Minnie Wallace: Murder, Money, and Mystery
Dec 06, 2020
Minnie Williams stands accusing of killing two husbands and possibly a guy who was in something like “the friend zone.” But did she really?
At 16, Minnie left New Orleans to marry 49 year old J.R. Walkup, the mayor of Emporia, Kansas. A month after the wedding, he was dead of arsenic poisoning. Minnie had purchased arsenic and strychnine at local drug stores, saying the arsenic was for her complexion. While this sounds a LOT like a murder story, and she was quickly indicted, it came out during the trial that Walkup was addicted to arsenic pills – smaller doses that wouldn’t get him sick, but that would, he believed, give him sexual vitality and protect him from STDS. Doctors testified that they’d told him to stop; Minnie testified that he’d sent her to buy it and instructed her to say it was for her skin. After a long and sensational trial, she was acquitted.
An Emporia newspaper on the day that witnesses testified as to Walkup’s love of brothels and arsenic.
Though it’s common to just assume everyone accused of murder was guilty, the case for Minnie’s innocence was pretty clear. She inherited his money, and a few years later moved to Chicago, living for a time at the Grand Pacific Hotel, and then in a couple of houses on Indiana Avenue (both of which are now gone).
In 1897, she was accused of murdering Jack Ketcham, her second husband. They had been married in secret after he finalized his divorce against Nettie Poe (a second cousin of Edgar A.). When he died a month later, his family was shocked when Minnie (who had gone back to calling herself Minnie Wallace) appeared with a marriage certificate.
There were theories that the wedding was fake, and, again, traces of poison in the body. But the coroner ruled that the death was due to alcoholism – which had been a big topic in his divorce proceedings. Minnie was not indicted, and claimed the inheritance.
Her lawyer later sued her for non-payment of some funds, and stories he later told make her sound more guilty to me here – she was very eager to find out how much Ketcham was worth after the wedding, and to make sure that he updated his will.
A decade later, a third would-be suitor, De Lancey Louderback, gave her a lot of money (three million by one account) and built her a large house, said to be rigged up with ways for him to keep tabs on her. She never moved in; around the time she was supposed to, she sent him a message saying she’d moved to England and gotten married to someone else. Louderback died of cyanide poisoning a month later – Minnie had been written into his will to get a fourth of the estate.
Her husband died in World War I, and after that Minnie vanishes from the record. A few sources say that she died under the name Estelle Minnie Keating in San Diego in 1957, and is buried in an unmarked grave there.
Thanks to Kyle Northrop, who happened to be in Toledo the day I talked about wishing I could go see the grave of her second husband, who was buried in the family plot there!
The Ketcham Family Plot at Woodlawn Cemetery in Toledo
“Jack” Ketcham’s marker. Minnie wanted to bury him at Forest Home in suburban Chicago, but the family (who were none too happy about him giving her all his money) prevailed on her to let them bury him in his family plot.
Ketcham’s first wife, Nettie Poe, is also at Woodlawn.
The First Journalist Killed In War
Feb 06, 2020
One of my favorite research topics – and a staple of my Rosehill Cemetery tours – is Captain Irving Carson, whose daring exploits as a scout made him a legend in his own time, the early days of the Civil War. But few at the time realized that he was also a journalist, at a time when it was a remarkably new profession. And when he died in the Battle of Shiloh, he became the first journalist to be killed in action. If you know his story well and look closely at his cemetery plot, you might notice that there’s something fishy about it. Did the cemetery originally plan to give him a big, fancy monument that would have become a selling point for other burial plots?
On this episode, we talk with Matt Palmquist of Civil War Humor – the best Twitter feed going – and bring back Mayhayley’s Grave for a new custom song, “Dodgin’ Bullets!”
Every year, thousands of people walk past the landmark Getty tomb in Chicago’s Graceland Cemetery to admire the architecture. Designed by Louis Sullivan, it’s perhaps the most perfect example of Sullivan’s style. Almost no one who sees it realizes that inside lie the remains of one of the most fascinating women in Chicago history – Alice Getty could have starred in adventure serials.
The daughter of lumber baron Henry Getty, after her mother died in the 1880s, Alice, now in her early 20s, began to travel the world, collecting art and curios. She became a noted composer in her 20s (she wrote the song for this episode), then switched gears to become an expert in Buddhist art and history. In 1914 her first scholarly book on the subject was published.
Her studies were interrupted during World War 1; having skipped a passage on the Lusitania’s fateful voyage at the last minute, she settled in Paris during the war and started a publishing house putting out braille books for soldiers who’d been blinded in combat. She was eventually decorated by the French government for this work.
Following the war, she lived in Japan in the mountaintop monastery of a secretive Buddhist sect. She wrote a book about her time there, but before it could be published the only manuscript was lost; it’s thought to have been destroyed when the Nazis took over the village where she was living in France. Fleeing the violence of World War 2, she settled in New York, where she spent the last years of her life with her study partner, Florance Waterbury, studying Illana, the Syrian goddess of love.
For all these broad strokes, though, most of what we know of her life comes from obituaries and articles written thousands of miles from the action. She remains a bit of a phantom – just as likely to star in a serial or to be the person Indiana Jones is looking for! Some pictures:
The landmark Getty mausoleum by Louis Sullivan at Graceland, one of the few spots featured on nearly every Graceland tour I run A rare photo of Alice Getty, from her 1917 passport. Her contact in the states was Martin A. Ryerson, who had commissioned Louis Sullivan to build his father’s own Graceland tomb.The skull lyre Alice and her father collected is now owned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Today we travel to Moline, IL’s Riverside Cemetery to find the unlikely burial place of Francis Jeffrey Dickens, third son of Charles Dickens – and check out some other Dickens family graves (all of which are more about Charles than the person buried there).
Perhaps the most famous thing about Francis is that he once asked for 15 pounds, a horse and a rifle to set up as a gentleman farmer overseas. Charles wrote back that he’d be robbed of the money, he’d be thrown off the horse, and that he’d shoot his head off. We read the letter in the episode!
Modern articles about the grave invariably say that Francis was in Moline to kick off a lecture tour about his father’s life and works, but a look into Quad Cities newspapers from 1886 show that he was there on vacation, and just planning to give a talk to a local club about his time in the Canadian military. It was an easy mistake to make, though – many of Charles’ sons went on lecture tours, and not many people go to Moline on vacation.
Some pics:
The Francis Dickens gravestones in Moline, IL. Both mention is father, the “renowned author.” The Berrien headstone was adorned with a clean pair of Nikes and featured the epitaph “I WILL COME TO YOU.” We can’t think of the non-creepy explanation, eithe! But we couldn’t find any urban legends about the grave, or anything about the Berrien family that would explain the shoes.The Alfred Dickens gravestone at the uptown Trinity Cemetery in New York City. The Augustus Dickens grave at Chicago’s Graceland Cemetery. Would you want your brother’s accomplishments on your gravestone? As we can see, it’s something Dickens’ relatives and descendants just had to live with. Pun not intended.
In 1806, Andrew Jackson and Charles Dickinson fought a duel near the KY-TN border. Dickinson was killed, but the story goes that Jackson took a bullet to the chest and carried it around for the rest of his life. But did he really? A look at primary sources suggests that it may have just been one of those “tough guy” stories people liked to tell about Jackson.
Dickinson’s grave space was lost for nearly a century before it was located on former farmland in 2010; what remained of him (a single finger bone) was reburied at Nashville’s City Cemetery with a new “box style” headstone similiar to the one he had until 1920, when the original was lost (see above). Hear the whole story above, with the pre-duel insult letters performed as a pre-match pro wrestling interview, with an entrance song for Dickinson performed by The Limited Time!
Nashville City Cemetery, just south of downtown Nashville, was agreeably damp the day we visited:
Not far from Dickinson was the finest name we’ve ever seen on any gravestone, ever: Ladie Savage Butts. (Ladie was her first name, Savage her maiden name; she married a farmer named Jim Butts. She was buried in the Savage family plot, and the family chose to use both names).
The Library of Congress preserves one of the original letters in which Dickinson insulted Jackson, leading to the duel. In the episode the letters are read in the form of a “pre-match” pro wrestling interview featuring former wrestler Nick Jordan and Wrestlezone’s Ross Berman.
The song for the episode, “Honor (Wrestling Entrance Music for Charles Dickinson Esq.)” was recorded by Adam Selzer and The Limited Time, a band named after how long Land Before Time puppets were available at Pizza Hut in 1988.
“Honor”
Elizabeth Keckley and Jefferson Davis’s Dress
Aug 14, 2018
Here’s one that, until very recently, would have had be called “Cemetery Mixtape: Unmarked.”
Elizabeth Keckley (or Keckly) was born a slave, bought her freedom as an adult, and became a modiste (dressmaker) for Mary Todd Lincoln throughout her years in the White House, eventually becoming a confidante of both Mrs. Lincoln and the President. Her whole life story is wonderfully told in her 1868 autobiography, Behind the Scenes.
The fair’s newsletter, VOICE OF THE FAIR, describes the wax Davis-in-a-Dress figure. Today it’s a bit problematic for reasons that wouldn’t have occurred to them in 1865.
While her time with the Lincolns and the book have made her a relatively well-known historical figure, it’s not as well remembered that, before coming to work for the Lincolns, she had also worked briefly as a live-in modiste for the family of Jefferson Davis, just before he left the senate to become president of the Confederacy. Mrs. Davis even tried to persuade Elizabeth to come back South with them!
In 1865, as the war wound down, Davis was captured by Union Soldiers while trying to escape to Mexico. Reports in the press were that he was disguised as a woman when he was captured, and artists quickly got to work depicting him in petticoats. Though he wasn’t dressed QUITE as feminine as the artists made him out to be, in this episode we examine several first-hand accounts that make it clear that, though he may not have intended it that way, he was disguised as an old woman, wearing his wife’s waterproof cloak and shawl, and referred to as an old woman by Mrs. Davis. In the episode, we look at some first hand accounts confirming that the legend was, at least, closer to true than Davis wanted to admit.
At the time of the capture, Secretary of War Stanton seems to have decided not to let facts get in the way of a good story – he locked the waterproof cloak and shawl in storage, and seems to have sent out a dress from Mrs. Davis’s trunk to be put on display.
The first display came a month later, when Chicago hosted The Great Northwestern Sanitary Fair, which became something of a victory lap for the war, hosting several generals and showcasing relics and munitions (see the recent post on Mysterious Chicago). Prominently displayed as a wax figure of Davis – in one of Mrs. Davis’s dresses.
The fact that the dress draped on the figure was one of Mrs. Davis’s was one known only because Elizabeth Keckley, who happened to be at the fair, wrote in her autobiography that she recognized it as one she had made for her five years earlier. In speaking of this, she said that she caused quite an uproar in the fair hall, but the story always had to be taken with a grain of salt – she’d said that it happened in winter (the fair was in June), and newspapers at the time didn’t mention the uproar.
Or, anyway, I thought they didn’t. Though they didn’t get her name quite right, the Voice of the Fair newsletter, which has now been digitized, mentioned it in passing:
An excerpt from VOICE OF THE FAIR confirming Keckley’s account., though they got her name wrong.
So, they didn’t get her name right – but she did report that she had to rush out of the building, and it’s easy to imagine that perhaps the reporter simply didn’t have a chance to speak with her.
Keckley’s grave was considered “lost” for many years – originally buried at Columbian Harmony Cemetery, the cemetery was considered full a few years after she died. Though it was mentioned frequently when it was in use – usually either from a notable black person being buried there or someone robbing the graves – after about 1918 it seems to vanish from newspapers until 1960, when a developer bought the land and had the bodies moved.
The tombstones didn’t travel with the bodies – some ended up in a “riprap” separating the Potomac River from land, and others are probably simply lost. The new cemetery where the bodies were taken, National Harmony, replaced them with simple plaques that lie flush with the ground. Elizabeth didn’t have one for years – it’s generally assumed that her plot at Columbian was unmarked, and it was said for years that the new cemetery simply didn’t know which plot was hers. But a historian dug through the records a few years ago, and found that there actually WAS a plot for her, and a new plaque with her picture was finally added. The Washington Post told the story and covered the unveiling of her long-overdue monument.
Given the extent to which the cemetery was forgotten by 1960, it’s possible that Keckley DID have a headstone, and people simply didn’t realize it. For all we know, one of the stones pictured in these shots of Columbian Harmony below could be hers!
Columbian Harmony Cemetery in April, 1960. Smithsonian.
Columbian Harmony, 1960. From the Smithsonian
EPISODE CREDITS:
Kalina McCreery – Mrs. Davis
John Kajander – Jefferson Davis
Ronica Davis – Elizabeth Keckley
John Piotrowski – “Voice of the Fair”
MUSIC
This month’s song is “Elizabeth Waltz,” written and recorded for this episode by Chicago’s own FRECKLEBOMB! Check out their cover of “Pale September,” my favorite Fiona Apple song.
The Bones of Button Gwinnett
Jul 06, 2018
For this month’s podcast, we take a deep dive RIGHT into the grave of Button Gwinnett.
Button Gwinnett was one of America’s least illustrious founding fathers. Though his very brief political career put him in the right place at the right time to sign the Declaration of Independence in 1776, he lived less than a year beyond the signing before challenging Lachran McIntosh to a duel. Lachran won.
No record of Button’s burial survives, but there’s no reason to doubt he would have been interred at Christ Church Cemetery, the only graveyard active in Savannah, Georgia at the time. His exact burial place was lost by the 1840s (the first time anyone made any real effort to find it), and there’s a rumor that the headstone ended up in use as a bar top at a Savannah grog shop.
Now, if they’d known where Archibald Bulloch’s grave was, they might have been able to find Button’s – Bulloch held the office of “president of Georgia” until his death in February, 1777, at which time the office fell to Gwinnett. When Gwinnett got himself shot to death three months later, it would be logical to bury him near his predecessor in office. Bulloch’s grave wouldn’t have been marked in the 1840s, either but in 1921, it was announced that a strange grave marked only with carvings of snakes, known as “The rattlesnake grave” or “The Serpent’s Tomb,” had been identified as Bulloch’s – but no one figured out that it would be a good clue to Button’s gravesite for more than thirty years.
Here’s Archibald Bulloch’s grave, with the snake-eats-tail imagery. This symbol, known in Ancient Greece as an ouroboros, is typically a symbol of eternity and the cycle of birth and death, though early 20th century visitors seem to have assumed it was left marked only with the serpent because the person had died of a duel or something similarly shameful. There are a lot of people who fought in duels buried here in what is now known as Colonial Park.
Archibald Bulloch – “The Serpent’s Tomb.” Bulloch’s descendants identified it in 1921 and added the inscription… though I think the cemetery just took their word for it! If it’s not Archie Bulloch, the odds that the grave seven paces away is Button go down considerably.
In 1957, when high school principal Arthur J. Funk looked near Bulloch’s gravestone, he found an unmarked one that he suspected was Gwinnett, and had it exhumed. Early reports on whether the skeleton he found was Button’s were inconclusive, but Funk kept it in his guest room for five years before the city was ready to re-bury it. A new monument identifies the grave as being the probable burial place of Gwinnett.
Pictures of the exhumation, including a delightful one of Arthur Funk lying in the grave with the corpse, smoking a cigarette, can be seen at the Georgia Historical Society’s page!
Arthur J. Funk enjoys a smoke in Button Gwinnett’s grave as he brushes dust from the skull. Georgia Historical Society.
The cemetery itself, now known as Colonial Park, is a lovely place full of live oak trees dripping with Spanish moss. Several gravestones have been defaced to make it look as though people lived improbably long lives or were married at 11 – it seems to be taken for granted that they were defaced by General Sherman’s troops during the Civil War, but I couldn’t find any reference to them even being in the cemetery that were written within about 50 years of the war. By the time of the war, in fact, the cemetery had been neglected for some time and was falling into disrepair – in the 1880s it was almost built over. The city bought it and turned it into a park in the 1890s, but as of 1919, it was said that it was mainly used as a playground for kids who went to a school across the street. I’d say the kids are much more likely to be the culprits here. Sherman’s troops DID set up a fort in a nearby Catholic cemetery, which might be the source of the legend, but, then again, Sherman tends to get blamed for everything broken or missing in some southern towns!
Here’s one of the altered graves, which makes it look like Muir was already married at the age of 11, among a wall where broken stones are propped up. The broken stones, too, are usually said to be Sherman’s handiwork, but I think it’s generally agreed that they broke of more natural causes, really. They were probably mounted on the wall in the 1890s after the city bought the long-abandoned cemetery from the church.
And Button Gwinnett isn’t the only person in the cemetery who fought in duels – Lachran, who fought him, is there, too, and so is this, “The Duelist’s Grave.”
“The Duelist’s Grave”
The epitaph is nearly illegible today, but, luckily, it was transcribed in The Century in 1906, and in Harpers in 1919:
“This Humble Stone
records the filial piety, fraternal affection
and manly virtue of
JAMES WILDE ESQUIRE late District Paymaster in the army of the U.S.
He fell in a Duel
on the 16th of January, 1815, by the hand of a
man who a short time before
would have been friendless but for him:
and expired instantly in his 22nd year:
dying as he had lived
with unshaken courage & unblemished reputation.
By his untimely death the prop of a mother’s age
is broken:
The hope and consolation of a sister is destroyed:
The pride of a brother is humbled in the dust:
And a whole family happy until then
overwhelmed with affliction.
Here’s Button’s new memorial:
Button Gwinnett’s supposed grave site, right where Arthur J. Funk found it, seven paces from Archibald Bulloch.
And here’s his old one, as pictured in the city of Savannah’s official report on the grave. A few markings are present, plus a letter or two that Funk speculated were “practice” carvings. This was probably the red sandstone end-stone of an “box” style gravestone, the top of which would, indeed, make a pretty good bar stone:
The remains of Button Gwinnett’s original grave, from the Arthur J Funk papers. Bulloch’s is in the background.
Funk also found this 1930s WPA photo of a “box tomb” that he thought may have been Button’s; we tried to find this one around the cemetery today and came up empty.
WPA photo of a stone that was no longer present when Funk started investigating; the red sandstone he found may be the end piece. Bulloch, again, is nearby. Somewhere along the line a brick base was added to Bulloch’s grave; Funk wasn’t sure when.
Of course, for more details, listen to the podcast above, or on Spotify, iTunes, etc.
Our song of the episode is “I Guess My Name is Button Now” by Dick Van Damen, who avoids the internet and has no webpage, but can often be found wandering the northwest side of Chicago, piano in tow.
Additional Voices:
John Piotrowski as Lachran McIntosh and Hugh McColl
Kitten McCreery-Navis as the archaeologist
Bring me the Head of George Frederick Cooke
May 29, 2018
Portrait of Cooke from Dunlap’s diary.
By some accounts, George Frederick Cooke was the greatest tragedian actor of the late 18th and early 19th century; his portrayal of Shakespeare’s Richard III was second to none. Whether he was Scottish, Irish or British was debated in his time; his epitaph reads “Three kingdoms claim his birth / both hemispheres proclaim his worth.”
But all who knew him had a few things to say that weren’t quite so complimentary – his biographer, William Dunlap wrote in his diary that Cooke was “a coward, a braggart, a hypocrite, a backbiter, fearing death… yet rushing on to meet him with the frenzy of desperations, form’d by nature for the attainment of every virtue without possessing one – I fear not one!” His tales of Cooke as a problem drinker were legion.
After Cooke’s death in 1812, he was autopsied by Dr. David Hosack, a Doctor’s Mob veteran and former physician to Alexander Hamilton, and his young associate, Dr. John W. Francis, who would go on to be Edgar Allan Poe’s doctor a few decades later (note: Poe wrote a profile of Francis, and a 19th century biographer described Francis saying Poe had heart disease and would die young, though later authors who called Francis Poe’s doctor may be stretching a big).
Cooke was buried in what was known as the “stranger’s vault” (which the church currently believes was used as a generic term for an unmarked grave), but moved at the request of Francis and actor Edmund Kean in 1821 to this fine new grave, with a flame pointing towards the Park Theatre, where he performed. It would have been visible from the gravesite when it was standing.
Cooke’s grave at St. Paul’s in New York City, near the Occulus and World Trade Center.
But here’s where the story gets weird – somewhere along the line, either Hosack or Francis separated the head from the body, and Francis ended up with the skull. It became a part of theatrical lore that Cooke’s skull had once been used as Yorick during a benefit performance of Hamlet – and Francis himself said it was true – and that the next night, Daniel Webster gave a phrenological demonstration.
Francis on the cover of Harper’s Weekly, 1858
The skull is now in Philadelphia, but whether the legend was entirely true is up to debate. Francis didn’t write the story down until decades after the fact, and didn’t give QUITE enough details to verify it. Hamlet was performed as a benefit at the Park Theatre, the theatre he named, a few times (most notably by Isaac Starr Clauson in 1824, and Cooke’s old rival Charles Kemble in 1833), but I haven’t been able to confirm that Webster was in town for any of them. Even if he was, we’d still be taking Francis’ word for it, really. And according to Poe and everyone else who knew him, Francis loved to tell shocking stories. He doesn’t strike me as the type to let facts stand in the way of a good one. But that he ended up with the skull seems beyond dispute. Oddly, no Poe bio seems to have noticed that he was friends with an actual grave robber!
Here in this episode, I examine all of the facts and sources (here’s the timeline of materials and links), then look into the mysterious “stranger’s vault” with help from Whitey Sterling, former lead singer of Stiffs, Incorporated, and with musical guests The Chuzzlewits contributing a song entitled “Bring Me the Head of George Frederick Cooke.”
More pics from the episode:
Memorial tablet in St. Paul’s to Sir John Temple, a near-victim of the Doctor’s Mob (see episode 2)
The commonly-misquoted grave of John Jones, often said to be the husband of the woman who wrote the epitaph. A close reading shows that John was 4 years old; the world is “harmless,” not “husband.” (rendered, 1700s style, as ‘Harmlefs.'”)
At Cooke’s grave on a rainy afternoon with Whitey Sterling of Stiffs Inc – the band for which I started a fan page in the 1990s! When Bokononists notice the randomness and complexity of the world, they whisper “busy busy busy.”
Dr. Hosack’s grave is at the Uptown Trinity Cemetery (on the other side of Manhattan from Trinity Church, where his patients Alexander and Phillip Hamilton are buried).
Several years back, I took a trip to Cleveland just to see the tomb of President Garfield after hearing a news story that someone had broken into the crypt and stolen several commemorative spoons. This, I had to see for myself!
It’s a fantastic tomb, with a tower you can climb, and relief sculptures all around, including one of Garfield on his deathbed, surrounded by doctors getting ready to poke him in the liver!
In the course of setting up the episode, I noticed that Garfield appointed Frederick Douglass as the Recorder of Deeds for Washington D.C., and walked with him during his inauguration as president. Our musical guest today, Silas Reed, had suggested a song about Douglass, so it seemed like a perfect fit! In research, I found some fascinating accounts of Douglass nearly starting a riot aboard a ship in 1845, the story of which we’ll examine in the episode – as well as solving the mystery of the spoon theft!
MUSIC AND CREDITS
The song for today, “1845 Riot Vibe,” is by Silas Reed, whom I met in Chicago at a songwriters’ night that I attend regularly. Check out his soundcloud!
The episode features the voice talents of John Piotrowski, Kitten McCreery, David Johnston, and Silas Reed. Photo of Douglass’ grave by Katie Barnes.
Joseph Wicher, Killed By Jesse James
Feb 27, 2018
In the Pinkerton Detective Agency lot at Graceland, most of the graves are worn down and illegible. Which is probably why it took me so long to find out that a victim of Jesse James is buried there! Joseph W. Wicher, killed by the James Gang in 1874, is buried beneath the grave on the left below, in a section that looks appropriately like something from the “Wild West” . You can almost make out the name:
What’s remarkable about the lot is, though it certainly served as good advertising for the agency just by existed, we know very, very little about the lives and adventures of the detectives buried here. The two largest and most legible markers are for Kate Warne, one of the first female detectives and spies, about whom books have been written, but which are really little better than fanfiction about her; what we know for sure of her can fit on one page. Next to her is a very wordy monument for Timothy Webster, a spy who, like Kate, helped Lincoln sneak past assassins into Washington D.C. But he’s actually buried in a whole other state – the marker is just a tribute.
Nearly all of the other graves – both of the detectives and the smaller plots nearby for their children who died young – are largely illegible now, victims of time, limestone, and acid rain. So I was very surprised to find an article mentioning that one of them, J.W. Wicher, had been killed by the James-Younger gang.
There are points in his story where we have to fill in the blanks – we don’t know precisely what happened in between what happened when he told local officials in Independence, MO, that he was going to pose as a farmhand to get access to the home of Frank and Jesse James, and the time a day or so later when he bullet-riddled body was discovered. But the basics can be easily guessed. Some believe that local officials warned Jesse, and other believe that Wicher simply couldn’t convince him that he was a farm worker with his soft hands. Both might have been the case. But there exists little doubt that the James gang executed him.
His name is variously spelled as Wicher, Whicher, or Witcher, which makes him a bit tricky to research. Newspaper reports also go their own way on calling him Joseph, Joseph W, or J.W., all of which can throw a wrench into searches.
Pinkerton’s own stone is far easier to read, telling the story of how he worked to free slaves (we’d now call it “performative wokeness,” perhaps, but the epitaph isn’t lying; he was active in the underground railroad and knew John Brown and Frederick Douglass). The employee lot is behind it and to the right. It’s a regular feature on my Graceland Cemetery Tours
Here’s my map of the employee lot. Can you find out more about the others buried there?
MUSIC AND CREDITS
Photo by Lis Eysink
The song for Joseph in today’s episode is in by James Mahaffey of The Scrap Merchants.
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