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You are now listening to True Murder, the most shocking killers in true crime history and the authors that have written about them, Gaesy, Bundy, Dahmer, The Nightstalker, DTK. Every week another fascinating author talking about the most shocking and infamous killers in true crime history. True Murder with your host journalist and author Dan Zufanski.
Good evening. At a remote little inn, not far from the Kansas homestead of Laura Ingalls Wilder lived the Bender family. These pioneers welcomed unwary visitors with jack rabbit stew and a sledge hammer to the skull. In time, their apple orchard gave up its secrets, a burial ground for their mutilated victims, each stripped of their possessions. The devilish enterprise on Hell's half Acre would earn the Bloody Benders an
undying place in the annals of American infamy. But it was the mysterious fate of eldest daughter Kate that would make them the stuff of mythic campfire prairie tales. Slaughterhouse on the Prairie is part of Bloodlands, a chilling collection of short, addictive historical narratives from best selling true crime master Harold Scheckter, spanning a century in our nation's murderous past. Scheckter resurrects nearly forgotten tales of madmen and thrill killers
that dominated the most sensational headlines of their day. The book they were featuring this evening is Little slaughter House on the Prairie Bloodlands Collection, with my special guest, journalists and author and historian Harold Schechter. Welcome back to the program, and thank you very much again for coming back to the program for this interview.
Well, happy to be here as oeas Dan. Thank you for inviting me.
Thank you very much. And let's get to a little bit about this Bloodlands collection before we get into Little Slaughterhouse on the Prairie. Tell us like this a little bit more about this collection.
Well, it's part of this new series called Amazon Original Stories. And each entry, each story and blood Lands, there are six of them altogether. Each one isn't meant to be read in one sitting a couple of hours. They run about forty or fifty pages, although they're only available as ebooks, and they span, as you mentioned in your introduction, about one hundred years of American criminal history. The first one
is called The Pirate. It's about an eighteen sixties mass murderer named Albert Hicks, who killed the entire crew and captain on bought an oyster sloop in the early nineteen in the mid nineteen in the excuse me in the eighteen sixties. And then there's Little Slaughterhouse on the Prairie, which is set in Kansas in the early eighteen seventies, as you mentioned about the bloody Bender family. The third
one is about a remember all of them. One of them is about this sex crime panic that gripped the country in the nineteen thirties. There was a hand full of very gruesome, sensational pad opheliac murders that happened in New York and one very horrific one in Los Angeles. And this fuel this UH, I guess what sociologists call a moral panic, which was also partly fed by Jack
or Hoover. This UH and and and again the tabloids played a great role in creating this nationwide hysteria that the country was overrun, you know, with what they call these sex degenerates. Then there's one about UH, an African American serial murderer who is known as the Brickslayer, who would sneak into bedrooms of women and murder them with a brick. He was the model for the character of
Bigger Thomas in Richard Wright's classic book Native Son. Then there's one on Howard Unrouped, the first modern mass murderer in American history, this World War Two veteran who shot to death a dozen of his neighbors in Camden, New Jersey, in nineteen forty nine. And then the last one is about Charles Schmidt, the so called Pied Piper of Tucson, who is kind of a pre Charlie Manson kind of
character in the mid nineteen sixties. So those six stories together, and each one is a separate kindle, single comprise the Bloodland's collection. And again they're only available as on Kendle. They can be purchased individually or being.
Well, that sounds very very interesting, incredible stories. Let's get to this incredible story, Little Slaughterhouse on the Prairie. You open this up with the right in the beginning, talk about the inspiration to this, and we just mentioned that a little bit about Charles Ingalls Wilder, and this is the story of Little House on the Prayer as everybody knows, sow that on television, and you say that this is the this is the story of these people moving to
big Woods of the Big Woods of Wisconsin. Charles Ingalls, pioneering spirit, packed his wife and small children into a covered wagon and headed west for the Indian territory of southeast Kansas. Why the play on the little play on words, little Slaughterhouse on the prairie? Why is it inspired by this little house on the prairie? What about this story? Why is little House on the prairie involved in this story? Little Slaughterhouse on the prairie?
Right? Well? Uh, Later in life, after you know, she had achieved a great yal of celebrity, Laura Inga Wilders published a magazine article talking about all the stuff she had left out of her Little House on the Prairie books. Uh, you know, and she you know, she discussed how, you know, there are all these all these events that she felt
were not suitable for children. You know that she actually heard about her witness families, you know, freezing to death in these blizzards and in cases of infidet marital infidelity, and you know, excusing various acts of violence. In the course of the article, she mentioned that her family had
actually had a couple of encounters with the venders. Uh. And she also uh described, you know, a memory she had of her father having gone off and you know, in return one day and revealed that he had been part of the posse that had pursued and hunted down the Benders, although he supposedly, you know, refused to tell her specifically what had happened, but she had the distinct impression that her father, again as part of this posse, he had taken part in, you know, running down the
Benders and lynching them. So, you know, for a long time, you know, people who you know were interested in Wilder and her life, you know, just took this, you know, as a matter of course. But later scholars have determined that in fact, the Wilders had left Kansas the before the Benders had set up their murder tavern. So you know, this was a case of you know, which happens very often obviously as one grows older, you know, some some flawed embellished memory.
Right, And very interesting is what she does write in that book, as well as saying that her father was part of this posseum we're getting ahead of ourselves with the story, but also that there was a couple of encounters where these the Benders had this tavern, and they came to on their on their way to their destination, they came to the tavern, but they didn't have the money. She said to stop at the tavern, so to avoid what would have happened certainly to all those other people.
And that was part of the other facts that were part of her book, weren't it.
Yes, that is part of it. But again that actually would not have apparently been possible because in fact, you know, there are dates in Kansas don't quite overlap. So so yeah, I mean kind of interesting, you know, the way in which one can you know, Revise once passed and become absolutely convinced that these things happened, when in fact they didn't.
Yeah. Absolutely. You say, during Wilder's childhood that Bender Tavern came to be known as the Devil's in the Devil's Kitchen, Hell's half Acre. And then now you say, just recently historians have branded at Little slaughter House on the prairie. You talk about there was the I guess surprising amount of murders. Are plenty of murders in the region that was sparsely populated, And it's how you mentioned notorious cities like Dodge City, and then another city. I hadn't heard
of Newton. This is years after the Civil War. And you say this county organized in eighteen sixty seven. How was it that there was a you talk about the treaty with the Ossasian Nation. How was it that people were coming to this area in fair amount of numbers? What was it that drove them to this area?
Well, well, I mean in eighteen sixty two, you know, the government passed the Homestead Act, so you know, well this was after the United States, after the O Sage Nation, you know, ceeded this great tract of their land to the government. You know, I mean, I guess most of us are, you know, familiar with the sort of history of you know, the way the US government dealt with
Native Americans. You know, they were constantly entering into these treaties, you know, taking over the land, you know, promising the Indian cit you know, they would be able to continue to reside on these large reservations in perpetuity. And then you know, the more white settler showed up, the more of the Indian land was appropriated. But in any case, in eighteen sixty two, you know, the government passed the Homestead Act, which offered one hundred and sixty acres of
what was then public land. You know, to any settler who came and worked it for five and lived on it and worked it for five years. So you know that obviously attracted a great deal of pioneers to the area.
You talk about. In eighteen seventy two individuals stopped in front of the trading post. You say, run, you're write that run by Rudolph Brockman and his partner August Earn. And this is in the southeast corner of the state, not far from Cherryvale. And he described the driver as a slim young man mid to late twenties, and just his nature, his behavior seemed like people might categorize him as a simpleton. And there was an older man sitting
beside him. And you say, it's not even sure whether that's it was his son or maybe a step son. But what was it that they were they stopped in front of this in front of this shop here? What was it that they had in common? You say that they were Brockmen and this person had something in common and that he decided to they were both help him out.
They were supposed to. They were you know what they called back then Hollanders, uh, you know, which basically meant that they were German in origin. You know, there's a lot of mystery that surrounds the origins and really even the relationship among you know, the various members of the so called Bender family. So yeah, there was old man Bender, uh. And then you know this younger man who, again we don't entirely know, I mean, you know, often described as
his son, sometimes a step son. You know, there are various accounts that claim, you know, that they there was no familiar relationship between them at all. But but in general, you know, the you know, the consensus seems to be that he was, you know, he was the son of old men Bender, you know, John Junior, right, And they had showed up, you know, like other settlers to the region, you know, to claim this land and to settle on it.
Now you talk about right away, they got some wood from neighboring town and they built a small little place, you say, sixteen by twenty four so it's a small building, and it's just the two of them that seem to have built this building. And then they sent for the women you described, they wrote They built a sixteen by twenty four foot building and It was constructed over a shallow cellar about seven foot deep, and then they got a huge slab of sandstone seven foot by three inch thick,
and that that served as the cellar floor. And then they've had a crude trap door that they built as well. And later they dug a well, built a rough sod stable, and assembled a corn crib, which I'm not sure what that is, and a corral intends for livestock. So they set up what kind of business you talk about a tavern, but describe, as you do in the book, what really this looked like in was and functioned as.
Yeah, well, you know, photographs actually still exist of the vendor quote unquote tavern. Yeah, but it was basically this one room shack and they strung up this partition which is sometimes again described as canvas at other times, you know, another kind of light fabric. But in the front part of it they create they built a rough counter and created this very rudimentary kind of grocery store. You know, they hung up a misspelled sign in front of the
cabin advertising it as a grocery shop. That the cabin, by the way, you know, was built right by this what was called the o Sage Trail, which was but it was the main thoroughfare between you know, two of the major towns in that area. So they deliberately constructed this residents, you know, where travelers would pass close by. Uh, and they stocked it, you know, the few meager provisions for travelers, but they would also offer food and lodgings
two weary travelers. Uh and uh. They used the you're part of the shack as the kind of again very very crude restaurant. You know, they had a table set up with some benches and so on, and then a couple of mattresses on the floor where all the benders slept. And then a few want to just spend the night there, you know, you can join them on the floor in another mattress.
You write in the book that soon after or in eighteen seventy one, But anyways, that two women arrived, and one was mob Bender and the other one was as you write, likely her daughter, twenty three year old Kate. And you had even some question as whether what Alvira it was Ivira or Kate sr. But anyway, we called her the mob Bender or as you say, sometimes called
the old Hag. Yes, and so and both you say, both the kids, John Junior it was supposed to be a little bit simple and Kate were products of a previous marriage that she had. And now you talk about you talk about the four of them setting up this tavern. Very interesting and we alluded to in the introduction that Kate's role in this little enterprise here. So what does Kate end up publicizing herself as in terms of some of the skills and talents that she has.
Well, I mean, Kate, you know, supposedly with some kind of medium who would conduct spiritualistic seances. It's a little again, you know, so many as you know, as with all notorious serial killers, particularly going back that far, all these myths and legends have grown up about her. But we do know for sure she uh, you know that she
advertised herself as a healer because business cards still exist. Actually, you know that she would circulate professor Miss Kate Bender can heal all sorts of diseases, can cure blindness, fits, deafness, and et cetera, et cetera. So yeah, she was, you know, set herself up as this kind of quack physician. But her main role well, I don't know how far ahead
of the story you want to get. But you know, her main role in terms of the family enterprise was apparently too distract unwary travelers who were eating, you know, at the Bender in, you know, while her husband, while her father and brother dispatched them.
Yeah, you talk about we'll get into the details right away with an example and a couple examples. Of course, you talk about some people were lucky enough to survive the lender experience. And so in eighteen seventy one, you say, for a few weeks, Katie took a job. Kate took a job as a waitress in the Cherryville Hotel, and she met Julie Hassler, a professed clairvoyant who shared her
enthusiasm for telling fortunes and talking to spirits. And sometime that spring, you right that Julie visited the Bender Place after Kate invited her. And immediately you say, Julie was struck by the squalor of this little shanty, but also the credible foul stench wafting up from the floorboard, she said, and the blue bottle flies. You talk about a seance. What happens in this seance that makes her change her mind about her friend?
Well, according to her testimony, and again let me emphasize, you know that her testimony came after the Vendor atrocities were uncovered. So what does always have to you know, question its validity because it is always the case when horrible crimes are discovered in some community in the past, that people come forward to testify. You know that they had come close to being killed themselves by these monsters.
But according to Julie's testimony, you know, they were they were beginning the seance and she closed her eyes and holding Kate's hands to some of up these spirits, and suddenly she was overcome with, as she described it, a terrible feeling. And when she opened her eyes, she saw the old hag, Mob Bender and John Bender and Pob Bender suddenly approaching her. Uh and Pob Bender had an axe in his hand. And you know, Julie basically said she had to her to the bathroom and got out
of bear and fled. So yeah, so that was her, you know, that was her experience. Again, maybe happened, maybe did happened. You know, there is some reason to doubt it, namely, you know, the Bender's basically who chose victims. You know that they were planning to rob and so on and so forth, and that I don't know if that was the case with you know, with Julie, but but anyway, that was her story.
You say that. About a month later, and this is May eighteen seventy one, two boys find a man's decomposing body in a body in a water hole just below a creek. And this is identified as William Jones, a stonemason who had gone missing on his way to independence, which is the long this route that we talked about, and he was supposed to file a claim on some
land in the next county. As we find with all of these cases, but this is the first one that authority see, that people see, what is the state of the person's physical body, The things that would come to known as that that signature of this killer.
Well, they all had, you know, their their skulls splashed in, the back of their skulls splashed in, and their throats were cut from year to year. I mean, you know, the throats of the vendor victims were gashed so severely that you know, the heads were barely attached to the bodies anymore in some of the cases.
Yeah, yeah, Now you say too that whatever money was there was gone as well, and the police were searching the site. They didn't find any solid clues, but they did find a set of wheel tracks on the sandy bank made my wagon whose rear axle was wider than the front. So that's the only thing they had, very very little anyway. And then you go ahead to January seventh, eighteen seventy two, and missus Leroy Dick, and you just say that she saw the old man and his son.
They lived about four miles southeast of the Dick's place of the home. But she said it was odd because the two men were heading away from their home towards the open prairie. Why would that be odd to her? And what does that develop into?
Well, it was odd because there was a snowstorm going on, and you know, there would have been no particular reason why they were heading into the open prairie as opposed to heading back home as quickly as possible. You know, when she mentioned it to her husband, Leroy, you know, he basically said, well, you know, maybe they were just
lost in the snow. But then when the spring fall came a couple of more the bodies of two war men were discovered out on the prairie basically in the direction that the two bendermen were headed when Missus Dick spotted them. And those two men, like the previous victim, had been murdered, you know, with their their skulls had been crushed and their throated throats had been slit.
Yeah, And we talked about the William Jones, the stonemason, had gone missing. He was found in that thaw. And you say, during the following year, at least nine men traveling by themselves through Labette County went missing. And you're write then in newspapers throughout the state, Southeast Kansas was earning a reputation as a perilous place for a loan traveler.
And then you say, within a month Osage Township Trustee Leroy Dick again we just mentioned him, received six letters from relatives looking for men lost heading in the direction of Labette County. And you say some of those men were thought to have been carrying substantial sums of money, especially for that time. You were saying William Crotton McCrate twenty six hundred dollars again reportedly another man, John.
Greery two thousand, six hundred dollars.
Yes, yes, absolutely, yeah, And then you had another one, John Greery, believed to be carrying two thousand dollars, Johnny Boyle nineteen hundred. And then he just had another man, Benjamin Brown. He only had fifty dollars, but he had a handsome wagon drawn by a well matched Ima Surrell horses, so a valuable he still had valuables. So yeah, and you also talked about too that even one of the men was this Jack Henry Mackenzie was a distant relative
relative of Leroy Dick's wife. So with all these reports, what do authorities do? And you do introduce a person named doctor William.
Yorke mm hmm, Well, I mean York was another victim. I mean York, Doctor William York ended up, you know, being the victim that kind of led ultimately to the
uncovery of the Bend atrocities. But yeah, I mean, uh, the you know, the townspeople of Labet or or you know, the residents of Labette County, you know be you know, because the area was starting to get, you know, such a terrible reputation, they at some point held a meeting and you know, decided that they were going to make a concerted effort to try to track down you know whoever was portraying these crimes. But yeah, So.
You talk about a man named George Longquorps, and you say his wife died in childbirth and he decided to leave Kansas with his infant girl and returned to his parents' home in Iowa. He needed a suitable vehicle for the trip, and he struck a deal for a wagon with his friend and family physician, doctor William Yorke, as we introduced, and he set up for Iowa in late
February eighteen seventy three. He said, the two of them made it as far as Coffeeville, went a blizzard hit and the pair took shelter at the home of a neighborly widow and the widow was the last person, you say to see George and his daughter alive. M you say that you're right that it was. It was doctor York who discovered long Corepse belongings when he left his home to visit the near Independence to visit his brother in Fort Scott. And once he was in the town,
how did he discover this wagon? What was it? Did he? You say this? He heard stories about the wagon and the team abandoned in nearby wood. What did he find and what did he deduce from from that discovery?
Well, again, long Cores and his daughter long Corps had traded for you know, this wagon and this this team uh with Dr York and you know, and and and set out presumably for Iowa. UH and then just and disappeared. And the townspeople found this abandoned wagon and brought it
into town. And then just by Happenstance York himself, you know, happened to be traveling, you know, when traveling to see his brother uh and stopped off of this town and you know, saw this wagon that had been abandondn't realize that was the wagon that long Core had purchased from him, you know. There other than the fact that he was very bewildered by this fact, you know, we don't know much more about how he reacted to it. But then
he continued on his way, and then he disappeared. And it was when William York disappeared that his brother, Colonel Alexander York, he was a very very prominent figure uh in the area U if he was a senator actually, you know, set out fund to find out what had become of his brother. And that, of course, ultimately led to the uncovery of the Bender atrocities.
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trifled with. He practiced law in eighteen sixty one before enlisting as a private with the ninety second Illinois Volunteers in eighteen sixty three. Three he rose to colonel and several years of law practice and he established a newspaper. So this person is looking for to avenge his brother's death, to look into what he hears about rumors, what may have happened, How does it happen that, How does it happen to this?
I mean at that point, he was not so much looking to avenge his brother's death, since he wasn't sure that his brother was dead, but yes, but he was certainly trying to discover what had become of his brother, who had just banished. So he assembled a search party and they began to retrace his brother's route, which ultimately
led to the Bender tavern Uh. And when they arrived there they spoke to They encountered John Junior, who verified that a man matching doctor York's description had stopped by there sometime earlier, about a week earlier or so, and then written off, And John Junior speculated that maybe York had been waylaid and murdered by a gang of gang of outlaws who you know, who were sort of camped out with some nearby spot and John led the posse uh to the place of the ambush, the alleged ambush,
and uh, you know, of course it didn't find anything, so,
you know, York and his posse wrote off. And it was shortly thereafter that a large group of men from O. S h township you know, call this meeting uh and agreed that they were going to serve every homestead in the vicinity UH to see if they could somehow, you know, turn up evidence that one of the local residents was responsible for this series of murders that was casting such a you know, such a blight on the name of the whole the whole county.
Mm hmm. You right, though, that was very haunting, is it. When he went for the fruitless Sir with John Junior, they returned to the Bender home and never greeted there by Kate, and accounts were again that York knew of Kate's psychic abilities and proposed that she used them to locate missing brother. And she said she went into a trance, and she said spirits were reluctant to assist. There's too many unbelievers around. And she told York told him to
return the next day, but on one condition. What what did she say that one condition was? And what did he do in response to that?
Well, the condition was that he'd come by himself. But you know, but York did not take her up on that invitation, and by implication, saved his own life.
Sure. Sure, you talk about a week later after this meeting, and and at that meeting is well, the two Bender men are at that meeting and they leave, apparently board their wagon and they leave. About a week later, a man named Charles Nelson, a resident of Fayir, Kansas, about ten miles north of where the Benders are Bender's home is, was passing through a ravine outside the town. He found
a dilapidated wagon abandoned with two half starved horses. And you say, the editor of the Fair Headlight, a newspaper, examined the wagon. What did they find in that wagon. It was very interesting.
Well, they found the Benders, the misspelled sign that the Benders had hung up on their shack advertising it as a grocery.
Yes, and.
You know the wagon also was notable because again it was constructed very oddly, you know, with the rear axles wider axle wider than the front axle. In other words, you know, it was the wagon whose wheels matched the tracks that had been found earlier at the location where
one of the first victims had been found. But you know what was the interesting thing about that meeting, Clearly Ah pob Ender and John you know, realized it was time to high talent out of there because you know this all the all the male residents of the county. You know, we're eventually going to descend upon their farm and you know, discover the horrible truth about what was going on there.
Yes, you're right that it takes three weeks after that wagon is found and the neighbor, Silas Tolls, notices that the Bender's farm looks unoccupied. He sees the cattle and hogs and horses are all wandering around. He found the house deserted and the horse and wagon gone. And he found a star of calf So Tolls contacts Leroy Dick, the town trustee, who sent word to Colonel York. So you talk about Colonel and a large party of men I think fifteen arrive at the border at the Bender place.
Tell us what they they find.
Well, they find evidence that the place had been vacated in a hurry. They find a number of hammers, including a very large six pound hammer. They find a German bible with these inscriptions on the inside cover, including one enigmatic entry slog day slagh Day. And what they also discover is this the place was just pervaded. You know, it's incredibly fetid odor. And they trace that odor to this trapdoor in which they lifted in the stentia rows. It was so foul, you know, that it drove them
in outside. So they actually managed to lift up and move the entire shack and uh, you know, and take up the floor. And they discovered this little cellar with a stone slab on the bottom which was you know, just coated with clotted gore, which was the source of the stench. And they got a sledge hammer and shattered the slab and the earth underneath it was just saturated with dried blood.
The you talk about the the amount of bodies that they find there and the excavation that they that they undertake. And right after this, right after they you say that one every part too is the colonel recognizes his brother and his head is cut ear to ear, you say, his throat, his ear to ear, His head falls off from is separated from his body when his brother's searching
through that this horrorful scene you talk about. Immediately after this, though, they're looking for somebody to prosecute, and oddly they look at Rudolph Brockman, the trading post proprietor.
Why is this the backtrack from it? Yeah, I mean after discovering you know, all this again, you know, this blood drenched cellar beneath the floor of the shack, they start looking over the property and your climbs a tree and he spots what appeared to be a grave in this nearby apple orchard. So who you know, the men go over there, did this makeshift grave up and discover the you know, the remains of York's brother, William new York.
Uh.
And then you know, in a short order they excavate the graves you know of about ten or eleven other victims, including that of George Longcore, who had been thrown into the grave with his infant daughter. Uh and the infant daughter there was evidence that the infant daughter had been had been buried alive with her father. So yeah, obviously the men are appalled, horrified, in rage, and they turn on uh Rudolph Brockman, you know, partly or largely because
you know, he liked the Benders, was German. He was the first person who had encountered the Benders when the Benders first arrived, known had given him some you know, advice and assistance. So their immediate you know, the Posse's again, you know, it was this inflamed mob, you know, reacting the way mobs often do, and you know, they immediately turned on Brockman and strung him up and then you know, until he was almost dead and then cut him down.
They basically, you know, were trying to torture a confession out of him, and of course he had nothing to confess, so.
You do write that. It's very interesting though that twenty three years later, however, he was convicted of first to be murdered torture of his sixteen year old daughter.
Yeah. Yeah, well, it's one of the horrible eyes. But yes, but at the time, you know, he was certainly, you know, innocent of anything to do with the benders, so you know, but it was, you know, an example of again in this mob mentality, which sadly often overtakes large groups of people under those kinds of circumstances.
You you write about another close neighbor, the other adjoining neighbor, Thomas Tayak. He was said to be a frequent visitor to the vendor home. He was also tortured in the same way with the rope lowering and stringing him up a few times to try to choke a confession out of them. And they eventually let both of these men go when they didn't get a confession anywhere. Now you you talk about it, you have an excavated grave photo
here in your book as well. I just thought I mentioned too that you do have some excellent photos included in this in this book as well. Of the time eighteen seventy three and other dates. There was no eyewitnesses, but the chroniclers of the time, you say, the newspapers grabbed this story and was a sensation. What was the scenario that you say that chroniclers came up with on how these people preyed on these lone travelers.
Well, you know, basically, the traveler would be invited to take a meal at this table, which was kind of sort of like a picnic table kind of thing, and he would be facing his back would be to this canvas partition with his head very close to it, presumably Kate who would distract him and entertain him and beguile
him while he ate. Meanwhile, on the other side of the petition, Popbender and or John Bender you know, would come up with one of these hammers, and when the unwary traveler would lean his head back, they would smash his skull through the partition. And then again, nobody knows for sure, you know, they would either some people thought they would then dump him down into the cellar finish
him off by slitting his throat. Other people speculated that they would just you know, tilt him back and slit his throat and just the blood would run down into the cellar and then they would wrap him up and you know, when it got dark, bury him in the apple orchard. So but one way or another, it seemed, you know, there was from you know, from the stains that they found on the cloth or canvas partition. You know, it seemed it seemed pretty certain that that's that's how
they would murder these people. You know, they would be sitting there having a meal and one of the venders men would come up with a hammer and smash their skulls.
Was there talk of any other mutilation?
Yeah, well, when they you know that, you know, and again exactly why or you know this this was done to some of the bodies, But when they dug up some of the bodies, it seemed clear that some of the men had been castrated. Wow.
Yeah, Now with the newspaper reports and you say, this instantly became a sensation. And not only were the graphic details reiterated over and old again, but rumors turn into I guess well received rumors and became facts in certain people's minds. So this story took on a life of its own in terms of the rumors becoming facts and very interesting what happened to the home itself with it becoming you say, an instant tourist attraction. I thought it
was almost unbelievable. What happens to the building itself, the farm?
Yeah, well, you know, it is and it isn't unbelievable in the sense that, you know, when you research these crimes as I've done. You know the book that I came out with, which I think I was on the program with you to discuss Hell's Princess about Bell Gunnis, Yeah, you know, which was you know, a very sensational case that happened about I guess thirty years after the bender. You know, you see the same thing, and you see this very very frequently. You know, there are some very
notorious cases. There's something called the Red Barn murder in England. We're seeing the same thing. You know. These sites become instant tourist attractions. They attract thousands and thousands of curiosity seekers, you know, who immediately come, you know, by whatever means they can get there. I mean, you know, they have excursion trains and so on and so forth, and these become you know, there's a very very festive, carnivalized atmosphere.
You know, hundreds of thousands really of curiosity seekers just immediately arrive on the site and start scavenging, you know, for all kinds of souvenirs. You know what people now call murder abelia. You know, basically you know, dismantling the shack, you know, taking every scrap of wood as a souvenir, you know, anything they can find, you know, clumps of you know, clumps of dirt and grass from the grave sites.
You know, there's just this, you know, powerful human desire, you know, to somehow acquire these evil relics from these infamous murder sites. You know that that again, you know, we say it's unbelievable, but the fact it's all too believable because it just happens all the time. You know, when the crimes of ed Gean who were uncovered, you know, local residents in Plainfield, Wisconsin, it burned down his house because they knew, you know, it was going to attract
all of these ghoulish souvenir hunters. Anything happened, you know, with Jeffrey Dahmer's place in Milwaukee. You know, if if if the place isn't torn down by the authorities, it's just going to attract people who're coming, you know, get a little get a little uh, you know, piece of memorabilia. So sure.
You write about and we mentioned the posse that was organized by Colonel York and some of his important men, but also that there was three other we'll say, very official posses that went after these men despite the head start that you say that the Benders had probably a week or so, and there was some other official lawman and also other amateur sleuths that joined in on this. There was a considerable reward. But there is of course,
nobody apprehends these people. But there are stories, and there are many stories about accounts of what really happened in terms of vigilante groups. Tell us a little bit about that.
Well, again, you know, a lot of mystery still surrounds the Bender case, as for example, you know it does with the Beliganus case. You know, nobody knows what happened to them. They're all kinds. There's various stories you know that different posses. You know, there are people again you know, Louring the Wilder, you know, who somehow claimed to have direct knowledge that you know, that the Vendors were hunted
down by one posse or another and had lynched. You know, then there are other stories that they escaped and you know is often the case with notorious killers who somehow managed to evade the law. You know, there are these different sightings of the Benders in Kate Bender. You know, for decades really the fact, you know, there were stories when Belle Gunnis's crimes were uncovered, and you know, this is thirty years after the Bender crimes. You know, there
were newspaper stories that bell Gunnis was Kate Bender. So yeah, I mean, again, that's kind of typical in these cases. You know, there were stories that they had escaped and were living in France and then well, yeah, so, but nobody knows for sure.
You have this, but many stories were that they were that they met their their rightful end at the hand of the gil Anti Posse, and some horrendous things were but at least they were shot dead. In a lot of the accounts, it was very similar that they were just eliminated. They were shot dead. There was varying reports that maybe somebody attacked them or wanted to attack them.
They had One of the stories was, of course Kate was armed with a knife and was slashing at them, and even had one story where Colonel Yorke somehow had Kate gave her the ability to escape while the others were killed, and then she went on to live in Canada. You include an incredible story in here that so this
story does not end. Includes a person named Francis McCann, and you say she had a terrible dream and she told her washerwoman, Sarah Davis about this dream at a little bit about this dream and what happens as a result.
Yeah, totally bizarre story. It was I guess around eighteen the mid eighteen eighties, eighteen eighty six or so, which was more than a decade after the uncovery of the Bender atrocities. Yeah, so this woman had a terrible This woman, Francis McCann, who was living in Kansas, suddenly had a dream that she heard a scream in the cellar and ran down and saw a guy with his throat cut. And she mentioned this to this widowed washer woman named
Sarah Davis, who did laundry for her. And Sarah Davis said, that was no dream, you know, that actually happened to you when you were a child, And just this wild, wild, wild story, claiming that missus McCann's mother, Elizabeth was her, that is the washer woman's sister, and that that the mother Elizabeth, you know, had married this guy, John Sandford, and that Elizabeth's other sister Rose. It's such a bizarre story.
I don't even all the details, had fallen in love with him, and that the washer woman's other sister Rose and their mother, Almirah, had conspired to murder missus McCann's
father in the basement. Anyway, totally bizarre story. But somehow missus McCann became convinced that the washerwoman, Sarah and her mother were actually Kate and Ma Bender, and she managed to persuade the authorities and other people, including Leroy Dick, whose name has come up a number of times in our discussion, that these two women were in fact and Kate Bender. And anyway, through you know, this completely bizarre, baroque way, these two women ended up getting arrested and
put on trial. Anyway, they were able to ultimately prove definitively that they could not possibly have been the Benders, mainly because they were both in I mean, they were shady characters, had many many runnings with a law. But their defense attorneys were able to provide documentation that they were both actually in prison at the time the Benders
were perpetrating their crimes. So but but again, it was you know, kind of a striking example, you know, of the way in which the Bender stories kept this grip on the popular imagination and the way in which you know, for years and years and years there continued to be the sightings of the Benders.
Now, as you say, there's so many the legend has it, there's so many names for the Devil's Kitchen, the Devil's In, and the little slaughterhouse on the prairie. Again, incredible story. Refuting, of course Laura Ingalls Wilder's tale of course that she was and her family had an encounter with the Benders.
But as you say, as you're right, there's so many accounts of so many people that wanted to be associated with this crime, either with a piece of a souvenir, a piece of wood, anything from that entire building was you say, entirely carted away, every single stone and piece
of wood. But also that people wanted to be associated with being a near victim, close to encounter, or people that wanted to claim that they were actually there, or they knew firsthand of people that were involved in the posse that took revenge for those murders.
Yeah, well, you know, I mean again that's very very very common phenomenon. You know, I've in my researches into various crimes. I'm always coming across that. You know, when ed Gean's crimes were discovered in nineteen fifty seven, you know, he had all these people, you know, come forward to claim that, you know, ed Gean had offered them, you know, packages of venison, which they then realized, you know, we're
probably human flesh. When the crimes of H. H. Holmes were uncovered, you know, there are all these people claiming, you know, that they had checked into his so called murder hotel, you know, and barely escaped with their lives.
You know. When Bell Gunnis's crimes were discovered, people came forth, you know, claiming that they had stopped off at her farmhouse and had close calls with so you know, it's hard to you know, some of these people are just kind of publicity hounds who want to get their names in the newspapers, you know, and others, you know, just have very overheated imaginations and I think really convinced themselves somehow, you know, that these things really happened. But it's not
at all unusual. In fact, on the contrary, you can almost count on something like that happening, you know, when a crime like this is uncovered.
Yeah, it's an amazing somebody.
I just met somebody by the way, you know, a couple of weeks ago, you know, who claim that Jeffrey Dahmer asked him out on it or claimed that he knew somebody a cousin or whatever, you know, And this person claimed that Jeffrey Dahmer had once asked him out on a date. You know, I mean, could be true, but you know, my own experience with these matters convinces me that probably didn't really happen.
But yeah, absolutely, it's a strange phenomena that we think is we've probably discussed this before that we think it's a modern phenomena, but it isn't. And the kind of behavior that people might find disgusting now in terms of behavior memorabilia sites and people buying you know, art and mementos from serial killers, is that that pales in comparison to what the kind of behavior people exhibited in the past.
I mean, you know, there were you know, people would when Burke and Hair, you know, the notorious British body snatchers. I guess I can remember which one was executed, one of whom I think Burke was executed. Anyway, which everyone was executed. You know, somehow parts of his skin were flayed off and made into tobacco pouches, you know, which
was old to people. You know, people would I myself, you know, have seen among the bizarre collections of some of the people that I have encountered in the course of my career as a true crime writer and researcher. You know, who have you know, like preserve you know, fingers from executed criminals. So you know, the the the the urge to collect ghoulish mementoes and souvenirs of you know, these sensational crimes. You know, there's I mean, that's that's
really an age old human phenomenon. Well look, I mean it's not that different, you know from Aboriginal tribes keeping shrunken heads or whatever you know of their you know, of their enemies. You know, human beings have always kept again google chuvenirs of horrible crimes.
So yeah, not so surprising. Yeah, And even just the hair on the victims of the Benders, the victims of the Benders, apparently or supposedly that hair was cut and and it was a real coup for somebody to get a few curls from the baby of Oh yeah, man, it was in the Baby, so yeah, very interesting. I want to thank you very much, Harold Scheckde for coming on and talking about Little Slier House on the Prairie
and part of the Bloodlands collection. For those people that might want to take a look at your other work, give us your website and Facebook age if you could please.
Uh, well, Harold Shuckter dot com. Uh, my facebook page. That's a really good question. You know. I know I have a Facebook page, but I never know on it.
It's actually that's a hard question.
Yeah, but you know, I guess the best. You know, I guess. Uh. Googling my name is always a way that one can discover more about me and my work.
So absolutely, I want to thank you very much Harold for coming on. Hope to talk to you again real soon. Thank you very much for this interview. You have a great night.
Thanks, good night. Thank you Dan. It's always a pleasure, always
A pleasure, Harold, thank you, good night.