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Herman Webster Mudgett was born in Gilmonton, New Hampshire in 1861. A graduate of the University of Michigan Medical School’s class of 1884, he found fame and fortune not as a surgeon but as a swindler, con man and probably the first serial murderer in the United States.
While still legally married to his first wife, Mudgett contracted a bigamous marriage to Myrta Belknap in 1886. Double marriage didn’t seem to hinder his charm to the ladies.
By 1888 he was already using his medical background as a means of making money by fraudulent means. At that time he was working as a pharmacist’s assistant in a Chicago drug store. In 1890 the owner mysteriously disappeared and Mudgett kept the income from the thriving business.
Across the street from the drug store a hotel was built for visitors of the Chicago World’s Fair. It was located at 63rd and Wallace Streets and was called The Holmes Castle. Unknown at the time, Herman Mudgett used the alias Henry H. Holmes. It was a name he had taken for his real estate deals and shady enterprises.
Shortly after the Castle was built, Henry Holmes began placing ads in various papers offering employment and occasionally marriage to young ladies. Known to be handsome as well as charming, Holmes was able to lure many ladies to his Castle. Often they brought everything they owned and all their monies only to disappear shortly after arriving. These ads were a constant in the local papers and there is no way of knowing how many women actually answered them.
The gothic style hotel was designed by Benjamin Pitezel whom went into Mudgett only to disappear shortly after taking out a $10,000 insurance policy on himself with “H.H. Holmes” as the beneficiary. The disappearance was actually a plan the two men cooked up to receive the $10,000. Pitezel was to disappear and Mudgett was to find a corpse that was similar in appearance to Pitezel. “Holmes” and Pitezel’s wife would go down to the coroner and identify the body as that of Benjamin Pitezel then collect the insurance benefits, sharing the payoff.
Pitezel disappeared on schedule and Holmes collected the money. Suspicions were raised though and the police began investigating Henry Holmes. After hearing of Pitezal’s disappearance, an ex-con who had served time had met Mudgett who was being held during an investigation into one of his swindling schemes came forward. He told the police of how Mudgett had bragged about his upcoming get rich quick scheme concerning the insurance company’s $10,000. Acting on this information the police began a more thorough investigation into “Mr. Holmes.” They then found Pitezel wasn’t the only disappearance to occur around Mr. Holmes or his castle.
Knowing the police were on his trail, Mudgett disappeared himself with Pitezel’s eldest daughter. When he felt safe, he returned and told Mrs. Pitezel that her husband was at a nearby town and needed her. Mrs. Pitezel and her four other children followed Mudgett.
For several months Mudgett, Mrs. Pitezel and the children moved to various locations in Canada and the United States. Unknown to Mrs. Pitezel, her husband had actually been killed and the Chicago police had begun searching the Castle. Their discoveries in the hotel are still talked about to this day.
The Castle was a three-storied building with turrets, bay windows for the various shops located on the lower floor. The top floor held the living quarters for Mudgett and “guests” of the hotel. On the second floor the police found 100 windowless, soundproof rooms of torture with secret staircases, false walls and ceilings. The basement held two huge acid vats, surgical instruments, rooms with gas vents, a overly large furnace that investigators believed was used for a crematorium, large chutes leading from the rooms to the basement, a variety of human bones and several complete female skeletons. It soon became evident Mudgett used the chutes to transport the bodies from the middle floor to the basement.
Also in the basement investigators found a heavy metal door placed in the floor that opened into a giant lime lined pit. In all, officials felt there could be up to one hundred possible victims.
While on the run with Mudgett, Mrs. Pitezel became suspicious concerning what had actually happened to her husband. Unfortunately she didn’t assist police until after Mudgett had murdered three of her young children and hid the bodies.
Arrested in Philadelphia, Mudgett stood trial for the murder of Benjamin Pitezel. While in custody, he spoke to the Hearst newspaper and sold them a story that admitted to the killing of 27 people. Later he changed his total and said he had actually killed up to 200 people.
Herman Webster Mudgett was convicted for the murder of Benjamin Pitezal and was hanged May 7, 1896 at Moyamesing Prison in Philedelphia. His total number of kills stumped authorities as they couldn’t distinguish nor sort into separate victims, the various bones found because of the thoroughness of Mudgett’s methods.
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