The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1906-01-14
The City Is Horrified by Details
Of Latest Murder.
Man Who Killed Mrs. HolIister
Had Narrow Escape.
DURING THE INQUEST.
Her Brother Law Drew Re-
vOlYer to Shoot Him.
There Is Still Much Mystery
Surrounding the Case.

Chicago. Jan. 13.-The city stands
aghast tonight over the horrible de-
tails of the last reported murder, last
night, that OF Mrs. Franklin c. Hol-
lister, by Richard Ivens, according to
his own confession. The crime was
the subject Of discussion on the streets
and on the street cars and even in the
down town district women appeared
nervous and cast anxious glances when
passing alley intersections in the dusk
of early evening The admission of
the young fiend that he did not know
Mrs HOLSTER and that it would have
been the same to him had any other
woman come along just at that time,
makes his crime appear all the more
british
Ivens is declared by the police to be
OF a low type of humanity and a mem
Der Of club of youths of the stamp
who loaf about the north side.
While telling the story that may
doom him to the gallOws he showed
not the slightest remOrse. To him.
apparently. it was as commonplace a
recital as though he were telling of
his wanderings about the north side
on any evening of his life.
After signing his lengthy confession
he was asked to read it. A half dozen
police officials and as many more
newspaper men sat in a ring around
the man, watching his every move. But
he read the damning statement
through without treTnor of the voice
or a change of color on his cheeks.
1t might have been an impersonal
story from newspaper judging from
the Indifference with which Ivens read
it off Yet it was the personal mar
rative of one of the most brutal muir
ders of the long list that recently has
disgraced Chicago.
Soon Confessed.
Mrs HOLSTER. who was the wife of
FRANKLIN c. HOLSTER. 49S Fullerton ave-
nue. was murdered at 6:45 D. m. yester-
day by lVens, who is "a years of age
She was strangled by a copner wire
wound about her neck. The murderer
confessed the crime whose brutality /
almost without equal in Chicago crini-
nal annals, to Assistant Chief of Police
Scu1IIer, and Inspector LAWN at the
North Halstead police station at 11:3O
a. m. today, shortly after his arrest smt
might. as we'll admit ii. I am
guilty, said Ivens after first DENYING
any knowledge of the crime she re-
sisted me. She fought me. I had to
choke her to keep her still. I don't know
woman"
At the inquest this afternoon Ivens
came near meeting swift justice at the
hancs Of William HOLSTER, brOther-in-
law OF the murdered woman, but fe~ the
Watchful eye of Lieutenant of Police
Schlau, who seeing HOLSTER draw re
NolVef jumped between him and the
prisoner, and disarmed the frenzied
man, the county might have been saved
the expense of a trial
Still Much Mystery.
There is still mystery surrounding the
actions and whereabouts of Mrs Hollis
ter between the hours of 1920 in the
forenoon and about o'clock in the ev-
ening when Ivens says he assaulted and
murdered her. A jeweler on the north
side says he saw at $50 woman he
took to be Mrs Holster whom he knew
we'll pass his store going in the oppo-
site direction from her home. He greet
ed the woman but is uncertain as to
whether the greeting was returned. This
leads Mrs. HOLSTERS friends to believe
1t was case Of mistaken identity and
that she was at that time either being
held prisoner somewhere or was even
then murdered and that her body was
brought after dark and placed where it
was found this morning. The theory is
that others besides Ivens are implica-
ted
A house to hNssse visit is being con-
Quoted by a number of the dead wom-
ans friends, including the Rev. W. H.
Hall, pastor Of Wesleyan Methodist
church. where Mrs. Hcllister sang in the
choir. They hope to trace every move
ment of the woman from the time she
left her home in the morning until she
fell into the hands of the brute who ac-
knOWledged killing her.