About Connections: Love it or hate it, history is a map. Those who hate history think it irrelevant; many who love history think it escapism. In truth, history is the clearest road map to how we got here: America in the twenty-first century.
August 20, 1900, 1:37 a.m., Pittsfield, Massachusetts, Charley Poole pumps as hard and fast as he can from 287 Tyler Street to Circular Avenue where he must sound the alarm.
Not exactly Paul Revere, Charlie is a journalistic legman. His job is to ride or run like the wind from the site of a big news story to the home or office of a news-hawk (reporter). If he gets there first, and if the story is a good one, Charlie can get a dime or as much as a dollar. He thinks this could be it: the story that is worth a dollar.
Like any of his competitors in the trade, Charlie is a young lad, but on this night he is way ahead of the pack — he has a bicycle and he has a lantern. It is black, dark and moonless, and while Pittsfield has streetlights, they are turned off.
“It ain’t thievery,” he assures himself. “Sure I took that lantern from the back of Dr. Schofield’s rig, but for one thing, I’m going to return it, and for another, I have to see my way, don’t I?”
Why, Charley wonders, not for the first time, do the city fathers see fit to turn off the electric streetlights at 12:30 a.m.? Sure, Charley knows what they say: “Decent folk have no business on the streets after midnight.”
But, Charley thinks as he swerves to avoid the wooden horses that block freshly paved sections of North Street, “I am decent, and I have very important business.”
Charley skids to a stop at the home of the news hawk. “Wake up!” He shouts. “It’s murder!”
Charley holds the lantern higher and bellows, “Murder has been done!”
The Murder
In the house on Tyler Street, May Fosburgh, 23, is dead; shot through the heart.
The others in the house are her parents Mr. and Mrs. Robert L. Fosburgh, 58 and 50, her brother James, 20, her brother and sister-in-law Mr. and Mrs. Robert Fosburgh Jr. (Bertie, 28, and Amy, 25), her sister Beatrice, 12 years old, and a houseguest, Bertha Sheldon, 16. (Her 16-year-old sister Esther is away from home.)
Shortly after 1 a.m. as the family sleeps, thieves steal over the roof and into the unoccupied attic. From there they descend to the second floor bedroom wing. Along the way, they snag pillowcases to use as masks.
Robert Fosburgh Sr. is the first to stir. Apparently, the men are rummaging through his drawers seeking valuables. Fosburgh wakes. One burglar holds a gun on Fosburgh, but he is not to be subdued. Fosburgh fights back. The men wrestle, struggling for control of the gun, it goes off, and the household is awakened.
May comes to the door of her father’s bedroom with Beatrice close behind her. As the fight between the men continues, there is second shot, May is hit. She dies instantly.
Bertie coming down the hallway from behind catches his sister as she falls. Her father is cold-cocked as the men run from the room with Bertie in pursuit. The thieves run to a back bedroom, open a window wide, jump out into the night, and are gone.
The noise rouses the Shepherdson household next door. In that house are Mr. and Mrs. James Shepherdson, their houseguest, Mabel Chapin, and Fred Lund, secretary to Robert Fosburgh Sr. The men go to the Fosburgh house to offer assistance.
James, sleeping downstairs, is the last to arrive on the scene. His father, unconscious for brief minutes, comes to and dispatches James to the Stanley Works across the street. He knows there is a telephone on the premises. Shepherdson and Lund go for a doctor. James calls the police station, mentioning injury to his sister but not the burglars, and then he returns home.
The commotion attracts neighbors and two pedestrians: patrolman Chapman and Charley Poole. Charley hangs back listening as the patrolman knocks on the door. Mr. Fosburgh tells the patrolman what happened but asks that he wait outside until his superior arrives.
Dr. Schofield arrives quickly with Dr. Paddock close behind. They, too, are asked to wait outside. Charley hears the word murder; he doesn’t hesitate. He grabs his bike, nicks the doctor’s lantern, and is off.
About the time Charley is shouting “Murder!” at the sleep-befuddled journalist, the fire alarm rings splitting the night. Charley, his dime in his pocket and the hope of a dollar in his heart, joins the volunteers.
The Initial Investigation
Police Chief John Nicholson is in the station within minutes. His first task is to send Captain White to the Fosburgh house and then to ring the fire alarm.
The Pittsfield fire alarm can be heard as far away as Lenox. When the men of Pittsfield hear it, they leap from their beds and spring into action. On North Street they expect to see flames. What they see is merely Chief Nicholson standing firm.
The Chief tells them that men had done murder. They are loose in the town and they must be hunted down and captured.
Chief Nicholson commandeers firearms from Pierson’s Hardware Store. Handguns, shot guns and rifles are distributed. Three hundred armed men of Pittsfield are briefed.
Chief Nicholson tells them. “These men broke into the R. L. Fosburg home on Tyler shortly after 1 a.m. Thieves, they attacked the Fosburgh men, shot wildly hitting and killing Miss May Fosburg. Now they are not just thieves, they are murderers.” The Chief warns, “Take extreme caution”.
As they move away, the men mumble, “an eye for an eye.” The hunt is on.
Over the next few days, it becomes fashionable to be part of the hunt. As men from other towns join, the ranks swell. Members of the Lenox Club offer their automobiles. The posse searches as far north as Williamstown, as far west as the state line; they go east into Cummington and south into Lenox.
By noon of the first day, they have gathered up “30 hobos” and marched them into the police station. By evening all are let go.
They do find clues: a shoe, a stocking, a pair of pants, and a .44 caliber hand gun called “the Bull Dog.” They do not find any thieves or murderers. By the end of the week, Nicholson is forced to admit defeat. The criminals got away.
The Crime of The Century
When the story broke, it was indeed a big one. Reporters came to Pittsfield from all over the world. A mere eight months into the new century, they nevertheless dubbed it “The Crime of the Century.”
The daughter of a prominent Pittsfield family was murdered in the night.
As time passed, the accounts became more lurid. The ranks of searchers swelled from 300 to 1,000 to 1,500. May Fosburgh, a 23-year-old spinster in steel-rimmed glasses, morphed into a socialite and was, all at once, a 19-year-old beauty. The rip in her sister-in-law’s robe became a torn nightdress, and a torn nightdress was, in time, shreds and tatters on her bedroom floor. As the ink flowed so did May’s blood until it bathed the distraught mother cradling her dead daughter. The daughter was found dead in her bed, or on the floor in the hallway, or outside her father’s bedroom door where she had valiantly attempted to stop the thieves from fleeing. Stories of a beautiful young socialite and heroine sold newspapers.
The theories were rife. Mr. Fosburgh was brought to Pittsfield to design and oversee construction of the new Stanley manufactory building. Further he was in the position of manager during his employment. Weekly, the money to pay salaries was collected from the bank on North Street and taken to the Fosburgh house until the next morning when it was distributed. The theory was that the thieves knew Fosburgh’s routine and were in search of the payroll.
Alternately, there had been a similar robbery the week prior in Springfield: perhaps, some theorized, there was a gang at work.
Gov. Murray Crane brought in the Pinkerton’s. Mr. Fosburg offered $1,500 for information and the city of Pittsfield matched it. Even with 300 men in the field, no miscreants were found; even with $3,000 reward available, no information was given. The mystery deepened. It was then that Pittsfield Chief Nicholson took a second look.
Next Week: Part Two, The Trial
