The record-union., 1894-11-21
HOLMES CRIMINAL CAREER.
STORY OF HIS LIFE AS RELATED
BY HIMSELF.

BY HIMSELF.
Tells a Detective That For tho Crimes
He Has Committed lie De-
serves to be Hung.
Snecial to the REcoRD-UNIoN.
PHILADELPHIA, Nov. 20.-Arch-con-
spirator II. Ii. Holmes, accompanied by
Mrs. Pitzle and pretty woman who
calls herself Mrs. Holmes, arrived in
This city to-day in the custody OF Detect
i've Crawford and Special Agent Perry of
the Fidelity Mutual Insurance Associa-
ton. Mrs. Pitzle's siXteen-year- old
daughter, Media, and her one-year- old
son were also with the party Mrs.
Holmes soon disappeared after her ar
rival, and no clew 10 her Whereabouts
could be obtained. 1t is thought she is
stopping at a hotel in the neigh ghborhood
OF the police headquarters.
After the arrival, the party was closeted
with superintendent of Police Linden
until late in the afternoon. When the
conference was over Detective Crawford
detailed the story of the trip, the most
important feature of which was the
revelation made to him by Holmes of the
! story OF his whole lie. 1t reads like the
most sensational OF romances.
Holmes sat beside the detective with
handouts on. The train had scarcely
emerged from the Boston depOt before
the prisoner tried TO bribe his captor.
lie offered the detective 5000 if he would
allow him to escape. He said be mad ire
quently hypnotlZed persons, having ac-
qulred the art from college professor in
the West. lie said he could get the money
from his wife and Mrs. Pitzle.
Whom he saw his words had no effect
he entered into general conversation and
told the story OF his life. He said he was
raised IN burlington, VI, and so well
educated in the schools there that at )
years OF age he was a teacher. For some
time aiterward he went 10 college there,
and later in Detroit. Mich. Here he
formed the Acquaintance of a medical
student, who, he said, furnished the body
in New York in the present case. He
refused to divulge his name. Duriug va
cations they worked on farms 10 raise
their college expenses, but one summer
they found themselves without means,
and the medical man suggested the idea
OF gettlngsa body and beating an insur-
ance company. This was twelve years
ago The doctor got his life insured for
$1,000. They obtained body in Chicago,
TOOK II East, arranged the details of iden-
tlilcatlon, aud successfully got the money
with which they continued their studies.
lie refused to name the company thus
swindled. They worked the scheme
afterward with success, obtaining sums
ranging from $4,000 TO $40, coo.
once Holmes got his life insured for
$50, 900. He went to hotel in Rhode island.
At that time he wore beard. He secured a
corpse in Chicago, cut off his head, and
took the body to a lonely spot not far
from the hotel. Then he shaved off his
beard, returned to the hotel, asked for
Holmes and engaged room TO wait for
him. lie had brought the head with him
and burned 1t beyond recognition in the
| fireplace in the hotel. This scheme. how
ever. fell through, the mother of his wife,
when she discovered the scheme, threat
ening to tell the police, and Holmes fled
to the West.
Resuming his story, he said that while
living in Chicago eighteen months ago
he fell in with typewriter girl, and fur
nlShed house on the outskirts where
they lived together. a younger sister
came to visit him, and the woman grew
! so jealous or her that In quarrel one day
| she struck her over the head with a stool
and killed her. To save the woman with
! whom he lived, Holmes said he put the
| BODY in a trunk, loaded it with stones
and sank it in the lake. This girl had
property in Texas. and he and
! PitZle took it off her hands and
send her abroad. 1t was worth, he
it in their hands they went through
Texas buying carloads of horses on notes
on this property, but as they never had a
| legal title to the property the notes were
worthless, and it is for this affair that
they are wanted in Fort Worth. To save
/ Ill
formed the scheme OF swlndling the
Fidelity Company. He told the de-
tective that for the crimes he had COM
mitted he deserved to be hanged dozen
times.
Holmes is not lacking for money, as he
himself admitted that at the present time
he is supporting nearly two dozen per-
SONS, including the girl murderer, her
mother and an imbecile brother, two
orphans in Chicago, who live on one of
his properties, three separate alleged
wives and their children, and his own
mother and father IN kaukakee. He
would not give the names of the women.
He firmly maintained that Pitzle is
alive, and is in Salvador, and that he
will hear from him through the personal
column of a certain newspaper.
Mr.. Perry said that as a result of the
interview it had been decided to arrest a
number of other persons whose names
would not be given out. Mr. Perry re-
lated In detail the story of Holmes arrest
in Boston, and the manner in which Mrs.
PitZle was decoyed from Burlington. lie
| said that in the secret conference to-day
nothing had been said that would in the
! slightest degree reiute his original theory
that Pit1le had been murdered. When
in the West be saw the parents of Mrs.
| Pitzle, ana they told him that their
/ daughter had complained of the exor-
| bitant lee charged by the st. Louis law
| yer-$2, 800. In corroboration of his muir
! der theory Mr.. Perry said that he had
| from Mrs. Pitzle an exact description of
/ her husband, agreeing in every respect
with that of the corpse found in Callow
| Hill. Mrs. Pitzle, he said, was perfectly
! innocent of any completely in the affair.
| She had told him last night that she had
received only $1,000 cash. She said
! Holmes had taken $1,000 of the money
! and put it in a speculation in Fort Worth
| in which PitZle was also interested
Holmes told Perry that this was true. In
| Texas, Perry said, Holmes operated un-
| der the name OF II. II. Pratt. He added
that B. L. Perry, B. +. Pitzle and B. Il.
| Lyman are one and the same man.