The Morris County chronicle. [volume] (Morristown, N.J.) 1877-1915, 1908-05-12


may have had a body brought here
from Chicago and after firing the house
made her own escape. She is believed
to have enticed men with matrimonial
advertisements and then to have rob
bed and murdered them.
1t was discov cred that a seldom Wis
tied cemetery few miles away from
her farm had recently been robbed of
a body. A laborer passing through it
found disturbed grave and an empty
coffin. Chief of Police Cochran and
two detectives are Investigating.
They heard though not authoritative
Iy, that it was a woman's body which
had been stolen If this proves to- be
so, they and many others firmly be-
lieve the first theory-that Mrs Gun
ness left corpse without head to
impersonate her while she fled after
the house was fired.
Murderess a Norwegian.
What sort of a woman was this
astounding murderer? That is hard
question, and yet something can be
done toward answering. She was a
Norwegian who lacked about two years
of the half century mark. She was
born in Norway and came to America
as young girl. In Chicago in 1888 she
married Max Sorenson, a fellow coun-
tryman. He died suddenly in 1890.
Two years later she married Guinness.
He died suddenly also. AS will be
seen, death, sudden and mysterious, at
tended Belle Guinness for many years.
When she came to Laporte six years
ago with Guinness, Mrs. Guinness was
fat, coarse featured woman who
stood about five feet seven and weigh
ed about 220 pounds. She had a big,
heavy head, a mop of coarse hair of a
muddy brown, little eyes that just
missed being black huge hands and
arms and legs and feet grotesquely
small for the burden they had to sup
port.
Everybody who knew her agrees that
she was far from attractive. Most of
her acquaintances describe her as re-
pulsive Some of her neighbors go fur
fher than that.
.More a devil than a woman" is the
way they put it.
In all there are fifteen deaths which
may be traced to Mrs. Guinness. The
bodies of two men, one girl and two
small children were found first. Two
of the bodies found later were those of
a man and woman, and two were so
terribly dismembered and hacked as to
make it difficult to determine the sex.
This fact will not be known until the
autopsy 1t is believed Mrs. Guinness
fired the house and that if she did not
deliberately wait for death in the
flames that she was responsible for the
death of the woman whose body may
have been carried to the house to be
taken for her own. In the flames the
three small children of the woman
We're burned almost to cinders. This
gives thirteen. and in addition the two
husbands of the woman met sudden
death. The first, Max Sorensen, drop
ped dead, supposedly from heart dis
ease. His relatives alleged that he had
been poisoned, but an order to exhume
the body was not carried out
Her Husbands Fate.
Joseph Guinness, the second hus-
band, died from injuries on the head.
His wife said meat grinder had
fallen on him from a shelf, and the
explanation was accepted by the au-
thorities.
Search will be made in the ruins of
the house, as it is believed bodies We're
buried in the basement. Ten bodies
have been found
An examination of the nine bodies
wrought with short, heavy spike and
that all the blows which killed the
ten persons We're delivered from be-
hind Several small holes We're found
in the back of each skull.
Two Of the nine mutilated bodies
were identified with reasonable GER
fainty. Antoine Olson of Chicago view
ed the body supposed to be that of
Jennie Olson, sixteen years old. foster
daughter of Mrs. Guinness, and pro-
nounced 1t to be that of his daughter.
a sister of the girl, Mrs. Leo Olander
of Chicago, confirmed the fathers iden-
fification.
Identifies Corpse as Brother
Ask X Helgelein, whose inquiries re-
garding his missing brother, Andrew,
led to the first discov cries on the death
haunted farm, became sure that the
largest and best preserved of the
corpses is that of his brother Against
this Identification, however, is the re-
suit of the autopsy performed on this
body by DR.. J. II. Meyer. He found
conditions which, to his mind, proved
that the man persisted long after An
drew Helgelein disappeared last Jan
nary. Dr. Meyer said that the corpse
showed evidences of having been in
the ground less than two weeks ASH
Helgelein, however, refused to be con
WINGED by these findings, and his GER
tainty led the coroner to accept his
identification for theSptesent.,
Roy Lamphere, who is held OH 8
charge of nrst degree murder as a re
suit of the fire that destroyed the Gun
ness home and caused the deaths OF
Mrs, Guinness and heFgthree children
gave no new evSaence despite repeated