Home Sweet Homicide

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Story 1.

The mystery of the Midnight Rider.

This week on Bedtime Stories, we examine one of the lesser-known of America's unsolved crimes, a series of murders which took place during the early 1900s, perpetrated by an enigmatic and brutal killer, one who had become known over time as the Midnight Rider.

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There had been relatively few instances during the time he had served as County Sheriff that Arthur Turner had made the decision to attend a crime scene in person.

But having heard the background story regarding the incident his deputies had attended earlier that morning, it seemed prudent to do so under the circumstances.

During the short ride from his office in Grand Forks to the premises in question, Turner privately hoped that the matter had escaped the interest of the local newspapers.

But as he arrived to find one of his deputies ushering a reporter from the Bismarck Daily Tribune away from the boundaries of the address, he knew that he would have no such reprieve.

Wearily acknowledging that if there was one, there would be others, the sheriff had assisted his subordinate in removing the troublesome journalist before making his way across to the nearby farmhouse.

Once inside, he spoke briefly with the homeowner, a somewhat emotional young man named Vakulin, before being led out to the rear of the household.

Waiting alongside the beginnings of a basement which they had been digging out beneath the property were two workmen, both of whom looked equally as haunted as their young employer.

Turner listened solemnly as the pair described what they had encountered during the course of their work and what lay beneath the tarpaulin they were standing next to.

Then, with a wave of his hand, he had watched as the covering was pulled back to reveal the five skeletal bodies beneath it, all with their skulls completely smashed beyond all hope of recognition.

It would not be until well into the late 1800s that the United States government eventually settled on a means by which to resolve the thorny issue of the Dakota Territory.

Having spent no small amount of time pondering over how best to dispose of the problem, it was decided to divide the sprawling region into two separate states.

Such a decision naturally created a need to establish new towns and infrastructures, with would-be settlers incentivized by the reward of free tracts of land granted by the authorities.

Amongst the many groups who decided to take up this offer was a small party from New York, which selected a site in the Red River Valley to found its new community.

Christening their settlement Niagara in honor of the home county they had left behind, the inhabitants soon settled down into a quiet and unassuming lifestyle.

That was, however, with the exception of one of their number, a 33-year-old bachelor by the name of Eugene Butler.

From the moment he arrived, Butler's increasingly eccentric nature brought him into direct conflict with his fellow settlers.

Electing to build his home well away from the rest of the town in the depths of the surrounding prairie, it seemed that trouble followed hot on his heels whenever he chose to venture into town.

Butler was convinced that every unmarried young woman in the town was deeply intent on pursuing him romantically, and that every man he encountered bore him a hidden degree of ill-will.

He spoke openly of his belief that his life was constantly in danger with the town's inhabitants all secretly eyeing his property and monies for their own selfish desires.

When he did attend social functions, he would refuse to have his picture taken, saying that the photographer would somehow steal his soul into the device.

As his mental health deteriorated, Butler's neighbors began to complain to the authorities that he was continually harassing them.

Several reports were filed with the police to the effect that he was riding beyond the boundaries of his property at night, screaming wild obscenities and howling at the moon.

When visited by deputies, the farmer did not deny his activities.

instead justifying them by claiming that it was he who was the victim of harassment by those who had made the report.

At great length he described to the officers how unknown persons were creeping around his property in the dead of night, trying to gain entry to his home and steal his belongings.

Untrusting of the police or indeed any other person within the community, he had decided his only recourse was to resolve the issue himself.

Conducting nocturnal patrols of his property on his horse, he would shout challenges to any intruder he believed he had caught sight of, lurking within the surrounding darkness.

Eventually in 1904, it was decided that Butler's antics had gone far enough, with the town leaders seeking engagement with his extended family in New York.

After a brief period of consultation, he was subsequently removed from his home by force, and then detained in the state mental facility in Jamestown.

It was there that he would remain until his eventual death from natural causes in 1911.

But the end of Eugene Butler would turn out to be only the beginning of his story.

In the years that followed his almost unnoticed passing, Butler's estate was gradually divided up amongst his surviving relatives.

This process would take no small amount of time, as his isolated and miserly lifestyle had accrued him a small fortune, both in land and government bonds he had purchased.

Reports in local newspapers suggested that the overall value of Butler's assets at the time of his death would be the equivalent of half a million dollars in modern value.

It would not be until 1915 that his home was finally passed into the hands of a group of lawyers, before being placed on the property market for sale.

In no time at all, it was promptly sold to a young family who were looking to settle down in the town, having just migrated to the local area from Wisconsin.

Upon first moving into the farmstead with his wife and newborn baby, Leo Vakulin was more than satisfied with his new surroundings.

Heralding from traditional farming stock, He immediately set about tilling the land around the property, commissioning workers to dig out a basement below the homestead.

But hardly had this work begun when the tradesmen had immediately downed tools calling for the Kulin to come and see what they had unearthed.

There in the crawl space below the building were the skeletal remains of a naked human body, its skull completely pulverized and crushed, beyond all recognition.

Immediately alerting the authorities, the hapless homeowner had then been forced to witness a truly horrifying revelation, as over the coming days, several further bodies went on to be recovered.

As word of the find began to spread throughout the surrounding area, journalists and crowds of onlookers were quick to attend, demanding clarity on what exactly had been discovered.

During a hastily convened press conference, County Sheriff Arthur Turner provided what little detail he could in an effort effort to suppress the many rumours that were beginning to circulate.

In total, the remains of six unknown persons were discovered beneath the property, which were all believed to have been killed in an identical manner.

The life of each victim had been cruelly and brutally ended with a fatal blow to the left side of their head from a sharp or pointed object.

They had then been stripped of their clothing, with their skulls smashed to pieces, before being pushed through a trapdoor which had been built into the floor of the homestead.

In the case of at least two of the deceased, arms and legs had apparently been broken in order to fit them through the aperture.

Five of the bodies had been found grouped quite closely together, a sixth half buried a short distance away, with nothing whatsoever to identify who they were.

The working theory of the investigators was that the victims were farm workers or hired hands, who Butler had killed at various times over the years, likely as a result of his madness.

It is probable that at the time of his speech, Sheriff Turner believed that however grisly the crime was, it would prove relatively easy to investigate.

But as the months turned into years, the exact opposite would be true.

The initial assertion by the police that the victims had been labourers or casual workers quickly began to fall apart.

Examination of the bones suggested that only two of the deceased were adult males.

One of the others most likely belonged to an adult female, with the remaining three being children of varying age.

A new theory arose.

With the corpse set aside from the others being one of the two men, It was now speculated that he alone may have been a labourer.

The rest of the bodies most likely belonged to a family, which had been killed all at once.

Inquiries by deputies would soon establish that no family matching the description of the remains had ever resided in or around the local area.

There was also no suggestion that Butler had ever allowed lodgers to stay at the premises.

prompting speculation that the victims may have been visiting members from his own extended family.

But liaison with the police department in New York revealed that this was not the case, with Butler's surviving relatives adamant that nobody from the family had ever disappeared.

The only person to ever answer the public appeal for help in identifying the deceased was a businessman from Minnesota named Leo Irvansky.

In a letter to the state attorney, He inquired if it was possible that his missing brother may be the dead man buried alongside the family.

John Irvansky had last written to him in late 1902, stating that he was passing through the Niagara area but would be staying on a while to work on the farm of a local bachelor.

With the suggestion that the missing Ibanski brother and the lone body which had been recovered both possessed crooked noses, it was hoped that this aspect of the mystery would be solved.

However, it proved inconclusive.

During the 1980s, the emergence of DNA analysis provided a means of identifying human remains, and the authorities moved to apply this technique to the still unsolved case.

But when members of the team allocated to carry out the inquiry looked into the matter, they discovered that the remains of the victims were nowhere to be found.

It transpired that there had been lengthy periods of time during the original investigation where the bodies had been left unguarded by Sheriff Turner and his deputies.

This had resulted in local residents being able to trespass on the farm and remove pieces of the bodies from the grounds as grisly souvenirs.

In addition to this, the samples taken by the police department had either been lost or disposed of over the years, leaving absolutely nothing to compare the familial DNA sample to.

With the passage of time that has elapsed since the the incident, it now seems apparent that the identities of the deceased will forever remain a mystery.

But as frustrating as this fact is, it has not deterred investigators and commentators from continuing to examine the case in subsequent years.

Analysis of the scene at the time would suggest that the murderer could only have been Butler himself, and no one else.

It was he who had personally constructed the property where the bodies were discovered, and added modifications such as the trapdoor where they had been disposed of.

There is no suggestion that any other person had resided with Butler at the address, and the erratic behaviour he displayed seems to offset the lack of any obvious motive for the crime.

Interviews with doctors at the North Dakota State Hospital suggested that Eugene Butler had been something of a model patient.

Finally separated from his fortune, his paranoia and suspicion had faded away, with no signs of aggression displayed towards the medical staff or those who visited him.

But there remained a strong conviction that all women were attracted to him, with one female nurse having to be moved to avoid the patient's aggressive and unwanted advances.

In an interview at the time the remains were discovered, Dr.

A.W.

Guest stated that despite his many ramblings, Butler had never once spoken of harming or killing any person.

It is entirely possible that he had killed the people found at his home, suspecting them of trying to steal his fortune, and had then completely forgotten he had done so as his mental state began to recover.

It was not uncommon, however, for Butler to describe to his doctors that he had heard sinister voices telling him what to do.

On occasion, he would carry out strange acts in front of the staff, later claiming he had no recollection of doing so, as if some unseen force had temporarily taken control of his body.

This raises the prospect that had he lived to be accused of the crimes, Butler may well have claimed to have been suffering from some form of personality disorder, or even demonic possession.

The only person who actually knew what took place at the remote farmhouse on the outskirts of Niagara died well before his crimes were discovered.

The house that Eugene Butler constructed and then adapted to serve his misdeeds was demolished many years later.

An industrial storage unit now stands on the site, belonging to a local family which owns the land.

Repeated public appeals for local residents to search their basements and attics for the bones that were stolen from the crime scene have yielded no positive results, all of which seems to indicate that the victims of the Midnight Rider will remain unidentified.

The manner in which they came into contact with their killer is as mysterious as the reasons for which their lives were so brutally ended.

May their souls rest in peace.

Story 2 The Misery of the Myrtles Plantation

Given their history, it is perhaps of little surprise that America's southern states are home to a wealth of allegedly haunted locations.

This week, we will be examining one of the most infamous of these sites, a rural dwelling which possesses a past saturated in sadness and tragedy.

Join us as we examine the misery of the Myrtles Plantation.

Waiting until she had heard the last faint traces of conversation trailing off through the main entrance, the maid finally rose and made her way into the parlour.

A regular visitor to the address, the guide for the plantation's ghost tours had just stepped back inside the foyer, having waved off the last members of that evening's party.

After a brief exchange, the guide had then gathered her things before heading off herself, leaving the maid to carry on with her evening routine.

Although she had not been working at the sprawling location for long, the young cleaner had already evolved what she believed to be a suitably efficient schedule.

Starting off at the far end of the first floor, she slowly made her way back to the stairs, wiping and polishing until she was satisfied everything was up to the required standard.

Methodically working her way down the wide staircase, She found herself frowning when she again reached the ground floor, having caught sight of a set of dirty handprints at the base of the mirror which hung there.

She had first heard of the mirror many years before, during her own attendance at an evening ghost tour of the site, how it was supposed to be home to the spirits of a mother and her children who once died in the house.

In the few weeks she had worked at the plantation, She had not seen anything strange or suspicious in or around the mirror.

She quickly formed the opinion that one of this evening's guests must have made the prints in order to provoke conversation.

Wiping away the marks, she resumed her chores, spending another hour traversing the ground floor before returning once again to the parlour.

But as she stood having placed her bucket on the floor and removing her gloves, her attention was once again drawn to the same mirror.

There,

directly in the centre of the lower half of the glass, were a further pair of palm prints, too small to have been made by a grown adult.

Feeling a growing sense of unease, the maid called out several times, asking if anybody had perhaps come across from one of the other buildings while she had been busy with her work.

When there was no reply, her uncertainty quickly turned to frustration.

Somebody was apparently pulling a prank at her expense.

Taking up her cloth, she advanced across the hallway towards the mirror, ready to wipe away the dirty marks once again.

But as she approached, a small hand suddenly pressed itself flat against the center of the glass, seemingly from the other side.

Instantly recoiling in horror, the maid turned and fled screaming into the grounds outside, the vision of the pale and emaciated young girl with the blonde ringlets who had been staring back at her from inside the mirror, tormenting her as she ran.

The location that would in time become known as the Myrtles Plantation is found roughly 18 miles north of St.

Francisville in the southern state of Louisiana.

When the first buildings were constructed at the direction of David Bradford, the original owner who had purchased the land in 1796, the 600-acre site had originally been christened Laurel Grove.

Bradford had been a politician of some repute in his native Pennsylvania, but had been forced to flee his home there due to his role in a period of unrest known as the Whiskey Rebellion.

It would not be until some years later, when he finally received a presidential pardon for his actions, that he was able to invite his wife and children to come and live in their new home.

Bradford and his family family would go on to reside at the plantation for many years, but sadly, a significant number of the younger members of the household would lose their lives there during a slew of localised outbreaks of yellow fever.

Eventually, the surviving members of the estate would go on to sell the property to the Sterling family, who owned a number of similar plantations situated elsewhere in the state.

It was under the direction of their patriarch, Ruffin Grey Sterling, that the property was extensively renovated, using the finest materials available at the time.

Sterling ordered that the size of the existing house be expanded and several more buildings be added alongside it, renaming the property the Myrtles.

But just as it had been for David Bradford and his descendants, The Sterling family's time at the plantation would be dogged by misery, with several members dying at a young age, having contracted tuberculosis.

Their decision to ally themselves with the Confederate cause during the American Civil War would also result in tragedy, with their home being seized and ransacked by members of the Union Army.

After a Sterling family member, William Drew Winter, was murdered on the front porch by an unknown assassin in 1871, the plantation was sold onto the first in a long line of short-term investors and businessmen.

And it was not long into this seemingly unending cycle, as each successive owner seemed unable to retain control of the property, that rumours of unwanted guests began to circulate.

Over time,

as an increasing number of stories involving spectral entities and poltergeist activity began to surface, the Myrtles became something of a local attraction.

In 1992, the plantation would see itself thrust into the public eye, after a seemingly innocuous act by the owner at the time generated national media interest.

Whilst renewing her policy, she had been asked by her insurance company to provide photographic evidence of the distance between two buildings at the site, the General's store and the butler's pantry.

Having sent off a picture to the insurers, she was confused to to find the photograph returned a week later, having been rejected.

In the letter accompanying the photograph, the company pointed out that the image was not suitable as it was not supposed to contain any people.

Taking a closer look, the owner was astonished to see what appeared to be a female figure wearing a turban and a long dress.

who had not been present when she had originally taken the photograph.

The wooden boarding of the building which the mysterious figure was standing in front of was clearly visible through her upper body, seeming to indicate that she was somehow not fully formed.

Bewildered, the owner went on to send the picture and corresponding negatives to the National Geographic magazine, which analysed them and came to the conclusion that there had been no trickery or manipulation involved.

This now infamous image is believed to depict the Myrtles Plantation's most infamous specter, that of a slave girl by the name of Chloe.

According to the stories which had been passed down by a number of previous owners, Chloe was a slave at the plantation at the time it was being run by Clark Woodruff.

Woodruff was a former law student who had studied under David Bradford.

He would go on to marry his mentor's oldest daughter and would eventually be elected as the local judge.

But despite his easygoing and gentlemanly outward appearance, it was rumoured that Woodruff was a violent and abusive master who would regularly force himself upon the female slaves at the plantation, including Chloe.

One day, Woodruff found her eavesdropping at the door during a business meeting.

Flying into a rage when she refused to explain her actions, he had dragged the girl to an outbuilding and cut off one of her ears as punishment for her misdeed.

In order to hide the disfigurement, Chloe took to wearing a green turban which covered the top of her head and privately swore revenge.

Taking great care to hide her intent, she waited several months until the family was preparing to celebrate the birthday of their eldest daughter.

Intending to poison the man who had ruined her, she slipped several oleander leaves into the birthday cake which had been prepared for the occasion.

But in a tragic twist of fate, Clark Woodruff would be the only family member not to consume the offering, with his pregnant wife and two daughters dying from ingesting the poison.

An alternate version of this tale exists in which Chloe intended only to make the family sick.

so that she could nurse them back to full health and therefore demonstrate her value to the family as a household slave.

She had since been relegated to working in the fields after being caught eavesdropping.

In any case, as the truth of what happened came to light, Chloe was captured by her fellow slaves trying to escape and was hanged by them in an effort to appease their master.

In addition to having been captured on film, Chloe has allegedly been sighted by numerous guests and visitors, with reports of her presence dating back to the 1950s.

One evening in the spring of 1987,

Frances Myers was asleep in one of the downstairs bedrooms when she was awoken by the uneasy feeling that someone else was present in the room with her.

Cautiously opening her eyes, she found a woman standing watching her from the end of the bed, wearing a green turban and holding a lighted candlestick in one hand.

Myers herself was surprised by the brightness of the light emanating from the candle, which was powerfully illuminating the rest of the room.

In addition to this, she was similarly struck by the old-fashioned style of the lengthy dress this unexpected visitor was wearing.

The intruder was staring down at Myers in a manner which completely unnerved her.

to the extent that she reached out in order to push the woman away.

But the second her hand made contact with the apparition, she immediately vanished into thin air, plunging the room back into a deep darkness.

It is rumoured that the ghosts of Chloe's unfortunate victims have also been sighted from time to time around the grounds.

More than one group of visitors has reported being approached by a small girl.

only for her to fade away and disappear when they attempt to interact with her.

The large ornate mirror which hangs in the parlour at the bottom of the main staircase is said to be a focal point for the spirits of the deceased mother and her two daughters.

Staff on site have allegedly found phantom handprints of varying sizes pressed onto the glass.

These have proven difficult to clean off, only to reappear hours later, sometimes in different positions on the face of the mirror.

More terrifying experiences include seeing the reflections of a woman and two girls, dressed in period clothing, staring back at them when visitors have attempted to clean the handprints from the glass.

The inexplicable marks found on the parlour mirror are not the only mysterious blemishes to have been historically encountered by the owners of the property.

There are several testimonies which pertain to a large, deep crimson stain which appeared one day on the floor of the gentleman's parlour.

Possessing the rough dimensions of an adult human body, this strange impression proved impossible to clean despite numerous attempts to remove it.

But a short time later, it suddenly faded away as quickly as it had appeared, seemingly of its own accord.

It has been theorized that this odd occurrence may somehow relate to the historic sacking of the property by soldiers of the Union Army.

In one of the stories relating to that event, an infantryman who broke in to loot the building was shot and killed by the owners as he had entered the room in question.

If other sightings are to be believed, the ghosts that inhabit the Myrtles are not limited solely to one political affiliation.

A number of visitors claim to have seen a limping figure, wearing the tunic of the Confederate Army and possessing a bloodied leg injury, moving slowly around the grounds.

In addition to the strange visions and unnatural markings associated with the main building, there have been numerous reports of ghostly footsteps making their way through the main hall.

These steps are described as uncoordinated and clumsy in nature, as if the person making them is tripping and staggering forwards as they make their way deeper into the interior of the house.

They are described as entering the main hall, continuing past the downstairs rooms until they meet the bottom of the staircase, where they then terminate.

This short phenomenon is believed to be linked to the most infamous murder associated with the residence, that of William Drew Winter.

One afternoon in January of 1871, Winter was teaching his children a school lesson in the gentleman's parlour.

when an unknown male rider arrived at the property.

The stranger demanded that Winter leave the premises to speak with him, and moments later, the quiet afternoon air was shattered by a series of gunshots.

As the servants hurried to see what had occurred, Winter staggered back in through the doors whilst the unknown rider fled the scene.

It is reported that the dying man staggered forwards, desperately trying to find his wife Sarah and their children one last time, before dying on the main staircase.

As with the other alleged incidents taking place at the Myrtles,

the phantom footsteps are indicative of the benign nature of the spirits who reside there.

There have been no acts of aggression or hostility directed towards those who have seen them, though on occasion, the forces which dwell within the location have proven somewhat mischievous.

During the summer of 1984, a film crew commissioned several rooms in the main building in order to shoot scenes for a remake of the movie A Long Hot Summer.

One evening, several of the crew members had spent many hours clearing some furniture away in preparation for the following day's filming.

But when they returned the following morning, they were frustrated to discover that all the furniture in question had been returned to the exact positions they had been moved from.

On making inquiries with the staff, the producers were assured that nobody had been in the room overnight, which had been locked and secured ready for them to use.

This phenomenon would occur several further times during the course of the shoot, prompting the crew to hurriedly achieve the shots they needed, before cutting short their stay.

As a result of its colourful and haunting history, several investigators have undertaken extensive research into the plantation's past.

Analysis of family records regarding previous owners has produced evidence which strongly undermines many of the more popular and outlandish stories.

It has been repeatedly highlighted that there seems to be very little truth behind the stories of Chloe and the murderous revenge visited upon her former lover.

Parish records clearly demonstrate that yellow fever was responsible for the deaths of both Sarah and her children.

Further, the unfortunate youngsters were a boy and a girl, not two daughters, as the legend recounts.

In a similar vein, analysis of witness testimony pertaining to the death of William Winter confirms that he died out on the porch of the address

and never attempted to make his way back inside.

It has been suggested that many of the ghost stories are the result of successive buyers being unable to afford the cost of maintaining the property.

Taking existing legends and aggressively embellishing them, cash-strapped owners might have created the ghost stories in an effort to make the property more appealing to prospective investors.

However, this theory does not seem to fully account for the sheer number of tales generated by this atmospheric and brooding rural location.

There is still no meaningful explanation for the famous National Geographic photograph of Chloe, which was proven not to have been faked.

And there are many other photographs which have been taken by visitors purporting to show ghostly forms moving around the grounds.

As with many of the cases we have previously examined, it seems apparent that the truth of these legends lies somewhere between two extremes.

A significant number of the stories are completely fabricated, or at best embellished to the point of misdirection, and yet at the same time, there are are too many photographs and witness testimonies of ghostly activity to ignore.

We have seen how locations steeped in misery have apparently trapped the spirits of those who have been wronged, forcing them to replay their final moments over and over again.

All we can hope is that, in the case of the Myrtles Plantation, with the passing of time, these unfortunate souls may find the peace they are searching for.

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