Everard FeildingThe following tale comes to us courtesy of barrister/psychic researcher (not a combo one sees every day) Everard Feilding, in the form of two letters he sent his friend Hereward Carrington, who published them in the 1951 book “Haunted People.” It is a rather delightful poltergeist account, complete with a supernatural snipe hunt!Transylvania,Jan. 26, 1914Dear Carrington,Your
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.
In the middle decades of the 20th century, Maurice Kish was probably not unlike many of his South Williamsburg neighbors. “Poultry Market,” 1940 Born in Russia in 1895, he immigrated to New York as a teenager, settling in Brownsville with his family. He served in the military and left it in 1919. Like so many […]
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 →
As Police Officers Henry Johnson and Eli Veazie were leaving
the Chelsea, Massachusetts City Marshal’s office on the evening of February 17,
1872, they were approached by a man, intoxicated and in a state of agitation.
“I have had my revenge. I want you to go with me,” he said, “I
suppose I have killed him and shall have to suffer for it.”
The man, Arzo B. Bartholomew, led them to a men’s
Soapy Smith STAR NotebookPage 19 - Original copy1884Courtesy of Geri Murphy(Click image to enlarge)
oapy Smith begins an empire in Denver.Operating the prize package soap sell racket in 1884.This is page 19, the continuation of page 18, and dated April 14 - May 5, 1884, the continuation of deciphering Soapy Smith's "star" notebook from the Geri Murphy's collection. A complete introduction to
[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 […]
A parson while instructing a pretty parishioner how to sing psalms forgets his duty and indulges in other exercises; Branchville, N. J. [more]
Placed Under Bonds to Answer a Charge Made by an Indignant Husband—Kissing and Squeezing Alleged.
The usually quiet village of Branchville, Sussex county, N. J., was startled from its propriety as by a galvanic battery, on Thursday last, when Rev. Thos. D Frazee, pastor of the Methodist Church of that place, was arrested by Constable Dillotson on a charge of attempting too much and violent familiarity with Mrs. Albert Halstead, a pretty young member of his church. Branchville has only six hundred inhabitants, and since the arrest they have been busy with the pastor’s name and fame in a manner that does not add greatly to his ministerial credit.
The principal of these stories has been sworn to by Mr. Albert Halstead, the husband of the lady who makes the charge against Mr. Frazee, and is in a fair way to come before the courts at an early day. The story that Mr. Halstead tells is as follows:
About a week ago Mr. Frazee came to my house for the avowed purpose of teaching my wife, who is a member of his church, how to sing some Hymns that he wished to have sung in church. Upon his very first visit he attempted to kiss her. She objected, and he told her it was no harm for her to allow such familiarity to her pastor. He then produce a hymn book and stinging behind my wife held the book in front of her face, his arm under hers, he looing in the book over her shoulder. This was bad enough but he kept time in an improper manner. My wife did not notice this at first because she thought he did it innocently; but after a while it he became more emphatic in his time-beating motions, and my wife, disengaging herself from his embrace, asked him what he meant by such conduct. He feigned surprise at her thinking he intended anything improper, and left. On Monday of this week, he came to my house again, and my wife’s little sister being in the room, almost the first thing he did was to send her out for some peaches.
No sooner had she left the house than he made improper proposals to my wife, and on her resenting the insults, he attempted to force her to yield to his unholy desires; but in this, thank God, was not successful, and alarmed at my wife’s screams, he hastily fled from the house. On the following day he returned and asked my wife to shake hands and make it up, but she refused and ordered him from the house. I was not at home at the time, but as soon as I heard of Mr. Frazee’s conduct I called on him in relations to the matter. He did not deny the charges I made against him, but told me I had better let the matter drop, as I was a poor man and people would not believe me. I told him that if I was poor I was honest, and that I intended to show him whether people would believe me, and I have cause his arrest as the readiest way of determining the matter.
Mrs. Halstead is about twenty years old and bears an excellent reputation in the village and wherever she is known.
Rev. Mr. Frazee is about thirty-five, has an amiable wife and one child. In addition to being pastor of the Branchville Methodist Church, of which he has been in charge for about eighteen months, Mr. Frazee is one of the editors of a Newark religious paper.
Mr. Frazee was placed under bonds to answer the charge preferred by Mr. Halstead, and the matter will be investigated.
Reprinted from "A Minister's Scrape." The National Police Gazette 9 Oct 1880.
"We follow vice and folly where a police officer dare not show his head, as the small, but intrepid weasel pursues vermin in paths which the licensed cat or dog cannot enter."
The Sunday Flash 1841