Adam Dury

**Adam Dury** is a farmer afflicted by a deep sense of guilt caused by dark ghosts of the past.

He is a character in 'The Alienist' portrayed by David Meunier.

## Character Overview

Adam Drury is a gruff man whose upbringing and past tragedies have made him hostile and suspicious toward anyone. He is conscience-stricken by what happened to his little brother, Japheth when they lived in New Paltz.

Adam Drury is a man in his late thirties or early forties, with short greying black hair, green eyes, and a sturdy build hardened by enduring hardship and working in the fields.

## Biography

A Gloomy Past

Adam Dury was born in a hostile family environment in New Paltz, New York, firstborn of Victor Dury, a preacher. He claimed to Dr. Laszlo Kreizler and John Moore that he and his little brother, Japheth were raised by a stonehearted mother who claimed that Japheth was the "the bastard child of the Red Injun," implying he was born of a rape perpetrated by a Native American man. Unbeknownst to him, Adam improved his younger brother morbid fascination in torturing animals by teaching him how to hunt and skin animals. When Japheth was a teenager he befriended an older peer, a farmhand named George Beecham who raped him. Filled with guilt for having entrusted his little brother to George, Adam wanted to kill the farmhand but he met his death on the Shawangunk Mountains.

Around 1880, Victor Dury and his wife were butchered. The police and the local press imputed the murder of Reverend Dury and his wife to a group of Native Americans. Since Japheth disappeared, it was widely believed that the Indians had kidnapped him. According to Eliza and John Moore's discoveries, following this slaughter, Adam left his parents' house to settle on a farm in Newton, Massachusetts.

Ghost Farm

Newton, Massachusetts, 1896. During a sultry day, Adam Dury braced his rifle ready to shoot from the mezzanine of his barn against two intruders. The two men immediately raised their hands in surrender, telling them they wanted to talk to him. Presenting themselves as two New Yorkers, respectively Dr. Kreizler and John Moore, the two men said they were conducting investigations on behalf of the police and wanted to know something about Adam's little brother, Japheth. Adam was surprised, having not heard of his brother for about twenty years.

The man recalled his violent childhood and how his brother had been psychologically and physically abused over the years; first by his parents, and later by a playmate named George Beecham, a peer of Adam whom he had entrusted his little brother but who later betrayed that trust. Adam was deeply saddened and angered to remember how the farmhand raped his little brother, saying he wanted to kill him if it was not that Beecham died during a climb. Once the requests to the two men were satisfied, they left and Adam went back to work.

## Memorable Quotes

**Adam Dury**: “*I taught him how to hunt with snares, skin animals. Thought it would do some good, but... Uh, even then he couldn't escape her shadow.*”
**Dr. Kreizler**: “*"Her shadow"?*”
**Adam Dury**: “*My mother. She was a woman with no heart.*”
**Adam Dury**: “*I trusted him to look after my brother. He betrayed that trust.*”
**Adam Dury:** “*I'd have ripped that man's throat out myself, I'd ever gotten the chance.*”
— Psychopathia Sexualis

## Appearances

* Ep. 7: *Many Sainted Men* (mentioned)
* Ep. 8: *Psychopathia Sexualis*

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 John Sayles (writer) & David Petrarca (director); (March 12, 2018); "Psychopathia Sexualis". Episode 8.*The Alienist*. TNT