by his counsel and which possibly we could say might better be modified or omitted on another trial. But rather we think that it was based on the substantial features and essential character of the case which was fairly established against him, and that so long as the conduct of an accused is to be tested in such an investigation as this, by the intentions and purposes which ordinarily prompt human acts, and by the consequences which ordinarily follow them, no other result reasonably could have been expected in this case than that which has overtaken the defendant.

  Judgment of conviction affirmed.

  6

  The Mansfield Walworth Parricide

  Frank Walworth was the eldest child of historian, author, and Daughters of the American Revolution co-founder Ellen Hardin Walworth and her abusive husband, Mansfield. Mansfield apparently routinely beat his wife, even while she was pregnant. After their divorce in 1871, Mansfield continued to threaten his ex-wife, and generally to behave like what today would be considered a stalker. In June 1873, young Frank summoned his father to his New York City hotel room and shot him three times, killing him. The case garnered tremendous publicity. Frank was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment, but after four years (thanks largely to lobbying on his behalf on the part of his mother) the governor of New York pardoned him on grounds of insanity.

  THE WALWORTH PARRICIDE!

  A full Account of the Astounding Murder By His Son, With the Trial and Conviction of Homicide and His Sentence for Life to the State Penitentiary at Sing Sing.

  The Parricide.

  On the morning of Tuesday, the third day of June, 1873, the people of New York were startled by the news of one of the most remarkable murders ever perpetrated in that city. Though long accustomed to see, in the papers of almost every morning, the details of some new and unheard-of crime, such tragedies as that which marked the morning of the third of June have been so very rare that it gave rise to a general feeling of amazement, and caused an expression of horror to escape from the lips of almost every resident or sojourner in the city. In many years there has not been, in the United States at least, any very remarkable instance of a murder of a father by his son or daughter. There have been in the city of New York, within the past seven or eight years, some three or four cases of matricide, a score of uxoricides, several fratricides, and hundreds of homicides, but not one parricide — at least none that has been determined to be such.

  Since the day of the Fisk murder indeed no such excitement has been seen in the city of New York over any single event. The eminence of the family, the reputation of the murdered man as an author, and the peculiarly horrifying circumstances of a son killing his own father, gave the affair an appearance of sensationalism which was justified by the facts. It was a true sensation, not simply washed, and the startling circumstances no pen could overdraw. Those who read felt that the people of New York were to be edified by another cause celebre, in which the facts were more repletely terrible than any for many years. From mouth to mouth the story passed, and was soon known all over the city. At the various hotels, in the many lobbies, little else was spoken of, and it engaged the deepest attention. In front of the Sturtevant, inquisitive crowds would occasionally collect and gaze into the empty hallway with that singularly idiotic stare which crowds possess.

  Of all the crimes that shock the souls of men none has ever been held in greater abhorrence than parricide. To conceive that the offspring should become the slayer of the parent is fearful under any circumstances, but when the offense is committed with intent and knowledge, its enormity is intensified a thousand-fold. It was a crime punished by the ancients with awful rigor and held in the deepest detestation; and, according to mythological record, the culprits were delivered up to the torments of the Furies. (Edipus slew his father Laius as they chanced to meet in the way, while the son was journeying to Phocis, and the aventring Fates followed him thereafter with misfortune, disgrace, remorse, and cruel tortures to his death. Orestes, too, the son of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra, slew his mother to avenge the death of his father at her hands, and to blot, out her adulterous shame, and he likewise was tormented by the Furies, though afterward purified by the people of Argos.

  In all ages the offense, considered in proportion to the aggregates of murders, has been comparatively rare, and in the majority of these instances the deed has usually been the result of anger, accident or mental aberration.

  The circumstances of the murder of Mansfield Tracy Walworth by his son, Frank II. Walworth, renders this tragedy one of the most remarkable of the present or any past period of our history. At about 3 o’clock, on Monday afternoon of June 2d, a tall and slim young man, with frank and winning large blue eyes, a smooth face, fair complexion, light whiskers and refined features, and dressed in a light tweed suit, and a spring overcoat, applied to Mr. Barrett, the clerk at the Sturtevant House, for a room. He registered his name Frank II Walworth, and was allotted room No. 267 on the second floor. Afterwards he went to the house where his father was boarding, in Fourth avenue, near Fifty-fourth street. His father was not at home, the servant girl informed him, whereupon he left with her the following note:

  3 o’clock.

  “I want to try and settle some family matters. Call at the Sturtevant House after an hour or two. If I am not there I will leave word at the office. F. H. WALWORTH.”

  The servant girl promised to give the note to his father. He then left, and went back to his hotel. Later in the evening he spoke with Mr. Barrett, who had had a previous acquaintance with him, and the two young men took supper together. During the meal Walworth appeared cheerful and unconstrained. The two gentlemen conversed on ordinary topics, and both ate heartily. Mr. Walworth retired to his room early.

  At a quarter past six on Tuesday morning a tall, robust gentleman, middle aged, erect and fine looking, entered the Sturtevant House and asked that his card, on which was the name Mr. M. T. Walworth, might be sent to the room of Mr. Frank II Walworth. The call boy took up the card, and after knocking twice was answered by Mr. Frank Walworth, who told him to ask the gentleman to wait, as he was not dressed. A few minutes after the call boy had descended with this message the bell of 267 rang. The call boy hastened up stairs, and on knocking at the door was told to enter. He did so, and saw Mr. Frank Walworth fully dressed, with his overcoat on, seated in a chair close by the window.

  “Ask the gentleman to come up to my room,” he said.

  The hall boy departed, and on delivering his message, Mr. M. T. Walworth ascended the stairs accompanied by the boy, to show him the way.

  The boy says that he had barely time to get down stairs and look around him when he heard the report of a pistol, followed by another report, and still another.

  In a few moments Mr. Frank Walworth came running down stairs, and going to the desk said to the clerk:

  “I’ve just shot and killed my father up stairs in my room.”

  The clerk was first bewildered and then horror stricken.

  “Get a policeman as soon as you can, ” said Walworth. “I wish to give myself up.”

  He then, through the telegraph office at the hotel, at once sent a dispatch to his uncle, C. Walworth, at Albany: “I have shot father; look after mother.”

  He then went to the Thirtieth-street police station, and advancing to the desk where Sergeant Keating was in charge, said:

  “Officer, I’ve just shot and killed my father at the Sturtevant House.”

  “I’m sorry to hear it,” said the Sergeant, thinking at first that the self-accuser might be insane.

  The Sergeant called an officer and told him to take charge of the young man. Another officer was sent to the Sturtevant House to ascertain the truth of the story, and on his return with the dreadful confirmation, the facts were formally entered on the record. The young man delivered to the S
ergeant a small Colt’s five-shooter, with four of the barrels discharged.

  “That,” said he, “is the pistol I shot him with.”

  At half past ten Coroner Young and Dr. Marsh arrived, and Walworth gave the following statement in reply to the Coroner’s queries:—

  “I reside with my mother in Saratoga, my father having parted from her some years ago. My father is an author, and I have been studying law. I think my father is about forty-one years old, but do not know where he was born. My father has not lived with my mother since we left here three years ago, but he has repeatedly sent us threatening and insulting letters. It is only a short time ago since he threatened to shoot my mother and myself. 1 shot him because of this. Not long ago I met him in the street in Saratoga, and I then told him that if he did not keep away from us, or insulted my mother any more, I would shoot him. I also told him that there were bounds which I would not allow any man to go beyond with impunity, especially when my mother was being insulted. I went to his house yesterday and left a note for him to call on me, which he did this morning. When he came into the room I drew out a revolver and told him to promise me that he would not threaten or insult us any more, which he promised. Shortly afterward we began speaking on family; matters, and he used some very insulting language and put his hand in his pocket as though to draw out a pistol, when I shot him. He then came towards me and I fired three other shots at him. When I fired the last shot He had me by the collar. I only regret this on account of the effect it will have on my family. I would like Judge Barbour to know this, as he was interested in the case before.”