No. 77
Crime, Eccentricity, and the Sporting Life in 19th Century America.
April 03, 2012

Killed By Cowardly Anarchists.

April 3, 2012
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Tag: Gangs

Collecting Beer Money.

A gang of female rogues, of the East Side, New York, work a little racket of their own.

9/15/2015

Rogues & Brawlers.

11/13/2012

"Four Aces."

9/25/2012

The Astor Place Riot

8/15/2011
Via Newspapers.comThis tale of strange goings-on in a seemingly unremarkable apartment was told in the “Western Mail,” March 10, 1927:An extraordinary story of queer happenings in an unoccupied Fulham (England) flat was told recently by a foreman and two workmen who have been decorating it (declares the "London Daily News").One of the men mentioned to the foreman some days ago that when working
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Strange Company - 6/10/2026
"As his son I am proud of hisefforts to succeed in life"Jefferson Randolph Smith IIIArtifact #93-2Jeff Smith collection(Click image to enlarge) oapy's son hires a legal firm to stop the defamation of his father's name. At age 30, Jefferson Randolph Smith III, Soapy and Mary's oldest son, was protecting his father's legacy and his mother's reputation from "libel" and scandal. He was also
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Soapy Smith's Soap Box - 10/13/2025
You can see it peeking out from the Harlem River Drive or through the chain-link fence of the Third Avenue Bridge: a five-story red brick building almost buried behind glass and steel apartment towers. The towers are newish luxury rental residences built on the Bronx side of the Harlem River. Shiny and modern, they bring […]
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Ephemeral New York - 6/8/2026
Youth With Executioner by Nuremberg native Albrecht Dürer … although it’s dated to 1493, which was during a period of several years when Dürer worked abroad. November 13 [1617]. Burnt alive here a miller of Manberna, who however was lately … Continue reading
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Executed Today - 11/13/2020
In 1830, Joseph Knapp conspired with his brother, John Francis Knapp, to hire a local criminal, Richard Crowninshield, to murder their great uncle, Captain Joseph White, in Salem, Massachusetts. They believed that if the captain died without a will, they stood to inherit a sizable fortune.Read the full story here: "A Most Extraordinary Case"
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Murder By Gaslight - 6/6/2026
As Mr. Moody for the Prosecution dramatically expounds on hatchets and grisly details, and a glimpse of two skulls in a leather case, Lizzie slumps over in her chair. Was it the heat or the ghastly descriptions?
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Lizzie Borden: Warps and Wefts - 6/7/2026
  [Editor’s note: Guest writer, Peter Dickson, lives in West Sussex, England and has been working with microfilm copies of The Duncan Campbell Papers from the State Library of NSW, Sydney, Australia. The following are some of his analyses of what he has discovered from reading these papers. Dickson has contributed many transcriptions to the Jamaica […]
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Early American Crime - 2/7/2019
Melancholy Boat Accident. | Allan Pinkerton.

Killed By Cowardly Anarchists.

Killed by Anarchists Calamity, Pennsylvania, Oct. 1893 - Mrs. Reese, of Calamity, Pa., Learned their secrets, and she and her husband are shot.[more]

Mrs. August Reese was murdered and her husband brutally and seriously beaten by anarchists at Calamity, a small mining town two miles south of Pittsburgh, Pa., the other night. Some time ago Mrs. Reese learned the secrets of the anarchists and her death was at once decreed

While returning from church Mr. Rees and wife were met by Moen Laisen and August Brice, anarchists, who at once opened fire. Mrs. Reese was killed at the second shot. The murderers then turned upon the husband and left him for dead. A party was organized and Laisen captured. Brice had already succeeded in getting away. Constable Hebaffer, of Calamity, says the murder is the direct result of the killing of a Frenchman a year ago. Brice cannot avoid arrest.


Reprinted from The National Police Gazette, October 14, 1893