On this date in 1895, William Lake died in the electric chair for soiling Albion, N.Y., with a most gory crime of passion.

The farmhand Lake nursed a very one-sided crush on a servant in the household of farmer Joseph Van Camp, 18-year-old Emma Hunt. One October night in 1894, the farmer called on a neighbor, leaving the two alone in the kitchen.

He returned an hour later to find Emma Hunt slaughtered as if by a demon. Her throat was slashed ear to ear and cross-shaped slashes to her abdomen had nearly disemboweled her. Nearby lay a bloody hammer that had caved in her skull. Lake was nowhere to be found, but he only dodged the sheriff’s posses for a few days before an officer caught him hiding in a barn.

It turned out upon Lake’s ready confession that this crime of passion was also one of calculation. Emma, said Lake, “bothered me and hectored me” in disdaining his affections, and “I made up my mind I would kill her.” (New York Herald, Oct. 22, 1894)

While the family ate supper on that horrible night, William Lake wrote out a confession to the murder he was going to commit once left alone, and packed a satchel with which to flee. (He forgot the satchel when the time came.) Lake’s written confession attributed a lifelong bitterness to his illegitimate birth.

He did not attempt to mitigate the crime in any way and welcomed a death sentence that was conducted within seven weeks of his conviction.

On this day..

• 2005: Six surprised Somalis
• 1913: A day in the death penalty around the U.S.
• 1902: Clinton Dotson, bad son
• 1975: Pierre Galopin, hostage of Hissene Habre
• 1809: Four by William Brunskill at Horsemonger Lane
• 1884: Henry Rose
• 1205 or 1206: Jamukha, Genghis Khan's brother and rival
• 1962: James Hanratty, the killer all along
• 1994: Richard Beavers, hungry to die
• 1693: Anne Palles, the last witch executed in Denmark
• 1761: Theodore Gardelle, artist
• 1979: Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, Prime Minister of Pakistan