No. 685
Crime, Eccentricity, and the Sporting Life in 19th Century America.
January 9, 2025

Life in Leadville.

Rev. De Witt Talmage Sampling its Wickedness.
January 7, 2025
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Tag: Attack

Knife and Chloroform Duel.

How a Doctor Kept a Morphine Fiend from Killing Him With a Long-Bladed Surgical Instrument.

6/21/2022

He Liked Little Boys.

How a Georgia alligator attempted to make a meal of Captain Johnson’s son.

3/20/2017
Via Newspapers.comOne often hears tales of ghosts returning to try to "solve" their own murder, but in this case the revenant appears to have been wasting his time.  The “Logansport Reporter,” February 18, 1899:Thornhope, a little village northwest of Logansport on the Chicago division of the Pan Handle, is all agog over a remarkable ghost story, the details of which were made public but
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Strange Company - 1/8/2025
Included in yesterday’s trip to Fall River was a stop at Miss Lizzie’s Coffee shop and a visit to the cellar to see the scene of the tragic demise of the second Mrs. Lawdwick Borden and two of the three little children in 1848. I have been writing about this sad tale since 2010 and had made a previous trip to the cellar some years ago but was unable to get to the spot where the incident occured to get a clear photograph.  The tale of Eliza Borden is a very sad, but not uncommon story of post partum depression with a heartrending end. You feel this as you stand in the dark space behind the chimney where Eliza ended her life with a straight razor after dropping 6 month old Holder and his 3 year old sister Eliza Ann into the cellar cistern. Over the years I have found other similar cases, often involving wells and cisterns, and drownings of children followed by suicides of the mothers. These photos show the chimney, cistern pipe, back wall, dirt and brick floor, original floorboards forming the cellar ceiling and what appears to be an original door. To be in the place where this happened is a sobering experience. My thanks to Joe Pereira for allowing us to see and record the place where this sad occurrence unfolded in 1848. R.I.P. Holder, Eliza and Eliza Ann Borden. Visit our Articles section above for more on this story. The coffee shop has won its suit to retain its name and has plans to expand into the shop next door and extend its menu in the near future.
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Lizzie Borden: Warps and Wefts - 2/12/2024
Coming across a vintage store sign tucked away in the modern cityscape is always a treat. And when that sign is actually two distinct old-school signs showing their age in different ways? It’s a find to celebrate. That’s the kind of sign I found myself charmed by at 318 Third Avenue near East 24th Street. […]
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Ephemeral New York - 1/6/2025
An article I recently wrote for the British online magazine, New Politic, is now available online. The article, “The Criminal Origins of the United States of America,” is about British convict transportation to America, which took place between the years 1718 and 1775, and is the subject of my book, Bound with an Iron Chain: […]
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Early American Crime - 12/17/2021
Today only! January 9, 2025
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Murder By Gaslight - 1/9/2025
Soapy STAR notebookPage 14 - Original copy1882Courtesy of Geri Murphy(Click image to enlarge) OAPY SMITH IN CALIFORNIA♫ California's the place you outta to beSo he loaded up his grip and moved to Grass Valley ♪ This is page 14, dated 1882, the continuation of deciphering Soapy Smith's "star" notebook from the Geri Murphy's collection. A complete introduction to this notebook can be seen on
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Soapy Smith's Soap Box - 11/26/2024
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
| Seeing in the New Year.

Life in Leadville.

Talmage

Rev. De Witt Talmage Sampling its Wickedness
He Goes the Rounds Among the Gamblers and the Girls
He Receives Lessons in Faro, Keno Poker, etc.

Rev. De Witt Talmage, on the 28th ult., repeated in Leadville, Colorado, his astonishing performance in New York a year or so ago, making a personal Inspection of the slums and by-ways, and privately visiting the dance-houses and gambling halls, and viewing the light therein presented for the purpose, as Mr. Talmage explains, of qualifying himself to flourish in the faces of his hearers the firebrand freshly snatched from the hotbed of iniquity. 


Illustrated Police News, August 14, 1880.