In this issue, we focus on November 1933, exploring a locked house mystery and a series of lynchings.

We’re Dan Williams and M. J. Van Deventer, co-authors of the forthcoming true crime book Madeline Gets Life, about an Oklahoma model who got caught up in a sensational murder in New York City in the 1940s. As a bonus, you can read excerpts from correspondence Madeline Webb smuggled out of prison.

🕯️Triple Tragedy in Oklahoma

Above: The Hayter house in Lawton, Oklahoma, on the day it was moved in 1961. The bodies of a mother, daughter and son were found in the home on November 1, 1933. (Lawton Constitution photo)

When the Little Orphan Annie radio program crackled through Oklahoma living rooms on the night of October 27, 1933, few listeners could have imagined it would become the soundtrack to one of Lawton’s most chilling crimes.

Five days later, on November 1, a young teacher named Virginia Hayter drove from Walters to check on her family, whom she hadn’t heard from in several days. As she neared the house at 1015 I Avenue, she saw police cars and a crowd gathering. Inside, officers had discovered the bodies of her mother, Nelle, her 14-year-old sister, also named Nelle, and her 18-year-old brother, Sidney.

“The most deplorable family tragedy in the history of the city,” declared the next day’s Lawton News-Review.

The doors had been locked from the inside, with chairs wedged against them. A bag of apples sat on the kitchen table. At the top of the stairs lay Mrs. Hayter, shot once in the head, an apple in one hand and a paring knife in the other. Nearby was young Nelle, her skull crushed by a baseball bat. A radio was still playing. In the adjoining bedroom, Sidney was found shot in the head, a pistol beside him.

Gas hissed from a stove pulled away from the wall, and quilts were pinned over every window except one that led to the porch roof — apparently an escape route.

With no leads after a month, police arrested the estranged father, Robert Hayter, on the strength of a fingerprint found on the stove. Newspapers hinted at an affair with a married woman, but coworkers testified he’d been in Fort Worth, Texas, that weekend. He was released after five weeks in jail.

The crime remains officially unsolved, though many believe Sidney killed his sister, shot his mother when she came upstairs, and then took his own life days later after trying to set fire to the house.

Sidney was six-foot-four but still in the ninth grade, awkward and withdrawn. A classmate recalled him showing off a pistol like the one found beside him. His surviving sister Virginia said he often flew into rages when teased by young Nelle, and their mother had written weeks earlier that she feared for him.

In 1961, when the old house was moved to make way for a gas station, former county attorney Dwight Malcolm revisited the case. He noted that a neighbor had heard gunshots the night Little Orphan Annie aired — October 27. Malcolm believed Sidney and Nelle argued over the radio program — as they had done before — and Sidney struck his sister, then shot his mother when she came upstairs and saw what had happened.

The radio’s cheery theme song may have faded, but in Lawton, the echo of that night still lingers.

⚖️This Month in Lynching Infamy

R.M. Pate, Harley Holeman and W.I. Huff pose before their car, which was stopped by vigilantes who seized three Black murder suspects. The group killed two and left the other for dead.

Lynchings filled headlines across the United States in November 1933 — with officials often endorsing the violence or obstructing justice afterward.

November 2 — Deputies implicated in Alabama killings

A human-rights commission accused Alabama sheriff’s deputies of “conniving” in a lynching that killed two Black teens and left another man for dead.

Dan Pippen, 18, and A.T. Harden, 15, were executed August 12 by a dozen masked men who ordered them from a car taking them from Tuscaloosa to Birmingham — supposedly for safekeeping. Elmore Clark, 28, was also shot but survived by covering himself with one of the bodies.

The three had been accused of murdering 21-year-old white woman Vaudine Maddox. The Southern Commission on the Study of Lynching later said they were likely innocent.

Deputies Harley Holeman and R.M. Pate and private detective W.I. Huff were driving the car and let the mob take them, the commission charged, calling the officers’ behavior “inexcusable … stupidity.”

The next day, Holeman and Pate shot and killed Jim Pruitt, a Black man they said resisted arrest on a nearby farm. Pruitt’s death, too, was listed as a lynching.

Thomas Thurmond, left, and John Holmes were hanged 11 days after their arrest for a kidnap and murder.

November 26 — Governor endorses mob justice

California Governor James Rolph declared the nation a bit safer after a mob of 5,000 stormed the San Jose jail and hanged two suspects accused of kidnapping and murdering a wealthy young man.

Rolph — who vowed to pardon anyone convicted in the lynching — said, “There’ll be less kidnapping in the country as a result of this.”

The crowd gathered after the body of Brooke Hart, 22, was found in San Francisco Bay. Thomas Thurmond and John Holmes, both 30, were dragged from their cells, beaten, and hanged in a public park. Holmes — naked except for socks and one shoe — pleaded for his life.

The pair had confessed to kidnapping Hart, throwing him into the bay, and then demanding a $40,000 ransom from Hart’s father, owner of San Jose’s largest department store. All three men were white.

Lloyd Warner, victim of a lynching in St. Joseph, Missouri

November 28 — Rioters hang 19-year-old

Vigilantes commandeered National Guard tanks and smashed into the jail in St. Joseph, Missouri, to seize Lloyd Warner, a Black teenager accused of attacking a white girl.

Warner was dragged from the building, hanged from a tree, and set on fire as thousands cheered.

Sheriff Otto Theisen claimed he surrendered Warner to save the lives of a dozen other Black prisoners.

Earlier that day Warner had admitted guilt in court but told a reporter in the lynching crowd that he was innocent.

A grand jury later charged eight men with murder, but after the first was acquitted, the state dropped the remaining cases.

Guards escort four alleged lynching leaders after their arrest in Maryland. A judge later freed all four men. (Baltimore Evening Sun photo)

November 29 — Judge frees lynching suspects

Ignoring a telegram from Maryland’s governor, Judge John Pattison released four men accused of leading a mob that lynched George Armwood, 28, in October.

Governor Albert Ritchie had ordered the National Guard to arrest the suspects after county authorities refused to act. Their detention at an armory in nearby Salisbury prompted a riot before they were moved to Baltimore.

When Judge Pattison ordered their return and declared there was “insufficient evidence” to hold them, the crowded courtroom erupted in cheers.

Armwood, accused of assaulting 71-year-old white woman Mary Denston, was the last recorded lynching victim in Maryland.

By the Numbers

According to the Tuskegee University Archives, between 1882 and 1968 there were 4,743 documented lynchings in the United States — 3,446 Black victims and 1,297 white.

November 1933 offered grim evidence that public lynching was not confined to the South.

💌 From Madeline Gets Life

In September 1953, New York City police arrested Bessie Marcus for violating parole. The actual violation is lost to history, but the contents of seven letters in her possession survive — written by Madeline Webb, serving a life sentence for murder at Westfield State Farm in Bedford Hills. Madeline used two matrons to smuggle the letters out of the prison.

Bessie had spent a year at Westfield for forgery. In May 1952, the two were discovered in bed together “in a compromising position.” Neither was punished.

Madeline wrote on Easter Sunday 1953:

Altho’ I am working very hard, I have a terrible time getting to sleep. When you were with me … I was stimulated with our little house-keeping and conversations – by your very presence – all this relaxed me – but no more. … I really believe you are the finest thing that ever happened to me in my life.

I love you very dearly, with all my heart and soul and think of you every minute. I shall always kiss you good morning and good night.

On May 3, Madeline writes:

My Precious Baby, I was sorry it was such a rainy, messy day for your birthday yesterday. I thought about you all day.

The letter continues:

After her arrest, Bessie denied a romantic relationship, calling Madeline “very affectionate … like a sister.” There’s no evidence the two corresponded again.

What We’re Reading/Watching

🩸 Ghoulish Resurgence

Ed Gein is having a moment again.

The Wisconsin killer of the 1950s who inspired Psycho is now the focus of the eight-episode Netflix series Monster: The Ed Gein Story.

In addition, podcaster Chris Collins devotes an episode of Crime, Conspiracy, Cults and Murder to Gein under the title The Most Gruesome Killer in America.
And my true-crime book club is reading Harold Schechter’s Deviant: The Shocking True Story of Ed Gein, the Original “Psycho.” (Shout-out to Story on the Square bookstore in McDonough, Georgia!)

Gein was accused of murdering two women and robbing nine graves to collect human remains, which he preserved in macabre displays at his farmhouse near Plainfield. His crimes inspired not only Psycho but also The Texas Chain Saw Massacre and The Silence of the Lambs.

In the Netflix series, Charlie Hunnam delivers a chilling portrayal. But beware: the producers take wide creative liberties. As Schechter told the New York Post, “So much of it is over-the-top fabrication.”

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