Staffleback Shack

One chapter in my latest book, Murder and Mayhem in Southeast Kansas, is about the notorious Staffleback family of Galena, Kansas. I've written more than once on this blog about the Stafflebacks previously; so, I'm not going to say a lot more about them. To summarize their main claim to infamy, suffice it to say that almost the entire family was implicated in the July 1897 murder of Frank Galbreath, a young man who had called late at night at the Staffleback home, which was considered a house of ill repute.
A few years ago, a large two-story house on north Main Street in Galena opened for tours as the so-called "murder bordello," because it was supposedly the old Staffleback home. Although even some of the people associated with the enterprise admitted that the two-story house on Main Street might not have been the actual home of the Stafflebacks, it still developed that reputation in the minds of many people.
For the record, the actual Staffleback house was no more than a one-story shack, and it was located on the western outskirts of Galena, not on Main Street. Attached is a sketch of the shack, which appeared in a St. Louis newspaper near the time of the Stafflebacks' trial for the Galbreath murder. The house was burned down by angry townspeople about a week after Ed and George Staffleback were convicted of murder but while they were still awaiting transportation to the state prison in Lansing.

Suicide or Murder?

Another chapter in my latest book, Murder and Mayhem in Southeast Kansas, is about a fascinating case that happened at Moran (located on Highway 54 between Iola and Fort Scott) in 1907. On a late September evening of that year, Mrs. Rebecca Sapp heard her grown daughter, Caroline May Sapp, scream shortly after she had stepped outside, and when Mrs. Sapp went to investigate, she found May lying dead in the yard with her throat slashed. Most people were convinced a heinous murder had taken place. No weapon was found on the premises in the immediate wake of May's death, but a subsequent search late that night turned up a razor. May's father and others who'd helped with the initial search swore the razor was not there at first. However, some people suspected almost from the beginning that Miss Sapp might have taken her own life.
Although no prime suspect in the apparent crime was identified at first, the incident recalled to some people's minds a scandal involving Miss Sapp from ten years earlier. When May was just 16 or 17, her schoolmaster, Samuel Whitlock, who was married and ten years older than her, was accused of having an affair with her. He staunchly denied the rumor, and the scandal was hushed up, but now May's death brought it back to the minds of those who remembered the decade-old rumor. And although no one openly accused Whitlock of killing the young woman, at least a few began to whisper that he might know something about her death.
Indeed, Whitlock, who had given up teaching and was now a businessman in Moran, came forward a few days after May died with a fantastic tale. He said he knew May had killed herself because he was present when she committed the act. He said that, in a panic, he picked up the razor after May slashed her own throat and took it with him but later brought it back. He said that ever since the Sapp family had moved into town from the surrounding countryside about two years earlier, May had been infatuated with him and had been almost constantly pursuing him. He admitted that he had met her secretly numerous times, but he said he was only trying to talk her out of her insane infatuation and that he never had an emotional or physical relationship with her.

Despite his denials, he was arrested on suspicion and tried for first degree murder. The prosecution's theory of the crime was that Whitlock was a brute who tried to seduce Miss Sapp and killed her when she resisted his advances. The defense, on the other hand, insisted that Whitlock was telling the truth and that, when he told May that he and his family were leaving Moran to get away from her, she had killed herself, as she had previously threatened to do, rather than live without him. If the prosecution had not been so intent on protecting Miss Sapp's honor, Whitlock might well have been convicted on a lesser count, because, although many people believed that May had been infatuated with the defendant, as he said, few believed that he had never returned her affection in any way. However, because the state insisted on a first-degree murder charge and didn't allow for the possibility that May was killed during a lover's quarrel, the defendant was acquitted.
This, of course, is just an abbreviated version of the story. As I say, it's an interesting case, and you can read the whole story in my new book.

The Daltons' Reconnaisance Mission

Another chapter in my latest book, Murder and Mayhem in Southeast Kansas, is about the Dalton gang's ill-fated attempt to rob two banks at once in Coffeyville on October 5, 1892. I've written about this incident previously on this blog; so I won't recount the details again. Suffice it to say that the double bank robbery attempt turned into a fiasco, and virtually the whole gang was wiped out, but not before they killed or mortally wounded four citizens.
One of the things that caught my interest as I was researching this incident this time around was a reference or two that I found in Coffeyville newspapers to visits that members of the Dalton gang paid to the town in the days leading up to the ill-fated robbery attempt. I have read in Robert Barr Smith's book about the Coffeyville raid, I believe, and perhaps elsewhere that one of the main reasons the Daltons' attempt to rob two banks at once turned out so badly for them is that they thought they knew the layout of the town because they had lived there a couple of years earlier but they had not been back recently to learn the changes that had been made. Specifically, a hitching rail near one of the banks had been taken up for road repairs, forcing the gang to tie their horses farther away from the bank than they had planned. This may well be true, but, if so, the Daltons' lack of intelligence wasn't because none of the gang had visited Coffeyville recently.
One night in late September, Bob Dalton called at the home of a Coffeyville druggist named Frank Benson, and the visitor had a six-shooter in his hand when Benson answered the door. Dalton asked Benson to go to his drugstore and get him some whiskey, but Benson told him the store was out of whiskey and referred him to some of the other druggists in town. Dalton politely apologized for disturbing Benson and retired without further ado. Or so the Coffeyville Weekly Journal reported. Benson said he knew for sure the intruder was Bob Dalton because he had been well acquainted with Bob when he'd lived at Coffeyville, as the Dalton boys had made Benson's drugstore one of their loafing places.
So, either the hitching rail had been only very recently taken up prior to the botched robbery attempt, or else Bob and his brothers did a mighty poor job of reconnoitering the place.

Who Were the Benders?

One of the chapters in my latest book, Murder and Mayhem in Southeast Kansas, is about the Bloody Benders of Labette County. Most people are at least vaguely familiar with the story. The Benders, a German family, settled north of Cherryvale on the trail from Osage Mission (i.e. St. Paul) to Independence in the early 1870s and started running a roadside grocery. People started disappearing in the neighborhood of the Bender inn during late 1872 and early 1873. Suspicion gradually settled on the Benders, but by the time some men went out to the Bender place to investigate and uncovered 8 or 10 bodies in a backyard graveyard, the family was long gone.
Actually, I've written about the Benders in one of my previous books, and I've mentioned them a couple of times on this blog. But I tried to approach the subject with a fresh perspective, and I did come up with some new information about the Benders, as far as their ages, where they came from before they came to Kansas, etc. At least this information was new to me, and I don't think I've ever seen much, if anything, about it elsewhere. The biggest mystery surrounding the Benders is what happened to them after they fled the scene of their heinous murders, but the exact makeup of the family and their origins have always been somewhat a mystery as well. I try to shed some light on this topic in my new book, but you'll have to read the book to find out exactly what I uncovered. I also offer my insight into what I think happened to the family after they fled, but, like everybody else's speculation on this topic, that's all it is--speculation.