1888: Oscar Beckwith, the Austerlitz Murderer
Add comment March 1st, 2018 Headsman
On this date in 1888, the “Austerlitz Murderer” — not a Napoleonic figure but an irascible septuagenarian woodsman — hanged in New York.
Oscar Beckwith’s crime, explains the New York Herald of Jan. 18, anticipating the sixth issuance of his sentence for this crime,
was the killing of Simon A. Vandercook at Austerlitz, Columbia county, in January, 1882. Both men were wood-choppers and quarrelled over a supposed gold mine near the town. The victim’s body was found in Beckwith’s hut, portions of it having been burned.* Beckwith fled to Canada and eluded capture until February, 1885. He was extradited, and while in custody admitted the killing, but claimed that it was done in self-defence.
That same paper four days afterwards informs us that he favored the court on this occasion with an “excited tirade” blaming the affair on “Freemason devils” as he was hauled back to his cell, where “he kept up a running invective against everybody who had any connection with his case.”
* More specifically, after suspicions were aroused by the awful smell belched by Beckwith’s stovepipe, the body was found hacked up and stashed under Beckwith’s bed, save that “the head, one hand and a foot were gone. The teeth were found in the ashes of the stove.” (Troy Weekly Times, March 1, 1888) This grisly pile spurred (likely baseless) rumors of cannibalism; he’s also sometimes tagged the “Austerlitz Cannibal”.
On this day..
- 1916: Benjamin Argumedo - 2020
- 1771: Edmund James and Joseph Jordan, runaway slave aides - 2019
- 1852: Samuel Treadway - 2017
- 1562: The Massacre of Vassy - 2016
- 1996: Antonio James, final judgment - 2015
- 1837: The slave Julius, property of John and Rebecca Matthews - 2014
- 2013: Naw Kham, Mekong drug lord - 2013
- 1864: Martin Robinson, treacherous guide - 2012
- 1951: The Mokotow Prison executions of Cursed Soldiers - 2011
- 1289: Ugolino della Gherardesca, ravenous - 2010
- 2004: Ibtisam Hussein, child-murderer - 2009
- 1877: Jack McCall, Wild Bill's murderer - 2008
Entry Filed under: 19th Century,Capital Punishment,Common Criminals,Crime,Death Penalty,Execution,Hanged,Murder,New York,Pelf,USA
Tags: 1880s, 1888, austerlitz, march 1, oscar beckwith
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