Killer Stories with Harvey Guillén - “H.H. Holmes” Pt. 1: Herman Webster Mudgett

Episode Date: February 17, 2020

He was the master of the infamous “Murder Mansion,” and often cited as America’s first serial killer. H.H. Holmes began his career as a con artist in Chicago, taking advantage of anyone he could between 1886 and 1894—all the while hiding his darkest motives. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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We advise extreme caution for children under 13. 30-year-old H.H. Holmes listened to the clock tick as he prepared his operating table. It was past midnight now. Christmas morning, 1891. While others lay safe in bed, dreaming of sugar plums, the doctor was at work. He pulled a long metal instrument from the tray beside him. him, the woman lying on the table, Julia Connor, led out a gasp. But he quieted her with a shush. He promised the procedure wouldn't hurt a bit, and it was essential.

She couldn't be allowed to have his child. In reality, he had no idea how to perform such an operation, but that had never stopped Holmes before. He was a cold, calculating man. If this contingency plan went awry, he'd simply come up with another. It didn't take long for Holmes to botch the procedure. Soon, his patient lay dead below him, as did the child inside her. The doctor shook his head.

It was too bad, but she knew the risks. With a heave, he shoved the body off the table to carry it to the cellar. He grunted as he dragged the corpse down the secrets. staircase he had constructed years before. The loss of Julia didn't weigh too heavy on his mind. Holmes was far more focused on the task at hand and the task ahead. The real challenge would be dealing with her six-year-old daughter. Hi, I'm Greg Polson.

This is Serial Killers, a parcast original. Every Monday, we dive into the minds and madness of serial killers. Today, we're covering the sadistic crimes of H.H. Holmes, the master of the infamous murder mansion. The man often cited as America's first serial killer. I'm here with my co-host, Vanessa Richardson. Hi, everyone. You can find episodes of serial killers and all other podcast originals for free on Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. To stream serial killers for free on Spotify, just open the app and type serial killers in the search. At PARCAST, we're grateful for you, our listeners. You allow us to do what we love.

Let us know how we're doing. Reach out on Facebook and Instagram at PARCAST and Twitter at PARCAST Network. And if you enjoyed today's episode, the best way to help us is to leave a five-star review wherever you're listening. It really does help. No one knows exactly how many murders H.H. Holmes committed. He confessed to 27, but only nine were confirmed. yet he had the motive and resources to slaughter dozens, if not hundreds. This week, we'll explore Holmes' childhood, his turn toward a life of crime,

and his first two confirmed murders. And the completion of his notorious murder castle, a building designed to hide Holmes' murderous activities and make it easy to dispose of his victims' bodies. H.H. Holmes was born Herman Mudgeett in Gilminton, New Hampshire, in 1861. His father, Levi Mudgeet, was a house painter, while his mother, Theodate, stayed at home. The Mudgeots were devout Methodists and raised homes to be religious. A neighbor later described the family as upright, god-fearing citizens, living in a quiet, secluded section of the country.

As a boy, Holmes was widely regarded as quiet, well-behaved, and unremarkable, but he didn't stay out of trouble entirely. He stole small amounts of money from several of his neighbors and refused to come clean when he was caught. Instead, he always had a quick excuse at the ready about how the theft was actually a simple misunderstanding. His clean and quiet demeanor convinced many adults that he was telling the truth. Though this act worked on most of the adults in his life, some were unnerved by the boy. Many later reported that he never seemed to look people in in the eyes. This was actually because Holmes had a medical condition, known as Strabismis.

People with this condition are sometimes called cross-eyed or wall-eyed. Though Strabismis is often not physically debilitative, it does prevent some individuals from making eye contact. Not being able to fulfill this social expectation can sometimes lead to social anxiety. Vanessa is going to take over on the psychology here and throughout the episode. Please note, Vanessa is not a licensed psychologist or psychiatrist, but she has done a lot of research for this show. Thanks, Greg.

As Dr. Ian Marsh, an ophthalmologist, points out, people who avoid eye contact are often viewed by society as untrustworthy or suspicious. This puts individuals with strabismus at a significant disadvantage when it comes to forming relationships with others. As a result, those with strabismus have been shown to have higher levels of social anxiety. However, Holmes' condition likely wasn't the only thing that caused him anxiety when he was young. He wrote in his autobiography that, as a child, he was bullied by a gang of older boys. The boys tortured Holmes with stories of decaying bodies and noxious mixtures hidden in the local

doctor's office. Then they took him to the office and dragged him through the doors. Inside, they had rigged an anatomical skeleton to scare him. According to Holmes, the skeleton stood with its arms extended, ready to grab him when he walked inside. At the time, Holmes panicked and screamed. He was haunted by the image of the skeleton's wicked smile for years. But as much as the skeleton scared Holmes, it also captivated him. Macabre thoughts of death and disease remained on his mind even as he grew up and tried to pursue the trappings of a normal life.

But even then, it seemed death followed Holmes wherever he went. In 1875, when Holmes was 14, his grandfather passed away and left him a small patch of land. Holmes didn't seem too broken up by the loss and instead sought to take advantage of his late grandfather's property. Allegedly, when he took a shine to a local girl, he bragged to her that he owned some land. He proposed they get married and live on the plot together. The girl accepted, but their grand plans were foiled when the girl's parents found out and sent her out of the state. Holmes was heartbroken by the affair. He didn't move on until 1877 when he was 16.

That year, he graduated high school and took some odd jobs, mostly as a teacher. With the newfound freedom of his young adulthood, he began courting 16-year-old, Clara A. Lovering. Some reports claim Clara and Holmes had known each other since childhood, while others state they met while Holmes worked on her family's farm. Either way, around 1877, Clara and Holmes began dating. Clara said of him, I always felt he was pleasant in disposition, tender-hearted,

much more so than people in general. But that tender heart had its limits. Once at a church, Holmes saw another boy talking intimately with Clara. He cornered the boy and threatened him. Whatever Holmes said must have been frightening, as the boy reportedly went pale and abruptly left the event alone after their conversation. The confrontation left Holmes giddy. The next day, he excitedly told his friends that he and Clara were engaged.

A year later, on July 4, 1878, the two married. in secret. They were afraid their parents wouldn't approve. They were right. Both Clara's and Holmes' parents felt they were too young to be married and were incensed when they found out about the union months later. Holmes' mother told him she couldn't have done much worse. Clara's parents tried to make the best of things by helping their new son-in-law. He began working at a grocery store owned by Clara's uncle. Holmes kept the job for a while, but it was far from ideal. His pay wasn't enough to allow him to live alone with Clara. Instead, for over a year, she remained with her parents.

Every Saturday, Holmes walked nine miles to spend the weekend with his wife, returning home on Monday morning. A year and a half later, in 1880, Clara gave birth to their first child, who they named Robert. She cared for their infant son while Holmes pursued a new passion, medicine. In 1880, 19-year-old, Harold Holmes enrolled at the University of Vermont Medical School. Clara again stayed behind at her parents' house, while Holmes moved to a boarding house near the school.

During this time, Holmes asked his roommate, Fred Ingalls, to keep the fact that he was married, a secret. Ingalls only agreed after Holmes promised not to pursue any other women while at the boarding house. Ingalls was a gentleman and didn't want his roommate causing a scandal. But Holmes apparently wasn't a man of his word. He began flirting outrageously with the landlady's daughter. People around town even thought Holmes and the young woman would soon be engaged. Ingalls was incensed. He made it known publicly that Holmes was already married.

On one occasion, they came to blows after Ingalls used Holmes' mustache wax without asking him first. The fight was so violent that Ingalls ended up with a black eye. However, the fight may have been less about the wax. and more about Ingalls entering Holmes' room without permission. Since Ingalls had already proven himself unwilling to keep home secrets, Holmes was likely wary of granting him any more confidence. His landlady, Mrs. Brew, later recalled that Holmes set up a chemical lab in his room. Apparently, Holmes held a special fascination with chemistry in particular

and even hired a private tutor in the subject after being dissatisfied with the university's class. He had a stock of test tubes, miscellaneous chemicals, and other oddities in his room. Mrs. Brew once found a bottle full of enormous roofing nails hidden in his closet. But that was far from the worst thing the old woman encountered. She once went to sweep up in Holmes' room and found the preserved cadaver of a baby stuffed under his bed. Mrs. Brew was terrified. The cadaver was most likely a medical specimen. Holmes loved dissection and apparently took some of his study material, Home, to privately experiment.

Holmes fellow med school students later remarked that he always seemed to have a morbid fascination with dead bodies. He was only too eager to work on cadavers during class. It was true that Holmes enjoyed studying medicine, but he ran out of money in Vermont and dropped out after one semester. He was forced to go back home and take a job as a job. teacher again. However, Holmes didn't last long at this new job either. He was rough on his students, who were mostly pre-teens, and took pleasure in subjecting them to corporal punishment. At the end of the year, students submitted universally negative evaluations of Holmes, and the school terminated him. Afterward, he moved with Clara and Baby Robert

to Ann Arbor, Michigan in 1882. There, Clara worked as a dressmaker, and 21-year-old Holmes resumed his medical studies at the University of Michigan. For the first time, the little family was all under the same roof. But things did not go smoothly. Holmes reportedly felt that Clara and the baby were dragging him down in life, despite the fact that Clara was the one helping to finance his schooling. Some neighbors reported that the couple thought often. Clara was seen with black eyes on multiple occasions.

Eventually, the abuse became. too much for her to bear. She left Holmes in early 1884, a few months before he graduated medical school, and took Robert with her back to New Hampshire. Left to his own devices once again, Holmes' ambitions almost immediately turned sinister. Up next, H.H. Holmes remakes his identity and begins his descent into the criminal underworld. Exema is unpredictable. But you can flare a left. But you can flare a left, with Epglis, a once-monthly treatment for moderate to severe eczema. After an initial four-month or longer dosing phase, about four-in-10 people taking Epglis achieved itch relief and clear or almost clear skin at 16 weeks, and most of those

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Stop taking bad travel advice. Start comparing hundreds of sites with kayak and get your trip right. Kayak, got that right. Now back to the story. 84, 23-year-old H.H. Holmes graduated from medical school in Ann Arbor, Michigan. His wife, Clara, had recently left him after he physically abused her. She took their son, Robert, back to her hometown in New Hampshire. Clara's departure didn't seem to bother Holmes. Instead, he bragged about the big things he planned to do

now that his wife was gone. Holmes told several of his classmates that he was going to travel to Africa to do some medical charity work after graduating. He even officially announced the trip in a local newspaper. In reality, it seems the stunt was kind of a prank. Holmes never went to Africa, and instead returned to New Hampshire following his graduation. After minor smallpox outbreak in the area, Holmes went around town offering vaccines for 25 cents each, about the equivalent of $6.50 cents today. After initially struggling to sell the medicine, he hatched a plan to con his potential customers. He started posing as an official from the Board of Health and claimed

the vaccines, still priced at 25 cents, were mandated by the government. The townspeople now felt like they were forced to pay. The scam netted homes the seed money he needed to rent a small office, which he turned into a laboratory. His goal was to create a patent medicine an over-the-counter treatment commonly sold in pharmacies as a kind of cure-all for a wide variety of symptoms. At the time, patent medicines were seldom subject to any kind of legitimate medical trials. It was the perfect opportunity for a scam.

Despite weeks of experimentation, Holmes never ended up creating a suitable formula and abandoned the project. Instead, he turned his attention toward treating the locals, though it wasn't very profitable. With a mass of unpaid bills and no money to pay them off, Holmes frequently resorted to lies to get debtors off his back. The landlord who Holmes rented his office from later said, I never saw a man who was a more

accomplished liar than Holmes. He could tell as beautiful a lie as you ever heard, and you would have hard work to bring yourself to doubt him. By the fall of 1885, 24-year-old Holmes had accumulated a six-year-old homes. accumulated a staggering amount of debt. Apparently, he couldn't get out from under it, so he resolved to run away instead. He abruptly left New York one autumn evening and moved to Pennsylvania.

Little information from this period in Holmes' life has survived, but we do know that once he arrived in Pennsylvania, he took a job at a psychiatric hospital. He hated the job, but badly needed money. It didn't take long for homes to resort to scamming, Though he was making ends meet with his hospital job, it seems he couldn't help himself. As a paper published by the Australian Institute of Criminology, explained, there's no single psychological trait that identifies a potential fraudster.

Psychologist Ezra Stotland wrote, Sometimes an individual's motivation for crime may have originally been relative deprivation, greed, and so forth. However, as they found themselves successful at this crime, they began to gain some secondary delight in the knowledge that they're showing their superiority to others. It seems Holmes came up with schemes not just out of necessity, but out of a desire to manipulate others. It thrilled him to take money from others. Ever since childhood, he'd loved to see what he could get away with, and he always seized an opportunity to make a quick book.

And soon, Holmes and a colleague from college came up with what they thought was the perfect. crime, insurance fraud. The pair led another man in on the gambit, a friend of Holmes who had a wife and child. First, that friend would take out a substantial life insurance policy on the entire family. He would then send his wife and child out of town and write a false suicide note proclaiming that he had killed them both before taking his own life. The note would be delivered to the insurance company, while the friend skipped town along with his family.

When an inspector from the company came to visit the scene, he would find three dead bodies to verify the story. In reality, the bodies would all be medical cadavers. Holmes would go to the scene posing as a relative and would ultimately receive the insurance money, which would be split among them all. Each of the three men participating in the scheme, Holmes, the colleague, and his friend with the wife and child, were responsible for finding one of the three cadavers needed. Supposedly, Holmes procured the corpse he needed by buying it from a local medical school.

But soon afterward, he read a book on insurance fraud and realized that insurance companies had sophisticated methods for detecting fraud and investigating bodies. He realized that if he didn't find bodies which matched the description of his friend's family exactly, the companies would refuse to, pay out.

In May of 1886, Holmes called off the plan, but he never forgot it. For years, he brainstormed ways to secure a steady stream of corpses that could fool an insurance inspector. After the failed insurance scheme, he decided to move again. In May of 1886, he went to Chicago, but he wasn't alone. H.H. Holmes was planning on remarrying. Much about Holmes' second wife, 24-year-old Myrta Bell-Nab, is a mystery. Before getting engaged to Holmes, Mirta was a clerk in a music store, but there's little information

about her appearance, personality, or temperament. It's also unknown when exactly they met, though it was probably not long before the couple decided to move together from New York to Chicago. Evidence suggests she and Holmes got married soon after they moved, but because Holmes was technically still married to Clara at the time. The ceremony was unofficial. However, it seems that Myrta may not have known that the wedding was off the books or that Holmes had a first wife. In fact, she most likely never even knew Holmes' real name. By now, he dropped his birth name of Mudgeett, probably in an attempt to clear himself of old

debts and settled on the moniker H.H. Holmes. The last time he ever used the name Mudgeett in an official capacity was to file for divorce from Clara. After finding a somewhat unscrupulous lawyer in Chicago, Holmes tried to petition the divorce on grounds of infidelity. In what were almost certainly made up accusations, Holmes claimed Clara had cheated on him while they were together in Michigan. He also said he'd been caring for their son Robert over the past several years in an attempt to avoid paying alimony for his child. But once again, Holmes' schemes were ill-considered and didn't stand up to the slightest investigation. For obvious reasons, Holmes could find no one to corroborate Clara's supposed infidelity,

and the divorce proceedings fell apart. Holmes remained legally married to Clara. She probably never even knew he had filed for divorce. So Holmes simply changed his name and pressed on with his new life, with Myrta. Only a couple of months after moving to Chicago in July of 1886, he had formulated a new scam once again. That month, Holmes apparently talked his way into managing a local drugstore. He had long wanted a shop of his own and secretly intended to buy the pharmacy from the young couple who owned it, the Holton's. To prepare for his eventual buyout, he first planned to reduce

the store's value. Holmes hoped by damaging business at the store temporarily, He could buy it out a bargain and ensure a good profit. That summer, he started swiping drugs and equipment from the pharmacy. Day by day, he stole more and more. Remarkably, the plan succeeded, and soon he was able to buy the pharmacy for a fraction of what it had been worth. There's an implication that Holmes made the couple disappear, or even murdered them, in order to take over the store.

However, official records confirmed the Holtans were still living in the same Chicago neighborhood long after Holmes was arrested years later. Even so, they did suffer at the hands of Holmes. Even after driving the price of the pharmacy through the floor, Holmes still refused to pay what he owed. The Holtans had to threaten Holmes with a lawsuit before getting their money. This was only the beginning of Holmes' petty crime spree in Chicago. In early 1887, he added more fraud to his resume after purchasing a plot of land right across from the drugstore on 63rd Street in Englewood.

Initially, his wife Myrta's name was on the deed, but soon it was altered to say it belonged to Myrtah's mother, Lucy Belknap. Holmes wanted his name on as few official documents as possible. That way, when he inevitably faced consequences for his actions, he could point the finger elsewhere. With the money he got from working at the drugstore and his numerous petty scams, Holmes set about developing the land on 63rd Street in early 1887. He first had architects draw up plans for a two-story building. The first floor would house retail establishments, including his drugstore, which he planned to move into the new building once it was complete.

The second floor was to be filled with apartments. Outwardly, Holmes declared he intended on becoming a landlord and real estate mobile. but even the first blueprints included some unusual features. Accessible from the rear of the new drugstore, Holmes placed a small, secret room between the first and second floors. He also installed a hidden staircase. Oddly, the entrance to the staircase was found behind a trap door in the bathroom on the second floor. Years later, a third floor was added, and Holmes' darkest motivations revealed themselves. Eventually, the building was known as the Murder Castle, one of the most notorious buildings in the history of Chicago. Up next, H.H. Holmes makes the castle his base of operations

and commits his first murder. Now back to the story. By the end of 1887, 27-year-old Dr. H.H. Holmes had started construction on a large retail and apartment building. He planned to run a pharmacy on the first floor and rent out apartments on the second. He raised the money for the venture through a variety of cons and shameless fraud, a practice he continued while the complex was under construction. For example, he once bought an enormous safe on credit and had it installed in the new drugstore. After moving the safe to the new building site, he proceeded with construction, essentially building a room around the safe. When Holmes refused to pay what he owed on the vault, the company came to repossess

it. Holmes was only too happy to oblige. He said the company was free to take the safe, but he promised to sue if they damaged the building while removing it. After appraising the situation, the safe company found it couldn't possibly get the vault out without knocking down some walls. They were forced to leave it where it stood. Similar situations occurred. with the architects and contractors. Holmes flat out refused to pay his bills. At least 60 lawsuits were filed against him over eight years in Chicago. Each time he was sued, he claimed his mother-in-law Lucy was the one liable for the debts, as he had put her name on the deed to the land instead of his own. Even when the suits were ruled in favor of the contractors, there wasn't much creditors

could do. Holmes didn't legally own any property and often sold off the things he borrowed or rented so there wasn't anything left to repossess either. Thanks to his many connivances, 27-year-old Holmes finished the building toward the end of 1887. By that time, he had relocated his drugstore from across the street to the first floor of his new complex. Holmes' latest batch of employees soon found that their boss had some quirks. His housekeeper claimed he would regularly tell her he was going out of town, only to show up skulking around the building at night. Each time, he had some excuse as to why his trip had fallen through, but they never seemed well thought out or particularly believable. The drugstore employees were also aware of the hidden staircase

and compartment between the first and second floor. Oddly, none of them seemed particularly unnerved by the building's strange design. Some employees took breaks or even naps in the small secret compartment. In their minds, there were far more suspicious things going on. Holmes reportedly once asked an employee to get inside the large safe in the store. He locked the safe behind them and then asked them to scream. After verifying the vault was almost soundproof, Holmes opened the door again. Naturally, he never revealed to the employee why he had asked them to scream from inside the safe. He could have been planning to use the safe as part of a con, or it could have been a component of something more sinister. Holmes' ultimate goals were always hard to pin down.

The custodian at the store once said Holmes owned a collection of false mustaches and disguises. Sometimes, seemingly for no reason, Holmes would emerge from his office dressed as a stereotypical southern gentleman, complete with a fake beard and bushy eyebrows. Of course, hijinks like these were nothing compared to most of his predatory cons. He never seemed to be content with honest work, and instead constantly involved himself in bolder and more ridiculous cons. As long as he felt he could get away with it, Holmes was willing to steal, abuse, and even murder to get what he wanted.

For the next couple of years, Holmes continued to borrow and steal as much as he could. In the process, he put his mother-in-law, Lucy Belknap and his second wife, Myrta, through an incredible amount of stress as lawsuit after lawsuit implicated them as well as Holmes. Throughout it all, however, Myrta stuck by her husband. In 1889, when Holmes was 29 years old and she was 28, she gave birth to their first child, a daughter they named Lucy after Myrta's mother. Not long after Lucy was born,

Holmes began cheating on Myrta with one of his employees. Julia Connor was the wife of a jeweler Holmes had hired for his drugstore. While Ned Connor oversaw the jewelry department, his wife worked as a cashier. They lived on the second floor of Holmes complex. along with their young daughter, Pearl. Holmes saw an opportunity to make a move on Julia soon after she and her husband moved in.

Holmes could hear the Connors fighting at night through the thin walls of the building. Away from the prying eyes of her husband, Holmes became very attentive to Julia. They carried on an affair for over a year, and in early 1890, Ned and Julia separated. At that point, Ned quit his job at the job at the store and started living elsewhere in the city. Almost as soon as Ned moved on, Holmes

sought him out and suddenly bragged that he was sleeping with Julia. As Ned later put it, he told me something no man on earth could have known if he had not been intimate with her. Apparently, tormenting Ned had been a part of the fun all along. The desire to boast about his infidelity may have been the same thing that drove Holmes to run. cons. He loved humiliating others. According to Dr. Neil Burton, humiliation is one of the most affecting feelings we experience. Some may even prefer death to severe public humiliation. Burton wrote, Humiliation involves abasement of honor and dignity, and with that, loss of status and standing. When we're humiliated, we may also internalize the trauma, leading to fear and

anxiety, flashbacks, nightmares, sleeplessness, suspicion and paranoia, social isolation, apathy, depression, and suicidal ideation. Perhaps this seed was planted in homes when he was humiliated as a boy, tormented by the skeleton prank. In response, he decided to inflict this anguish on others, even those closest to him. His favorite scams were ones where he could watched the look on his victim's faces as they realized they'd been hoodwinked. He wanted them to know they'd been beaten and that there was nothing they could do about it. His actions fit with a kind of behavior that political science professor Edward Weissband described as excessive cruelty. He wrote that, for some, the appeal of violating moral taboos is found in the obscenity of the crimes.

He noted that for these people, it's not enough simply to cross the line. The further they transgress, and the more unnecessary the brutality, the more enjoyment they get from their evil acts. Ending Ned and Julia's marriage wasn't enough for Holmes. He also used Julia as an unwitting party to several of his scams. He collected almost $2,000 from her at one point in exchange from making her a part owner of the drugstore. The position granted her no rights or profits, but Holmes, gladly took her money anyway. He also signed her name

to a variety of small companies he falsely created as well, mostly to misdirect any legal consequences of his actions onto someone else. In due course, Julia was named in several lawsuits, directed at fake businesses Holmes was involved in,

just like with Myrta and her mother. Holmes saw his relationship with Julia as just another way to take advantage of her. Even so, Julia and Holmes continued their affair until the end of 1891, and 30-year-old Holmes remained as devious as ever. He successfully kept their liaisons secret from his wife, even as he got Julia into legal trouble. But everything Holmes had put Julia through so far was nothing compared to what was coming.

Just before Christmas of 1891, Julia got an invitation in the mail. Her sister was getting married back in Davenport, Iowa. Thrilled by the news, she hurried to prepare for a trip to attend the wedding. On Christmas Eve, she and her daughter, Pearl, now six, spent the evening with the Crows, another family who boarded at Holmes' building. John Crowe later recalled that Julia talked excitedly about her sister's wedding. She was looking forward to the trip, but told John she intended to pack light for the journey. She said she would only be gone for a week or two and wasn't planning to leave until after Christmas.

As Mrs. Crow later said, Julia talked of what she would do Christmas Day, saying nothing to cause us to think she intended on going away that night. She even left the dinner dishes on the table. And yet, after she left the crow's apartment, no one ever saw Julia or Pearl again. What exactly happened to the crow's apartment? them is unknown. In later years, Holmes sometimes claimed he'd never killed Julia at all, while other times he said she'd died accidentally. Holmes' lawyer D.T. Duncombe told a newspaper that Holmes had privately confessed to murdering Julia, but he was never clear about how or why

Holmes had done it. The most likely theory is based on the explanation Holmes gave in later years, that he got Julia pregnant with his child and convinced her to have an abortion. Then the procedure went awry. Though Holmes was technically a doctor, he didn't have much practical experience with surgical procedures. At the time, abortion was illegal, and even when performed by experienced physicians, it often resulted in the death of the mother. As to what happened to six-year-old Pearl, there's no way to tell. If her mother did die during the operation, it seems like Holmes could have given Pearl to her father, Ned, without much trouble.

But when he claimed Julia had accidentally died during surgery, he had no explanation for the little girl's disappearance. But we know he was responsible for her death. Her body laid in the cellar for years until the bones of a young child were found after Holmes' capture. On Christmas Day, the Crow family, who had spent Christmas Eve with Julia and Pearl, went out to visit friends. When they came home that night, they found Julia and Pearl's apartment had been boarded up. They found the whole thing strange, but assumed at first Julia had simply left for Davenport early. Holmes acted as if Julia and Pearl were alive and even pretended to look for them. He also kept in contact with Ned, likely motivated by some twisted sense of amusement he got from stringing the man along.

But though Holmes was committed to outwardly feigning concern for Julia and Pearl's disappearances, he wasn't going to leave money sitting on the table. And soon he rented their abandoned apartment to a new family. As the new renter, Mrs. Doyle later reported, when Holmes took us in to look at it, it presented a remarkable appearance. In the dining room, the table was standing untouched after a meal. On the floor and chairs was the clothing of Mrs. Connor and her child. A doll was laying on the floor, and Holmes quickly shoved it under the bed with his foot.

Holmes even tried to sell Mrs. Doyle the leftover clothes still sitting in Julia's dresser. When she politely refused, he had them sent somewhere else. Despite some suspicions from fellow tenants about the strangeness of Julia and Pearl's disappearance, no one had a concrete reason to suspect Holmes. After a few months, he breathed a sigh of relief. Ned assumed Julia had run away to cut him off from his daughter, and everyone else assumed something had happened to them on their trip to Davenport. Just like he always did, it seemed Holmes had gotten away clean,

And unfortunately, Julia and Pearl were only the first of many victims to come. As Holmes later wrote, Yes, 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 song, nor the ambition of an intellectual man to be great. The devil truly was inside Holmes, and it was just beginning to be.

emerge. Thanks again for tuning in to serial killers. We'll be back Monday with part two exploring Holmes' horrific murder spree and the completion of his sadistic murder castle. For more information on H.H. H. H. H. H. H. H. H. H. H. H. H. H. H. H. H. H. H. H. H. H. H. The true history of the White City Devil by Adam Seltzer. Extremely helpful to our research. You can find more episodes of serial killers and all other parcast originals for free on spot. Not only does Spotify already have all of your favorite music, but now Spotify is making it easy for you to enjoy all of your favorite Parcast originals like Serial Killers for free from your phone, desktop, or smart speaker. To stream serial killers on Spotify, just open the app and type Serial Killers in the search bar. Several of you have asked how to help the show, and if you enjoy the show, the best way to help is to leave a five-star review.

And don't forget to follow us on Facebook and Instagram at Parcast. Twitter at Parcast Network. We'll see you next time. Have a killer week. Serial Killers was created by Max Cutler and is a Parcast Studios original. Executive producers include Max and Ron Cutler, sound design by Juan Borda, with production assistance by Ron Shapiro, Carly Madden, and Freddie Beckley. This episode of Serial Killers was written by Terrell Wells, with writing assistance by Abigail

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