Episode 271: The Villisca Axe Murders Part 1 | Morbid

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Hey weirdos, I'm Ash. And I'm Alayna. And this is Morbid.

It's the third morbid of the week. Third morbid of the week.

Third morbid of the week. the week and next week you're gonna get three too and this isn't really a wrap but here it was you enjoyed it it's the night time And you know what that means?

It's weird. Keeping it weird at night. It's spooky season, so we decided spooky season, we're just going to throw all the episodes we can at you, all the spooky episodes.

Yeah, and you can thank the Patronuses for that because they wrote a lot of good listener tales that you just need to have pounded into your ear.

They provided us with some beautiful spookiness.

Yeah. And for that, we just are gonna keep just... puking it right back at you.

But this episode I'm actually really excited about.

I've been wanting to cover this case. Now, I'm not excited about the actual crime that occurred.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's a very interesting case.

I feel I don't need to say that, but you know.

You know. You get it. You get it. If you're listening, you get it.

We're far in here. You understand. I love that that's our new thing.

You just talk really fast and I just go...

Okay, it's fine. It's fine. But this case, I have been wanting to cover forever, but I knew if I started it, It was going to suck me into one of my Elena crazy rabbit holes that I just can't stop.

What is it? It is the Villisca axe murders.

Oh. For some reason. Okay, like, first of all, very, very accurate. yeah excited to hear this horrible i don't know how to work It's a case that I find really fascinating.

And second of all, I wasn't expecting you to say that.

Really? No. That's funny. I don't know. Yeah, this is one of those, because I think I covered early on the Hinterkaifeck episode.

Axe murders. Axe murders are pretty fascinating to me.

And this one, Villisca has always been like...

Just sitting there waiting for me and I was like, I'm going to get you.

We should also go to that house together.

I want to go to the house so bad, especially after diving into this.

Shout out to, before we go ahead, we have to shout out, I forget who it was, but you're going to know if it's me.

It's you, so shout out to you. But the person who recommended that we go to the farm, what's the farm where we're going on today?

Oh, yes. You recommended Connor's Farm. There you go.

In Danvers. And it's like an outdoor. You're like, finish the sentence.

Yeah, it's really, it looks like it's gonna be really fun.

We bought tickets to the... It's an outdoor haunted, like... haunted corn maze and hayride and haunted house, all that fun stuff, but all outside, like we were saying we wanted to do.

Yeah, so shout out to You rule. Thanks.

Thank you so much. If you tweet at me, I'll say your name on the next episode.

I was going to say Please tweet at us because we want to thank you properly, but I'm very excited for it.

We don't know when we're going to be able to go, but...

Damn it, we bought tickets. I feel like we're going to wait until the kids go to sleep and then we'll go at like 10 o'clock at night.

Yeah, we only have like two weeks left, but we'll figure it out.

We've got so small windows of time. They're also only open on Fridays and Saturdays.

Really? But back to the Villisca axe murders.

Yeah, we should go there. This one is going to be, so today I'm going to talk about the murders.

I'm going to talk about the whole crime scene, the whole shebang that happened around that.

I'm gonna talk about one suspect today. One suspect that when I first started reading about this, I was like, oh, he did it.

Why does no one know that he did it? And then you were like, and then I started looking further into it and I was like, Wait a second.

Then we're going to do another episode where we cover a few other suspects. just to get them out there because they're big theories but then I'm gonna just I'm gonna drop kick you with what I think is the The right theory.

I don't dropkick people. And then in the same episode, I'm also going to go into the hauntings that are now at the, because it's spooky season.

Right, right. So we got to have a little bit of the hauntings in there.

And man, this house is haunted. Like haunted AF.

I thought you were going to say like episode one, we're going to talk about the murders and the suspects.

And then episode two, we're going to talk about the hauntings, but I'm kind of excited.

It's going to be a mishmash. Cause you're going to get us like sitting on this one person and then you're going to drop kick us like you said.

I'm going to roundhouse kick you in the face with another theory.

One time she punched me in the face. It was awesome.

You have to say it. It's going to be awesome.

You have to say like, awesome. She like breathes it.

It was awesome. Yeah, it's gonna be a lot because my theory is gonna involve a lot of other axe murders.

So we're going to talk about some more. Makes sense.

So we're going to talk about some more in the second episode.

So get ready. There's going to be a lot of axe murders. coming up you know what they say once an axe murder always an axe murder they always say that I hear it all the time.

Yes, it really is. It's on t-shirts, I feel.

So this happened way back in 1912. This was June 10th, 1912 in Villisca, Iowa.

You can tell us a lot about that period, I'm sure.

Oh, yeah. I loved living in this period of time.

It was a simpler time. You know? Sorry, honey.

I haven't age shamed you in a while. It's fine.

You really haven't. That's true. I appreciate it.

It felt good. Yeah, you're welcome. But yeah, so what's interesting about this is according to, first of all, what's interesting to me is that the dictionary of Iowa place names exists.

Yeah. But what's even more interesting is that in that I found that the town got its name because it sounded like the Sac and Fox tribes word, Walisca.

And they thought the word was something nice and meant pleasant place or like...

Pretty. You thought. You thought. Yeah, they thought.

Well, they were wrong and it actually means evil spirit.

Yeah, that'll do it. So while they didn't name their town Waliska, they named it Waliska because they thought it sounded the same.

So it's got a weird start already. They just cut the W in half is all.

But... Regardless of that little unfortunate mix-up of terminologies, Villisca was known to be safe. in this time where people didn't lock their doors, they knew each other, they looked out for each other.

It was also a dry town at the time, So they didn't even have the chaotic energy of alcohol around to like deal with it. so like there wasn't you know that there wasn't a lot of you know Because I feel like in this time period, too, a lot of people were alcoholics because there wasn't a lot more to do.

What the fuck else were you going to do?

And I feel like that can lead to chaos, so at least this town can lead to chaos.

So that wasn't even like a contributing factor here because it was a dry town and everybody was pretty fine with it being a dry town at the time.

That's wild to me. It seemed to not be really a problem for them.

But... I read a, I, so I kept seeing something about the streetlights during this, this night.

And I was like the streetlight, what? Like what was up with the streetlights?

Apparently all of the streetlights in the town were off this one night.

The night of the murders. Was there like a person that was in charge of that?

Well, it's for a crazy reason. So the town council was in a knock-down, drag-out fight with the Villisca Public Service Company, who controlled the lights.

And it was over the lights in the town. So for months, they had been fighting back and forth.

It went to court. It was just crazy. Because the town wanted better lighting, they wanted replacement lights, they wanted like replacement, you know, utility poles, like...

Very reasonable things. Yeah fair. I would say.

Fair. And the light company was like, nope.

And it all came to a head on the night of the murders. when the Villisca Public Service Company shut off the streetlights in the town.

As like a fuck you. As like fuck you guys.

Like you don't want to do it. Like you're going to fight with us.

We're going to shut off all the fucking lights.

We're in charge of these. So outside this night was pitch black. black yeah like think of like have you ever like driven in like a like old country roads where there's no lights that shit is scary It adds to the craziness of this night and the scare factor of this night.

And it would have made it much easier for someone to... to creep around undetected outside.

Absolutely. And they were turned back on the Monday after the murders.

Oh, I hate that. So they were off for this like 24 hour period of time where it was just like mayhem.

Just like really coincides. And what a weird coincidence that they got shut off on the night that this prowler decided to do that.

It's just a really weird coincidence. do you think maybe he could have worked at the light place well actually there was a like pretty wild theory that like somebody you know the light company had done it and then or somebody on the town had like had somebody do it to show that they needed better lighting because look, the whole family got ax murdered when the lights were off.

It's a ridiculous theory. It didn't happen.

Crazier things have happened. That did not happen.

You're like, that's stupid. that did not happen I'm just fucking with you so sometime after midnight again on June 10th 1912 um sometime after midnight.

We don't have a specific time of death because it's 1912.

And also, hoo boy, they did not cordon off this crime. scene so again 1912 we have what we have to go with we know it was sometime after midnight because they did They were able to tell through like lividity and stuff and like some other factors.

Impressive. There was a little bit of, there's a few things in this case that I was like, all right.

Like A for effort. All right, you guys. You guys gave it a shot.

Nice. Good for you. I want you to say some time around midnight again.

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Sometime around midnight. Sometime after midnight, actually.

It's like a song by the Airborne Toxic Event.

And every time you say it, the guy says it in my head.

And it's like... sometime after midnight it was sometime after midnight and before 5 a.m. so sometime in that stretch of time A killer entered a beautiful farmhouse through an unlocked door.

Because again, nobody's locking their doors at this point though.

And it wasn't a problem because everybody's just like, whatever.

Everybody's cool. On his way into the home, he had been outside. clearly for a little bit outside of the home.

So he had found or seen at some point, possibly when casing the home, he saw that there was an axe, a long-handled axe, either in the shed on the Holmes property or outside of the shed, like right outside of the shed on the property.

It could have been either one. He stopped at that shed and he took that axe before walking into the home with it in his hands.

Lock your axes up. Inside the house, he found an oil lamp.

They all used kerosene lamps at that point.

And They all had those glass chimneys on them.

You can picture the lamp that I'm talking about.

Absolutely. And it's called a chimney, that little glass part.

So he found an oil lamp in there. He removed that chimney, that glass globe off of it, and placed the chimney under either a chair or a dresser.

You see it both. ways in various sources i'm gonna go with a chair because i like i see that fitting better Well, dressers were like weird too, but then they had like the taller thing.

You're right. You're right. But then he split the wick on the candle in two to make sure that he cast a dimmer light.

Very specific move. Who the fuck would think of that?

Very specific move. And we'll remember that later, possibly in the second episode.

Just remember that that's a thing that happened here.

And then he set out on a mission that evening.

He walked right past the downstairs bedroom, which was right off the parlor, In that downstairs bedroom were two sleeping little girls.

And he walks straight... to the bedroom upstairs on the second floor of 39 year old Sarah Moore and 43 year old Josiah B. Moore.

In that bedroom, he raised the axe high above his head and crashed it back down, over and over. on both Josiah and Sarah's faces.

Oh man. The next morning, a woman named Mary Peckham was the first to notice something was amiss at the home of Joe and Sarah Moore the next morning.

Mary was a neighbor, very close by neighbor.

She was very close to the family. They were like, they knew each other.

She was, I believe in her early sixties, she was like not super at the time that was like oh she's a grandmother like it was like they were like whoa what's her secret look at that elderly witch over there maybe it's maybelline but she was their neighbor super close and she woke up very early, around like 4 or 5 a.m. that morning.

Because again, everybody's like got farms, they have animals, they're all up. when the cows wake up.

Doing farm girl shit. So she comes out, she starts working outside, doing laundry, tending to her animals...

And she was really concentrated on the chores that she had.

And before she knew it, a couple of hours had passed by and around like 6 or 7 a.m., she was like, huh.

Nobody's awake at the more house which was weird and she was like this is weird usually I would hear the sounds of children or They would all be up doing their chores and laughing and playing.

There wasn't the sounds of Joe Moore awake or Sarah Moore playing with the kids or doing their chores.

And did they have animals too? They had a lot of animals.

So she noticed, like a good interested neighbor as well, that their curtains were still not opened. and that there was no lighter movement inside at all.

And the Moors, like you were just saying, they had a ton of animals.

They had chickens, cows. uh horses um and they were all way all the all the animals are starting to get a little like what the fuck is going on too because they all need things done like cows need to be milked in the morning like they're you know and horses need to be fed walked around and fed the chickens need to be let out of their coop like a ton of stuff needed to happen hours before this and it wasn't.

Right. And the Moors took good care of their farm and their animals.

So this was very strange. The Moors were also well known and very well liked in town.

Joe ran a prominent business and Sarah was very involved in the local Presbyterian church where Their children were also very involved and very beloved.

Not a lot of people had like bad things to say about this family at all.

From what it sounds like, Sarah was like an amazing mother.

She was amazing. housekeeper they all said because that was like your claim to fame back then was like he kept a very tidy house And she did.

That's still my claim to fame. What are you talking about?

And actually her father-in-law, one of the things he had to say about her on the stand was like, those children were always so clean.

And I was like, well, shit, Sarah, like, good job.

What a doting mother. And to be honest, like when I first read it, I was like, wow, what a compliment.

Then I was like, no, that's actually like a great compliment.

Because as I looked at my youngest... As I looked at my youngest while I was doing this research, I was like, yeah, they wouldn't say that about me on the stand because I was like, she's a wreck right now. she's feral because kids are so feral they're like and she had young kids so the fact that she kept those kids clean all the time like good on her tough Good on Sarah.

But they had like a beautiful, very large home for the time, a big farm with, like we said, tons of animals.

They took very good care of their property.

So this morning, the quietness was strange.

And they were always... up by 7 a.m. 7 a.m. was like sleeping till noon like that's crazy And usually they were up at the crack ass of dawn at 4 a.m.

So this was just not how mornings went. something was off.

It wasn't like, Oh, maybe they all slept in or maybe she was like, I, something was weird there was just a bad vibe in there and she said there was quote an odd stillness That just came off of that house.

It's like a feeling. Yeah, it was just like this... it was everything seemed to be frozen and she was like i don't know what's happening in there so she knocked on the doors because again she's a good neighbor Yeah.

Mary's a great neighbor. I love Mary. Rest in peace, Mary.

But she knocks on the doors. She gets no answer.

She tried to enter the home because, again, usually doors are open and neighbors just walk into each other's houses and are like hey buddy no thanks so she goes to go in but it was locked And she was like, that's weird.

She tries the back door. She's like, what the fuck?

It's locked. All the doors are locked. So she's like, that's strange.

They don't lock all their doors, but like, okay.

So. she did what any good neighbor would do she took care of their animals she did the chores for them, she started letting the chickens out and milking the cows, doing whatever she needed to do.

But she was getting more and more nervous as time Yeah, what a freaked out feeling that would be, too.

I feel like I would get, like, tingles in my back doing all, like, the chores.

Like, ooh, like... I feel like I would feel like... Yeah.

It just is like... I don't know what's going on in there.

And I feel like she was walking around that house like doing things and she was probably looking back at it being like, What's going on?

No one's waking up. Like, no one? What is going on?

And all the curtains were drawn. And it's just, I don't, I can feel it while I was reading it.

I was like, I can feel the stillness. No, literally. stressing me out.

And the more you read about this case especially, it feels like a movie.

So when you keep having to remind yourself, like, no, this was really what happened, it keeps blowing your mind over and over.

Now, two girls were staying with the Moores that night who were not part of the family.

They were 11-year-old Lena Stillinger and 9-year-old Ina Stillinger.

Eight or nine, I saw it in both sources, or a million sources, I should say.

But the Stillingers, their parents were getting a little concerned as well because They were staying over the night before, and they hadn't heard from their daughters yet.

And again, everyone is awake at the ask of dawn.

7 a.m. They haven't called yet. Yeah, right.

And basically it was like when the sun comes up, you call me.

Right. Like that was their instructions.

You call me to tell me that everything's OK and we'll decide when to come get you and all that.

Right. So Sarah Stillinger, the girl's mom, had actually called the Moore home to ask what the plan was, like when Should we come get them or are you going to bring them home?

Like what's going to happen? And she didn't get an answer. which she thought was weird because back then everybody answers their phone.

And it's like... everything's so quiet back then that you're not missing phone calls because shit's going on.

Right. It's like your house is fucking dead silent except for all of you in there.

You know what I mean? Yeah. There's not the distractions of like...

TV and all that. So it's like... It's just weird that somebody would continuously not answer the phone.

Right. So... Mary is also getting more and more concerned, so Mary decides to call Joe Moore's brother Ross.

And she told him what was going on. And she said, you know, I had seen the Moores return home the night before.

They'd returned home from this thing called like the children's services at their Presbyterian church.

Cute. And it was the night before. It was this annual event.

It was like the kickoff of the summer. And it always started at like 8 p.m.

Okay. They had arrived home around 10 p.m. because I think this program went to 9 p.m. or 9.30.

They probably hung out. and then they went home.

Now these were special services that Sarah Moore actually ran for the church.

And like I said, they began at 8 p.m. And they had like Sunday school classes with the kids.

They would all sing. They would recite like... like, Bible things and do all sorts of stuff of that nature.

I really don't know, but it sounds awesome.

Yeah. Sounds like a cool time for all them.

You're like, it sounds really fucking great.

It sounds so fucking cool. But all the more children were in that program as well.

And so were Ina and Lena Stillinger. Now, Ina and Lena had gone home with the Moors because they were friends with Catherine Moore, one of the children.

She had invited them to sleep over that evening.

Lena and Ina were actually supposed to go to church that morning, then they planned a visit with their grandmother, but they changed the plans at the last second. asked their parents if they could go to the Moore's house.

It was actually her older sister that said it was okay because her parents were in the house at the time.

Uh-huh. Just like the series of events leading up to them being in that house is really unfortunate.

Yeah. Because it's just like... The parents didn't even okay it.

Yeah. And it's like a change of plans. Yeah.

It's just like when you read it, you're just like...

Like they almost just missed. Yeah. Like it just, it could have, I don't know.

It's just a bummer. So Ross, Joe's brother, was concerned as well because, again, this was not like his brother.

So he calls Joe Moore's business head. headquarters.

Right. And this was JB Moore Implement Company.

He owns this business. Yeah. It was a farming machinery and vehicle company.

He would rent out and sell equipment to farmers and all that good stuff.

The flyer for the company advertised John Deere plow goods, Hoosier cedars and press drills, Fort Smith wagons, belly buggies, belly harness, and and Sharples Tubular Cream Separators.

That's my favorite. Those... I can't get those anywhere anymore.

It's so hard to come by those. It really is.

I just used my last ones on Monday. I was like, son of a gun.

No, and I don't know if you heard the first thing, John Deere plow goods.

Everybody knows the name John Deere. Yeah.

For like equipment, right? That was a huge account that he had.

So he was making good money from that oh I would think so and he got that account when he left his old job he took that account with him oh So there was a little rivalry that was floating around town, which we will get into in episode two.

So don't worry. But that's just interesting that that's the first thing that's advertised on his thing is one that he was in like a little bit of a feud with someone about.

So kind of like, I like, fuck you, I got it.

Yeah, it's like John Deere plow goods. But an employee for his company named Ed Selle answered the phone.

And he was like, you know what? I'm actually I was actually worried about Joe, too, because he was supposed to be at work like hours ago.

And he was like, so I'll call him. So he called.

He got no answer as well. So he decided, you know, I'm going to go check in person myself.

I'm going to see if he's all right. So he showed up at the Moore home and Mary Peckham, the neighbor who initiated this whole wellness check, fed the rest of the animals and stuff and he helped her.

She kind of filled him in on like what she had seen and what she was feeling.

They tried the door again. No one answered the door.

So Ed Selle just decided to walk back to the store because he's like, I got to go on sales calls and I don't want to let that get all messed up yeah so he was like i'm gonna do that but meanwhile during the whole thing joe's brother ross who was called first, has decided to now walk to the Moore farm as well to check, which I just keep thinking, this must have been like, chaotic like it's just like ed's showing up and mary is probably like at this point she's like i'm not telling this fucking story again she like like writes it down she literally is just like knock on the door figure it out yourself i don't know Context clues.

Like, she's just telling the story over and over.

Like, yeah, okay, I woke up. Here's what happened.

So Ross shows up, he talks to Mary Peckham, she fills him in on the whole thing again.

He tries the doors. He knocks on the windows.

He's yelling for them. Nothing. Oh, that's so creepy.

And it's getting worse and worse. As the hours go by, they're like... this is bad there's nothing good on the inside of that house so ross had keys in his pocket Now I saw in some sources that he had an actual key to their house,

But then I saw in other sources that keyholes and keys were not super unique back then.

Yeah. The technology wasn't there to make them as unique as they are now.

So he had a key that happened to unlock their latch. door I feel like that makes more sense more yeah because it probably was like he was like oh maybe like I can try this one I'm just going to try this key.

I think that's what happened because I saw that in more sources.

And why else would he waste all that time?

I'm knocking on the windows and the doors and yelling.

You literally took the words out of my mouth because that's what I was thinking.

I was like... Also, he would have just tried the key first.

So it doesn't make sense. So he opens the door.

And he walks into the parlor and Mary's behind him, but she kind of just stays in the doorway.

She's like, I'm just... No, I'll be here if you need me.

You let me know what's going on in there.

He immediately notices that every single curtain... was just covering the windows.

All the windows are covered with extra curtains.

Everything is blacked out in that house.

It was pitch black. They said it looked unnaturally dark in that house.

Somebody had made it a point to make it unnaturally dark in that house.

That's so terrifying. And it was literally, so he was the one who entered the first bedroom on the first floor, which was off that parlor room.

When he looked in, he said he could smell what he thought was death immediately.

The air, the warm air had wafted it around pretty harshly.

Yeah. Upon further inspection, he could make out two figures in one bed.

They were covered by sheets and there was clear blood stains that had formed around the heads of the figures. blood on the walls that he could see quickly.

He ran right back out the door. Yeah. Bye.

He ran right out to Mary. who had not gone into the home, like I said, she was just on the front porch And when Ross came out onto the porch, he sat down, put his head in his hands, and he said, something terrible has happened. and he immediately they called city marshal hank horton and he arrived soon after and He was definitely the guy to call for sure, City Marshal Hank Horton.

He was the highest ranking law enforcement officer in the town.

But poor Hank was certainly not ready for this.

He was not used to walking out on, like, axe murder massacre scenes.

That was really not... Who is really? He wasn't even used to dealing with homicides.

He wasn't used to working on... even assaults.

He was used to like... He was basically just a peace officer.

Like he just kept the peace He kind of just was like, he didn't do a whole lot of aggressive detective work because the town was not an aggressive town.

It was a dry town. He didn't even deal with drunks.

It wasn't even like he had to break up bar fights or anything.

Right. He didn't do anything. And so this must have been...

I overwhelming for everybody, but he must've been like shit.

Well, because it's all on him. This is all on me now.

And I have to deal with this. So when he went into the downstairs bedroom he saw the same scene but he opened the curtain to let the light in.

He didn't move the bloody sheets away to reveal the people underneath because he figured he would do a once-over first and not move any evidence.

But it was clear that they were dead, and it was violent.

It was apparent by the blood spatter that was... all over the room.

An axe. Exactly. He then saw the murder weapon right there.

The bloody, rusted axe was leaning against the wall in that downstairs bedroom.

It was very blunt as well, they said. Although it was bloody with hair and flesh still attached to it.

It had also clearly attempted to be wiped down and cleaned.

It was clear that somebody had tried to wipe it down.

Okay. It was later positively identified as belonging to Joe more.

Because his brother looked at it and said there was a very specific chip in the blade that was very characteristic of his axe. so they were able to say yes, that was his.

I don't think enough attention is really brought to the fact that This killer came into this house without a weapon.

Like, he came to the house without a weapon.

Yeah. So he didn't come to the... He didn't even come to the house with lights.

He took a light that was there. He had no weapon to defend himself with, so they even knew the axe was in the shed.

Which would lead me to believe that they had been watching the family for at least some amount of time.

Or maybe even knew them. Or knew them. Or they were just risking it all and showing up hoping that this guy had an axe nearby that they could find easily.

Or maybe they were going to use a kitchen knife or something instead, do you think?

I don't even know. Because that doesn't seem like it would be... I mean... he that's the thing it's like there was eight people in this house yeah There was six kids and two adults.

And it's like, that's a lot of people you have to subdue.

Yeah. And it seems like they went pretty systematically, because as we'll get into it, they went straight to the... adults first and took care of the adults and took care of joe first very specifically So then people think, were they waiting in the house?

Was he hiding in a closet while they were at a church?

Did he BTK it? I hate that. We don't know.

It's like so many questions are unanswered, but I'm going to try to like talk through them at least.

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The sale ends 831. Don't miss it. But back to Hank walking through the crime scene.

He comes out of that first floor bedroom.

He walks upstairs and he saw the master bedroom.

And when he let the light into that one as well, there was blood.

Everywhere in that bathroom. It was on the ceiling, the walls, all over the beds where Joe and Sarah Moore lay dead under. blankets as well um later coroner lindquist um A lot of doctors and several coroners went into this crime scene.

There were many different people talking about what they saw at the crime scene.

It all matches up pretty clearly, but they did have like different interpretations of certain things, which is interesting.

Yeah. But a coroner Lindquist determined via this blood spatter in their room that the killer was very likely left-handed.

Or at least swung an axe like someone left-handed would, which is interesting to me.

And that's going to come back later, too, when they start talking about suspects.

Sarah Moore and Joe Moore's heads had literally been crushed in. with such force and such violence that they were unrecognizable.

I saw in a couple of sources that Joe Moore's eyes were just...

Like, they did not exist anymore. Okay. Mm-hmm.

Yeah. If you didn't know who lived in this house, they wouldn't be able to tell who these people were.

So the ceiling actually also showed a large, several large gashes that had been chopped into it oh wow and this comes back later when we can piece together the scene It was in this room that they also found another abandoned oil lamp on the floor without the chimney. set up the same way.

That's interesting. Almost like he'd used one downstairs and left one upstairs to to better see his way through the house yeah but not cast a lot of light to wake people up right Now he went into the second bedroom upstairs and he saw three more beds.

He could make out four bodies. One bed had two occupants in it.

All of them were tiny and clearly children.

Some were covered by bloody blankets. Some were covered by like jackets and stuff.

It was odd. And when Hank left the home, he walked right up to Ross, who was still Joe's brother, who was still on the porch waiting for him.

And he said immediately, my God, Ross, there's someone murdered in every bed.

And he told everyone outside not to let anyone in.

So at least by the standards of 1912, they like... quote unquote, tried to secure that crime scene right away.

Yeah. Basically by him just being like, Don't go in there.

And he failed, of course, and it was completely trampled over by neighbors later and everyone else that...

Seems to always be the case with these stories.

I would not want to go into a scene like that. and murders and everything.

It's like people just, we want to pretend.

That we are above it all, but people innately, even in 1912, these prim and proper ladies and gents were-

Check it out. Walking through this axe murder house.

But... They rushed to go get Dr. J. Clark Cooper on scene, and he arrived with Hank Horton around 8.45 a.m.

Now, meanwhile, word is spreading everywhere about this.

Tight-knit town. So far, in fact, that when Mrs. Sarah Stillinger... called the Moore home that morning again because remember she had called earlier and didn't get an answer.

So she calls again. She had to go through the operator because this is a time when you didn't just You had to be like, hello, I would like to talk to them and they would connect you.

That's crazy. And like be on the phone sometimes.

So when she called the operator, the operator said to her, Everyone in that house is dead.

Oh! She's calling to check on her two kids.

And she's like, can you connect me to the Moore house?

And she said, everyone in that house is dead.

Everyone in that house is dead. What a way to say that.

Holy. Like, okay. Like, wow. Talk about like a little insensitive there, madam.

I would say so. So they entered the home together, the doctor and Hank.

And they also had along with them at this point, Dr. Hugh Johnson.

Dr. F.S. Williams, who was the first to examine the bodies and put together a time of death estimate. and Reverend Ewing, who was the Moors Reverend.

And then Dr. Lindquist, the county coroner who came right after.

So a lot of doctors and a reverend. Five doctors and a reverend walk into an Axe Martyr house.

That's a bad joke. So they piece together...

Together, all of them pieced together what happened the night before.

Now, after the initial inspection of the bodies and the scene, Dr. Williams actually came out of the house and he could see that people were crying. crowding around the house, neighbors are showing up, it was starting to become a circus outside.

And he literally came outside and put his hand up and said, Don't go in there, boys.

You'll regret it until the last day of your life.

Oh, yeah. That's the thing. Especially with this one.

Yeah. Why would you want to go in there?

He was trying to be like, guys, I know this is what we do. at this time I know that we all trample through crime scenes and look at dead bodies I realize that it's 1912 and we do that like it's cool but But this is not the one.

No, this is not the one. Don't do it. So they first, when they went into the house, they first walked into the downstairs bedroom again so they could Because Hank was doing that initial, just taking a peek and seeing how many.

Right. He didn't want to move anything or touch anything.

Now they're going to go over with a fine tooth comb.

So they walk into that downstairs bedroom where they found the brutally butchered bodies of eight or nine. year old Ina Stillinger and 11 year old Lena Stillinger.

They had both been killed with ax blows to the head.

Their heads had been reduced to nothing.

Oh my god. It was determined that Ina, the younger one, had been killed first and Lena second in that room.

And it turns out that Lena was actually the last of everybody to die.

But... Ina's face was covered with a little boy's coat.

Lena was in a strange position compared to everybody else.

They determined that no one in the house likely woke up long enough to know what was happening.

Like, everyone was pretty much taken out before they could even wake up.

At least there's that, I guess? Well, Sarah and Joe Moore were killed first to dispatch the adults right out the gates.

So the person came into the house, either came into the house or came out of wherever they were hiding in the house and went straight to their bedroom.

So they either walked right by that downstairs bedroom and went straight to that bedroom, which is like, did you know that that was their bedroom?

Like, how'd you just go start? Like, there's no light in that house.

It's the middle of the night. It's pitch black outside.

Yeah. How can you find that bedroom and find the adults first?

It's very strange, but... They went right to the adults, right out the gate, and then they got the children after. but they were all killed quickly and brutally and found in the same positions they were likely sleeping in.

So it seemed like everybody was just... boom like killed while they were sleeping lena however was found in an unsettling position This is from the testimony Dr. Williams gave to a grand jury later.

He said, quote, she lay as though she had kicked one foot out of her bed sideways with one hand up under the pillow on her right side.

Half sideways, not clear over, but just a little.

Apparently she had been struck in the head and squirmed down in the bed, perhaps one third of the way.

And it looked to me probably as though she may have been turned over that way after. after she had possibly died for the reason that the blood had run through the pillow onto the bed. and this arm had been rammed up in there after the blood had run in there.

So he believed she was the only one that woke up after, like, when it happened and was aware of what was happening.

Oh, Lee. What I think happened, because what he's saying is that her arm was her right arm was rammed up under her pillow. and above her head, but blood had already pooled through that pillow and into the sheet and not on her hand.

So they were like, did she ram it up there afterwards?

What I think happened was she was pulled down the bed forcibly and her arm went up.

Okay. For the force of like pulling down the bed.

Yeah, sure. i think something like pretty terrible happened to her i think he like took special care with her From the 1912 Villisca Axe Murder blog, which, like... is actually an amazing... The research on that blog, I could not stop reading it.

This blog, it's amazing. I will link it in the show notes because it deserves a lot of visits.

She was found halfway down the bed on her right hip, but her upper body was rotated to be flat against the bed.

So in a very weird position. So like twisted.

Yeah. Yeah. Most unsettling is her underwear was removed and put under the bed.

Oh. It was also bloody, but investigators determined it was likely bloody because the killer attempted to either clean himself or the axe with it.

Oh. And her nightgown had been pulled up above her waist.

Her right arm and hand were raised above her head like we said, and her hand was under the pillow.

Now, this blog points out that a lot of people who saw this said it looked like a defensive position, like she was fighting back.

But the arm under the pillow was not soaked in blood.

Like we said, it was just laying in the blood.

So it's more likely that he pulled her down the bed forcibly, like I said, after killing her with the axe and her arm just raised above her head. and dragged as it did.

I think it just probably flopped into that position.

She was also splayed out with her legs spread, which seems purposeful.

Yeah. because they also found a bloody smear that was definitely from the killer's hand on her inner thigh.

They were identified first by their names in their Bibles found at the scene.

And because church members and their neighbors saw them leave church with the Moors that evening, otherwise they couldn't tell who they were.

Oh my goodness. Only by the names in their Bible.

And you said Lena was 11? 11. Oh. All doctors later said no one in the home had been raped.

But they said Lena was very likely the victim of some kind of sexual assault.

Yeah, I was going to ask that. At least, possibly after the fact, she was the only one.

That isn't that... Kind of weird to you.

Very weird. Yeah. Very weird to me. I don't know if he saw her.

This person saw her earlier in the night.

Maybe he was at the church service. There's so many things that could... And the suspect that I will float at the end of this that I... at one point was like, that's the guy, he did it.

And now I'm like, I don't know. He fits, but he doesn't fit at the same time.

That was one of the things. He was at the church service and he could have seen her.

But I don't know. I just don't know. So they go further into the house after seeing Lina and Ina.

And they noticed that Joe Moore did have the most damage inflicted on him. this could possibly be a personal vendetta, or maybe because they wanted to make sure the father, who they probably thought was physically the biggest threat, was dispatched thoroughly.

He was the only one of the family that was actually hit first with the sharp end of the axe.

Everyone else was hit with the blunt end initially.

And that's how they were hit first and then chopped.

I'm surprised that they could figure that out back then.

Yeah, I know. Isn't it interesting? But he was hit so many times and was such force that force.

Such force that the killer actually left huge gashes in the ceiling above.

That's what those gashes in the ceiling...

And then could they probably use that to figure out like how tall this person was?

We're going to go into that a little bit.

So he had actually, so this person had obviously swung the axe above his head. hit the ceiling and came down and done that several times, which Here's the other thing that bothers me about that.

If he was hitting the ceiling and hitting Joe...

That would make a lot of noise. Right. And probably wake up the rest of the house.

But they said that... Didn't wake up. But they said no one else woke up.

But do you think that maybe they said that back then to, I don't know, to ease everybody's minds?

I don't think they were into easing minds back then.

They were letting people trudge through a crime scene.

I don't think they give a shit about anybody's, you know...

Yeah. Sentimental. Well, I mean, they did tell them not to.

But, you know, I think that's just like, they're like, don't come in here, guys.

Yeah, right. I don't think anybody gives a shit about that.

So then what would be the reason that they didn't wake up then in your mind?

I don't know. Maybe they have... Well, there is one thing that could account for this, and we'll get into it in a minute, but...

It makes sense to me more so that he wasn't hit first with the... sharp side of the axe that he was also hit with that blunt side first, because I think he went around systematically hitting them with the blunt side.

Doesn't make as much noise. Not a lot of chopping having to happen.

You can just bonk, like... But you can crack someone's skull with the blunt side of a, it's going to inflict a ton of damage.

Yeah. And I think he went around doing that, and then we'll find out later.

I think he did go back and inflict more damage afterwards.

Maybe when they were all either dead or unconscious.

Which more so seems like a personal vendetta than like dispatching him.

Because there's no way this guy swung that axe over his head first. and then got everybody else.

He had to do a smaller chop first. Which just makes it even weirder.

It makes it even like this whole thing is just weird.

But I don't know. But weirdly enough, they also found similar gouge marks in the ceiling of the kids rooms upstairs. but not in the downstairs bedroom.

You were mentioning how tall they were. It might have been someone kind of on the short side actually, because the ceiling was low.

And an average sized person would actually have trouble hitting the ceiling, like actually like swinging that axe fully in there. without getting it like slamming into the ceiling um and this was according to uh the man from the train by bill james which is, such a good book and i'm gonna link it and it's just it's so good it's such a good book um and he's a retired detective who like goes into this case and looks at it from a detective's point of view from now and it's fascinating right and i think he knows what happened Like in that book, he floats a theory that and I'll talk about it in episode two that I think his theory is the right one.

Okay. And I think it's really well laid out.

I highly, highly recommend that book. I'll link it.

But what we do know is that Joe was hit at least 30 times with that axe, which is a lot of times to the head.

Dr. Lindquist, the coroner, said in a note, quote, Mrs. Moore's face was cut but recognizable.

So what I saw in a lot of sources was that her face was like chopped into slices almost.

Oh, God. So she was like... slightly recognizable but like by by the standards of the rest of the house which is like yeah very bad um He said, Mr. Moore's face was cut worse than hers.

The top of the skull was crushed and the face was cut.

The eyes were gone and the cheeks were cut, but the cheekbones were not crushed in.

Apparently Mrs. Moore's face had been cut into sections, is what they said.

It almost looked like somebody had dissected, but not.

It was like... Much like harsher than a dissection, but like how you would or not how you would. how I would like, think somebody like, not somebody dissecting an organ. would do after an evisceration like you do the sectioning where you slice into little sections.

That's kind of what her face was doing. Now, aside from Sarah and Joe Moore, their four children, Herman, who was 10 or 11, Catherine, who is nine, Boyd, seven, and Paul, five. were in the room across them upstairs.

During the same testimony the coroner said, quote, the children were all cut in about the same way.

Oh, my God. Yeah. Now, when he entered the home, the killer had walked right past Ina and Lina had gone straight to Joe and Sarah first, so he killed them with the blunt side of the axe. went right to their four children, and then he finished with Lena and Ina.

Now after all were dead in the house, we were just saying, He went back upstairs, and one by one, he literally axed their heads unrecognizable with the sharp side.

So after he had systematically gone through that house and killed them all, essentially, because again, a blunt side of an axe is not like dunk.

No, you're crushing someone's skull. That's a massive blow.

Heavy metal. So he has definitely killed them all.

Then he goes back up and he just demolishes everyone's face.

With the sharp side. Do you think that he just enjoyed seeing that?

It could be either... that or it can be I need to dehumanize them because of what I've just done. some it can be i don't know it's like there's no real you can go to like six different reasons for all of these things None of them make any sense.

And the coroners literally said that everybody, each person individually... had been hit up to 20 times with that axe afterwards.

So this was like frenzied and rage-filled and just... like, animalistic.

And they were able to determine this through some pretty fascinating, in my opinion, usage of early forensic investigation.

Like I love seeing in like the 1800s and early 1900s when they did shit that you're like, Look at you.

Good job. Look at you. That's going to get so much better.

But it's there. Good start. Good start. Good for you guys.

So... Sarah's shoe was next to the bed on Joe's side of the bed.

It had been filled with blood during the initial murder.

It was because... blood had saturated all the bed sheets and had run down the side of the bed into the shoe and like filled it.

But when they found it, it had been knocked over and the blood had been spilled out of the shoe. and more blood was pouring onto the side of the shoe.

This led them to see that the killer obviously came back upstairs accidentally knocked the shoe over before they inflicted more damage.

Interesting. which I'm like, that's good for you guys for figuring that out.

Like, wow. Now, some of the wounds were also in various stages of healing and coagulation, which was telling them like...

You know, some time passed before this initial wound was caused, and then a second wound was caused that's in another stage of healing. or coagulating.

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Now, this person also would brought the sheets over everyone's faces or would put other things over their heads.

Right. The sheets were brought up over Sarah and Joe's demolished faces.

They put an undershirt over little Herman's face, a dress over Catherine's face.

They also covered Boyd and Paul with their sheets or their blankets.

And then they went downstairs and they covered Ina and Lena with covers.

Mm-hmm. And based on lividity, doctors and coroners agreed the murders definitely took place between midnight and five.

So after covering everyone's faces, the killer had then walked around the home and put cloth over every mirror, and every reflective piece of glass.

I was waiting to get to that part because that part freaks me the fuck out which there can be a million different reasons for this a myriad So he also used Sarah's skirt, which he ripped in half and put over two mirrors.

Uh-huh. And any reflective surface was covered in cloths.

Anyone, glass, anything. That's so fucking creepy.

And it's like the opposite of Red Dragon.

I haven't seen that. dragon the killer puts like would take out the eyes of his victims and put mirrors in the eyes so that he would see life talk about that And I think this guy, so it's either It was some kind of weird shame thing where he didn't want to see himself after what he'd done or he didn't want to see himself covered in blood.

Because it's not a humanity thing. It's like, because some people take that as like, no, he didn't have shame.

It's like a weird thing. psychological fucked-up thing that, like, some...

Some killers do this weird thing where they have this weird sense of morality all of a sudden after they do something horrible.

That morality is not real. It's just like a flicker of a flame of morality and then they just go back and kill other people again.

Yeah. But I feel like it could have been that he had this weird sudden, like, what have I done?

You know, like, I'm going to cover all these so I can't see myself.

Yeah. Or... It could be that he didn't want anybody else to see, like through any of the windows or anything like that.

But again, it was dark. That doesn't make a lot of sense.

But then there's also, this was like Victorian times.

And it's like... All those funeral traditions are huge where like you cover mirrors when there's a dead body lying awake in your house.

Right. Yeah. Because it's like a luck thing.

Your mirror can take the person's soul and stuff.

So it's like, was that something? with it and they say that remember I think one of the things that you had said was like If you see yourself in the mirror, then you're the next one.

So it's like, was it something with these weird traditions?

I just got the chills. freaks me out right I fucking hate that it could have been any of that stuff so it's like you don't know if he was like religious Could that point to something?

I just keep picturing this guy walking through the house and covering the mirrors. look at my arms right now oh and he did more he didn't just cover the mirrors He didn't just cover the mirrors.

So next to the axe... which was sitting in the room that Lena and Ina were in, sitting next to the wall, next to the axe, There was a two-pound slab of raw bacon. that was wrapped in some kind of like cheesecloth or linen or something like that.

And it was removed from their icebox. Like there was more of that bacon in their icebox and it was on the floor in Lena and Ina's room.

Do you have any idea what that means? Unfortunately, yes.

Some sources, including A Nightmare in Villisca by Richard Estep, which is another great book that I will link, They say investigators theorized, and this is going to be tough to hear. that he used this bacon to masturbate with. as it was found in Lena and Ina's guest room in Lena was posed sexually with her underwear removed and clothing pulled up.

Yeah, because they cannot figure out why else that would be in there.

Why was it in their room? Bacon? Like a slab of bacon.

No, I get it. Yeah. Okay, we can move on now.

Yep. But that is a very strange thing that no one can figure the fuck out why that's Two pound slab of bacon was just slapped on the floor in one of the rooms.

Imagine the first person to float around the idea that it was like to masturbate with.

They were definitely like, so what are you, like, why are you thinking that?

That's sad. legit like that poor guy was probably like here's the thing i've never done i have not done it but I'm just thinking out of the box here and they're like, are you sure you're not thinking in your box, dude?

Dude, what is in your box? That's scary.

I mean, here's the thing. I don't want to get really into this, but it makes sense.

No, it does, unfortunately. I mean, this person was fucked up beyond anyone's wildest dreams.

Yeah. So it makes sense that he would masturbate with a two pound thing of raw bacon.

Okay. I need to move on right now. And he left it next to the axe, which is like, what does that symbolize?

There's got to be something here. I don't know.

And there was more bacon in the icebox. You just took out this two pounds.

You wrapped it in cheesecloth. What's going on?

He wrapped it in cheesecloth. Or in linen, some kind of very thin fabric.

To hold it, probably. Yeah. Which is horrific.

I need to move on. I literally need to get out of this headspace.

I need to get away from there. Thank you.

There was also like random things like parts of a keychain that didn't belong to the Moore family found on the floor.

After he had brutally butchered an entire family, including six children and their guests...

In their sleep, the killer then filled a bowl with water and washed his hands in it. and left the water out with the bloody water in it.

He took his time. He hung around afterwards.

He chilled out. There was even a plate of food on the table.

Oh, Golden State Killer. Golden State Killer.

He just had a snack. It wasn't until 5 a.m. that he left and he left that lamp at the top of the stairs and he locked all the doors behind him.

Hmm. What one? How did he lock the last one?

They think that he locked the last one because there was a key in that... keyhole that either Sarah or Joe had left in the keyhole.

Oh, freaky. which because i think they did that back then they would just leave the key would just be sitting in that thing right who the fuck cares they didn't even use it yeah they don't give a shit So I think he just used that key.

Okay. Now, after seeing what they saw in the home... all the coroners and, you know, poor Hank.

They went to the other buildings on the property because they're like, now we have to see what the fuck's in there.

There's like barns and shit. Is there anything in there?

Yeah. And there was a shed and a barn. And in the barn, they found a little, some interesting things.

They saw hay bales, which is not weird because it's a barn.

Correct. But they saw that they were stacked on each other in a weird way.

The hay bales. Yeah, like a couple of them were moved and stacked in a weird way. that just didn't seem right.

And so they looked closer and they saw that there was a clear depression on the top of the hay.

Like a man or some human had been lying in it for a while.

Yeah. there was an outline of an actual human, and next to this outline in Strange Haystack was a hole cut in the side of the barn.

And this hole allowed whoever looked through it to see the entire property.

And in most of the windows to see the goings on inside the house.

I literally hate that more than I hate anything in the entire world.

So now they're like, was this person just laying on a haystack watching this whole? that's not even a question like obviously why the fuck else would that be there i don't know No, like that's like, I don't care.

That's yeah. Because the hole they said could have been like a knot in the wood that was just happened to be there. the right place.

It's a perfect place. You know, was one of the kids playing on top of the hay bales?

Like, it could have happened. It could have happened. no i'm just saying it didn't i'm just saying it was the man it was the man's Now, other people think the killer broke into the home earlier while the family was at church and did a BTK, like we said. hid in a closet or the attic and waited to attack in the middle of the night. even both of those things yeah that he was watching and then when they left he snuck in and then he And that's how he figured out the room.

Exactly. Now, there were footprints in one of the children's closets upstairs.

I'm leaving. No, I'm vacating currently.

I also wanted to get the hell out of here.

Also, why do we have to do this at night right now?

I know I'm really sorry I apologize I'm not going to sleep I also watched Halloween Kills last night so It wasn't good.

I've heard very bad things about it and it's upsetting me.

I don't think you're gonna like it. But I'm not saying that it's bad.

Alright, I'll give it a shot. I need to watch it again.

Okay, cool. I'll give it a shot. But either way.

Anyways. So yeah, there were children... There were footprints in the children's closet upstairs.

I don't wanna. I... I don't know if I, so I personally don't know if I believe that they were waiting in the house already.

Why is that? And a lot of experts don't believe that either.

You're a fucking expert at this point. And I'm a fucking expert.

I am now a Villisca axe murder expert. Writes that on her resume.

A fucking expert. A fucking expert of the Villisca axe murders.

So... I think that would be very risky.

There's a lot of people in that house. There's going to be a lot of commotion putting kids to bed and shit.

Yeah. The odds that they wouldn't be caught in that silent ass house.

In that they would have to stay like dead silent until everyone in that house was asleep.

Yeah. That's a lot of people to account for to make sure everybody's asleep.

Yeah. And then like to come out of a closet or out of an attic unnoticed.

Yeah. Like, I don't know. That doesn't ring to me like super probable, but...

Do you think the footprints could have literally just been because you put your shoes in the closet? think that could have just been footprints from somebody going into the closet to get something or whatever.

Right. I think, sure, somebody could have been watching from the barn.

For sure. That's totally what I think. I do think someone entered the home later that night.

I think they entered... at some late hour and started their shit.

But because realistically, they wouldn't even need to hide in the closet because it's not like they needed to get in at a certain point because that's when the door was going to be open or anything like that.

Because it's like the door was always open.

Right. They were always going to be able to get in.

And they knew that because they were laying on that hay watching.

And that's the thing. I feel like they had to know the routine here a little bit.

Mm-hmm. I fucking hate this. Yeah, it's pretty terrible.

So as investigators went back and forth between the scene and the precinct and like town buildings and such to try to get more experts and all that. they tasked like one guard to keep watch of the scene and they said dude don't allow Anyone in here except for law enforcement.

Direct quote. Direct quote. Dude. don't my dude don't let anyone else in here besides law enforcement he was like got it He failed miserably.

Over 100 neighbors. Members of church and friends entered that house that day at one point or another.

Tisk, tisk. on them because what is wrong with you like your friends what are you doing you want to see axe murder children that's the thing Oh, it gets worse.

They took things. They touched things. They fucked up everything.

No. Someone took a piece of Joe Moore's skull.

Yeah, that is a lot for my brain to comprehend.

That's the most. That's the absolute... And do we think...

I know what you're going to ask. Yeah. Do we think that it was the person that did this?

I do not. You don't? No. I think they took it when they went back in.

Because they displayed it later. Like they thought it was cool. that's yeah a lot i think because that was one thing that i thought too i was like oh no i don't think it was when you find out who it was you're like yeah i don't think so Oh, okay.

And I'll talk about him probably in episode two.

Why would you want that? I don't know, because that's too much.

That's haunted. That's literally a... that's haunted that's a recipe for very angry that's a curse right there uh yeah hello it's not a recipe that's the full-blown That's literally, it's baked.

It's out of the oven. It's fully cooled.

You just cursed yourself. You can frost it.

You can call it a cake. That's a hex cake.

That's what that is. You've been hexed by your own self, by your actions.

Your actions have cursed you. Yeah, that's no good.

And you deserve it, man. That's bad. Yikes.

But what happened was they all go in there.

Now fingerprints are everywhere. They've smudged any fingerprints that they had of this guy.

They've added fingerprints onto things. It's fucked up.

So by noon, they had finally officially cordoned off the crime scene, but the damage was already done.

Also, here's the other thing. Why would you put one guy in charge of this place?

For like the whole crowd. I know. Come on.

They were just like, you. And then everybody probably blamed him.

And it's like, that's not fair. He definitely was not.

Like Steven is just tasked with like keeping everybody out.

And like Steven is like... He's like, I'm just Steven.

I'm just... I'm just Steven. It was actually just like a farmhand from down the street.

And he's like, I was milking my cow and I was not prepared for this.

I'm literally just Steven. He's like, I'm not a fucking expert on my resume, so... My resume says...

My resume says I'm busy that day. So I don't know what to do here.

My resume says Milk's Cows. Well, and they finally officially cordoned off the scene, but people were still getting in even when it was cordoned off.

It was a completely compromised crime scene now.

It's just like ducked under the tape. Well, like a lot of them would talk their way in or they would distract one of them and like somebody else would go in.

It was a fucking mess. Y'all want to go in there though.

Yeah, it's a real wreck. Now, bloodhounds were brought in.

And they were actually famous bloodhounds, apparently, which I didn't even know that there was famous bloodhounds, but apparently there are.

I think I did know that from, like, another i was gonna say there was another case where there was bloodhounds that were that were famous Damn it, now I want to remember what case that was.

Oh, it was the Oklahoma Girl Scout murders.

You're right. Yeah, another very awful case. case.

Terrific. But yeah, they were well respected to be the finest at finding what they were brought Good doggles.

They failed here, but, you know. But I think their track record other than this was really good.

Well, they probably failed here because there's like 82 gazillion cents.

I think they were. Yeah, I don't think they were.

What are you going to do with that? They had their work cut out for them.

Yeah, like fuck that. They were called the Beatrice Bloodhounds and they were brought in all the way from Beatrice, Nebraska. why were they named Beatrice though yeah I don't know I couldn't figure that out I looked everywhere yeah I couldn't figure it I don't get it So it was sometime around 9 PM that they were actually brought in.

Sometime around. Sometime around 9 PM. Time is a flat circle in this case.

It's not. Time is not real in this case.

It's not. Because everyone's just like, what position is the sun in?

Retrograde. Yeah. Retrograde, that's it.

I don't think the sun retrogrades. No, I don't think so.

But they were brought in at 9pm and they were brought to the scene, they were brought in to smell the axe, they got a scent immediately.

They started going out the door down the street, They were like on the scent.

They went close to a man named Frank Jones's home.

We will talk about Frank Jones in episode two.

But they kept going. They kind of just like stopped in front of his house and were like, No.

And then they just kept going. No. But very weird.

I wish you had seen her face. She squinted her eyes for a second then went...

No, no, no, maybe not. That was really funny though.

Yeah, they were just like, oh, what? No, no, no, no, no, no.

And they just kept going and they went all the way to the Nottoway River before losing the scent at the banks of that river.

So do we think like somebody just like traps through the river?

They don't know because then they brought them to the other side of the river thinking maybe the scent will pick up over there if the person went across but nothing was picked up over there maybe they swam to the end of the river Maybe their wagon was lost forging the river.

A la Oregon Trail. Oregon. Oregon Trail.

I'll call the actual place Oregon if you want me to.

I'll do that for you. Oregon Trail is Oregon Trail.

And they tried to fake it like they weren't.

And you know what's crazy? Oregon Trail...

You did me dirty. You did me dirty. It does feel fucked up.

Came for me. I remember as a wee one sitting in the computer room because like we had a computer room. we were like those bitches oh yeah this girl across from me right now played hours and hours of your game oregon trail i was you really wronged her Hell yeah.

I was bartering at the general store. I was avoiding dysentery at every turn.

I was like, can we go on MySpace? And she was like, no.

Like, I was the younger one being like, can we get on MySpace?

Like, can we aim chat your friends? No. What's Debbie doing?

No, and you know what? I told John about that whole thing that Oregon Trail did me dirty, and he was like, no.

He was like, every teacher told us it was Oregon Trail.

So don't blame just... Blame Massachusetts and the education system because we were all told it was Oregon Trail.

Also, I'm just going to throw this in the middle of this episode.

Regional dialect. Dialect is a thing. In England, in different parts of England, they say different words.

They say the same words differently. Well, it's just regional dialect.

Because it's dialect. We all say things differently.

But anyways, the Villisca Oxburners. But no matter what, somebody obviously did not forge the river to safety on the other end.

Yeah, I don't know. Because the bloodhounds lost the scent.

They did not pick it up on the other end.

And that was it. So many people were arriving on the scene, even from out of town at this point.

It was spreading everywhere. And apparently, according to Villisca by Roy Marshall, another book I read on this that's really good that I will link, Books!

Books! The hotels were booked within the two days after the bodies were discovered because so many people were coming into You know, it's hilarious.

I was like, wow, hotels were a thing back then.

Like inns, basically. Hotels. Yeah. Motels.

Yeah. Holidays. Hardware stores. were sold out of locks.

People were buying guns. It was families would take turns staying awake at night to guard their loved ones. kind of like the Axemen of New Orleans.

It gave me those vibes like real hard. We might mention him again.

Yeah, no jazz here. But June 12th, a couple of days later, was the memorial and funeral for the eight victims. victims they were initially brought by morticians to the local firehouse to be taken care of and they were displayed there in their coffins for mourners to pay respects.

They were displayed. Displayed is like...

Morticians did what they could, but I don't think they were actually like...

I think they were maybe just like the coffins displayed.

Okay. town shut down and apparently the mayor actually ordered businesses to close for the day. that's good I would have done that if I was mayor yeah I was like that's real badass of you yeah like I mean I don't know if all the businesses appreciated that but like it was a nice thought it's one day you know So the day before the murders were now being looked at to see if anything was out of the ordinary before this happened.

We're like, we gotta go back now. We gotta look at the events leading up to this.

Sure. Now, many people did say there was an unusually high number of peddlers in town that day, salesmen going door to door.

A woman named Ethel Landers, because of course.

Yes. Ethel knows what's up. Ethel Landers knows.

And she was at her mother-in-law's home across from the Moore's house that day.

And there were two wallpaper cleaning salesmen, which like wallpaper cleaning.

Hello, 1912. Like that's yes. also imagine just people showing up at your door selling you things no it's a fucking nightmare Like somebody came to my door the other day about solar panels and I was like, how dare you?

Get out of here. How the fuck dare you? Get the fuck out of here.

Yeet yourself. I'm going to haunt you for the rest of your life now.

Two wallpaper cleaning salesmen actually were going door to door.

They spoke to her husband. They were later seen at the Moors and around town a lot.

So people immediately were like, who are those guys?

I think they were just wallpaper cleaning salesmen.

Yeah, perfect. Yeah. A man also tried to peddle something to Sarah Moore's sister Faye that day.

And asked her something inappropriate. I was not able to find out exactly what was inappropriate.

It was probably like... Like, I don't even know.

It's probably something not inappropriate by today's standards.

Yeah, it was. it was probably something very innocuous, but literally it was probably how old are you?

But Sarah said the same man approached her as well. and had passed by the Moore home a couple of times that day.

She mentioned it to her sister. So there's that.

That's weird. Now, interestingly, a lot of people like to mention that it was also weird that Mary Peckham, our Our wonderful Mary, the neighbor, didn't hear anything the evening of the murders.

Back then, shit was quiet. You've said quiet. well do we know like i'm sure i'm sure you don't know exactly how far but like she was pretty close That house was pretty gross.

I wonder where her bedroom was in relation.

Well, like, you know, it's like... Windows are open.

Usually they're not very like insulated at that point.

Yeah. And it's like. Eight people were massacred in a house.

I feel like some noise had to be made. But then it's like... Especially after they were all dead.

He went to town in that house. Yeah, I know.

And he chopped up into the ceiling. After they were dead, he swung that axe hard enough to hit the ceiling several times.

That was gonna make a dunk, dunk, dunk, dunk.

But I do wonder how big her farmhouse was and where her bedroom was.

Here's the thing. Mary was a little older by those standards.

Right. Maybe she couldn't even hear. I don't believe she...

I don't want to believe she heard anything.

If she did... What was she thinking it was, first of all?

She could have thought it was thunder. And what, is she going to come out swinging? in the middle of the night.

What is she going to do? She might have just been freaked out and was like, I don't know what that noise is.

I'm just going back to sleep. Yeah. She wasn't hearing screaming because no one screamed.

Well, that's the other thing. And maybe she's a deep sleeper.

So all she was going to hear was maybe... I do believe she could have definitely heard like... the banging from the gouging in the ceiling yeah but you don't know what the fuck that is if i heard that in the middle of the night i'd be like what is what is somebody doing okay good night Like, I wouldn't, if you're not hearing.

I was going to say she might have thought it was her air conditioning turning on.

I was like, wait a second. Probably not.

1912. She's like, wait a second, is that the AC?

Because sometimes when my AC turns on, it does like a little clunkity clunkity.

Yeah, like a dunk dunk dunk. I mean, I'm sure it's just like, whatever.

There was pipes back then, eh? Yeah. There was pipes, eh?

Was there? I'm sure there was pipes. Pipes clink in the middle of the night.

You know what it is? I just love Mary. I know she loved.

And here's the thing. Mary was described as a grandmother to those children.

Like, that's how much she loved those kids.

She was said to be unbelievably traumatized by this whole thing.

She actually passed away only months later. from like probably a broken heart and like the stress of it all.

And so I found... one of the parts of her obituary and it said, Mrs. Mary Mallory Peckham, wife of Orlando Peckham, of this city died at Bozeman, Montana, Thursday, December 12th, 1912. at 10.45 in the morning after a lingering illness.

The cause of death is directly attributed to anemia and followed a nervous breakdown which was greatly aggravated by the tragedy in Villisca last June.

Mrs. Peckham lived next door to the J.B.

Moore family and was the first to surmise that a tragedy had been enacted there.

The awful affair so preyed upon her mind that health gradually failed her.

On the 3rd of December, 1912, Mrs. Peckham was taken to Montana in the hopes that her condition might be ameliorated I don't know what that word is.

I usually know words meanings and I don't know what that means.

Her daughter, Mrs. E.C. Hugh and son E.L.

Peckham and Dr. Hugh accompanying her but all that loving hands could do was of no avail.

She died at the age of 63 years, 7 months, and 11 days.

Wow. So she died months later and they attribute it directly to a nervous breakdown from dealing with this and like her mind like couldn't handle it I mean imagine she's probably like for the rest of the days after the murder, like thinking about going around that farm, feeding those animals and what was like, behind her in that house.

It was just sitting there, right? She had no idea.

Like, what does that do? And then she was sleeping right next door when that happened. had to know forever that that person entered that home while she slept next door.

Right. Was just creeping around outside.

Right. killing children in the middle of the night and she had no children who she considered her own like surrogate grandchildren exactly I just wanted to clear Mary Peckham's name in case anybody wanted to be like, why didn't she hear anything?

I mean realistic also like we really think Mary Peckham was like swinging an axe like that no I think Mary Peckham was doing she I love Mary Pat.

I think she was snoozing. She was a great neighbor.

She was a neighbor we should all have. Yeah, agreed.

So I'm going to talk about one suspect before we end here.

Okay. Because I want to get this suspect out of the way because I was totally convinced he was the guy at first.

And then now you're not. He's a good suspect, so I will say.

His name is Reverend Lynn George Jacqueline Kelly.

A rev? A rev. And like, am I related to him?

And now he was a preacher. And he went by like Reverend blah, blah, blah.

Sure. He was also a known creeper extraordinaire.

He was British and he literally was a sexual predator.

Oh. I only said he was British like not to be like...

He was British and a sexual predator. No, but, like, he was British.

He was not from Villisca. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So... like he was well known because they were like oh that accent you know what i mean like he was definitely known sure but he happened to also be a sexual predator thank you for I was going to say, I don't want to trip.

You're like, thank you for making it clear.

Thank you for clearing. Because I clearly thought you meant that.

Well, not clearing. Well, you know, I love my British people, so I want you to know that.

I think I'm a little bit British. We are.

Yeah, right? So, you know, I love us. So...

So people also said he was like a little, you know, mad at times.

And that he was kind of like a scary man to be around, even.

Mad as in like angry? Mad as in like, woohoo.

Oh, but even he was like a smaller man, too.

He was 5'2", 119 pounds. And they thought that the guy could have been shorter thank you uh he was from macedonia which was 40 miles away that's where he lived okay The night of the murders, though, he had been in Villisca.

And not only that. he had been visibly in attendance at the Children's Day service held at the Presbyterian Church that was organized by Sarah Moore.

And was he in Villisca because he was going to that?

Yep. Okay. Uh, The entire Moore family and Lena and Ina Stillinger were there, like I said, and would have been very visible throughout the entire service.

Because Sarah was the one, like, who orchestrated the whole thing.

And the kids were all a part of it. People said he was there and that he was watching them.

So he was in Villisca the Night of the Murders and said of his own volition also, that he left by dawn on a train before the bodies were discovered the next day.

Like, ran out of town before dawn. Why?

Jumped on a train. Why? No idea. When he left and caught the train around 5.20 a.m.

Oh, okay. Which is... right outside of the time that the family was murdered.

He spoke to an elderly couple on the train that later said they remembered him and that he had told them...

Did you hear about that horrible axe murder and ballista of that whole family?

Which is weird because this is hours before the bodies were discovered and before the news spread.

You think they was lying? But later, that couple changed up their story a little bit.

Yeah. They said they... He definitely said that.

They said they did see him on a train. He did say that, but they couldn't be positive of the date.

And they were elderly, so people were like, they might have forgot.

But he said that he hopped on the train that day.

He said he hopped on the train that day, but it could have been another day that he talked to these because Villisca was like a big railroad town.

So people came in and out of this town on the train all the time.

Okay. Still weird that he left at 520 a.m.

Super weird. The morning of the murders.

We can't be sure one way or another whether he talked to the elderly people that morning or another morning.

Like after. Yeah. Initially, they said it was that morning, but they pulled it back.

I don't know if they got intimidated or what.

Or they could have been wrong. So there's that.

Exactly. Now, he was also caught peeping in windows in Villisca two days before the murders because he was a peeping Tom as well.

And this was in Villisca that he was caught peeping in windows.

Gross. And he was basically caught by like the husband of somebody's of like a wife that was peeped on and he almost got the shit beat out of him for it.

He should have. Now, he came back to Villisca a week after the murders and was said to be obsessed with them.

It was so obsessive that he even posed as a Scotland Yard detective to get access to the crime scene.

And it worked because he just pretended he was from Scotland Yard and they let him into the crime scene and gave him a personal tour of the crime scene. that's weird because like was he trying to relive the crime exactly he also hounded investigators in the case saying he knew what happened.

Of course he wanted to tell them about it.

He was also left-handed. So why don't you think it was him?

In fact, later he was kind of under surveillance of some kind and they watched him swing an axe in his backyard cutting wood.

Because people cut wood all the time back then.

That wasn't weird. He had an axe. He had an axe in 1912.

But he was like... He could swing an axe because people are like, you know, he was under 19 pounds.

Could he really like swing that axe that hard?

He could. They watched him do it. And he swung it left-handed with zero trouble.

He also sent bloody clothing to the dry cleaners in Macedonia after the murders.

Nothing was really done about him for a little while.

Do you think that he would have sent like the bloody clothing?

Because wouldn't that clothing be like, saturated.

For sure. But there's also the thing that like he's kind of loopy.

So like maybe that's something he just wouldn't give a shit about.

Okay. Let's just send him in. He was arrested two years after the murders in 1914 for something else.

He was arrested because he placed an advertisement for a female stenographer in a local newspaper.

What's a stenographer? A stenographer is like a typist, somebody to transcribe things.

It was a disgusting thing that he wrote back to this woman, so he placed the advertisement.

In it, he said he needed, you know, a female stenographer.

It couldn't be a male. And that they were going to be working on something confidential. and that sometimes they would have to pose as a model But that was like, what?

And he set up for clients or something. So he made it seem like it was part of this whole thing.

And this... woman, Jessamine Hodgson, answered the ad. and his response back to her was a typed letter that, according to a judge later, was, quote, so obscene, lewd, lascivious, and filthy as to be offensive to this honorable court. and improper to be spread upon the record thereof.

Whoa. He wrote in it that she would be required to type in the nude.

Oh. Mm hmm. He was institutionalized at that point.

He was put in a hospital and then released at one point where they And once he was released, they were now just starting to pick up on all this evidence. all the individual pieces that were like, huh.

And Villisca. Wait a second. Let's go back to that Villisca business and see what that's all about.

Right. Just now they're realizing like, wait a second, he's a little off.

Now, in 1917, he was arrested and charged with just the murder of Lena Stillinger.

He was asked about the Moore murders and he confessed.

And he signed a confession that he did it.

He said, quote, I killed the children upstairs first and the children downstairs last.

I knew God wanted me to do it this way. Slay utterly came to my mind and I picked up the axe, went into the house and killed them.

Now, later he recanted this confession saying he had been like beaten into that confession.

Right. Which is very likely. Yeah, I would think so.

That was my first thought, actually. Now here's the thing, that doesn't necessarily make it a false confession.

Right. But it is a coerced confession because in it he does say he killed Lena last.

And that bodes well with the idea that... He said he killed the children first.

In that he wanted to possibly sexually assault her and killed the whole house to do that last.

Also, she was killed last. So we know that's correct.

Like he said, I went upstairs, I killed them first and I killed the downstairs.

That's true. Why would he know that? But do you think that like word might have spread?

That's the thing. So much shit happened and so many people in that house.

So many people were probably hearing investigators talking about shit that they shouldn't have been hearing.

And he posed as a Scotland Yard detective.

So they very well could have told him that.

Exactly. So I'm sure he's had this whole thing.

He's heard the whole song and dance about what happened, so I'm sure he could have just been spitting out what he knew.

Right. I'm like, it could be true, it could be false.

It's either way. I think it was definitely coerced, so I can't really look at it as like a real one.

But also, he was staying the night that he was staying in Villisca that the murders happened.

He was staying with another reverend or preacher.

And that man was actually staying in a tent in his own yard that evening because he was sick.

People used to do that back then if they were sick with a respiratory illness.

They would stay in a tent almost like a tuberculosis patient or something.

But just for any respiratory illness, they would just get fresh air outside.

So they would sleep in a tent. So this man who he was staying with was sleeping outside.

So he didn't really have anyone that could technically say that he was in that house all night because that guy wasn't in the house all night.

Now, it did go to trial. This was the only one that went to trial, and he was freed when the jury was hung.

And it was hung 11 to 1, so 11 people wanted to acquit him, and only one was stuck.

Wow. Because people did believe that confession.

Interesting. So they did another trial because it was a hung jury and they all acquitted him.

He was acquitted and freed. I wonder why.

Yeah. I think people didn't believe that confession, I think.

But... He's definitely, like, he's not... Not a shitty suspect.

To me, he's not totally ruled out. But I think it was a serial killer.

Yeah, I mean the practice. I think it was a serial killer.

I don't want to say somebody that had practice.

But they did. I think they had plenty of prior experience in this.

So I think it was a serial killer and I am going to tell you exactly why in part two.

Awesome. But that is part one of the Villisca axe murders.

I have to. tell you the way that you put this together was like I was hanging on to every last word like that was really I don't want to say that was really good, but the way you told it was really good.

Thank you. I appreciate that. Because there's so much information that I wanted to make sure was in there.

And I was like, I hope this makes sense. snaps yes that was wild it's a fascinating no it absolutely is and i've well the thing is i've heard it told So many different times.

Like I felt like. Yeah. It didn't seem like. the same story.

I love that. Thank you. Of course. What a compliment.

I would literally like I was telling Ash earlier I was like I want to do a full ass podcast like several episodes just full fucking diving into this just like a separate show yeah just like i just want to go nuts I want to do a shepherd show.

A shepherd show. I want to do a separate show on something totally different.

I'll tell you about that sometime later.

Maybe it'll come to fruition later. We should leave now.

Maybe it'll come to fresh and lighter. It's just really late, guys.

Goodbye. It's been a long day. But stay tuned for part two.

It's coming in a couple of days, so it will be long.

I just got to get the rest of it together.

And in the meantime, we do hope that you keep listening.

And we hope you keep it weird. but that's where that you lay atop a barrel of hay and you like look through like a little peephole thingy at a family while they're doing their whole like family shindig and you say I'm going to kill that family and you go in there and you axe every single one of them.

And you have a candle and you cut the candle in half because that's super rare.

Why'd you even cut the handle in half? And like, The bacon?

Don't keep it so weird about the bacon. I'm leaving.

I'm leaving. Goodbye. Don't keep it so weird about the bacon.

Just don't. Thank you. If you like Morbid, you can listen early and ad free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts.

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Before you go, tell us about yourself by filling out a short survey at wondery.com slash survey.

[The Chilling Mystery of the 1912 Villisca Axe Murders]-[Episode 271: The Villisca Axe Murders Part 1]

📋 Summary

The Villisca Axe Murders: A Night of Unspeakable Horror

The Atmosphere of a "Pleasant Place"

The Discovery of the Crime

The Brutal Crime Scene

Suspects and Theories

A Compromised Investigation

🎯Key Sentences

📝Key Phrases

📖 Transcript