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| ‘Sisters in Black’ sour Ocey’s domestic bliss |
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By: MIKE WEST, Post Managing Editor
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Posted: Sunday, February 22, 2009 6:37 am
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Ocey and Fletcher Snead were happy, at first, in their new little home with a young daughter and another child on the way.
Life was still complicated for the young couple who headed to East Orange, N.J. to get away from their murderous family. Husband and wife, they were also first cousins, which was against the law in many U.S. states even in 1909.
It was to be the year of great advances. 1909 was a great year for explorers. Robert Peary and Matthew Henson reached the North Pole. Marconi received the Nobel Prize for developing the wireless radio. Pittsburgh beat Detroit to take the World Series. The first event was held at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Henry Ford produced the first Model T, and there were telephones in some homes and businesses.
But still it didn’t take long for the year to sour for Ocey and her husband. Two of the “Sisters in Black” arrived on their doorstep, soon followed by a third. Fletcher, all too aware of the circumstances of his brother’s death, soon departed for Canada. His brother, John, fell from a moving train and nearly drowned in a cistern before burning up in his bed soaked with coal oil.
The two Snead brothers were the sons of Mary Snead, one of the three Sisters in Black. The other sisters were Virginia Wardlaw and Caroline Martin, whose son and husband died in mysterious circumstances.
It was March of 1909 when Fletcher departed. His wife – and cousin – gave birth in August. By then, her young blonde daughter was dead of unknown causes. Unfortunately for Ocey, three insurance policies had been taken out in her name through the Equitable Life Insurance Society. The policies were worth $7,500 each, reported the New York Times. Her days were sadly numbered with the birth of her son. Ocey was told the child had died at birth, but actually he was taken to a hospital.
Shortly after Thanksgiving 1909, the elaborate web of treachery and death created by the Wardlaw sisters was exposed. On the afternoon of Nov. 29, 1909 the phone rang at the East Orange Police Department. On the line was an elderly woman with a Southern accent, who requested a coroner, explaining that an “accident” had occurred at 89 North 14th St.
The assistant county physican, Dr. Herbert M. Simmons, walked three blocks to the home where he was greeted by Virginia Wardlaw, wearing her accustomed black clothing with heavy veils.
Simmons noted that the shuttered house had no heat and little furniture and appeared to have been unoccupied for a long time. Upstairs in the bathroom, he found the nude, dead body of an attractive woman in a bathtub filled with just a few inches of water. In his examination of the crime scene, Simmons found a pile of clothing with a note attached. It was a neatly written “suicide” note.
It read: “Last year my little daughter died; others near and dear have gone before. I have been prostrated with illness for a long time. When you read this I will have committed suicide. Do not grieve over me. Rejoice with me that death brings a blessed relief from pain and suffering greater than I can bear - O.W.M. Snead” Virginia calmly identified the woman as her niece, Ocey. She confirmed the information in the note, adding that Ocey had a 4-month-old son in Brooklyn hospital and that she had become a “widow” seven months earlier.
She said she shared the 14th Street home with Ocey and they had only recently moved in to it.
Simmons was suspicious of Wardlaw and her story. Ocey had been dead at least 24 hours and the house looked unoccupied. He stopped at the nearest phone and called veteran detective, Sgt. William O’Neill, who immediately went to the Wardlaw address. Virginia was reluctant to allow O’Neill access and was very closed mouthed, claiming he had no right to interrogate her.
The detective responded by arresting her as a material witness and had her transported to the East Orange Police Deparment, where Chief James Bell questioned her. She told Bell that she had arrived in East Orange 10 days earlier from Brooklyn, but declined to give Ocey’s maiden name, background or any other real facts. The circumstances screamed homicide to the veteran officers. The clever Wardlaws had not encountered this type of law enforcement before.
Their questions were endless: How could a weak young woman write such a clear and intelligent suicide note? How could she drown in such a small amount of water? Would she not save herself in a reflex action? Officers began to question neighbors and were able to find their previous residence in Brooklyn.
They learned of visits by a second woman in black and about a physician who had made a house call six days earlier. The doctor told authorities he had been requested by Virginia Wardlaw to provide a certificate of good health on Ocey. The doctor said she was weak, but generally in good medical condition. At the house in Brooklyn, they discovered Ocey’s last will and testament, which bequeathed everything to her grandmother, Martha E. Wardlaw, in trust for her son.
A thorough search of 14th Street, revealed several insurance policies for Ocey, but nothing she could have used to write a suicide note. No pen, no paper and scarce evidence of human habitation except for a cot and a few personal items. Ocey’s cause of death was ruled drowning with starvation a contributing factor.
More documents were discovered and more insurance policies along with some correspondence and information about the Wardlaw family. Authorities were able to find another sister, Mary Snead, living with her elderly mother in a basement in New York City. She provided little information and officers put her under surveillance.
From their investigation, they believed the missing sister, Caroline Martin, was the brains of the operation. Caroline didn’t even attend her daughter’s funeral on Dec. 7. Mary Snead was the only family member in attendance since Virginia was still being held in jail.
About a week later, authorities did apprehend Caroline after receiving a tip from New York Police about a bizarre guest staying at the Bayard Hotel. The guest was dressed in black clothing with a heavy black veil. A ruse was necessary to take her into custody where detectives discovered three more suicide notes written in the same hand as the one found at Ocey’s death scene. Two days later, Mary Snead was taken into custody. Another cache of suicide notes was found in her basement apartment.
Soon thereafter, Ocey’s “dead” husband, Fletcher, was discovered in Canada where he working as a cook in a logging camp. He refused to return to New Jersey. On Dec. 22, authorities indicted “the sisters in black” for murder and for aiding, abetting and counseling Ocey Snead in suicide. An April 1910 trial date was set and the situation soon grew more complicated.
Virginia grew ill. The sisters’ elderly mother died, as did Ocey’s son. Soon it became obvious that Virginia was starving herself to death. Delay after delay stopped the trial and despite force-feeding Virginia died, but the prosecutors persevered. The trial was pushed to September with authorities hitting another roadblock. The sisters’ younger siblings, Bessie Wardlaw Spindle and Albert G. Wardlaw, began proceedings to declare Caroline insane.
They had no problem producing countless witnesses who attested to Caroline’s strange behavior, but Caroline argued that she was perfectly sane. Ultimately, the judge sided with her, and the trial finally began on Jan. 9, 1912.
It just lasted a day with Caroline pleading guilty to manslaughter. Her sister, Mary, was freed. The judge sentenced Caroline to seven years in the New Jersey State Prison. The sentence came as a shock, and she began to fight for an appeal. Eventually, she was transferred to a mental institution where she died on Jan. 13, 1913.
Her body was transported to Christiansburg, Va., where it was buried at Sunset Cemetery in an unmarked grave. |
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Member Opinions:
By: mtsusecretary on 6/18/09
Elisabeth O. Howse Ridley, in her book Flowers from Grace, has dedicated a whole chapter to these Weird Sisters. You can find this book in the Linebaugh Library. There are several pages of articles in the archives of the NY times re this trial. No mention was made in this article to the Wardlaw jewels. Is this story just a myth?
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