Elizabeth Reed -First Woman Executed by Hanging- Heathsville, Illinois

In honor of October being the month of Halloween - and other things spooky - all of my blogs this month will deal with a haunted location and the cemetery that ties into the story.

Tis the season……..Enjoy!

~

Illinois in 1840

Arsenic

Her story is one of questions, conflict, and mystery over 160 years later.  Elizabeth (Betsey) Reed was a frontier wife, in a tiny Illinois town, in the mid-1840’s when she was suddenly charged with the unthinkable – murder!

According to the news and court reports during May 1844, Betsey Reed was accused of giving her husband Leonard, a cup of arsenic-laced sassafras tea.  He died the next day.  The charge of murder levied against Elizabeth Reed was based on only one report - made by a relative.

Heathsville & Palestine

Unfortunately for Betsey, she was not well liked in the tiny village of Heathsville, Illinois.  Many of the women found her to be coldhearted, uncaring and eccentric.  However, the men appeared to be fascinated by her, observing none of the traits the local women did.

Public opinion of her husband Leonard wasn’t much better.  Some viewed him as a calculated businessman, others as a failure who was unwilling to fit in to society. Either way, neither garnered public sympathy or support.

1840's Log Jail

Reed was arrested, taken to Palestine, Illinois and charged with murdering her husband.  She was placed in the Palestine jail where she started a fire that burned down the building.  Officials said that she had nothing in her possession that could have been used to start a fire.  The insinuation of being a witch had been made and the town’s 13-hundred residents were titillated by the story.

Lawrence County Courthouse

Reed was then moved to the Lawrence County jail in Lawrenceville, Illinois, about 25 miles away.  The change of venue did nothing to assist in Reed’s defense.  The story was so horrifying for the time that it was being covered, by newspapers from around the state, and around the country, from as far away as New York.

Augustus French

William Wilson

Elizabeth Reed was defended by two well-known attorneys, Augustus French and Usher Linder. The only witness to the supposed event was a relative, 16-year-old Evelyn Deal.  Evelyn said that she saw Betsey pour a white powder into Leonard’s tea and serve it to him.  No other evidence was given.  Reed’s trial lasted for three days and she was never allowed to comment in her own defense.  Illinois State Supreme Court Justice William Wilson pronounced her guilty of murder and sentenced her to be hanged.

On the morning of May 23, 1845, thousands lined the streets of the small town of Lawrenceville.  Crowd estimates ranged from 8,000 to 20,000 people on hand for the execution.  It was rumored that Betsey Reed ‘found God’ in the eleventh hour and had been baptized in the Embarras River the night before.  Reports said that she went to the gallows, riding on top of her coffin, singing hymns and chanting religious verses.  The minister who presided, Reverend John Seed, preached a long sermon to the crowd while Betsey continued to sing and chant.  Ninety minutes later, Elizabeth (Betsey) Reed became the first woman in the U.S. ever publicly executed and the only woman executed by hanging in Illinois.

According to the New York Daily Tribune, Betsey’s body was taken down and dissected.  It was found that she had swallowed tiny pieces of brick and pulverized in glass in an attempt to kill herself and escape the hangman’s noose.

Baker Cemetery

Betsey Reed was buried outside of the local town cemetery, in an unmarked grave.  But family members, who did not believe she was guilt, demanded she be given a proper burial.  Betsey was re-interred at a tiny country cemetery called Baker, just outside of Heathsville. 

Lane to cemetery

Up a narrow country lane, surrounded by crops and woods, the cemetery has a gloomy feel, even during the day.  

E.R. Marker

The Reed's Gravestone

Elizabeth is buried next to Leonard, the husband she was found guilty of killing, at the back of the cemetery.  A simple stone marked E.R. can be found in the grass.  Along side it is a replacement stone that simply lists their names, dates, and how they died.  Under Leonard’s name it says “Death by Murder.”  Under Betsey’s name it reads “Death by Hanging.”

Two orbs near graves

(Crawford Co Ghost Hunters)

But, according to the Crawford County Illinois Ghost Hunters, it appears that Betsey Reed did not go ‘quietly into that good night.’  After exploring this cemetery they have reported paranormal activity around her and Leonard’s graves.

An afternoon in Baker Cemetery

One hundred sixty five years later, questions still exist as to her guilt or innocence.  Regardless, Elizabeth Reed has gone down in the annals of U.S. history as the first women to be hanged in the state and the country.

~ Joy

The Old Slave House – Equality, Illinois

NOTE:

In honor of October being the month of Halloween - and other things spooky - all of my blogs this month will deal with a haunted location and the cemetery that ties into the story.

Enjoy and make this a spook-tacular autumn!! ; )

~

Sign posted at drive

In the 1800’s it was formally called Hickory Hill.  It’s now known as the old Crenshaw Place, or the Old Slave House. And it’s claimed to be one of the most haunted places in the southern part of Illinois.

Located near Equality, Illinois, in Gallatin County, the large, two-story pseudo Greek Revival 

John H & Sinia Crenshaw

Hickory Hill - also known as
the Old Crenshaw House

style house is situated on top of a windswept hill, overlooking the Saline River.  John Hart Crenshaw had the house supposedly built for his wife, Sinia Taylor Crenshaw and their five children.  But research has revealed the most important function of the house was to aid as a place to stash kidnapped free blacks before sending them into slavery, a reverse Underground Railroad.

Old Shawneetown Bridge
over the Ohio River

John Crenshaw became deeply involved in the slave trade during the 1820’s.  He was charged several times with kidnapping, and became a slave trader in 1827.  The first documented case against his involved a black indentured servant named Frank Granger that Crenshaw kidnapped and took to Kentucky in 1828.  The second kidnapping case followed right on the heels of the first and involved a free black woman named Lucinda and her two children.  Crenshaw kidnapped the three and took them to Barren County Kentucky in 1828 to be sold into slavery. Crenshaw was also known as John Granger, (pronounced more like Cringer) due to regional dialects and accent.

Hickory Hill

In 1829, Crenshaw and his brother, Abraham, bought the land where Hickory Hill would be built.  It would be almost five years, in 1834, before ground was broken for the house, and another four before it was completed in 1838. The lavish house was furnished with European artwork and furnishings located on the first and second floors, where the family lived.  

A Whipping Post

The third floor was constructed of thicker walls with over a dozen cells, about the size of horse stalls, all equipped with heavy metal rings and chains.  A whipping post was located at either end of the hallway.  Windows at each end of the hall provided the only light and air to the attic.  It would only be after Crenshaw’s and his wife’s deaths, when new owners took over that the true secrets of the attic would come to light.

Map of Southern Illinois

Meanwhile, Crenshaw bought his first salt works in Gallatin County. Few men were interested in the harsh work and brutal conditions required to mine salt, so Crenshaw used slave laborers and indentured servants. 

Although Illinois was a ‘free state’ where slavery was not 

Only Surviving Record

allowed, an exception had been granted to Crenshaw for slaves to be leased for one-year terms for use in the salt mines in Gallatin, Saline and Hardin Counties. Illinois also allowed indentured servitude; the contracting of work for a specific period of time in exchange for food, shelter, and sometimes passage.  Crenshaw owned over 30,000 acres of land and leased numerous salt mines from the government.  He had over 700 slaves working for him in 1830.  At one time it was said that Crenshaw had made so much money he paid 1/7 of all taxes collected in Illinois. It is from his illegal trafficking of humans into slavery that much of his vast fortune was made. 

Crenshaw is best known for creating a reverse Underground Railroad in Illinois. He and his hired men would capture free blacks from the North and smuggle them across the Ohio River into Kentucky where they would be “sold down the river” and into slavery in the southern states.

Hickory Hill

Runaway Slaves

When the house at Hickory Hill was built, a secret wagon entrance was constructed in the back of the house.  Covered wagons carrying kidnapped blacks and indentured whites would go directly into this entry. Then the kidnapped would be taken up the back stairs to the third floor attic of his home.  There they were imprisoned in cells, tortured, raped, whipped, and sometimes murdered. According to local legend, there was also a secret tunnel from the basement to the Saline River so that the kidnapped could be put on boats quickly and inconspicuously. 

Slave Auction

Crenshaw then devised a plan to begin a slave-breeding program in the attic.   A slave named Uncle Bob was used as the stud breeder to provide Crenshaw with cargo to sell off to the south.  A pregnant black woman would bring more money at auction in a slave state. An adult able-bodied slave could bring $400 or more.  A child could be sold for around $200. It was said that Uncle Bob sired more than 300 children in that upstairs attic.

John H. Crenshaw

Crenshaw was finally indicted in 1842 for the kidnapping of Maria, his cook, and her seven children.  Because of his clout and financial standing in the community, he was found not guilty.  (If he had been found guilt, no jail time would have been served; the only penalty was a fine of $1,000 allowed by the Black Code of 1819.)  But people in the area talked and suddenly Crenshaw’s methods were being questioned.  His mill was burned and his standing as an upright and moral man in the community was waning.  Business in the salt works began to decline as more profitable salt was discovered in Ohio and Virginia. Crenshaw was now watching his empire dissolve.

Rumor has it that it was during this period of time that Crenshaw brutally beat several female slaves.  In retaliation, a group of male slaves attacked Crenshaw and during the assault Crenshaw’s leg was severed with an axe.  Following this attack, most of the slaves were sold off.

Equality, Illinois

The Crenshaw’s left Hickory Hill in 1850 and moved to Equality, Illinois.  Crenshaw continued farming, but also became involved in railroads and banks. The Hickory Hill house was sold in 1864.

Crenshaw died December 4, 1871, his wife, Sinia, in 1881.  Both are 

Hickory Hill Cemetery

Toppled Crenshaw Stone

buried in a tiny, forgotten cemetery down a lonely dirt road.  The cemetery is also known as Hickory Hill and is located to the northeast of the house.  It is said to be the oldest cemetery in Gallatin County.  It is fitting note that Crenshaw’s stone has been toppled off of its pedestal, now laying flat on the ground

Old Slave House in the Fifties

In 1906, the Crenshaw House was purchased by the Sisk family.  The true horrors of what had occurred on the third floor were then unmasked.  The slave quarters were dismantled soon after but talk spread and by the 1920’s tourists from around the country were arriving to see the attic and hear the stories of the Old Slave House.  George Sisk decided to capitalize on the history and by the 1930’s, was advertising that you could tour the house where “Slavery existed in Illinois,” for only 10 cents for adults and a nickel for children.

Third Floor Attic

It was during these tours that people began to report odd occurrences on the third floor; unseen fingers touching passersby, strange noises, rattling chains, whispering voices, hushed sobbing, and the feeling of being watched.  Legend has it that the Crenshaw House is haunted by those who were held captive there. 

Old Slave House in the '90's

From the thirties to the mid-90’s, the Old Slave House was visited by many ghost hunting groups, psychics, and paranormal investigators.  Many reported feelings of unrest and agony trapped up there.  It was on October 31, 1996 when the Sisk’s closed the house due to their age and declining health.

Courtesy Saluki Times

In December 2000, the State of Illinois acquired the house and two acres of land from George Sisk, Jr.  And in 2004 the National Park Service declared the Crenshaw house, aka the Old Slave House, as a station in the ‘Reverse Underground Railroad Network to Freedom’ program, thus acknowledging the sadistic part that John Crenshaw played in condemning free blacks and indentured servants to lives of slavery.  But no plans were made to reopen the house.

Courtsey Saluki Times

Earlier this year, the Center for Archaeological Investigations at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale began doing digs at the house.  Working with the Illinois Historic Preservation Agency, the group has a three-year grant to undertake historical, architectural and archaeological research on the site. The archaeological excavations ended August 1, 2011.  The state says there are still no current plans to reopen the house to the public.

Hickory Hill - The Old Slave House

Crenshaw's Tombstone

It remains to be seen what more is discovered about the house and property with these investigations.  One thing is for sure, while John Hart Crenshaw was not the only slave trader in the state of Illinois; he became the most notorious, known as one of the most ruthless men in this state’s history.

~ Joy

Cemeteries Worth the Visit – Oak Ridge Cemetery, Springfield, Illinois

1872 Map of Cemetery

Oak Ridge Cemetery is located in the Illinois capitol city of Springfield.  Founded in 1855, the name was suggested by Mayor John C.Cook because of the large standoff oaks on the original property. Several of those trees remain standing today.  The cemetery was dedicated on May 24, 1860.

 Oak Ridge was landscaped and designed in Classical Revival and Romanesque styles.  Primarily known for President Abraham Lincoln’s tomb, Oak Ridge is so much more.  The hilly land consists of bluffs and valleys, with 12 miles of paved roads that meander throughout over 300 acres.   Oak Ridge is on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places. 

Lincoln's Tomb

Rubbing Lincoln's Nose

Abraham Lincoln, the 16^th President of the United States, is the most famous person buried here.  Because of this, Oak Ridge is the second most visited cemetery in the U.S.  (Arlington National Cemetery is first.)  Lincoln’s 117-foot Tomb was designed by sculptor Larkin Mead.  It was built of brick covered with granite. Four bronze sculptures surround the tomb.  Each sculpture represents one of the four armed services in the Civil War; infantry, cavalry, navy and artillery.  At the entrance of the tomb is a bronze head of Abraham Lincoln.  The nose is shiny due to tourists rubbing it for good luck.

Lincoln's Funeral held at Receiving Vault

Tomb Rotunda

Once inside the tomb, a marble rotunda contains statues of Lincoln, along with plaques that contain excerpts from his most famous speeches.  There are two doorways in the rotunda – one to enter the tomb by, and the other to exit by.  In the tomb itself, a granite monument marks the gravesite.  Lincoln, his wife and sons are in crypts located in the south wall.  The receiving vault, where Lincoln’s body was held until the monument was built is located at the bottom of the hill, behind the monument.

 Vachel Lindsey's Stone
(Courtesy Connie Nisinger)

Nicholas Vachel Lindssey

Others buried in Oak Ridge include Illinois poet Nicholas Vachel Lindsey, considered the originator of poetry as performance art.  Lindsey was one of the best-known poets of the 1920’s and 1930’s in the U.S.  Lindsey apparently committed suicide by drinking a bottle of lye. He was well known for his poems ‘The Congo’ and ‘Abraham Lincoln Walks at Midnight.’

Shelby M. Cullom's Grave
(Courtesy of Connie Nisinger)

Governor Shelby M. Cullom

Many Illinois politicians, congressmen, senators and governors, including Governor Shelby Moore Cullom, known as ‘Mr. Republican.’  Cullom held almost every elective office including two terms in the Illinois House of Representatives three in the U.S. House of Representatives and five terms in the U.S. Senate.

Governor John Riley Tanner

Tanner's Mausoleum

The 21^st Governor of Illinois, John Riley Tanner, is also buried here, along with numerous Civil War generals.  Lincoln’s first law partner, John T. Stuart is also buried in Oak Ridge. 

Roy Bertelli's Controversial Grave

And, not to be missed is the controversial grave of Roy Bertelli, known as Mr. Accordion.

G.A.R. Memorial

There are several war monuments in Oak Ridge.  Memorials exist for the Grand Army of the Republic (G.A.R.), World War Two, the Korean War, and Illinois Vietnam Veterans.

If you go to Springfield, don’t miss Oak Ridge Cemetery.  A visit to Lincoln’s Tomb is a must, but don’t stop there.  Plan half a day and enjoy the beautiful rolling hills, amazing sculpture and pleasantly designed grounds.  Stop by the cemetery office, at the front gate, for a map.  You can also purchase a CD that will guide you on an audio tour of the cemetery and many of its fascinating stones. 

Oak Ridge Cemetery is located at 1441 Monument Avenue in Springfield.  You may contact them by phone at (217) 789-2340.  Or visit the cemetery's web sit at http://www.oakridgecemetery.org.

~ Joy

Abraham Lincoln Walks at Midnight by Vachel Lindsay

In Springfield, Illinois

IT is portentious, and a thing of state

That here at midnight, in our little town

A mourning figure walks, and will not rest,

Near the old court-house, pacing up and down.

Or by his homestead, or by shadowed yards

He lingers where his children used to play,

Or through the market, on the well-worn stones

He stalks until the dawn-stars burn away.

A bronzed, lank man! His suit of ancient black,

A famous high top-hat, and plain worn shawl

Make him the quaint, great figure that men love,

The prairie-lawyer, master of us all.

He cannot sleep upon his hillside now.

He is among us:--as in times before!

And we who toss or lie awake for long

Breathe deep, and start, to see him pass the door.

His head is bowed. He thinks on men and kings.

Yea, when the sick world cries, how can he sleep?

Too many peasants fight, they know not why,

Too many homesteads in black terror weep.

The sins of all the war-lords burn his heart.

He sees the dreadnaughts scouring every main.

He carries on his shawl-wrapped shoulders now

The bitterness, the folly and the pain.

 

He cannot rest until a spirit-dawn

Shall come:--the shining hope of Europe free:

The league of sober folk, the Workers' Earth,

Bringing long peace to Cornland, Alp and Sea.

It breaks his heart that kings must murder still,

That all his hours of travail here for men

Seem yet in vain. And who will bring white peace

That he may sleep upon his hill again?