Do Go On - 36 - H.H. Holmes

Episode Date: June 29, 2016

This week, Jess has jumped into the suggestion hat and has uncovered the case of one of the first serial killers - H.H. Holmes! Come inside the Murder Castle but don't get too comfy! Twitter: @DoGoOnPodInstagram: @DoGoOnPodFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/DoGoOnPod/Email us: [e-mail] the show and get rewards like bonus episodes:www.patreon.com/DoGoOnPod Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Melbourne and Canada, we got exciting news for you. And we should also say this is 2026. Jess, what year is it? 2026. Thank God you're here. Right now, I'm in Melbourne doing my show with Serengy Amarna 630 each night at the Cooper's Inn Hotel, having so much fun. We'd love to see you there. Canada, we are visiting you in September this year.

If you've somehow missed the news, we are heading up Vancouver, Calgary, Montreal and Toronto for shows. That's going to be so much fun. Tickets for all this stuff, I believe, are online. And I'm here too. Hello and welcome to Do Go On. You can hear Jess Perkins. This episode is going to be very funny because she's already laughing before we've even said anything. My name is Dave Warnocky.

Did I say it's called Do Go On? I hope I did. You've already heard Jess's laugh. I'm here with her. Hello, Jess. Hello, Dave. How are you? Very depressed.

Trying to convince yourself to have a good time for laughing. And we're also joined by not laughing so much. A bit of a tough cookie to crack. It's Matt Stewart. Look, to be honest. serious business here. The business is podcasting. And we're all very rich.

There's a lot at stake. There's a lot at stake. My word, there is. Oh, you must. I just had a can of pumpkin soup for dinner. That's how well I'm doing. And some very buttery toast. Oh, man, I've been craving butter all day.

So before the pod, I bought a can of soup, bought a loaf of bread, bought a packet of butter, and put half that packet onto two pieces of toast. It was confronting to watch, but also, like, strangely satisfying. And then what you, after, I know after soup, I always feel like a bit of a dessert kind of treat. Did you have a little treat, Dave? A little $2 supermarket chocolate moose.

All right. Which is as delicious as it sounds. I noticed he didn't bring any for us, which is interesting. That is interesting. Do you guys want food? There is an extra one in the fridge if you want a fire-d-ever. I kind of just assumed you didn't get us one because you know we're both adults. Well, yes.

He is the youngest here. Thank you. Just to paint a little picture for our listeners, little Davey Warnock, he's still got moose all over his face. It's all around my mouth. Saving that for later. He had a good time. I could never finish a whole moose at once,

but I'm not going to put it back in the fridge. I just leave it on my face. It's a good way to do it. It's my style of eating. But how are you guys? What have you happened to dinner? Let's go around the table. I have not had dinner.

Okay. There we go. Who's the adult now? That's even less successful than I am. But very adult. And I had a frozen pizza that I put in the oven. Oh, cooking in a way. Yeah, in a way, because I got home and had to finish this report and was like,

I need something that I don't have to tend to while it cooks. Well, let me ask you one question. That pizza, what's your flavor? Tell me what's your flavor. What's your flavor? Remember that song, Matt? Yeah, Craig David. Is it Craig David?

It's from his unsuccessful follow-up. album after his smash hit that included walking away. And seven days. Which one's seven days? Sunday, summer, some, some, some. Monday. Took her for a drink on Tuesday. We were making love by Wednesday.

And on Thursday, Friday, Saturday, we're chill on Sunday. You've got to have a rest day. Got to have a rest day. Thanks, Craig. Can't be banging every day. Craig's a pretty good name. Craig. Remember last week you had an issue with King Stephen?

What about King Craig? Yuck. Oh, I couldn't be a King Craig. And also, like, Americans would say, like, Craig. King Craig. You know King Craig? You know that album that we're talking about is like 15 years ago? He's only like 33 or something now.

He was really young. He was a wonder kind. He really was. Was he really young? When he was walking away, he was walking away in nappies. He was walking away protege. I thought you were the rhymeer on the show. What kind of trouble say have then?

Oh, come on. Sam's laughter for the walking away protégé? Well, you know, I don't. just about give up, to be honest. Matt, you didn't let it breathe. You said, walk away protege, I am the best? But you can't finish the joke. I mean, am I wrong?

Walk away protege, shoot, which, chew it. Matt, I didn't even hear what you said because you're suddenly chanting. I am the best. Can we just say that after every joke today? I am the best. I feel I'm going to be saying that after a few of mine bum, as they often do. Well, I appreciate that you guys thought it was a joke. Anyway, I mean, really all I did was rhyme a couple of vaguely related words.

Not even. We need to work on rhyming with you. Portagee walking away. I'm, look, I stand by it. Yeah, all right. Well, this has been a rock solid start. Well, we don't usually talk this much about chocolate moose or Craig David. We should talk about both of those things more. What we usually do is that one of us take over and do a report, God, I hope it's about Craig Turford. Oh, that'd be great. What a segue. Jess, it is your turn to do a report this week.

It is my turn. And I have delved into the hat. Yes. Matt took off the hat momentarily. You jumped in there, grabbed a topic at random. You got to be quick. Man, I love the hat so much. Yeah.

The hat's pretty great. And it's fun to choose them. You know, it's like, oh, am I going to do that? What am I going to do? Did you hand pick or random pick out of the hat? I had a look at a couple, and then I did a really quick Google search of this one because I hadn't heard of it. And like, within a few seconds, I was like, oh, yeah, we're doing this. This is it.

Oh, I like that. That means that it's from the get-go. It's a good. That said, it's a darker topic, and you guys are really going to have to lift your comedic game to make our listeners not feel very sad at the end. Challenge, not accepted. Oh, great.

Oh, you're right. I'm the funny one. That's right. Shit. How's this going to work? Sorry, I've written jokes in this. Wait, look, I'll see if I can put some rhymes together. Yeah, okay, great.

Does the end of every paragraph does have... Pause for laughter written at the end of your report? Hold for applause. Hold for applause. And three, four. Second bow now. Anyway. Anyway, please do go on to start your report, which I assume you have a question.

I do have... Not breaking protocol 36 weeks in. No, never. I do have a question. Does it relate to the topic? Nah. It's just what's your favourite colour? That would break protocol.

Green. Okay. Blue. I'm blue as well. You guys always gang up on me. Although you can't make green without blue, so suck a dick. To yourself. You can't make that.

What a weird? I don't fully get why that is like a mean thing to say. Suck a dick. More than half of the world enjoy doing that. I would if I could. Oh, hang on. Okay. All right.

All right now. So, um, look. Well, Matt's on one. So my question. Dark topic, dark topic. Dark topic. My question is, who was America's original serial killer? Singing that bad offspring song, original prankster.

Yeah, this is what it is. Like, original serial killer. Original, all right. Original serial serial. I can't forget. I had never heard of it. The guy with the... Jack the Ripper, but that's single.

That's English. The guy only got Charles Manson. That was much, much later. More of a mass murder. So earlier than Charles Manson. Yeah, we're talking like 1800s. Adnan. Syed, allegedly.

Oh no, he's been convicted. And that wasn't serial. Oh, that was serial. Oh, that was serial. Oh, eh? I didn't ever get my own joke there. Can we call that one a joke? Yeah.

Two jokes. Two jokes and one, um, embarrassing. Oh, well, it's embarrassing. That's an interesting comment. You homophode. No, the one where you said you wish you were able to suck. Like you're not able to. All right.

Good. There's nothing homophobic about what I'm saying. Dave, Dave is backpedaling pretty briskly over there. Much like a homophoed. It is a little weird that he's on an exercise bike in the studio. You got to make time for these things. That's right. I'm multitasking.

I'm on a yoga ball. Nothing. Sam's laughter. I'm the Bears. What is happening today? Okay. All right. Serial killers.

Serial killers. All right. Serial killers. Look, I had never heard of him. Okay. So it's a him. Is this someone who, I remember vaguely had like a hotel where they killed people? Yes.

Oh. Correct. But I know no other details. I think it might have been like a Ripley's Believe It on nuts type thing. That's how it's a little fact about someone who allegedly killed a lot of people. That is absolutely bang on. Oh my goodness. Well done.

Now this was suggested to us by Cody Clark. Cody Clark, you morbid past. At Cody C-095 on Twitter. Also what's the Twitter? At Cody C. 095. Cody, if you were born in 95, that's my guess. Anyway.

If you are, that's my guess. If you're not. If you're 95 years old, congratulations on being good at Twitter. I saw someone driving around, and then number plate was like GS or two initials, and then it said 1924. Oh, yeah, okay. No, no, it said it was earlier than that. It was like 1920 or something.

So it was very similar to 24, but four years old. And then I looked at the person in the car, and they were, definitely that old enough to claim. So, 96 year old driver. Geez, always don't do that every day, do you? Yeah. I'll tell you what. Wish you did.

Nah, take the licenses away. Wow, so thank you to Cody for the suggestion, of course. But so it is as morbid as it sounds as a serial killer. Yeah, it's fascinating, but really sick and twisted as well. And what's kind of interesting is that there's a lot of information. and there also isn't a lot of information about this person, right? So. All right.

Well, one of those things is not true. No, no, no, no. But you know what I mean? Like, there's, there's... No, I don't. Okay. Well, like, there's still a lot of questions. There's a lot of points in this where you're going to ask me a question and I'm going to go, I don't know.

What's his favorite color? Blood. Black. Oh, I would say... That's definitely not a color. Oh, come on. Blood red. Just give me that one.

Okay. What about, um, I feel like that maybe you're just covering your tracks for... Lack of research? Yeah. Enough research. Look, that could be as well. No one knows what this guy's name was. Okay, well, that's not true.

But what I mean, and you'll understand as we go along, but there's so many points where you're like, why, why did nobody twig? Why, how did this happen? Their first serial killer. And they, as a country, what are they, like, 400 years old? So they, they, he's listed as one of the first. sort of serial killers in the modern understanding of the word serial killer. So was it highly publicised that kind of definition?

Yeah, exactly right. So I'll tell you a little bit about it. So his name... Oh, would there be a body count on this? Oh, yeah. Oh, cool, because maybe we've done that for King Tut and for Bonnie and Clyde now. Okay, yeah, sure. The trilogy of body counts.

Right, you can body count, so that's fun. His name was HHH Holmes, okay? Triple H. But he was actually born... Ah, wrestler. Herman Webster, Mudgett. Whoa. I think I get the change of name.

Are you thinking? Although I'm wondering why... Don't point that pen in my face. What is it, Herman? Herman. You pronounce H. H. H. Did I? H. H. H. H. Oh, no, no. No. No. No. No. No.

No. Fair enough. That's fine. Look, I've got no problems with that. I just... We'll take it every now and then I'd like to take the opportunity to feel superior to you. And, yeah. I'll be sure to let you speak I'd like to know the name again Herman Webster Mudgett And are you saying Was this one of the

Times where someone should have tweaked When they name someone that They thought of fuck he's going to be a killer Okay well now I feel like you're just taking the piss All right Lots of people died Dave Oh no I have a 200 year old serial killer He's the real victim here

No Too soon And what year was too soon He was born on the 16th of May in 1861, okay, in New Hampshire. 1861, he was born, now his parents were Levi Horton Mudgett and Theodate, Page Price. Thea, three cracking names. Great names. Can you just repeat those because they're so good.

Levi, these people never really come back into the story, but Levi. These people definitely didn't exist. Levi and Theodate. Yeah, this is feeling very made up, so. I made his whole thing up I've never See Levi, obviously I've never from Levi Strauss

I'm guessing that's how you say it And that's a woman Theodate Yeah So he was the third child So he had an older sister named Ellen An older brother named Arthur And he had a younger brother named Henry

So they've all got fairly normal names Herman Now his father was a farmer From a farming family What did he farm? First question No one knows Did you not hear the

I don't know, wheat and pigs, both of them. What a combo. Yeah, that's a great combo. How much land did you have? A couple acres. A couple of hundred acres. A couple of hundred acres. Oh, wow.

What could he have made? He could have, using his produce, Dave, what could he have put together? Bacon bread. I'm really happy to eat bacon bread. I'm not wrong. You're not wrong. Buddy, not wrong. He was a bacon bread farmer.

And his parents would devout Methodist. Now apparently as well his father was a violent alcoholic. Oh, really? So a bit of a troubling childhood, as they always do. I was thinking a lot of Levi. But then... Just for the genes? The serial killer.

They often do, like you say, have bad upbringings, don't they? Yeah, well, you think so, yeah. But apparently he was very good at school. He excelled at school. He was a really smart child. But then he got sort of bullied by jealous classmates because he was smart and because he excelled at school. So in an attempt to scare him, the bullies,

found out that he was scared of the doctors. He was scared to going to the doctor, so they forced him. They booked him an appointment. Oh no! 1pm! A checkup! No! My kryptonite! They bought him private health insurance.

Oh, I'll be there forever. With regular checkups. No! I'm glad you guys are finding this funny. You told us to try. I did, I did and thank you. Let the bodies hit the floor. Let the...

The bodies hit the flocks. Oh man, I'm hoping these bullies pay. But anyway. Anyway. So what did they do to... For the doctors. I think they will. They broke into the doctor's office,

and they made him stand face-to-face with one of the human skeletons, like one of the display ones. You know, when you have a human on display. You know what I mean, though, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. One of those skeletons. So they made him stand face-face with that. A human one.

Not one of the pig skeletons he used to back home. Yeah, he wouldn't find with that. And they even, like, they placed the skeleton hands on his face and, like, creeped him out. But, um... I'm sorry to think he's got less of a fear of doctors and more fear of skeletons. Well, I mean, I'm sure that didn't help. And if he said, he later admitted that that was very frightening at first, but then he sort of found the experience really fascinating.

And he said that that cured him of his fears. And he soon became obsessed with death and later started the hobby of dissecting animals. Whoa. So he's gone from one extreme to the other. Yeah. It's like it's fascinating. him now. Pretty quick.

Yeah. Well, actually. It'd be pretty disappointing. And then he grabbed the skeleton in hand and slowly pushed it down his body, just down, down, down his stomach, slowly down. And down to his belly button. Keep going down, lower and lower. Oh, no, no, no. And then he put out his, loosen his belt a little, down and, and, you know, et cetera, et cetera.

It's a guy, I've got to say, it's a pretty disappointing time for a bully when you're like, yeah, and they're shitting themselves. And then five minutes in, they're like, oh, I love this. They're making it out with the skeleton. They're mounted the skeleton. Just get out of here. Now the bullies are scared. Oh, Herman's crazy. What's the name like Herman?

Sorry, any Herman's out there. Now, at the early age of 16, he graduated from high school and took teaching jobs in and around the area that he lived in in New Hampshire. What sort of like tutoring style things? Well, it says took teaching jobs. So I think like a teacher and a school. Wow. Dave, that was fast.

As far as asking questions about an interesting point, that was you were way off the mark there. Oh, tell me more about these. What was he teaching? Piano. That would have been an interesting question. What is he like tutoring or like, what, was he just teaching in a classroom? Did he have a textbook? Fucking hell.

Probably. Was he a member of the teachers credit union? I don't know, Dave. Fucking hell. Stop bogging Jess. with the bullshit man. Okay. All right.

I don't want to have to warn you again. Guys? Teachers tweet in if you want us to talk more about your profession. Now, on July 4th in 1878, so he was born in what, 61. So he's like 17, 17, 18? 17. 17. He married Clara Lovering in Alton.

They got married. Great name again. Clara. Lovering. Lovering is a pretty good name. Lovering. Is it like, is it spelled lovering? Lovering.

But is it Great, really good Good banter you guys Lovering, right Lovering, what's your question? Is it spelled love ring Like L-O-V-E-R-I-N-G? Yes, love ring.

That's a great name. Hey, if I had to pick a wife Look, I don't think I've spent enough time on this. Would you say lovering or lovering? One question. Was she also a teacher and what was she teaching? I hate you. So they got married and then they had a son.

Oh, I'm born to be a teacher. In 1880, right? Oh, so imagine, so you've got a dad. Yeah, imagine that. I mean, like, imagine, but then also, on top of that, he kills people for a living. He doesn't yet. Shut up, he's a teacher. Okay, sorry, who teaches people.

For a living. So he teaches people for a living. That's fine. There's no shame in your dad being a teacher. He kills My dad's a teacher So's mine And I'm very proud of him

Oh dear dad We haven't discussed Dad's names What's your dad's name? Paul Is it really? Yeah I wouldn't have picked that at all

Paul What would you have guessed? Paul What would you have guessed? What would you get? The man I've never met It's more of a Gavin to me I would have said like a David

Oh yeah Dave, that's your dad's name I put David and Paul in the same world All right, both have a crack at my dad's name Your dad's name Oh fuck I think I know this too actually Gary No

No, I've got an uncle or garrets? A Warnocky? I feel like you've said this kind of recently, and I should know it. Jules. As soon as you say it, I'm going to know it. Jules Warnocky. Give us a first letter.

Greg. M. Martin. Malcolm. Martin is correct. You have said it. Martin Warnocky. All right, have a go on mine.

He's a fuckhead. I'd purposefully misunderstood what you said. For humour. Now we're all having fun. Close. Jim Perkins. Not close, but yeah. Jim.

John, bang. John Perkins. You guys are good at this, and I'm so... I would never have guessed Paul. Well played. Anyway, so now we've talked about our dad's names. I've played grandparents. Now, at the age of 18s, this is before his son was born, so just shortly after getting married.

He enrolled in the University of Vermont. Hey, before you go on, text in your dad's names. 1-800. Dad. Actually, yes, we do. Hashtag, Dad's name. Hashtag... Jeez, you used to be really good at the hashtag.

And I'll get there. Hashtag, my dad's name is. There we go, there it is. Very clever. I love the multiple meanings that you know what I do. Text in a hashtag. No, let's solidify that. My dad's name is, no apostrophe, we'll forgive you.

Yeah, great. You'll rule the hashtag. Okay, can I move on, please? Please. Last week was our loose episode, but this week is fucking crazy. 100% gold. I regret. Nothing I've said so.

far. So far. This is our Jumping the Shark episode. Jumping the dad. There it is. Hashtag jumping the dad. Yep.

All right. Happy with that. Okay. So when he was 18, he enrolled in university, but he's not that happy with the school. So he left... Because he was like, I'm already a teacher. Why am I here?

I don't need university. So he left after a year. And then a couple of years later in 1882, he entered the University of Michigan's Department of Medicine and Surgery and graduated in June 84 after passing his examination. So he's a doctor. And also, he only studied for two years and he's a doctor. Two short years, wow.

Yeah. So he's... That's a... You don't realize that. But back in the 1800s, being a doctor was one of the least respected jobs. What was the most? Most respected job? Rat catcher.

Rat catcher. Yeah, you actually had to do a 70. year course to become a rap catcher. I've only got one year left. Then I can catch allie rats. I've always dreamed of having 17 rats. Then they'll respect me. I'll show them all.

Imagine if he had 16 rats and then he accidentally caught two. And he's like, no! You'd have to kill one of them. I'll have to kill them all and start again. They know the rules. You might as well hit skip on your own The iPod. It's just a minute of Jess loving.

I'm so hot. They know the rules. Because the rats were like, no, fair enough. No. Fair enough. Chop our heads off. I think you,

Jess's laugh broke the... I'm sorry. Broke the internet. Kim Kardashian's ass and Jess's laugh. Oh, boy. No, it's funny. It's going to be good. Remember how we're like, no, we're not going to fuck around in this one. Oh, dear.

What has happened to us? I've got to throw up. You know what? Like, listening back, it won't even be that funny. Oh, I think it might be. Especially when you hear yourself laughing for a minute. I think you'll laugh. We know the rules. You can picture it with a little head rat.

It pulls up his little hat and he sort of hold his chest. It's been in honour, being in the sack with you. Governor. Yeah. Should we do it? No one. Do it. Don't take your time.

Let us have it. Throw us in the lake. We knew the deal when we got into this caper. And this sack. How do we get to rat sacks? Rat catcher. Rat catcher. A noble revision.

Of course, that's how we got here. Anyway. So he was a doctor. He's a doctor. H.H. Holmes. Now, while enrolled in medical school, he stole cadavers from the lab. Oh, God. He disfigured the bodies and claimed that the victims were killed accidentally

in order to collect insurance money from policies he took out on each of the deceased people. But weren't they like, he's already dead? Yeah, but he would take out an insurance policy. This is what I mean when I say there's questions. No, I suppose that records are obviously a lot less well-kewarm. kept. Yeah. So he would just...

So he'd take out a life insurance policy. And then we'd just drive into the place with a body and you'd be like, look, another one. I don't know. I don't understand how he got away with it, but it worked. So he would just claim insurance money on these bodies. He would disfigure them so it looked like they'd had some horrible accident. Yeah, I mean, maybe when he got to him, maybe they weren't officially dead yet. I mean, he's the doctor.

Maybe they've come in sick. No, they're already cadavers. Cadavars. Like med. Great word. It is good. It's like a med school. Is that what you were saying?

Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So they donated their body to science. So they're dead. Well, that's very confusing. It's so confusing. Maybe he drew a mustache on them and said that they were their twins. Yeah.

I don't know. That's what I mean when I say. There was a mix-up. You thought they were dead, but they're actually alive. But now they're dead again. Yeah. Can I have the money. Please.

Because for some reason, me, a stranger to them took out insurance. That's what I mean. It's so strange. Like, you're gathering you did this a few times. A couple of times. Yeah, it worked. And so this is like the beginning of Captain Crazy. So he shall now be known.

Captain Crazy. Now, weirdly, his marriage to Clara quickly fell apart. Which is strange, isn't it? Because he seems like a really balanced person. Just after he ripped her throat hair while she slept. No, luckily she lived. So he eventually abandoned his wife and son. And he spent the next couple of years working various jobs

and continuing with his scams he kind of moved around the country a little bit which was very strange. He moved to... Still doing these like sort of dodgy sort of thing. Yeah, and he moved to New York and a rumour began spreading that Holmes was seen with a little boy

who later disappeared. And he claimed that the boy went back to his home in Massachusetts, but no investigation took place and he sort of left town. So... Wow, it's quite a dodgy time. Yeah, it's really strange.

And he later, to travel to, sorry, Matt question? Is his name, his name's Holmes? I missed that. He changes his name. When did you become? I'm actually not 100% sure. Oh no, sorry.

Is it because right now? As of now. It's funny because I was thinking... I'm sorry, yeah, I was referring to him as Holmes. He sounds a little bit, already the story made me think of that other doctor that Dave talked about a few weeks ago who went on to write the story of Sherlock Holmes. Oh, Arthur Conan Doyle. They were both in the olden days, right?

Both became doctors. Yeah. Both had something to do with someone with the surname Holmes. Mm-hmm. Any questions? One solved murders, one committed them. Mm-hmm. All I'm asking is, please do go on.

Thank you. They must be the same person. He later travelled to Philadelphia, where he got a position at a drug store. And when he was working there, a boy died from taking medicine. that was bought from the store, and he, because his name isn't Holmes yet, Herman, denied any involvement with the child's death and immediately left the city. And right before moving to Chicago, he decided to change his name to Henry Howard Holmes to avoid the possibility of his previous scam victims catching up and reporting him.

So now he is Holmes. So I'm sorry I was referring to him as that before, but now moving to Chicago, he's now Henry Howard Holmes. The victims of his scams, who were they, the dead people? Henry. He stole his brother's name. That's right. That's a weird one. Sorry, Matt, what were you saying? Who were the victims of his scams?

Well, like, the boy who died taking medicine. I think there'd been some more insurance fraud. Yeah, the cadavers, possibly this kid in New York City, so there's just a bunch of weird crimes attached to us. So he's, yeah, so he's escaping the cops.

Yeah, well, he's not... And the insurance companies, I imagine. It doesn't seem like just yet he's being sought after by the police. He's just kind of like, I think maybe he would leave when people started to be a little suspicious of him. When he got that feeling he'd bail. So now he's headed for Chicago and he arrives in

Chicago in August of 1886 and he came across Elizabeth Houghton's drugstore at the northwest corner of South Wallace Avenue and West 63rd Street. And she gave him a job and he proved himself to be a hard word. working employee and they seem to get along quite well. And after her husband died, Holmes offered to...

Every death feels suspicious to me. Yeah, you say someone dies and you're like, oh no. Well, he wasn't really part of the drugstore. So she was his employer. So I think he may have died of his... Of natural causes. Anyway, allegedly. Allegedly.

Holmes offers to buy the drugstore from her and she agrees. She's like, yep, fine. But then she's never seen or heard from again. Oh. And whenever any regular customers asked homes about her whereabouts after she'd sold the drugstore to him, he'd say that she'd move to California to be close to relatives. But she was never heard of again. Oh, she must have really, yeah, just really liked the quiet life of the relatives in California.

Yeah, and just spent her days of the beach. Cut all ties from her life in Chicago. Jeez, what a life, hey? Yeah, a lucky lady. Lucky that he came about and then bought the drugstore. Yeah, gave her the money to retire. He really is quite a citizen. I wonder when he's going to turn.

It's obviously, yeah, at some point he becomes a bad guy, but bloody hell. For now, there's nothing but ticks on that page. So far, so good. So he'd arrived in Chicago in 1886, and in 1887, he married Merta Bellnap. Jess, like, if you want us to believe this, you're going to have to, like, at least give us... Her name was Mupp, oh, okay. Thank you. All right, so he hadn't even yet divorced Clara.

Love ring. He filed a divorce a few weeks after marrying murder, but the papers never went through. So he's technically married to both of them. Oh, and if that's his biggest crime. The crime of loving too much. Jess, you're really trying to bring this great man down. You're going to regret that's so bad.

Am I really? Oh, Jess, is that a threat? Yeah. Whoa, who's the serial killer here? So now, a couple of years later, he purchased an empty lot across the road from the road from the... the drugstore, and he built a three-story block-long hotel building. And because of its enormous structure, local people dubbed it The Castle, and the building

was 162 feet long and 50 feet wide. So it's pretty big. It's a pretty big building. Three stories. The ground floor of the castle contained Holmes' own relocated drugstore. He moved the drugstore across the road into a new location, and it had other shops in it. There was like a jewelry store and a couple of other little shops.

I'm not really sure exactly that good. Those are just sort of rent those out. I think he rented them out. So he sort of rented out those spaces. And the upper two floors contained his personal office and a labyrinth of rooms with doorways that opened to brick walls. Rooms with doorway. Okay, yeah, that bit.

Oddly angled hallways. Stairways leading nowhere. Doors that could only be open from the outside. And a host of other strange and deceptive construction. So was it a hotel or not? Could you stay there? Yes. It seems like it was more the case that...

It appears my room is a brick wall. It seems like... I'm afraid it's non-refundable. He sort of had tenants rather than a lot of guests. Right, okay, sure. But yeah, it was a hotel, so you could stay there. Now, he was apparently constantly firing and hiring different workers during the construction of the castle,

claiming that they were doing incompetent work. But his actual reason was to ensure that he was the only one to fully understand the design of the building. Ah, well, that does make sense. See, if you have different builders. Yeah, they only see part of it. They never know the full... They never know exactly what's going on.

I haven't felt this creeped out in a long time. I'm glad we're recording this at night. So that's good. Oh, in a castle-shaped hotel room. I'm terrified. Castle-shaped. Yeah. It's quite a big hotel room.

Yeah. It's shaped like a castle. Yeah, it's the castle themed. I'm in the dome right now. Our castle has a dome. I'm in the moat. Where are you dead? Pat?

Were you dead? Did he say that? Where are you dead? I swear you said. I went to say Dave. Where are you dead? Matt. Where are you?

Dad. Dad. Dad. I am in the broom closet. The castle broom closet though. We're in the castle and you chose the broom closet. Oh. Okay.

Now, during the period of building construction in 1889 homes, met and became close friends with a guy called Benjamin Petzel? Where did you research this? It could be Pitzel. It feels like you... Pizzle, Pizzle, Pizzle. The letters have been scrambled on all these words that you're trying to say. I'm dyslexic.

Anyway. Pizel. So it's P-I-T-E-Z-E-L. Pitzel. It's like Pitesal. Pitesl? Everyone involved in this case. Let's decide how we want to pronounce it.

Pretzel. Let's just call him pretzel. Right. Benjamin Pretzel. He was a carpenter with a quitzel. He was a carpenter with a criminal past. Can we call him Peter Pretzel? No, we'll just call him Pretzel.

All right, great. He used Pretzel as his right-hand man for his criminal schemes. So, and I don't think, Matt, did you hear that he's a builder with a dodgy past? Criminal past. Someone you might see on like a current affair. Yeah, dodgy builders. Yeah, he's definitely like, they're chasing him down the street. Like, why didn't you finish the job?

No, comment. Yeah. Yeah, somehow makes you sound more guilty than if you said, I killed them all! Exactly. So Pretzel comes up. this story of quite a bit. So after the completion of the hotel, it was all built. He selected mostly female victims from among his employees.

Okay, right, sorry. I feel like they should have been a full stop. After the hotel was completed, he chose mainly female victims from his employees. Oh my God. Many of whom were required as a condition of employment to take out life insurance policies. Who do you reckon may have paid for those premiums,

but also be the beneficiary? Why would you... Any ideas, anybody? Any ideas? Is it pretzel? No. Next guess. Is it...

Myrtle or bell nap? It's myrtle... No, it's homes. Is it Gary Warnocky? It's Gary Warnocky. Dave's uncle. You had a name change. Right, so he makes them take out

life insurance policies. He pays a premium. He's like, I'll pay for your life insurance. My new job has done the same thing. Should I be a bit worried? Very interesting. Hmm. So some of these employees slash victims, just as an idea,

they were either locked in soundproof bedrooms fitted with gas lines that let him asphyxiate them at any time. Asphyxiate, that sounds positive. What does that mean? Suffocate. You've got an issue. He'll asphyxiate it? Nope.

Just take away all the oxygen if you've got too much of it. Can't spell asphyxiate with that? Sphix. I was going to say fixed. Well, that would have made more sound. Svix was fun. Svix is still fun. Okay.

You got a problem? I'll fix it. That was his motto. That's on the billboard for the hotel. He's got a billboard and he looks creepy. He's like holding a knife. Which is weird because he kills people with other means. It was a red herring to make you feel safe.

Oh, he'll never gas me. He's a knife murderer. Oh, no! I can't breathe! I'm glad you two are finding this so fun. It's the only way to handle such a morbid topic. It is. Other victims were locked in a huge soundproof bank vault near his office where they were left to suffocate.

There was also a secret room. Yeah, that was the worst part there. They didn't take it to the bodies and the barrels? Well, that's a very recent one. That was a bank vault as well. Oh, of course. Of course it was. There was also a secret room that was completely sealed by solid brick that could only be entered through a trap door in the ceiling.

And Holmes would lock his victims in this room for days to die of hunger and thirst. That one seems almost the most human. I'd take the gas room for sure Would you? You'd take like a week to die in the other one What wait, what was... Gas. Would you rather gas that would kill you in like two minutes

Or the room where he leaves you to starve to death? There's others. There's more coming if you want to choose at the end. I mean, can I not, can I pick life? I want to choose life. Interesting choice. Like George Michael told me to. He also, this is kind of interesting and super creepy.

He also invented a, unique alarm system and installed it to all the doors on the upper floor to alert him whenever anybody was walking around in the hotel. Chubb's security still use it to this day. I'm not entirely sure how it worked. There wasn't a lot of information about his alarm system, but it seems like it was quite ahead of its time, obviously. It's probably just all connected to one bell.

Yeah. And I'd want to be like, oh, every time I open a door of bell rings. Look, it may have been that simple, I don't know. But he was aware when people were moving around in the top floor. Why did he want to be aware? I don't know, in case like... They found one of the rooms. Well, because if...

Well, he would be aware of who's where, obviously. And then if he heard movement and he was like, no, no, no, there shouldn't be anybody up there. And he may know that somebody's snooping around. Ah, Scooby-Doo. Yeah. Raggy? Um, the...

The victim's bodies were put inside either a secret metal shoot or a dummy elevator, which led to the basement where some were meticulously dissected. stripped of flesh crafted into skeleton models then sold to medical schools So is he doing this for money Or is he Or a combination of craziness and cash?

I think it's a bit of column A, A bit of column B I think it's for the patch No no no it's just for the money No no, you know what they like For the money Dave There's no way He has no enjoyment of this

He's like it's a job This is just a It's a gig I got to strip him of skin Get him down to the bones And so look You know, we all have to make ends meet. I think it's the opposite.

I do a 50-hour week like every other man on this block, okay? I think we all dream about, you know, making money from our passion, and he gets to do that every day. Wow. Oh, my God. This has become too real for me. If podcasting could be our full-time job, you know. It's like stripping a body.

Do you guys mind if I stop listening to Jess from now on? Hey, I'll turn my voice up in your ears. Thank you. But I also have to listen to Jess. I have to listen to Jess every day. Oh man, this topic is fucked. I'm sorry. Thanks a lot, Cody.

Is it interesting, fucked? No, I'm enjoying it. No, it definitely is interesting, but I'm starting to think, like, why is this Cody guy so interested in it? Because it's fascinating. Why does he want us to talk about it? Because it's fascinating. Now he knows how we think about it. Now he can use that against us when he brings us to his own hotel of mystery and death.

That's his whole plan. That's where my mind's going anyway. I'm starting to think that this HH homes guy might not be as nicer guy as. I originally thought and stated about 30 minutes ago. There we go. I'm starting to regret that statement completely. Good. To be honest, with a bit of hindsight,

I think it's starting to sound a little foolish. To have said that. Oh, dear. Oh, we did the pen lift. You're fucked. He looked his pen. Okay, so he's making them into skeleton models, but if you think about it.

Oh, sorry, sorry. I thought he was doing, he's having, like, a fashion show. Like a little skeleton catwalk with the moth. models going down. I've heard of stick-thin models being... But this is ridiculous. Sorry about all that.

Definitely worth stopping you mid-sentence. Yeah, I appreciated that. But through the connections that he'd gained in medical school, he sold the skeletons and organs with little difficulty. No, that makes no sense. Why is he constantly turning up with another skeleton? Where did you get that organ from, Holmes?

I just found this one in the forest again. You'll never believe it. Money, please. You know what? This sounds like a real bloody brilliant time for small business. And I think that's what they say today. Small business finds it so tough because there's all this red tape. Like if you try and sell an organ or a skeleton. Oh man.

You're feeling out forms for weeks. People are going to be there asking who's organs worthy, et cetera, et cetera. Did they have work cover? Oh, okay. I'm just trying to provide for my family. Honestly. I'm really P-Oed right now. So just to answer this question, Jess, is it going to get worse before it gets better?

Yep. Oh, no, Matt. So he also buried some of the bodies in lime pits for disposal, which, like, breaks down the bodies. And he also had two... Oh, he could have sold those, an idiot. He had two giant furnaces, which are used to incinerate some of the bodies or evidence, as well as... How many bodies are there? Have he selling some, burying some, putting some on a chute, burning others?

Some in giant furnaces. Giant furnaces. questioning this. He also has pits of corrosive acid and bottles of various poisons and even a stretching rack. Mm-hmm. So he's a psycho. Now, whatever. Oh.

Yeah. Yeah, he's a... He just starting to sound like a psycho. That stretching rack just put him over the edge. Yeah, that's right. He just went to the next thresholds. Now, at one point, a young woman called Julia Smyth moved into the building. She was the wife of Ned Connor.

So Ned and Julia... have moved in. A couple of normal names. Thank you, Jess. Nice people. I think, Ned was working at the pharmacy's jewelry counter, right? So, like, he was selling jewelry.

Okay. In one of the little shops in the building. At some sort of counter. At a counter of some kind. Now, Holmes began an affair with Julia Smyth. And after her husband, Ned found out about the affair, he quit his job. He moved away.

He left Julie. and her daughter Pearl behind and Julia gained custody of their daughter Pearl Oh no No, chose the wrong parent's Pearl Remained at the hotel

Continuing her affair with Holmes Say what you like about this guy He bloody bet a few women didn't he Yeah Is this his third wife? No, he's still currently married Twice Twice but living with one of them

Oh so that's when you say He continued the affair He continued his affair He's a fair. Right. Okay. So in 1891, Julia told him that she was pregnant with his baby and demanded marriage. And he agreed to marry her, but told her they could not have a child.

He then suggested performing an abortion and she agreed. Okay. And they planned it for Christmas Eve because that seems like a nice time to do. But Holmes murdered Julia by overdosing her with chloroform and later killed Pearl. as well. When confronted by a tenant in the building who questioned the whereabouts of Julia and her daughter, Holmes said that they'd left for Iowa to attend a family wedding. They never came back, but no questions asked, apparently.

Great wedding. They had a ball. They got married. They got married. It's one of the spare of the moment things. This guy, like, evil genius and so, I can't believe how many, like, he's making people fall in love with him and do, like, irrational things. Yeah. Like you like letting a small business man.

I mean, he was a doctor, but... Yeah, well, he's wealthy. It must be pretty wealthy, so... Oh, geez. And he's obviously... He has to be quite charming. You know, like, to do you get any way with all this. After Christmas, so after Julia's gone to a wedding...

Yeah, well, most people are like, wow, this is a weird time to get married. It's strange time, but I guess if everybody's already on holidays... Plus, it's a little bit cheaper. Yeah. Those kind of days. That was the kind of small talk they made. Yeah. Oh, it must have been...

Yeah, it was cheaper. Probably cheaper. Great value. Yeah. So he hires a man named Charles Chappell to articulate Julia's skeleton. So basically we turn her into one of the models. The skeleton. Why does he have to hire someone to do that?

I don't know. Because I assume he was doing it himself. And is the other guy dodgy or is this something he does non-dodggy? Again, I don't know. I don't know why he has this skill set. Like, is he like a taxidermist for people and it's quite legal? Or is it something like... Because that's not a thing.

I'm also a serial killer. But I mean, someone's got to be able to do it. I imagine, like, a lot of those skeletons now are probably not even real, are they? No, no. But back then, they would have all just been... Real, I suppose, yeah. ...donated bodies. So someone must have had the skills to do it, right, legally?

Yeah, I don't know. And maybe this... Yeah, they're from the university or... This goes... Or maybe he's just about to become crazy man number two. Yeah. So he brings this guy Charles... Charles Chappell to the hotel.

He introduces himself at this point as Henry Gordon, so it's another alias. Who says Henry? Holmes. He says, I'm Henry Gordon. Chapel's going to die. I just realised. No, but it's weird. I'm Henry Gordon and his people are saying in the hotel like, no, you're not.

Shut up. Yeah, see, I don't. That's what I mean with his questions. Is he still firing and hiring regularly? I mean, he's killing all his employees as well. So there must be a pretty high turnover of staff. That's a thing. When people go missing, nobody asks any fucking questions.

Do you ever reads a resume or he just hires anyone? Well, he had a thing for blonde women, so. I'm creeping myself out here. Not only am I not blonde or a woman, I'm also alive well after he must have been dead. Phew. Yeah, I'm also not blonde, so we're okay. But I could dye my hair blonde.

Oh, God. Wait, Jess, how lonely are you? He seems charming. I think I could change him. I could be the one that does get away. Maybe you could only kill every second weekend. Yeah, it could just be a hobby. Anyway, so he takes Henry Gordon now,

takes Charles Chappell, shows him the body. And after some discussion, they agree that Chappell would put the arms in a bag and take them home to articulate them and homes would do the rest of the body. It's so great. Gross.

What? So he hires him again a couple of times, takes him to the same room, another time it's to process a body of a man. The third job was for a body of another woman. And after Chappell finished the third skeleton, Holmes refused to pay the money he owed him due to some financial trouble. And so Chappell then refused to give home back the skeleton and kept it inside his home.

And it was later used as like evidence, much, much later. So there's just like a full skeleton in Charles Chappell's place. But he's holding ransom. Charles also sounds like he's asking very few questions. I know, it doesn't make any sense. A third body in your basement? All right. As long as you can pay, you can pay, right?

Yeah, if you just go past the two oversized furnaces. Don't take the second or third on the left because that's just a brick wall. The vat of acid. Was it acid? Lime, etc. And some of the other things you mention. I'm really just trying to show you that I've been paying it. Now, a little bit later, I think it was about 1892, 1893.

Oh, it'd be 1892. He's on a business trip in Boston. I don't know what kind of business. Entrepreneurring slash murdering. He meets a... His business card. Entrepreneur slash murderer. He met a railroad heiress.

Her name was Minnie Williams. And he introduced himself to her as Henry Gordon. So he's just got different names all the time. They started dating. entered into a relationship and although homes had to return to Chicago, he kept in touch with Minnie and sent her love letters. He's married also still at the same time. In February of 1893, she moved to Chicago and she contacted him and he offered her a job at the hotel as his personal stenographer and she accepted. So now she's working for him and they rekindle their relationship

and then he was able to persuade Minnie to transfer the deed to her property in Fort Worth, Texas to a man named Alexander Bond. Who do we think Alexander Bond is? Another alias for Holmes, correct. And who does she think Alexander Bond is? Who knows? He is such... How convincing is this guy?

They haven't even known each other long and he's like... Is there photos of this guy? Is he really good looking? He's pretty good looking. Quite a must-ash. I don't think I want to see him. No, you don't. But no, he doesn't look that murdery, though.

You know how, like, Charles Manson looks fucking murdery? This guy sort of just looks like a normal person. But anyway, so... Yeah, but a lot of the really successful ones do. They're like, even modern ones. I suppose that's how you get away with it. They're like go to their kids' soccer practice and the coach and stuff like that. They're just normal people.

They're really normal. My kid's soccer coach? Billy! Not Billy! Right, so in April of 1893, so only a few months later, she did sign the property over to Alexander Bond. And then Holmes proposed to Williams. So yes. Next to the furnace

He asked her to marry him He's already married twice And killed off a mistress But he's going to get married again He got down on one knee behind her And then someone pushed her So he proposes And then he says

Hey why don't you invite your sister Annie to come visit So Annie Williams comes and visits them in Chicago And they get along quite well Homes and he's soon to be sister-in-law They get along well He gives her a tour of the hotel Great, maybe this he's finally recovered He's going to go good

Now while working in his office one day, Holmes asked Annie to go inside his office vault to get a file for him. While she was inside the vault, Holmes locked her inside and turned on the gas line that led to the vault, killing her. About the same time, Minnie Williams also vanished. But we're not sure what happened to Minnie. No, but she probably just went to a wedding. Oh, thank God. In Ohio. Yeah, she went and got married without him.

So he didn't even bother giving a story for her. She's just vanished. But we don't know. But did Alexander Bond get the deed? Yep. Oh. And not long after this, Holmes left Chicago. Now, where or where could he possibly go?

To Fort Worth. Fort Worth, Texas, where he had inherited property. That's convenient. So convenient. There he sought to construct another castle, another hotel, along the lines of his Chicago one. But he abandoned this project, not really sure why. and he sort of continued to move throughout the United States in Canada.

He moved around a fair bit. Another interesting fun point, he married Georgiana Yoke in 1894 in Denver, Colorado. So now he's got three wives. Three wives and two dead mistresses. Two dead mistresses. He's a busy man. Now, in July of 1894, he was arrested and briefly incarcerated for the first time for a horse swindle that ended in St. Louis.

Well, there's one crime that's going to bring down. the greatest serial killer of all time. It's horse swindling. I've stood idly by so far. Right, fair enough. You've killed and dismembered your wives and their daughters. Fine.

But horse swindling? I draw the line. An innocent horse. Swindled again. Too soon. I'm not sit utterly by. Watch an innocent horse get swindle on the main street of Fort Worth.

Not in this town. Sunny Jim. Whatever you're calling yourself this week? No, that's right. I'm calling myself Sunny Jim. All right. You're under arrest. Sunny Jim.

So for all that he got arrested for was horse swindle. Now, he was bailed out, but while he was in jail... The only thing is he probably didn't even do that. Yeah, probably. While in jail, he struck up a conversation with a convicted train robber named Marion Hedgepeth. Oh, no. Is it a woman? No.

Oh, it was a Marion man. Marion. Yeah, good point. That's John Wayne's real name. Marion. Marion. You'd change it to John, wouldn't you? John Wayne?

Marion Wayne? Tough guys of the 20th century? Marion. Anyway, so Marion's in prison serving a 25-year sentence. Now, Holmes starts chatting to him because he's concocted a plan to swindle an insurance company out of $10,000 by taking out a policy on himself and then faking his death. So who's faking their death? Holmes. This is an idea Holmes has had.

Cool. And he's speaking to Hedgepeth, and he promises him a $500 commission in exchange for the name of a lawyer who could be trusted, like a dodgy lawyer. Right. You're a crook. You're going to know a dodgy lawyer. And if you tell me the lawyer's name, I'll give you $500 when I pull off this $10,000 insurance heist. Right. So Holmes was directed to a young attorney named Jephtha Howe.

Come on, Jess. Seriously, I'm just, I coughed these names. Jeptha. J-E-P-T-H-A. J-E-P-T-H-A. J-P-T-H-A. Jepther. Oh, come on.

Jeptha. Okay, now Jeptha. She's treating us like absolute mug, Dave. I feel like a bloody idiot. Jepther. Jepther thought Holmes's plan was brilliant. He's like, that's a great idea. Of course you bloody, dude.

He's Jepther. Unfortunately, though, Holmes's plan to face. his own death failed when the insurance company became suspicious and refused to pay out. So he didn't press the claim. Instead, he concocted a similar plan. When he walked in and tried to claim, they're like, Hello. I'm suspicious of something.

Something feels weird about that you're collecting your... Hello, I'm dead. Money, please. Money, please. Hashtag I'm dead, money, please. I'm really forcing the hashtag, so I'm sorry. Anyway, so it didn't work for him, but instead he's like, okay, well, we'll do a similar plan, but this time we'll use my good buddy,

pretzel Pitzel. Where's Pritzel been all this time? He's been around. He's hanging out. So, pretzel agreed to fake his own death so that he and his wife could collect on the $10,000 life insurance policy, which she was to split with Holmes and the attorney Jeptha. Right?

So you're going to fake his death and then everybody splits the money. It's a lot of money back then, too. Like, that's a huge amount of cash. So it's like a million dollar life insurance suite. It's plenty of money. Yeah. And so everybody's going to really make a, make a, make a, a good money, make a good living from it.

Oh, I feel like that Holmes is going to swindle this in his favour somehow. Do you reckon? Yep. So the scheme, which was to take place in Philadelphia, was that pretzel would set himself up as an inventor under the name P.F. Perry, and then be killed and disfigured in a lab explosion. And Holmes was going to find an appropriate cadaver to play the role of pretzel. Right.

So he's going to create a... You know who's... I reckon I'd use pretzels. And I bet you... What do you reckon? Is there any more appropriate cadaver for pretzel? For pretzel than pretzel? You're spot on.

He murdered pretzell. Yes. But I don't understand. Did he, they created a fake identity as well? They created a fake identity instead of... Yeah, but hold on. Hold on. Hello, I'm an inventor.

If you're going to invent a fake identity, why does it have to be you? You could just invent this identity, then get the body and then just call it, yeah, that body, that was David Jones. Can we have the insurance we put out? on David John. I guess they needed to see him alive for some reason, but yeah, I kind of agree with you there, Dave. Like I said at the beginning,

there are a lot of questions in this story. Anyway, so... I don't understand it either. Was Matt right? What happened in the lab explosion? He, instead of going and finding a body and disfiguring, he's like, I'm just going to kill pretzel instead. So he did.

He murdered him. He knocked him unconscious. He said to Pretzel, there's the body, and Prestel's like, where? And he's like, there and he's pointing at him and then hit him over the head. It's chilling.

He knocked him unconscious with chloroform and then set. his body on fire. Oh, no, no. That is awful. You've got to stop trying to give yourself a catchphrase there, buddy. No, no. You did it one time and it was funny.

Let it go. You guys have been saying it off mic all night. Jess really no and did you there. But so, just to recap, chloroform, he's not dead from the chloroform. He's dead from being set on fire. Oh, that is really awful. And so then Holmes proceeds to collect the individuals. insurance payout on the basis of the genuine body of his friend Pretzel.

Oh look, there it is. But Holmes then went on to manipulate Pretzel's unsuspecting wife into allowing three of her five children. Oh, no, no, no. Alice, Nelly and Howard to be in his custody. And the eldest child and the baby remained with Mrs. Pretzel, who doesn't know her husband is dead. Where do they think pretzel is?

He's hiding in London. He's told him they're hiding in London and then he and the three Pretzell. children travel through northern United States and into Canada and simultaneously he's escorting Mrs. Pretzel along a parallel route all while using various aliases and lying to Mrs. Pretzel concerning a husband's death.

So he's saying he's just, um, he's in hiding in London and we're gonna, we're gonna meet up with him at some point. And they're, but they're traveling together? No. No. Parallel route. He's like sending her one way and he's going a different way with three of her children. I don't, exactly. It doesn't make any sense why this is happening, all the while still maintaining whichever wife he's living

with now. I don't even remember which one it is. So the wife has just adopted these three kids with him? No, she's got no idea about the three kids. Oh, she's back home. She's back home. Why is she not worthy of death? It's so weird that he's, like, he's falling in.

So, yeah, maybe that's just real love. Oh, so the other one, yeah, I didn't even consider that. I thought he was actually falling in love, but he's... No, I think that he's a manipulative bastard. Well, I mean, well, you don't marry someone just for, oh, no, no, no. You've got to marry for love, whatever your name is now. Yeah, none of us know. H-H.

H-H. So that's terrifying. So even, like, it's really strange, but in Detroit, just prior to entering Canada, Mrs. Pretzel is only a few blocks away from where he's also staying with three of her children. She doesn't know where her children are, but at one point, point they were only a matter of blocks away from each other. Guys, what do we have to with the body count? We're really not sure, to be honest.

I reckon it's past all other episodes combined. Whatever, what are you got? I'm going to start counting now. Dave, give me a number. Will there be a body count at the end? Like a suspected number of victims? Oh, yeah. You and I, Matt, will take a guess each, right?

Yeah, that'd be really fun. Although, again... That will be really fun. It's a bit undisputed. Undisputed. It's a bit of... It's a bit disputed. I am undisputed.

Now, Holmes' murder spree finally ended when he was arrested in Boston on November 17 in 1894. Pig swindling. On his daddy's farm. After being tracked there from Philadelphia by the Pinkerton. Have you ever heard of the Pinkertons? It's a family of pigs. I looked this up. This is kind of interesting, actually.

No, I don't know them. Pinkerton founded as the Pinkerton National Detective Agency is a private security guard and detective agency established in the United States by Alan Pinkerton in 1850 and Pinkerton became famous when he claimed to have foiled a plot to assassinate President-elect Abraham Lincoln who later hired Pinkerton agents for his personal security during the Civil War.

So they're like this super cool detective agency. Wow, okay. Yeah, so they... There's a Weezer album named Pinkerton. Maybe that's where it's from. I reckon it might be. So the police had been suspicious of homes ever since his former cellmate, Marion, started talking.

Right? So he was sort of talking to the police about this guy. Was he bragging to Marion about his murders? No, but Marion kind of dobed on him because he never paid him the $500 that he promised him. See, no honour among thieves. Yeah, so he never paid up. So his payback, Marion shared the information with the police about, like, oh, he's a dodgy, this dodgy insurance.

claim that he's going to make. So they're kind of a little bit suspicious of him anyway. Now, while they initially had very little evidence to convict him with, they did have his outstanding warrant for stealing a horse in Texas. So they arrest him on that basis. And he was terrified of being sent back to Texas, apparently, where the punishment would be rough and ready. And he confessed to the insurance scam, rough and ready is apparently what he said. I don't really know. But he didn't want to go back to Texas because he was going to be punished. So he confessed to the insurance scam, but not the murder of pretzel. He claimed that he'd gotten

a body from a doctor in New York who shipped it to Philadelphia where he was living at the time. That's a much more believable story. And using his medical knowledge to fit the body into a trunk. And he actually nearly got away with that story. But then the inspector remembered that when the body

was first discovered, it was in full rigormortus meaning the person had died recently. So the inspector asked, what technique Holmes had learned to stiffen a body after rigormorus had been broken? And he didn't have the answer for it, so, like, the game was up. They got him! Yeah, how clever is that, though?

They're like, oh, really? Well, he'd been shipped here. Well, I didn't know you could put a body back into Rigamortus when it's out of Rigamortus. Mike drop. Tism had an album called D-Rigamortus. There you go. Well, maybe he was a Tizm fan. Was that named after Pinkerton?

Probably. Right, so then the police began interviewing the employees at the castle, like the hotel back in Chicago. Who was left? Yeah. Now, the caretaker was a guy called Pat Quinlan. He informed police that he was never allowed to clean the second floor. So they're like, well, this seems dodgy. So they begin this thorough investigation over the course of a month

and they uncover all of the torture chambers and secret passageways on the upper floor. Inside a large stove on the third floor, they found a piece of gold chain, women's hair and a woman's shoe. Now, suspecting that the chain belonged to Minnie Williams... That was a terrible meal. No nutritional value whatsoever So they think this might belong to Minnie So they took it to a local jeweller

Who had sold jewellery to Minnie in the past And he confirmed that it was hers So she died in an oven of some kind So he was torturing them as well Yeah So yeah it wasn't There was also a hanging room Where he would just hang them

That's just where we hung out in between murders The hanging room I mentioned a hanging room in five If you say yes to that offer, you're an idiot Yeah, a passive idiot They later looked inside Holmes' office vault And found several scratch marks And marks of what appeared to be a woman's shoe

He later stated in his confession That the shoe print in the vault came from Annie Williams During her violent struggle before she died When the police finished on the upper force They moved their investigation down into the basement And then they found a pile of human bones mixed with animal bones, a dissection table covered with dry blood, and a pile of bloody women's clothes.

Bloody women's clothes. Everywhere. I leave them everywhere. They leave them all over the bloody basement. So he wasn't even clean. It's just dry blood everywhere. He didn't even clean up after himself. I love that that makes you, that makes it grosser than if he was cleaning.

This is like the time you had to have a whole new crematorium built for you because you just didn't like the idea of anybody else's dust being mixed up in yours. Still freaks me out. Okay, well, what freaks me out is they didn't clean up the blood on the dissection table. Yeah, okay. Okay, horses for courses. We all have our thing. If you can say one thing about Jess, that she likes her serial killers, clean.

I do. I like them tidy. Anyway. Now, the investigators dug up the lime pits and found skeletal remains of Holmes' victims. The lime had turned most of the remains into dust, but they identified two strands of hair, one brown and one fair in two spots in the clay, and the strands match the respective hair colours of Minnie and Annie Williams. So they sort of found their bodies.

Investigators also found a pile of line with female footprint on it. They suspected that the footprint came from Minnie. And they also looked inside the acid pit and found several bones at the bottom. One part of the basement, investigators unearthed several bones belonging to a child, estimated to be six to eight years old, who maybe we can assume is Pearl, Julia's daughter. That's just getting so sad. This is fucked. They also found a dress that they suspected had belonged to Julia,

and they showed it to her former husband and he confirmed it was hers. So it's pretty, oh, it's pretty fucked. Three firemen later explored a nearby tunnel that led from the basement to the street and the tunnel ended in a hollow-sounding wall and after the fireman had torn it down, a plumber lit a match just to be able to see

so he lit a match for light. Oh, dear. And accidentally caused an explosion powerful enough to shake the whole building. Oh, what happened to the fireman and the plumber? Well, several of the men were injured and had to be taken to hospital, I don't think anybody died.

They were just injured. And afterwards, investigators found that the fumes that caused the explosion were coming from an oil tank hidden behind the wall. And Holmes, like, he had no explanation for the oil tank. There was no reason for that. But the chemists who examined the oil stated that the fumes were strong enough to kill someone in less than a minute. So Holmes later stated that the bodies that were found in the basement

were bought from a man who stole them from a local cemetery. But he could name neither the man nor the cemetery. So what was he doing with that oil? Nobody knows. There's no explanation for it. And that's the problem. He changed his story so often, and he was known for lying, that there's no solid answers for some of these questions.

A liar too. Well, well, well. Well, that's tipped it over the edge, matey. Okay, we're towards the end now, if that makes you feel any better. Hopefully he's not going to kill again from now, right? No, he's done. I'm pretty glad that he, I thought when he said it, start that was a sad end was he was going to die a happy old man in a nursing home, you know,

with three wives, three beautiful wives. Two of which are still alive and a third, just a bucket of bones, which he jerked off into every evening, you know, like real, just like real idyllic retirement. Jerking off into a bucket of bones. Yeah, that was a fuck thing to say. You've changed me today, Jess. Today. You did this to me.

You made me do this. So he's sitting in prison in Philadelphia now. He's confessed to the insurance scam, and there's all these different investigations happening into, you know, like, firstly the castle, but they're also looking into the Philadelphia police are trying to unravel the pretzel situation. In particular...

Unravel the pretzel. In particular, they're trying to find these three children that are missing that he had custody of, So Alice, Nellie and Howard. Oh, yeah, what happened to them? There was a detective called Detective Geyer, and he was tasked with finding answers. And his quest for the children,

much like the search for Holmes's castle in Chicago, received a lot of publicity. So the story of him searching for these children got quite a bit of publicity. And his eventual discovery of their remains essentially sealed Holmes's fate, at least in the public mind. So it was kind of like, yeah, no,

he's a bad guy because he found their remains. Wait, that was it? They already found his torture chamber. Yeah, I know, yeah. That could have just... They could have been anything. He didn't know it was there. I do have how the children were killed, but I might skip that.

Thank you. Okay. There is one... No, okay, I'll leave it. Let's just imagine the worst thing possible, and it's probably worse. Yep, pretty much. So, in October of 1895, Holmes was put on trial for the murder of Benjamin Petzel, and was found guilty in sentence to death.

Oh, so he killed Pretzel as well. Yeah, he did that ages ago, remember, for the insurance fraud. That's the insurance scam. There's just so many deaths and so many weird names has actually been very difficult to keep up. It has been, I'm sorry. He was convicted of that and sentenced to death. Sentenced to death.

By then, it was also evident that he had murdered the Pretzel children, and following his conviction, he confessed to 30 murders in Chicago and Toronto. Although some that he confessed to murdering were in fact still alive. So he's like, oh yeah, I killed this person, kill this person, kill this person. So he's lying. He's like full of shit. Wow. So that's why at one point he confesses to about 27 murders.

Then writers are about to hanging him. He's like, I only killed two people. Bang, gone. And it doesn't make any sense. It's so strange. But they did hang him. They did hang him. But before that, he was paid $7,500, which today would be about $215,000.

By the Hurst newspapers in exchange for his confession. but he gave various contradictory accounts of his life, initially claiming innocence and later that he was possessed by Satan. And his propensity for lying made it difficult for researchers to sort of get the truth. That's what I mean when I say there's lots of questions. We still don't have a lot of the answers because then nobody knows exactly what was happening. Now, while writing his confessions in prison, Holmes mentioned how drastically his facial appearance had changed since his imprisonment. He described his new grim appearance as gruesome and taking a satanical cast.

and wrote that he was now convinced that after everything he'd done, he was beginning to resemble the devil. Isn't that weird? There's actually a quote from him, I got down here, where he says, I was born with the devil in me. I could not help the fact that I was a murderer. No more than a poet can help the inspiration to sing. I was born with the evil one standing.

He's singing singer. Oh, he's confused poet. Singer right there. And also, like, I mean, nobody really loves poetry, but it's not murder. He said, I was born with the evil one standing as my sponsor beside the bed where I was ushered into the world, and he has been with me ever since. Creepy. On Bay 7, 1896, Holmes was hanged at the Philadelphia County Prison for the murder of Benjamin Pretzel. Until the moment of his death, Holmes remained calm and amiable, showing very few signs of fear.

Despite this, he asked for his coffin to be contained in cement and buried 10 feet deep, because he was concerned grave robbers would steal his body and use it for disson. Oh, and he knows how fucked up that is. Exactly. What a hypocrite. He's like, no, don't do anything weird to my body. That is strange. If he was going to say, because I'm afraid that the devil in me will, like, bring me back to life and I'll kill again, and it'll be like, oh, good on you, mate. No, it's just like, oh, don't touch my body, yuck.

That's gross. I don't know if this will make you feel better or not. I'm not sure if this is good. Matt's been very quiet. I feel like I need to give Matt a big heart. hug later. But, um... Look, this guy's man...

I just wish he was still alive so I could... Kick him in the nuts? Just have a stern word to him. Oh. And tell him it's not on, buddy. Cut it out. Buster, this is no good. You know, you're not making any friends.

Mm-hmm. Well, I mean, not long term. Are you... Where do you want me to go? Oh, yeah, yeah. I'll sign this. All right. Make it out to H.H.H., good. No worries.

And, um, yeah. No worries. Yeah. Anyway, what are we talking about? Really, mate, you are an interesting guy, and I think I misjudged you. Yeah, it's probably good. It's probably the best that he's dead. And this is kind of weird.

Holmes, his neck didn't snap when they hung him. Instead, he was strangled to death, twitching for over 15 minutes before he being pronounced dead, 20 minutes after the trap had been sprung. Well, couldn't happen to an assy guy. so weird I do have some Fun facts Yeah

I want to say fun Yeah I want to I'm really looking forward to your Your spin on making the end of this fun I just meant like a A kind of wrap up have I Is this too fucked No I've enjoyed myself a lot

I watch You bloody watch Lor and Otress for you And it's worse than this It's all right Matt Matt? Matt You don't watch Lorna

Not a special thing In the eye anymore Maddie Mattie Maddie? It's not me. I'm just telling a story. It's just a human psyche.

Remember, it's made up. Pretzel? You really think that one's called pretzel? No, good point. Claro Lovering? Come on. None of these. Murder. Mertor bell nap? Come on. Bell nap. Pulling your bloody leg.

All right. This has made me feel all the emotions. Mainly angry and sad, but... But all of them. All of them. All of those. I laughed for a solid minute. That was pretty good.

Geez, it started out bright. Didn't it? My life's going to feel like there were two parts. Aw! Before and after this episode. Well, you probably felt that way after the cremation episode as well. Yeah, I felt a bit sad. We've recovered since then.

And now it's one of my favourites. On March 7th in 1914, this is quite a while later, the Chicago Tribune, reported that with the death of Pat Quinlan, who was the former caretaker of the murder castle. I'm just imagining him as a butler. Was he a butler? I don't know, yeah, let's say yes. He's just kind of a caretaker.

He sort of, I don't know, watered the pot plants. So once he had died, they sort of said that the mysteries of Holmes' castle would remain unexplained because he was sort of gone. He was like that last connection. But sadly, Quinlan had committed suicide by taking strychnine and his body was found in his bedroom with a note that read, I couldn't sleep.

Quinlan's surviving relatives claimed that he had been haunted for several months and was suffering from hallucinations. I'm imagining him for some reason still living there but he wouldn't have been so that didn't make any sense in my head but yeah so he was very rough on him. Fun fact number one

right there. Somebody killed themselves. Because they couldn't sleep. Because of the haunting awful things they'd seen. Oh no. Yeah so he was aware. I don't think he was, no. Oh, man, that would be...

But that would be... But obviously, once the story came out, he would have been aware. Yeah, obviously, it's a psychologically thing. Oh, a lot of things now make sense. Totally. When he asked me to grease the death machine... I thought it was a euphemism. Yeah, so it's pretty fucked.

Now, what's interesting is the murder castle was mysteriously gutted by fire in August of 1895. Oh, the year after he died. Yeah. Now, according to a newspaper clipping from the New York Times, two men were seen entering the back of the castle between about 8 and 9 p.m. About half an hour later, they were seen exiting the building and running away. And several explosions happened and the castle went up in flames. Still unexplained.

Yeah, so a bit interesting. So there'd be, I imagine there are two options there. One of them is that they fucking hated it. They freaked them out and they just wanted to get rid of it. And the other was that they were somehow involved, right? Well, that was exactly what people thought. Some people sort of believed that they'd broken into the castle and started the fire in order to destroy any remaining evidence that the police hadn't discovered yet.

And other people believed that some outraged citizens started the fire to prevent the castle from becoming a future tourist attraction. Both make sense. Yeah. So it was gutted. The building survived, but everything inside was fine. And it remained in use until it was torn down in 1938. What city was, this is in Chicago?

Chicago. There's a few. What I know about Chicago? The Windy City. Windy City. Michael Jordan. Oprah Winfrey. Kill Hotel.

The top five. That's what you need to know. Everything you need to know about Chicago. And one of the big porn guys. What's the big porn guy? Ron Jeremy. No, no, like a Playboy, playboy guy. Oh, Hugh Hefner.

Hugh Hefner. I think the playboy... Big porn guy. I think of Playboy, but you could think of big porn guy. Yeah, I could think of a vague description. Playboy. What do you think about Playboy? That's from Chicago, I'm pretty sure.

I'm pretty sure that's in Los Angeles. I mean, California. Yeah, they moved there in the 80s or something. You full of shit? No, I watched a documentary about it. Oh, cool. Also, was it the Bunch, the housemates of... What was that show about his girlfriends?

Was it the real housewives of you have now? Yeah, what was that? Yeah, it was a great show. It wasn't that. It was on an aeroplane, I think. It was like just one of those really sort of dry stock footage documentaries. Right. They must put together for no money.

So good. I think Chicago also has O'Hare International Airport, which is the world's busiest airport. Is it really? Because it's the second biggest city. It's also second city. Oh, yeah, there you go. Improv.

Well, that kind of ties in nicely to what I was about to say because there's a few different representations of HH H.H. Homes in various media. So, for example, the Baltimore Rock Opera Society produced and performed a full-length original rock opera based on homes, titled Murder Castle. In May 2013, that's pretty good. Oh, my two favorite things, murder and musical theatre. No, no, no, rock opera.

Even better. Oh, no. There was an author called Anthony Boucher, Boucher, and he used H.H. H.H. Holmes as a pen name during the 1940s for murder mysteries and magazine reviews. It's kind of interesting. He uses a pen name. In the fifth season of American Horror Story, which aired last year, 2015, it predominantly takes place in a hotel and features a character named James March, who was said to be modelled after Holmes.

So, like, they used his story as a plot for the series of American Horror Story. And... My housemates watch that, and often don't sleep at night. Yeah, I don't watch it. I don't like scary movies. I probably went sleep tonight. Now, there's actually... I'll forgive you.

There's actually a film being made called Devil in the White City. There's a book written called Devil in the White City. And they're making the film. It's going to be directed by Martin Scorsese starring Leonardo DiCaprio. Really? He's going to be homes. He's going to be homes. Wow.

He'll probably do a fantastic job. Yeah. Is that in production? I think so. Well, like, it's... I saw articles about it very recently, so I think it's kind of in the next few years. We'll keep an eye out for it because you heard it here first, guys.

What's it called? Devil. Devil in the White City. And also on the Wikipedia page for H.H. Holmes, it also mentions that he's the topic in a few podcasts. So I think... Oh, so we're cashing in. I think we now need to somehow...

Somehow get a Wikipedia page. We need to edit that Wikipedia page and be like, he's also on episode 36. It's one of my dreams. Because I love Wikipedia. I love Wikipedia so much. It's one of my dreams to one day have a page. Okay.

Like, oh man, it's... Because I love it. As far as... Did you know that you exist? Achievable dreams. I reckon that's one you could just knock up yourself. Yeah, but it gets taken... No, I would never...

I would never... I would never... I would never... I would never do that. Sure. I'd like to earn my page. Okay. That gentleman was my report on H.H.H. Holmes.

Wow. That was quite the journey, I'm going to be honest. Oh, and just to tie it all together. So he admitted to, to like... About 30 murders and then took it back. They think it may have actually been closer to 200. I just want to look at that space. 200.

They suspect some say 100, some say 150. Up to 200 is sort of the guess. But again, no official confirmations because the bodies were just in bits. And you know how like it worked, like populations work where you wipe out 200 people, like the amount of potential people who'd be alive now, a couple hundred years later, he basically took away, he probably did the world a lot of favours

because, you know, overpopulation, that sort of stuff. You have really done a 180. Look, I'm just saying, I'm just looking for a silver lining here. Silver knife into your guts. Yeah. Imagine being Leonardo DiCaprio.

He's going to have to, like, isn't he one of those actors who really does the research? A method actor? Embodies him. I don't know if his method, but he definitely, you'd have to research a lot of,

what, oh, and just to be that guy, and they say being a good actor, as you would know, Jess, you have to really, you have to find something in the guy, in the character to connect with. Don't know? I don't know. You've seen my acting. Yeah. It's just me. Make me feel like murdering a bunch of people on our own. My comedy will make you want to go on a killing spree. Anyway, let's wrap it up and go home to our families if they're still there. Well, thanks for listening. Let's do another shout out to our.

favourite serial killer fan, Cody. Cody, please be cool. Yeah, be okay in your life, Cody. But no, great topic, because it is fascinating. I actually do. I bet you he found it because of that movie. Oh, maybe. Who knows how Cody found it?

Cody probably knows how he found it. Well, I come across. I'd heard of the murder hotel man before. Yeah, that's impressive. And so I heard my friend when I was mentioning last night that I was doing this report. Because I understand the fascination. I get a bit...

I love it. I read into these things, but then I'd do it alone at night, and I think, I wish I hadn't read that before bed. Yeah. So it's fun to joke about it with friends, and hopefully I'll drive home, forget about it, and sleep all night. Is it fun to do in a big dark, empty warehouse?

Oh, no. Can you guys walk me to my car? Yes, because it's just out the front. See it from the door. Thank God. It's parked next to your car. We'll be okay. Well, thanks so much for listening, guys.

If you, too, would like to have us talk about your favorite serial killer. Don't forget that you can tweet in at DoGoOnPod or on Facebook or email. We're getting a lot of lovely emails. I'd like to do a big shout out to Fergal in Ireland. He's been doing it a bit tough lately and has been finding a lot of fun in our podcast, which was one of the nicest emails we've ever read, right, guys? Yeah, it was the best. Thanks, Fulg.

So thank you so much for your email, Fergel. And you can like us on Facebook as well and Twitter. We try to do a couple posts every week. and always enjoy getting into a polite chat with the... There's always extra little in... No, there's always a little extra in jokes about that week's episodes and stuff like that and little maybe callbacks of stuff that you'll get if you've listened to much of the show. So check that out.

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