BECAUSE I CAN.
The most interesting family, legal case, and sibling rivalry that I have ever seen or heard of.
On September, 17th, Samuel Adams turned up missing. His wife had even taken to advertising her anguish in the city newspapers. Upon reading the ads. a teacher of bookkeeping and penmanship came forth with a story. From his office in a main business building in downtown New York he had heard some odd noises coming from a nearby office like the clash of fencing foils followed by a heavy thud. This was the office of another teacher of penmanship, John Colt. He peeked into the office and saw a man bending over something. Later he borrowed a key and went into the empty room finding a floor that had been recently scrubbed clean and that a large packing crate there earlier was missing. Another witness said he saw a man, who he identified as John Colt, struggling down the stairs with a large shipping crate. A carman came forward as well saying that a man hired him to take the crate to the wharf for shipment to New Orleans. The carman said the man hiring him was John Colt.
John Colt came from an illustrious family. One of his brothers was a famous lawyer in St. Louis. The other, Samuel, was an inventor who had struck temporarily upon hard times. Apparently an invention of his, a revolving pistol, had failed and he was about to declare bankruptcy. Of course, he did not know that within five years a group of Texans, called the Rangers, were going to purchase his invention and make him a wealthy man. John Colt, however, was an unsavory sort. In 1841, he was a thirty year old ne'er-do-well. Earlier he had lied to get into the marines then committed forgery to get out. Then he became a professional riverboat gambler at which time he had a torrid public affair with an octoroon mistress of a rich planter and had to flee the South. In New York he had been arrested for burglarizing his employers shop. At the time of Adam's disappearance Colt was living with a woman who was not his wife who was about to have a baby. Actually John, as later revelations would show, was doing his brother Samuel a favor. Apparently, the woman, Caroline Henshaw, was the abandoned wife of his brother, Samuel.
The ship for New Orleans had been delayed and the constables arrived to find a grisly sight. Inside the crate was a badly decomposed body. Only a gold ring and an unusual scar on the leg identified the remains as that of Samuel Adams.
Colt was arrested and immediately brought to trial. Colt did not deny his killing of Adams. It had been a duel, he claimed, that had gone too far. There had been this angry fight over a debt that simply had gone too far. A sort of ante bellum dream team was assembled on Colt's behalf. The fee was some stock in Samuel Colt's new company which was to begin manufacturing one of his new invention, a battery for submarines. Colt admitted to the killing but declared it to be in self defense. Adams was strangling him, he said, and Colt reached out for something with which to defend himself, it happened to be an axe. In panic, he cleaned the office and stuffed the body in the create.
The newspapers of the day did not, as they had done just six years earlier with the Jewett case, become too excited or involved. This was strange because the rivalry was in place. First, there was--as there had been in the earlier case--James Gordon Bennett and his New York Herald which tended to sensationalize. His work earlier was largely responsible for getting the killer acquitted. Second, there was Horace Greeley and his newly established New York Tribune. Greeley was approaching journalism more cautiously, trying to downplay or handle sensation more discreetly. Most New Yorkers preferred Bennett's approach. So the lines were clearly drawn for a newspaper battle but it never occurred. Instead, both Bennett and Greeley stayed aloof, in a professional way not taking sides.
The prosecution built its case on premeditated murder. It claimed that there were shots to the head from a gun which were masked over by the axe blows. Furthermore, the prosecution claimed the coverup itself was a sign of guilt. Colt's character, with emphasis upon his previous affairs and present living with a harlot, were constantly brought up to influence the jury. Colt's stoic and resigned attitude in court was also used against him; he did not appear to have any remorse.
The defense based its case on any number of alternatives: manslaughter, self defense, and possibly insanity. There was some history of mental illness in the family. Immediately they dug up the body, decapitated the corpse and presented the head to the jury. There was no evidence, as the prosecution claimed, that gunshots were in the head. Therefore, the act was spontaneous and not premeditated, the legal requirement for murder. Furthermore, the defense noted, a premeditated murder would not be done in a crowed office building in the middle of Manhattan at the middle of the day. Certainly premeditated murderers could think of a better time and place to minimize apprehension, they noted. The coverup activities were only natural for a confused man fearing the stigma that might be brought upon his family. He knew that his shady past would compel many to rush to judgement. Of course, no one at the time realized that this "harlot" was the abandoned wife of Samuel and that John was simply taking care of her until delivery.
That was the case and now the jury left to deliberate for ten hours before they returned with the verdict on the Colt affair.
Source: The Colt Case. The website is a brief summary of chapters in the book Froth & Scum: Truth, Beauty, Goodness, and the Ax Murderer in America's First Mass Medium, by Andie Tuchter.
The Colt Case was one of the greatest travesties seen in any court, messy and only half thought out by the defense. However, things got even weirder, believe it or not.
For some time before the commission of this crime, Colt lived with a beautiful young woman named Caroline Henshaw, and she remained loyal to him to the end. As she and Colt both expressed the wish that they be made man and wife, arrangements were made for the marriage, which occurred a few hours before the time set for the execution. The witnesses to the ceremony were Colt's brother, and John Howard Payne, the author of "Home, Sweet Home." After the ceremony was performed, Colt asked for and was granted permission to remain alone for a short time.
As the hour for the execution was drawing near, the excitement about the Tombs became intense. Shotly before the dread moment, a fire broke out in the prison and for the time being the execution was forgotten, as it appeared that the prison was doomed. But the firemen soon got the fire under control and the authorities proceeded with all haste to prepare for the execution. A clergyman went to Colt's cell to console him, but found Colt lying dead upon his bed with a dagger in his heart.
There were rumors for a long time afterward that the fire was set by Colt's friends in order to spirit him from the jail during the confusion and that he had actually escaped, leaving the dead body of another person in his place; but they had little foundation and have been proved to be false.
Source: American State Trials: A Collection of the Important and Interesting Criminal Trials which have taken place in the United States, from the beginning of our Government to the Present Day, editor: John D. Lawson.
If this isn't interesting to you, I don't know what could be. Actually, maybe the insane life of Samuel Colt, written very interestingly here. Samuel Colt was the third son of Christopher Colt, who was a failure in most every way possible. The first son was John The Ax Murderer. The second was Christopher Colt, Jr. who married into a slave-trade family that was arrested a mere two years into his marriage, leaving Chris with an increasingly unstable and codependent wife until he left his family and children behind to be take care of by his brothers. Sam Colt himself was a failure until 1841 and had been sponging off his brothers for the past few years, spending all their money and sleeping around. James Colt was the extremely clingy youngest brother who became a lawyer after John's travesty of a trial after Sam more or less kicked him out. They had two sisters as well, one named Margaret that it is IMPOSSIBLE to find information on, and Sarah, who committed suicide when she was 21. It's highly likely that the Colt family was genuinely mentally unstable, although they definitely didn't have a very healthy childhood.
Chris I married his wife at a young age, and seemed to be absolutely smitten with her until she died and he remarried. The new wife refused to deal with Chris's insolent, bickering children (there was nothing but animosity and a grudging reliance on each other for the four) and sent them off at very young ages. John and Chris Jr. were sent to work on a farm, Sam was sent to become a sailor, and James was young enough that their stepmother allowed him to stay. Sam attended school, where he blew up a pond and was expelled, sending him back to sailing. Ambitious to the last, Sam sailed to England to patent his revolver and then came back to America to do the same, all the while his invention a flop and considered nothing but a useless indulgence until 1841. As his success kicked up, John went and slammed a hatchet into Samuel Adam's skull. The story goes that when he found out John was found with a dagger in his heart Sam broke into tears, saing "Thank God."
This family was fucked up and fantastic. I just hope to god that if they're used, they're used right.
On September, 17th, Samuel Adams turned up missing. His wife had even taken to advertising her anguish in the city newspapers. Upon reading the ads. a teacher of bookkeeping and penmanship came forth with a story. From his office in a main business building in downtown New York he had heard some odd noises coming from a nearby office like the clash of fencing foils followed by a heavy thud. This was the office of another teacher of penmanship, John Colt. He peeked into the office and saw a man bending over something. Later he borrowed a key and went into the empty room finding a floor that had been recently scrubbed clean and that a large packing crate there earlier was missing. Another witness said he saw a man, who he identified as John Colt, struggling down the stairs with a large shipping crate. A carman came forward as well saying that a man hired him to take the crate to the wharf for shipment to New Orleans. The carman said the man hiring him was John Colt.
John Colt came from an illustrious family. One of his brothers was a famous lawyer in St. Louis. The other, Samuel, was an inventor who had struck temporarily upon hard times. Apparently an invention of his, a revolving pistol, had failed and he was about to declare bankruptcy. Of course, he did not know that within five years a group of Texans, called the Rangers, were going to purchase his invention and make him a wealthy man. John Colt, however, was an unsavory sort. In 1841, he was a thirty year old ne'er-do-well. Earlier he had lied to get into the marines then committed forgery to get out. Then he became a professional riverboat gambler at which time he had a torrid public affair with an octoroon mistress of a rich planter and had to flee the South. In New York he had been arrested for burglarizing his employers shop. At the time of Adam's disappearance Colt was living with a woman who was not his wife who was about to have a baby. Actually John, as later revelations would show, was doing his brother Samuel a favor. Apparently, the woman, Caroline Henshaw, was the abandoned wife of his brother, Samuel.
The ship for New Orleans had been delayed and the constables arrived to find a grisly sight. Inside the crate was a badly decomposed body. Only a gold ring and an unusual scar on the leg identified the remains as that of Samuel Adams.
Colt was arrested and immediately brought to trial. Colt did not deny his killing of Adams. It had been a duel, he claimed, that had gone too far. There had been this angry fight over a debt that simply had gone too far. A sort of ante bellum dream team was assembled on Colt's behalf. The fee was some stock in Samuel Colt's new company which was to begin manufacturing one of his new invention, a battery for submarines. Colt admitted to the killing but declared it to be in self defense. Adams was strangling him, he said, and Colt reached out for something with which to defend himself, it happened to be an axe. In panic, he cleaned the office and stuffed the body in the create.
The newspapers of the day did not, as they had done just six years earlier with the Jewett case, become too excited or involved. This was strange because the rivalry was in place. First, there was--as there had been in the earlier case--James Gordon Bennett and his New York Herald which tended to sensationalize. His work earlier was largely responsible for getting the killer acquitted. Second, there was Horace Greeley and his newly established New York Tribune. Greeley was approaching journalism more cautiously, trying to downplay or handle sensation more discreetly. Most New Yorkers preferred Bennett's approach. So the lines were clearly drawn for a newspaper battle but it never occurred. Instead, both Bennett and Greeley stayed aloof, in a professional way not taking sides.
The prosecution built its case on premeditated murder. It claimed that there were shots to the head from a gun which were masked over by the axe blows. Furthermore, the prosecution claimed the coverup itself was a sign of guilt. Colt's character, with emphasis upon his previous affairs and present living with a harlot, were constantly brought up to influence the jury. Colt's stoic and resigned attitude in court was also used against him; he did not appear to have any remorse.
The defense based its case on any number of alternatives: manslaughter, self defense, and possibly insanity. There was some history of mental illness in the family. Immediately they dug up the body, decapitated the corpse and presented the head to the jury. There was no evidence, as the prosecution claimed, that gunshots were in the head. Therefore, the act was spontaneous and not premeditated, the legal requirement for murder. Furthermore, the defense noted, a premeditated murder would not be done in a crowed office building in the middle of Manhattan at the middle of the day. Certainly premeditated murderers could think of a better time and place to minimize apprehension, they noted. The coverup activities were only natural for a confused man fearing the stigma that might be brought upon his family. He knew that his shady past would compel many to rush to judgement. Of course, no one at the time realized that this "harlot" was the abandoned wife of Samuel and that John was simply taking care of her until delivery.
That was the case and now the jury left to deliberate for ten hours before they returned with the verdict on the Colt affair.
Source: The Colt Case. The website is a brief summary of chapters in the book Froth & Scum: Truth, Beauty, Goodness, and the Ax Murderer in America's First Mass Medium, by Andie Tuchter.
The Colt Case was one of the greatest travesties seen in any court, messy and only half thought out by the defense. However, things got even weirder, believe it or not.
For some time before the commission of this crime, Colt lived with a beautiful young woman named Caroline Henshaw, and she remained loyal to him to the end. As she and Colt both expressed the wish that they be made man and wife, arrangements were made for the marriage, which occurred a few hours before the time set for the execution. The witnesses to the ceremony were Colt's brother, and John Howard Payne, the author of "Home, Sweet Home." After the ceremony was performed, Colt asked for and was granted permission to remain alone for a short time.
As the hour for the execution was drawing near, the excitement about the Tombs became intense. Shotly before the dread moment, a fire broke out in the prison and for the time being the execution was forgotten, as it appeared that the prison was doomed. But the firemen soon got the fire under control and the authorities proceeded with all haste to prepare for the execution. A clergyman went to Colt's cell to console him, but found Colt lying dead upon his bed with a dagger in his heart.
There were rumors for a long time afterward that the fire was set by Colt's friends in order to spirit him from the jail during the confusion and that he had actually escaped, leaving the dead body of another person in his place; but they had little foundation and have been proved to be false.
Source: American State Trials: A Collection of the Important and Interesting Criminal Trials which have taken place in the United States, from the beginning of our Government to the Present Day, editor: John D. Lawson.
If this isn't interesting to you, I don't know what could be. Actually, maybe the insane life of Samuel Colt, written very interestingly here. Samuel Colt was the third son of Christopher Colt, who was a failure in most every way possible. The first son was John The Ax Murderer. The second was Christopher Colt, Jr. who married into a slave-trade family that was arrested a mere two years into his marriage, leaving Chris with an increasingly unstable and codependent wife until he left his family and children behind to be take care of by his brothers. Sam Colt himself was a failure until 1841 and had been sponging off his brothers for the past few years, spending all their money and sleeping around. James Colt was the extremely clingy youngest brother who became a lawyer after John's travesty of a trial after Sam more or less kicked him out. They had two sisters as well, one named Margaret that it is IMPOSSIBLE to find information on, and Sarah, who committed suicide when she was 21. It's highly likely that the Colt family was genuinely mentally unstable, although they definitely didn't have a very healthy childhood.
Chris I married his wife at a young age, and seemed to be absolutely smitten with her until she died and he remarried. The new wife refused to deal with Chris's insolent, bickering children (there was nothing but animosity and a grudging reliance on each other for the four) and sent them off at very young ages. John and Chris Jr. were sent to work on a farm, Sam was sent to become a sailor, and James was young enough that their stepmother allowed him to stay. Sam attended school, where he blew up a pond and was expelled, sending him back to sailing. Ambitious to the last, Sam sailed to England to patent his revolver and then came back to America to do the same, all the while his invention a flop and considered nothing but a useless indulgence until 1841. As his success kicked up, John went and slammed a hatchet into Samuel Adam's skull. The story goes that when he found out John was found with a dagger in his heart Sam broke into tears, saing "Thank God."
This family was fucked up and fantastic. I just hope to god that if they're used, they're used right.