The Cambria freeman. [volume] (Ebensburg, Pa.) 1867-1938, 1894-11-23
HOLMES BLACK LIFE.
lie Has Swindled Many Insur-
--ce Companies.
TELLS THE STORY OF HIS CAREER
To Detective Holmes, After Trying to
Brib- Him to E.cape-His Family Com
posed of Several Dozen Wives and Chill
dren-suspected of Several Murders.

dren-suspscted of Several Murders.
PHILADELPHIA, Nov. 21.-Arch-Con-
spiratOr H. H. Holmes, accompanied by
Mrs. PitZel and a pretty woman who
calls herself Mrs. Holmes, have arrived
in this city in the custody of Detective
Crawford and Special Agent Perry. of
the Fidelity Mutual Life association.
Mrs. Pitzels 16-year-old daughter.
Media, and her 1-year-old boy were also
with the party
Holmes sat beside the detective with
handouts on and the train had scarcely
emerged from the Boston depot before
the prisoner tried TO bribe his captor
he offered the detacti--~ 800 :s l.
would allow him to hypnotic him so
that he could escape. He said he had
frequently hypnOtized persons, having
acquired the art from a college profes-
sOr in the west. He said he could get
the money at once from his wife and
Mrs. PitzeI. When he saw that his
words had no effect Holmes entered into
general conversation and told the story
of his life.
He said he was raised in Burlington
VT, and was so well educated in school
there that at 10 he was teacher. For
some time afterwards he went to college
there and later in Detroit. 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. During
vacations tney worked ON farms to raise
their college expenses, but one summer
they found themselves without means
and II was then that the medical man
suggested the idea of getting body and
beating an Insurance company. This
was II years ago. The doctor got his
life insured for Sl2 800, they obtained a
body in Chicago, took 1t east, arranged
the details of identification and success
fully got the money with which they
continued their studies. He refused to
name the company thus swindled.
They worked the scheme afterwards
with success, Holmes continued, obtain
ing sums ranging from $40, 900 TO 500
600. Once Holmes got his own life in
sured for $50, 900. He went to a hotel
IN Rhode leland. At that time he wore
beard. He secured a corpse in Chi
cagO, cut off the head and took the
body to lonely spot not far from the
hotel Then he shaved off his beard,
returned to the hotel, asked for Holmes,
and engaged a room to wait for him
He had brought the head with him and
burned 1t beyond recognition in the fire
place of the hotel. This scheme, how
ever, fell through. the mother of his
wife, when she discovered it, threaten
ing to tell the police and Holmes fed to
the west
Resuming his story, Holmes said that
while living in Chicago about IS months
ago. he fell in with a typewriter girl
and furnished a house on the outskirts,
where they lived together. a younger
sister came TO visit them, and the woman
grew so jealous of her that in a quarrel
one day she struck her over the head
with a stool and killed her. To save
the woman with whom he was living,
Holmes said he put the body in a trunk,
loaded II with stones, and sunk it in the
lake. This girl had property in Texas
and he and Pitzel took ii off her hands
and sent her abroad. 1t was worth, he
said, $40, 600, and after getting il in
their hands, they went through Texas,
buying carloads of horses on notes on
this property, but as they never had
legal title TO the property, the notes
were worthless. and it is for this affair
that they are wanted In Fort Worth
To save this property, Holmes said he
and PitZel formed the scheme of swim
ding the Fidelity company. He told
the detective that for the crimes he had
committed he deserves to be hanged a
dozen times.
Holmes is not lacking for money. as
he himself admitted that at the present
time he is supporting nearly two dozen
persons, including the girl murderess
her mother and an imbecile brother;
two orphans in Chicago who live in one
of his properties, three separate alleged
wives, and their children and his own
mother and father in Kankakee. He
would not give the names of the women
He firmly maintained that Pitzel is
alive in San Salvador and that he will
hear from him through the personal
column of a certain New York news
paper.
y telegram has been received by Pres
ident FOuse of the Fidelity company to
the effect that Howe, the St. Louis
lawyer, Is en- route TO this city, with
Mcdonald in the capacity of his .'ad-
wiser" 1t has been decided to arrest a
number of other persons whose names
have not vet been given out.
Special Agent Perry still maintains
that Pltzel has been murdered. When
In the west he saw the parents of Mrs
PitZel and they told him that their
daughter had complained of the exorbi-
tant fee charged by the ST. Louis law
yer-S2, 500. In confederation of his
murder theory, Mr.. Perry said that he
ndu IrOh hrS. flIZeI an exact deSCrlp-
ton of her husband, agreeing in every
respect with tkat of the corpse found in
the Callowhill street house Mrs. Pit
gel, he continued, was perfectly innocent
of any completely in the whole affair
She had been forced. through ignorance
and pressure of various kinds, to sign
,ertain papers, but she told Perry that
she had had received only 800 in cash
She said Holmes had taken 8, 900 of the
money and put II in land speculation
in Fort Worth in which titzel was also
interested. Holmes told Perry that this
was true.
In Texas, Perry said Holmes operated
under the name of II. NJ. Pratt He
added that b. F. Perry, b. F. Pitzel and
b. L. Lyman are one and the same man.
Mr.. Perry further said that Holmes is
said to have one wife in New Hamp-
shire. from whom he claims to have
been divorced and by whom he has
child Is years old; another in Illinois.
whom Mr.. Perry himself saw, and by
whom there is a 6-year-old child. and
the wife who is at present in this city.
Mr.. Perry intimated that he feared
that PitZels children had also been mur-
dered.