CULTURE AND CRIME

Taranaki Daily News, 17 July 1929, Page 4

CULTURE AND CRIME

BRILLIANT DOCTOR’S LIFE SIX TIMES A BIGAMIST. > FIENDISH MURDER DRAMA. 11 p.m. —There is a crash of a shot hi the darkness, a stab of flame, and a woman seated beside the driver of a speeding motor-car topples forward with a bullet in her brain. The driver thrusts a revolver in his pocket, and at his touch'the car sweeps ahead into the open country. Midnight—Nearly 00 miles away the car comes to a standstill, 'lhe driver, gathering the lifeless form of the woman in his arms, staggers with it to a lonely roadside plot. Carefully ho places the body, face upwards, on the frost covered grass and returns to the cai. A moment later he is back at the dead woman's side. There is a sound of gurgling and splashing, a flicker of light as a match is struck, and then, with a roar, flames envelop the petrolsoaked body. The man jumps into the car and drives headlong into the night. Such was the tragic funeral pyre of Mrs. Mildred Mowry, who, less than a year ago, was a bride. Over her murdered body the flames leapt like fingers —clutching fingers of vengeance—for, by their red glow, policemen on patrol fatched the fire fiend drive away, and their high-powered car used for running expeditions chased him into the shadows. He looked at the dawn through iron .bars with handcuffs on his wrists,

By his own confession, H. Colin Camp- . bell stands condemned as the fiendish murderer of Mrs. Mowry, whom'he bigamously marriecl;: in August, 1928. He married her after a courtship in which he acted the roles of gallant lover and 'wealthy man-about-town, and when the marital ceremony was over, his honeyed ■words belied a grim plot to get possession of her. small fortune. Hence ' the seethe of blazing gasoline near Elizabeth, Ncw'Jersey. But H. Colin Campbell is something more than a killer of one woman. He is a Bluebeard, fortunately with few rivals in modern times. His past is unique in the annals of American crime.

• He is, or was, the “husband” of seven ■wives, a bigamist several times over, an embezzler, an ex-convict, a graduate of New. York and Californian prisons, and, withal, a brilliant man entitled by law to the magic word “Doctor” before his -name.

11. C. Campbell is not his real name. He is 60 years of age now, but 30 years ago he was Dr. Henry C. Close, honoured son of a New York schoolmaster. .

There was a time when his astonishing research work into the causes of failing human eyesight won him recognition as a benefactor of mankind. He was feted rs a scientist of repute. He left a growing practice to become technical adviser to one of the most famous firms of ophthalmic specialists in the world. He helped them in the invention and patenting of costly eye-glass camera lenses that revolutionised the treatment of the eyesight of nations and of the photographic industry. Then came the €l llis criminal kink asserted itself. He embezzled thousands of pounds by means of ingenious frauds, and forgery, and in 1890 was sentenced to five years’ penal servitude.

UNMASKED BY FINGER PRINTS

Wealthy friends interceded on behalf of Dr. Henry Close, and because of his ability and proved worth he received a special pardon. For nearly 15 years he was unknown ito the police, until in 1905 one Henry Campbell was sentenced to Sing Sing on a charge of larceny. His identity was disclosed as that oi the doctor when his finger-prints were tested in the files of Manhattan police headquarters. A complete confession led •to the astounding disclosure that he was three times a bigamist, that beside his own wife he had three other young women, whom he maintained in separate establishments. It was revealed that he Wooed and won the women at the same time, and each was solemnly pledged to secrecy until he could obtain a divorce.' ' Eventually he gleefully persuaded them that ho was at last a free man, and the marriages-were solemnised.In each case these duped and deluded Jove-sick girls had . money which their mysterious husband took from them. So Dr. Close, alias Henry Campbell, once more went back to prison. Came the day of his release, and he iniorated to Omaha. He burned his past, and in the little growing community became a man of importance. He was regarded as a brilliant citizen who combined the abilities of a first-rate physician, engineer, photographer . and an authoritative writer on human and technical subjects. Omaha grew, and Henry Campbell, as ho called himself, grew with it. The town went on fete when its popular and distinguished citizen was appointed local director of the Union Pacific Railroad. Once more came the crash. Early in 1014 a widow, flattered to the verge of desperation by Campbell’s secret attentions, went to Mrs. Campbell and asked her to release, her husband from all his matrimonial bonds. It was the first Mrs. Campbell had heard of her ex-con-vict husband’s philanderings. Omaha buzzed 'with cxc tihnent, and pent-up emotions ran riot. Five other women declared that Campbell had courted them,'pledging them to silence, on the ground that he would soon obtain a divorce from his wife. Irate husbands gave vent to their suspicions of the way Campbell had paid attentions to their wives, and after a few brief but exciting adventures at the hands of enraged citizens Campbell was “run out of the town.? What the “torch murderer” did for the next few years is not known, and the New Jersey police declare that it does not matter, as the charge upon which he is now arraigned will wipe out all misdeeds. Campbell is faced with the electric chair. He knows it, and sits in his cell brooding and thinking, his chin fiunk on bis chest..

SEVEN KNOWN '•'WIVES.” Campbell has been questioned for hours by police anxious to probe his mentality and bring out the full details of his confessed crime. He refuses to discuss the matter. “I killed her. That ' is enough,”’is the reply made a dozen times a day to the detectives. Prosecutor David declares that the murder will prove a simple matter for judge and jury. “The trial will come on soon,” he.... paid, “and, will be short, 'and sharp. Campbell has made a full

confession, and his only defence can be one of insanity. I shall resist that to the uttermost in view of liis„amazin D record, which he also admits. The police have tabulated the se' en known “wives” of this modern Bluebeard as follows; — , Sarah Phelan, of New York, married 18 Marle Becker, of New York, married 1899. * May Parkington-Powers, of Pawtucket, married 1902. Maude Allen, of New York, marned 19 Emma Bullock, of Chicago, married Rosalie MacCready, of Florida, married 1014. p Mildred Mowry, of Greenville, la., married August 28, 1928, murdered. The man is the father of four childrcn. An extraordinary sidelight on Campbell's personality is furnished by the attitude of his sixth “wife,” Rosalie MacCready. She refuses to be upset by the disclosure that her husband, even while living with her, was making love to a woman whom he later married and murdered. mind what he has done,” she said. "He loved only me. I love him. My love will sustain me, come what may. ,> Yet Rosalie is still young and pretty. Her friends were shocked when as. a school-girl, straight from a Florida high school, she married Henry Campbell, "I'ey-haired and twice her age. ° What, then, is the. fascination of this man over women? What strange streak in his nature has distorted what could have been an honoured career into a weird mixture of culture and crime? Is it the same power that caused ill.fated Mrs. Mowry to write to him: “Why, 0, why did you desert me. I who need you so. I cannot let you get away. I will work, I will go into the streets, into the slums, but you must live with me. I am your wife.” This letter was found in Campbells pocket on his arrest. He answered her heart-stricken plea. Ho went back io her. Then came the motor ride in the night, the “shot, ■ the flame. And Campbell sits in his cell .waiting for what may be the last act in the tragedy of an amazing life.