Sin, Confession, and .... Cover-up? (Part Two)

Note:  This is continuation of Sin, Confession, and .... Cover-up (Part One).

February, 1919

John Kinnucan, Sheriff of Leelanau County, Michigan, had a problem.  He actually had a multitude of problems, but one was of over-riding concern.

There had finally been a break in the case of Sister Janina who had gone missing twelve years earlier in August, 1907.  Thanks to information supplied by young Martha Miller, Sister Janina's bones had been located.  The information regarding the whereabouts of the body had been told to Martha Miller by Father Podlaszewski.  How he had come by the information was a story that was shocking because it implicated the past Auxiliary Bishop of Milwaukee, Edward Kozlowski, in a blatant disregard of both the civil laws of the State of Michigan and the canon laws of the Roman Catholic Church.

Upon questioning by the authorities, Father Podlaszewski had confessed that in the Fall of 1918, he and the church sexton, Jacob Fliss*, had dug up the bones of Sister Janina from the basement of Holy Rosary Church and reburied them in the adjacent Holy Rosary Cemetery.  Father Podlaszewski had not been anywhere near the area at the time of Sr. Janina's disappearance, so he was not a suspect in her murder.  However, he had not found her bones by accident.  At least three different people in the Church had told him where the bones were buried.  The last had even gone so far as to instruct Fr. Podlaszewski not tell anyone and to move the bones from the basement to the cemetery in the dark of night.  Upon further investigation, it appeared that the source of the information regarding the Sr. Janina's bones had come from Edward Kozlowski who had been a priest in Michigan before he had been appointed as the Auxiliary Bishop of Milwaukee in 1914.  Bishop Kozlowski had said more than where the bones had been buried.  He had also stated that Sr. Janina had been murdered by a woman.  He did not state how he had come by this information, but it must have been through a confession.  How else could he have obtained it?

Milwaukee Journal 2/27/1919

Suspicion had immediately focused on Stella (Marciniak) Lipczynski, who had been the church housekeeper at the time of Sr. Janina's disappearance. She had lost her husband at a young age while she was still in Poland, and she had promised him never to remarry.  She had then moved to northern Michigan with her young daughter. Stella was a diminutive woman, but wiry and irascible, and her contempt of the nuns in general, and Sr. Janina, in particular, was well-known.  But here was the crux of Sheriff Kinnucan's problem.  There was no physical evidence to connect Stella Lipczynski to the murder.  Moreover, Bishop Kozlowski had died in 1915, so he could not be called to testify, nor could he provide any further information that might help the prosecution.  Sheriff Kinnucan realized that unless he got Stella to confess again, this time to someone other than a priest, it might be very difficult to convict her.

Sheriff Kinnucan had arrested Stella almost immediately.  She had been once again serving as the housekeeper for Father Bieniawski, but now they were working at St. Joseph's parish in Manistee.  However, despite several days of intense grilling (without an attorney present), she had refused to budge from her position that she knew nothing about Sister Janina's death.  He then tried to trick Stella into signing a blank affidavit on which he could later fill in her "confession."  However, the person impressed to translate for Stella saw that the affidavit was blank and told Stella not to sign it. Sheriff Kinnucan decided he had to try a different tack.

Milwaukee Journal, 2/27/1919

He settled on two alternative methods to get Stella to talk.  The first was that he hired a "spy".  When he went to Milwaukee to interview Stella's daughter, Mary (Lipczynski) Fliss, he had also made a secret stop at the Wilson Detective Agency.  There he engaged the services of a Polish-speaking matronly detective by the name of Mary Tylicki.**  Back in Michigan, she will pretend to be a social worker who is arrested for disobeying the sheriff's order.  She will be placed in Stella's cell with a view to getting Stella to confide in her.  She will spend a total of six days in the cell with Stella.

The second method chosen by Sheriff Kinnucan to extract Stella's confession was psychological intimidation.  He noticed how much Stella relied on her religion to help her in her time of troubles.  She was constantly in prayer.  So he tried to take that support from her by confiscating her rosary and prayer book.  When that failed to do the trick, he took more drastic measures. According to what Stella later told her doctors, the Sheriff tried to frighten her into submission.  In one instance, he shoved Stella into a dark room where the bones of Sister Janina were laid on a table and illuminated by two glowing candles.  The skull, moved by invisible threads, turned toward Stella and the jaw began to move as if trying to speak.  Then Mary Tylicki, hidden somewhere, shrieked, "You killed me! You killed me!"  The Sheriff kept Stella in the room, alone with the bones, for two hours, until Stella fainted.  In another instance, Mary Tylicki turned off the lights in the cell and pulled down the shades.  She put on a long black robe and a mask with the face of the devil.  She began to make eerie sounds.  She approached Stella and pulled two bones out from behind her robe.  "These belonged to Josephine Mezek [Sr. Janina]. You must tell me all you know about her murder," she demanded.  If all this is true, it is no wonder that Stella became slightly unhinged.

The doubts about Stella's sanity increased so much that her trial was delayed so that she could be sent away for psychological testing.  In the end, she was deemed to be sane enough to stand trial.

Her trial, which finally started in October, 1919, was a dramatic affair.  By this time, the murder of the nun had reached national notoriety.  The spectator area was continually packed, and those who were able to get seats were usually not disappointed by the spectacle.  Much of what went on in the courtroom would no longer be allowed under today's standards of judicial fairness.  Bishop Kozlowski's statements regarding Sr. Janina being killed by a woman were heard by the jury.  Although the judge latter struck them as hearsay and admonished the jury not to consider them, it was bound to leave an impression.  The judge also allowed some fellow nuns of Sr. Janina to hold a prayer session over the bones of Sister Janina in the courtroom during the trial.  This must have erased any possible doubts that those were, in fact, the bones of Sr. Janina and not some other poor soul.  The glaring omission from the trial was any mention that Sr. Janina had been pregnant at the time of her death.  Sheriff Kinnucan and the other four men who had been present at the time the bones of the fetus had been discovered had all sworn to keep this matter a secret.  None of them had bothered to tell Stella's attorneys of this crucial fact which may have had an impact on the defense.

Of course, the dagger to the heart of the defense was the testimony of the "spy," Mary Tylicki.  When placed on the stand, she stated that Stella had confessed the crime to her.  Not only that, Mary Tylicki was able to fill in much of the story that was otherwise missing from the prosecution's case.  For example, in regard to how Father Kozlowski came to his knowledge, Mary Tylicki testified that Stella told her, that she (Stella) had gone to confession in Milwaukee.  The priest who had heard the confession was Father Nowak.  When he had heard Stella's confession, he had been unsure as to whether he could give Stella absolution.  He had told Stella to wait in the church while he consulted with Bishop Kozlowski.  This explained how the Bishop had learned the information.  [If true, Mary Tylicki's story does not explain why both Father Nowak and Bishop Kozlowski would then break the seal of the confessional, supposedly one of the most inviolate rules of the Roman Catholic Church.]  She went on to state that Stella was confused as to why she had been arrested because Stella believed once the Church had given her absolution, she could not be prosecuted by the civil authorities.  Finally, Mary Tylicki testified that Stella's mental illness was all feigned in order to avoid jail.

Stella took the stand in her own defense.  She denied killing Sr. Janina. She denied confessing to Fr. Nowak.   She denied confessing to Mary Tylicki.  She denied telling Mary Tylicki that she was going to pretend to be crazy.

Her denials were not enough.  In the end, the jury took six ballots to reach a unanimous guilty verdict for murder in the first degree.  The judge sentenced Stella to life imprisonment with hard labor.  However, she was pardoned after serving only seven years.  She moved to Milwaukee to be with her daughter.  Just a month after leaving the Michigan prison for the murder of a Felician nun, she was hired by the Felician Order in Wisconsin to work as a cook, and she remained there for the next 30 years.  Stella died in 1962 and is buried in St. Adalbert's Cemetery.

Ironically, the bones of poor Sr. Janina appear to have been lost.  They were first buried in the basement of Holy Rosary Church.  Then Fr. Podlaszewski and Jacob Fliss had dug them up in the dark of night and re-buried them in the Holy Rosary Cemetery.  When this secret had become known, the civil authorities had again exhumed the bones.  They were then used as props to scare Stella Lipczynski, as an exhibit in the courtroom, and as the subject of prayer by fellow nuns.  What happened to them after the trial is not known.  It would have been nice if they had be reburied at Holy Rosary, but there is no record of this every having been done.

Coming Next:  Sin, Confession, and .... Cover-up? (Second Guessing)


Post-script:

The facts of this case formed the loose basis for the play, The Runner Stumbles, by Milan Stitt.  (I have not seen the whole play, but it appears that storyline merges the roles of Father Podlaszewski and Father Bieniawski, or at least assumes Father Bieniawski was the lover of St. Janina. Moreover, it appears that the pregnancy of the nun forms the whole focal point of the play, whereas, in real life, it was a closely guarded secret that was not mentioned at all in the trial.)  The play was made into a movie of the same name, starring Dick Van Dyke, which was filmed near Roslyn, Washington.  The town now celebrates the event with an annual cross-country race.

*Jacob Fliss is stated to be a cousin of Joseph Fliss, husband of Mary (Lipczynski) Fliss.  It is possible the parents of Jacob and Joseph were siblings but I could not document the exact relationship.

**There are several possible choices as to whom this Mary Tylicki may be.  Three possibilities are all daughters-in-law of Joseph Tylicki. (The numbers in parenthesis are the age they would have been in 1919.)  They are Maire (Kuranki) Tylicki (60), wife of Felix; Mary (Paluczak) Tylicki (57) wife of Frank, and Mary (Drzewuszewski)[Woods] Tylicki (40), wife of Nicholas.

You-Heard-It-Here-First Trivia:

Mary Lipczynski Fliss had a daughter Estelle Fliss.  Estelle's first husband was Stanley Bembenek.  He appears to have been the uncle of Laurie Bembenek (aka, "Bambi" Bembenek).  Thus, Estelle may be in the unique position of being both the granddaughter of one woman convicted of a nationally famous murder, and the aunt of another.

Sources:

"Church Politics May Enter Leland Trial," Luddington Daily News, October 21, 1919, pg. 6

"Death Secret Buried With Bishop Here," Milwaukee Sentinel, March 1, 1919, pg. 9

"Killing of Nun Described," Milwaukee Journal, October 18, 1919, pg. 12.

"Late Milwaukee Bishop Named in Nun's Death,"  Milwaukee Sentinel, March 2, 1919, pg. 11

"The Law of the Seal of Confession," on the Catholic Encyclopedia

Link, Mardi, Isadore's Secret, University of Michigan Press, 2009

Link, Mardi, "Where is Sister Janina?", on Wonders and Marvels

"Probe of Death of Michigan Nun May Center Here," Milwaukee Journal, February 26, 1919, pg. 2

Saunders, William, "Secrecy of Confession is Absolute," on CatholicCulture.org

"Seal of the Confessional and the Catholic Church," on Wikipedia

"Witness in Nun Death Found," Milwaukee Journal, February 27, 1919, pg. 1

Sin, Confession, and .... Cover-up? (Part One)

Preface:  Although most of the action of the following history takes place in Michigan, many of the main participants lived in Milwaukee Polonia, either before or after the events described. In fact, the farming community in Michigan which is the scene of the crime was first settled by Milwaukee Poles about 1870.*  Thus, at least some people in Milwaukee Polonia had relatives in the area.

Much of the information in this post comes from the well-researched and interesting book, Isadore's Secret, by Mardi Link.  Anyone wishing to learn more about this tragic event should pick up a copy.

Somewhere in Michigan - January, 1919

Father Edward Podlaszewski was on an unusual mission. Being the only priest at Holy Rosary Church serving the small, Polish farming community of Isadore on the remote Leelanau Peninsula he probably had to preform many roles, but his role on this day was "complex."  On the surface, he was performing an act of a charity.  One of his young parishioners had become pregnant outside of wedlock.  Her parents had come to him for counsel and he had advised them to send her to the St. Joseph's Sisters of Mercy Hospital in Ann Arbor where she could give birth and put the child up for adoption.  Her parents agreed, and in December, Fr. Podlaszewski had driven the teenage Martha Miller downstate.  Now, he was bringing her back to the community.  It was a long slow trip, and the two had ample time to talk.  One topic of conversation which hung heavy in the air was the paternity of the child.  Martha had never divulged this secret, not even to her parents.  Only Fr. Podlaszewski knew.  It was he.

However, there was a much darker secret discussed that day.  This one belonged to Fr. Podlaszewski, and the fact that it was known only by him and other clerics or employees of the Catholic Church gave it the sickly scent of cover-up.

Why Father Podlaszewski felt the need to share this secret is unknown.  That he confessed it to Martha showed how much he trusted her ability to keep her silence.  However, Martha had gone through a lot in the last two months.  Being torn from her family over Christmas only to have her child torn from her arms had changed her.  She was no longer compliant and willing to abide wrongdoings.  When she reached Isadore and the arms of her family, she disclosed to her parents both the secret regarding the paternity and the other one, the one Father Podlaszewski had confessed to her.  The second was, by far,  the more shocking.  It was a dark secret that carried a web of wrongdoing stretching all the way to Milwaukee and its beloved Polish Auxiliary Bishop.  However, the center of the secret was right there in Isadore, in the cramped quarters of Holy Rosary's basement. It was a pile of bones in a shallow grave covered by heap of scrap wood;  a pile of bones belonging to a long-missing nun and those of her unborn child.


The story begins in......


 Isadore, Centerville Township, Michigan - Fall, 1907

This small, close-knit community is in an uproar.  No one can understand what has happened to the young, vivacious Sister Mary Janina.  The day in August when she disappeared had seemed like any other.  The pastor, Father Andrew Bieniawski, had gone fishing that day, but there was  nothing unusual in that.  Everyone else had much work to do, and that was certainly not unusual.  Everyone appeared to follow their normal routines.  However, late in the afternoon, they began to realize the world had tilted - no one could find Sister Janina. 

Both Fr. Bieniawski's sister and a church errand boy had accompanied him on the fishing expedition.  That had left five people remaining on the church grounds: Sister Janina, two other Felician sisters, the church housekeeper Stella (Marciniak) Lipczynski, and her teenage daughter, Mary Lipczynski. Stella, as always, had much work to do.  In addition to her regular chores, she also had to help Mary sew a dress. The nuns also had much work.  The Bishop was coming in two days to bless their new brick schoolhouse and they had to clean the school, retrieve the decorations from the church basement, and then hang them about the grounds. However, all three nuns were in weak health.  (Sister Mary Janina suffered from T.B.)  So, as was their custom, all three went to their separate chambers to lay down for a nap before their afternoon labors.

The first indication that something was awry occurred when Sisters Angelina and Josephine awoke and went to look for Sister Janina.  Not only was she not in her room, but she had left behind two items that she should have kept with her.....always.  Her long rosary, which should have been cinched around her waist, was hanging forlornly from her door handle, and her prayer book, which should have been in a special pocket of her habit, sat on a windowsill, its pages turned by the unseen hand of the breeze.

Sisters Angelina and Josephine commenced what would be the first of many searches for the missing nun. Each search grew in size and scope from the one that had preceded it. First, it was just the people at the church searching.  In the next several days, the local sheriff was summoned and then, volunteers stood watch throughout the night.  On the Sunday after her disappearance, four hundred people gathered to do a systematic search of the area. When that proved fruitless, Fr. Bieniawski, out of his own pocket, hired a private detective to help solve the mystery.  Becoming more desperate, he also offered a $500 reward and engaged the services of a trained bloodhound.  The dog had become somewhat of a legend in the region based on its ability to find missing (or hiding) individuals. The hound followed a scent into a cornfield, through a swamp and across a road, all the way to a second dirt road, where the trail vanished.  Some searchers (without the consent of Fr. Bieniawski) even brought in a clairvoyant.  In the end it appeared every inch of the church grounds and the nearby forest had been scoured.

All these searches revealed just a few, ambiguous clues.  The bloodhound had led the men to some footprints wandering around the swamp which may have been Sr. Janina's.  A piece of torn cloth, apparently from the habit of a nun, was found attached to a barbed wire fence running along the roadway where the dog had lost the scent.  One dark evening, just after the nun had disappeared, the men standing guard at the church, including the sheriff and a newspaper reporter, had heard what sounded like Sr. Janina singing her favorite hymn.  The eerie voice seemed to come from the depths of the swamp, and instead of inspiring the men to look for her, it raised their hackles.  None of them dared to venture into the night.  Later, a woman reported that she had been walking near the swamp that night and had seen Sr. Janina, or at least a nun, wandering about the swamp,  It was this nun that was singing the hymn.  However, the woman did not approach the nun.  Maybe it was because the strange way that the nun's candle remained steady, and did not flicker in the breeze.

One other piece of evidence was found under strange circumstances.  Two months after the disappearance another nun had to retrieve the decorations stored in the basement of the church.  As she opened the small door to the basement, the sunlight reflected off of something on the ground.  They were eyeglasses, perhaps Sr. Janina's.  But if they were Sr. Janina's how could these glasses, laying in plain view near the basement door, have been missed by the countless searchers who had scoured every inch of the basement in the last two months?  If they weren't Sr. Janina's, to whom did they belong?

In the absence of facts, rumors began to circulate.  Sr. Janina had run off with a man.  Sr. Janina had returned to her brothers in Chicago. Sr. Janina was held captive in a basement (this the statement of the clairvoyant.)  Sr. Janina had been pregnant.  This last rumor was given substantiation by the investigations of the Sheriff.  He had discovered that despite the rule of the Order two men had been seeing Sr. Janina alone in her bedroom.  One was Fr. Bieniawski.  The other was her doctor, George Fralick.  Moreover, it seemed that lately, Dr. Fralick had been seeing Sr. Janina much more than would normally have been needed by someone suffering from T.B.  But all these remained just rumors.

Years passed, and life moved on. In October, 1910, Mary Lipczynski married Joseph Fliss of Milwaukee who had cousins in Isadore.  After the wedding, she and her mother, the housekeeper, Stella, moved to Milwaukee.  In 1913, Fr. Bieniawski was transferred to a different parish, and his sister went with him.  The nuns who had been at the church at the time of the disappearance had left much earlier, just a short time after the event.  They had requested the transfer because they were afraid for their lives.  In just a few short years, there was no one left at the church who had worked with the nun.

However, Sister Janina was not forgotten. The fact that her disappearance had never been solved haunted some individuals and was a thorn in the side of others.  For the sheriff, it may have been a cold case, but it was still open.  He undoubtedly would have welcomed any useful information in the matter.  There were, in fact, several individuals who had such information.  One of these, before his death in 1915, was  the Auxiliary Bishop of Milwaukee, Edward Kozlowski.  Bishop Kozlowski had  important information, including the whereabouts of the remains of Sister Janina.  Although he had shared that information with several other individuals, none of them were in law enforcement.  In fact, for at least four years, none of the Church officials who knew about the remains of Sr. Janina shared that information with investigators, and when they finally did so, it was not voluntarily. It could be that was because the source of Bishop Kozlowski's information was not first hand.  It had come from an individual who had knelt before a priest, and in a voice that surely betrayed some fear and anguish stated, "Bless me father, for I have sinned...."

TO BE CONTINUED......

*The source of the information regarding the settling of Isadore, Michigan comes from the article on Centerville Township, Michigan on Wikipeida.  It appears to be corroborated by the records.  For example, Isadore's Secret states that one of the earliest settlers of Isadore, and the person who chose the site for Holy Rosary Church, was Jacob Rosinski, Sr.  The Michigan death record of his son Jacob, Jr., indicates that he was born in Milwaukee in 1872.  (Jacob Rosinski, Jr., played  a minor role in Sr. Janina's tragedy and is mentioned in Isadore's Secret.)  I could not tie these Rosinskis to any family that stayed in Milwaukee.  However, records on the Poznan Project indicate that they originated from the area around Smogulec and Kcynia, Poland which is the source of other Milwaukee families.  Also, as mentioned above, the Fliss family (sometimes spelled "Flees") had branches in both locations.  In addition, Mary Fliss, of the Michigan branch (possibly an aunt of  the Joseph Fliss mention above), married Martin Brzezinski who had been born in Wisconsin in 1875. (Their son Andrew married Katherine Rosinski, daughter of Jacob, Sr.)  Again, I could not find a link between this Martin Brzezinski and any of the Brzezinskis who remained in Milwaukee, but it is quite possible that there is such a link.  Even the family of Martha Miller spent time in Milwaukee.  Her older siblings Elizabeth (1890), Frank (1891) and John (1892) were all born in Milwaukee.

Big Collar at the Cock Fight

The following appeared in the Milwaukee Journal on December 15, 1913:

Names Mentioned:

Jacob Litza
Chris Miller
H. Hartkoff
Thomas Reunet
John Stein
J.W. Doven
George Jesson
H. Niedman
Peter De Graf
Samuel Ryan
S. Ewald
J. Miller
O. Ewald
B. Zimmers
John Hahn
F. Schneider
E. Schultz
E. Patzer
A. Lehers
F. Selin
G. Lineup
Charles Rathke
Charles Cutler
Louis Purzer
Thomas Wahlen
A. Meyer
Matthew Strow
John Walters
Joseph Banaszka
Ernest Vogt
John Bikulek
Max Czarnata
Joseph Fons
Joseph Hillo
Tony Ertman
J.M. Kunkel
Charles Barth
Edward Szczpanowski
Joseph Heiden
John Sczyski
John Kunkel
John Sabaniash
Frank Klapinski
Phillip Tewed
Thomas Melz
Julius Lutz
John Farrell
Bert Shay
Louise Jeske
Jack Jones
William Benz
Albert Bartel
Edward Hann
John Kleczka
Leo Sapinash
C. Gumpert
Robert Hiller
Robert Epcke
R. Bishop
George Kammerling
Anton Nowak
J.S. Koenig
Frank Klein

Guns and Roses

Happy St. Valentine's Day Everyone!  In honor of this romantic occasion, I give you two eerily similar tales from the pages of the Milwaukee Journal.  The first appeared in the May 28, 1908 edition:

Despite this rocky start, it appears this Anthony Smukowski and Sadie Przybyla Smukowski endured.  I found the following in the Milwaukee Journal on September 21, 1941:

 

Also, I wonder if Sadie's evident confusion, as portrayed in the story, resulted from a language problem or from the fact that she was flustered to be in a courtroom standing before a judge.


The other story I want to share with you appeared just two months after the first.  It ran in the July 3, 1908 edition of the Milwaukee Journal:

 

 

According to records available on FamilySearch.org, Lucian Wolski and Jadwiga Majkowski (or Maykowski) were married on August 3, 1908.  However, a quick search (done this morning) did not disclose any evidence of this couple after that.

First in the Line of Duty - The Death of Frank Piszczek (Featured Profile #33)

Frank Piszczek (@1850 - 1884)

The night of Friday, June 20th, 1884, probably started much the same as any other for Frank Piszczek.  There was nothing -- no portents, no omens, no signs of any sort, that it would unleash a chain of events that would culminate in Frank becoming the first Milwaukee police officer killed in  the line of duty.

Milwaukee Police Officers and wagon outside the West Side Station, 1886

Frank was born in the German Partition of Poland but came to Milwaukee at a time when Milwaukee was still in its adolescence.  There were a number of Piszczek families among the earliest of the Polish settlers, and it is quite reasonable to assume that Frank was related to these, but as to exactly how he fits in, I have been unable to located any documentation.  [If anyone knows, please contact me.] 

Frank had originally been trained as a tanner.  For a while, he had also worked as a brakeman for the St. Paul road.  But in 1876 he had joined the Milwaukee City police department.  At first, he was assigned as a night patrolman.  He was then given a day watch.  Next, he assigned to a station on the South Side.  Finally, in about the beginning of 1884, he was made a roundsman.

When he had reported for duty earlier on that fateful day, he had been told to be on the look-out for two notorious crooks and "cracksmen."   They had been known to have left Chicago a couple weeks before for a trip through northern Wisconsin.  Just a couple days before, the pair had shown up in Manitowoc where they had robbed a saloon.  Since that time, their movements had been traced but they still eluded capture.  They had followed the railroad tracks out of Manitowoc until Sheboygan.  There they had made a wide circle around the city, but had picked up the railroad tracks again south of town.  They had then hopped a freight train which had reached Milwaukee about 7 that Friday morning.  They had leaped from the train about three miles before reaching the Lake Shore Depot, and then had walked into the city.  Since then, the police had scoured the city looking for them, but when Frank Piszczek came on duty, they still had not been apprehended.

There were no sign of the men until about 2:30 on Saturday morning.  Officer Piszczek was visiting Union Depot on Reed Street when he was approached by Private Watchman Dan Kennedy.  Kennedy told him that there were two men near-by who were acting suspiciously.  They had been first seen at the Depot about 10 on Friday night and they had spent most of the intervening hours there.  At one point, the smaller of the two men had tried to change a number of small bills for larger ones.

Union Depot on Reed Street, from the Wisconsin Electric Reader.

They then had crossed the street and had sat for an hour in front of the Exchange Hotel, carrying on a conversation in a low tone.  They were noticed by Tony Belzer, the bartender at the Exchange.  About 2 a.m., the taller man had entered the bar.  He pulled out a wad of bills and exchanged a number of smaller denominations  for a $20, but Tony Belzer did not like the way the man had taken a minute to look over the bar when he had entered.  The man had the "mark of a criminal" and Belzer suspected that the men were planning a robbery.  Fearing the worst, Tony Belzer had pointed out the man to Dan Kennedy, and he had informed Piszczek when the Roundsman had arrived at his regular stop. (The whereabouts of the second man are not mentioned at this time.)

Piszczek, who was wearing plain clothes, crossed Reed Street and sat next to the man, engaging him in some conversation.  He asked his name, where he was from, and several other questions.  Feeling that his answers were not satisfactory and that the man was indeed a crook, Piszczek asked if the man would take a walk with him, and the stranger consented.

An enlargement of an 1883 map shows the area.  Union Depot fronts on Reed St..  Clinton is one block east.

The two men proceeded south down Reed Street until Florida Street.  As Piszczek turned east toward the police station the man became agitated.

"Where are you taking me, you ---- ----- -----?" he asked.  Piszczek replied that he would show him. At that, the man sprang away from Piszczek and landed on his knees in the gutter. Whipping out his 38 caliber revolver, he got off two shots before running away down Reed Street.  Piszczek tried to pursue. He also took three shots with his own gun as the man disappeared in the darkness.  However, he soon realized that he was wounded, so he turned back to the station.  He never made it, instead he collapsed in the street a half block from where the shooting had occurred.  That is where he was found by the patrol wagon from the South side police station which had been attracted by the sound of gunfire.  He was taken to the station and two doctors were summoned.

The doctors determined that Piszczek had been hit twice in the abdomen and that both wounds were fatal.  They were eventually proven correct, but Piszczek fought for his life for 43 hours.  A later autopsy determined that the first shot had hit him in the left side, entering his abdomen between the 11th and 12th ribs.  The bullet passed through the left kidney and then lodged itself near the spinal column.  The second bullet had entered the lower abdomen and had lodged itself in the muscles of the hip. 

The flags of the city were flown at half-mast and all the police stations were draped in black.   The Mayor and the Chief of Police, along with 50 off-duty police officers, attended the funeral.   A long, solemn procession wended its way from Piszczek's residence on the corner of Greenbush and Mitchell Streets to St. Stanislaus Church.  The funeral, presided over by Reverends Gulski and Rogzinski, was one of the largest funerals held in that church up to that time.  Afterward, Officer Piszczek was laid to rest in Trinity Cemetery.  He left his wife and and five children surviving.

In the meantime, all efforts to capture the perpetrator went for naught. It was not that the Milwaukee Police didn't try.  Nearly a hundred officers hit the streets within an hour of the shooting.  All roads out of the city were guarded and every street and alley on the south side was searched.  One officer was sent to Racine, and another to Western Union Junction with orders to search every passing train.  Two detectives were sent south in a carriage, another to the west, and the sheriffs were searching to the north. A reward of $500 was offered.  Detective McManus was sent to Chicago, where it was believed the assailants had fled, and thirty policemen were on the case there.

The murderer was last seen shortly after the shots were fired by Mrs. McFadden, a resident of Reed Street.  She was feeling ill, so she was sitting at her open window at about 3 a.m. when two man walked quickly past.  One was very agitated.  She distinctly heard him say, "I couldn't help it; if he had left me alone, I wouldn't have done it."  But then the darkness closed around both men, and they disappeared into history. 

Relation to Nearest Featured Profile: (Roman Czerwinski, Featured Profile #10):  Father-in-law of grand nephew

Path From Nearest Featured Profile:  Roman Czerwinski > brother, John Czerwinski I > son, John Czerwinski II > wife, Catherine Cecylia (Piszczek) Czerwinski > father, Frank Piszczek

Sources:

Genealogy Uncovers a Woman's Link to a Moment in Milwaukee's History

Memorial Page of the Milwaukee Police Department

Milwaukee's Finest - 1800's

"Murder of Piszczek,"  Milwaukee Journal, June 23, 1884, page 4

"Peril of Policemen," Milwaukee Journal, June 21, 1884, page 1

"Taken to the Grave," Milwaukee Journal, June 24, 1884, page 1

"Who Shot Piszczek?", Milwaukee Journal, June 25, 1884, page 4.

An Early Example of the Effect of Media on Youth

The following article appeared in the April 4, 1913 edition of the Milwaukee Journal:

Names mentioned:

Michael Oleniczak
Joseph Kmiecek
Eddie Jelenski
Joseph Pinkowski

St. Valentine's Day and the Law

Today, I have two items that are unrelated other than that they both deal with St. Valentine's Day and crime.

First, an article that appeared in the Milwaukee Journal on February 14, 1925 about the unusual Valentine given to Stanley Janis after he married Clara Jasnewski (possibly Jansniewski) :

 

I wish I could learn what happened to this couple, but I was unable to match up any families in the 1930 or 1940 census records that matched the specifics given in the article.

That was all I had planned for today, but then today I ran across a possible connection between our community and the much more famous interplay of the law and February 14th:  the St. Valentine's Day Massacre. 

I was entering information from the Pedigree Resource File of Frances (Lukaszewski) Cesarz when I noticed a probable match between this family and the family of Leo* and Frances Cesarz that is part of the Sweeney and Allied Families Tree on RootsWeb World Connect.  A little investigative googling fleshed out the following story.

Leo and Frances Cesarz had one daughter, Irene Alice Cesarz who was born in 1906 and baptized at St. Hedwig's.  Unfortunately, Frances appears to have died just a year later in 1907.  The 1910 census finds Leo and daughter Irene living with Leo's in-laws, Joseph Lukaszewski and Catherine (Prill or Pryll) Lukaszewski.  Tragically, it appears that Leo, succumbs to tuberculosis in 1913.  In the days before Social Security, perhaps the only thing Irene then had to live on were her family connections and the $150 she received from Leo's membership in the Wood, Wire and Metal Lather's International Union.  I do not know when either Joseph or Catherine Lukaszewski passes away, but I cannot find them in the 1920 census, so it may have been before that date.

According to the Sweeney and Allied Families Tree, Alice makes her way to Chicago.  1926 finds her as a back-up vocalist at the notorious Green Mill Cocktail Lounge in north Chicago.  There she meets and marries Milton Neul, a jazz musician.  They have one son together.  I do not know what became of this marriage, but in about 1932, Alice marries again, this time to John Edward Moore.

The occupation of John Edward Moore on the Sweeney Family Tree is given as "Bootlegger; owner: Circus Cafe, Chicago; Labor Union Racketeer."  Of course, there is more to this than that one statement would imply.  John Edward Moore, a.k.a. Claude "Screwy" Maddox was born in St. Louis, Missouri in 1900 and he may have been a member of the gang called Egan's Rats.  He eventually makes his way into the Chicago crime scene.  He was the owner of the Circus Cafe night club, and more notably, the leader of the criminal gang of the same name.  The Circus Cafe gang was the only gang on the North side of Chicago that associatedwith the organization of Al "Scarface" Capone, infamous leader of the Chicago Outfit (and, reputedly, part-time resident of Brookfield, WI.)

Moore may have been involved in the Massacre in a couple ways.  First, Moore's previous association with Egan's Rats mat have played a role because the Rats were eventually implicated in the crime.   Second, the location of the Circus Cafe on the North side made it an advantageous spot from which to hit the Irish north-side gang of Bugs Moran.  After the St. Valentine's Day Massacre, the police searched the back of the Circus Cafe.  They found a drum filled with bullets for Thompson sub-machine guns.  They also found numerous overcoats strewn about.  Were these the overcoats of the killers?  Or, perhaps, the victims of the Massacre?  One of the overcoats held a .45 caliber pistol in the pocket. Moreover, it is speculated that the garage next door to Cafe was used to cut up one of the get-away cars.  However, it caught fire and burned before this could be fully investigated.

Moore himself was never implicated in a direct involvement in the St. Valentine's Day Massacre.  He had the best of alibis:  he was already in jail on that day for an unrelated offense.  But, he may have been involved in other gangland killings.  Needless to says, he seems an odd choice in husband for a nice Polish girl who had been baptized at St. Hedwig's.

Sources:

Binder, John J., The Chicago Outfit

The Lather,

My Al Capone Museum:  When, Where and How Did They Die

The obituary of Milton Neul, Jr. on Legacy.com.

*Shifting from Leo Cesarz to his brother, Teodor connects you with another published family tree:  the Balliod Family Tree, also on the RootsWeb World Connect Project.

Bomb!

The general scene of the wreckage after the explosion on November 3, 1935. (Originally published in Milwaukee Journal.)

Autumn, 1935 was a tense time on the South side of Milwaukee.  The Great Depression was entering its sixth year.  The initial stock market avalanche had wiped out the family savings of both millionaires and mill workers.  Since then, the constant pressure of no work - no money had slowly ground away people's confidence, self-esteem and even hope.  It is no wonder that individuals snapped, causing sporadic outbreaks of violence in varied and unlikely places.  One of those places was the strike at the A.J. Lindemann and Hoverson Co.  (See Featured Profile #1) where striking workers and replacements exchanged insults, as well as paint and rocks.  While this was occurring, another more lethal flash point was festering in the heart of the Milwaukee's South side.


Hugh "Idzi" Rutkowski was a somewhat clever individual with some manual skills.  He had attended St. Vincent's Academy and Boy's Technical High School where he learned the auto mechanic's trade.  Unfortunately, he had not been able to find consistent employment.  In  the Fall of 1935, he was 20, unemployed, living with his parents, and frustrated.  He was also a bully with an inflated sense of his abilities and a total lack of respect for the law and the rights of others.  Unfortunately for him, and his innocent victims, those are the qualities he drew upon to formulate his plan to get rich quick.

(as published in the Milwaukee Sentinel)

On October 2, 1935 he took the first step in this plan when he stole 150 sticks of dynamite, blasting caps and fuses from the Estabrook park CCC camp.  He had tried to get a job there earlier in the year, but had been rejected because of his bad teeth.

On October 22, 1935, Idzi stole a West Milwaukee police squad car from two unsuspecting officers who were in the police station at 4755 W. Beloit Road.  He stripped it of its siren, radio, red spotlight and license plates.  He placed these items on a Ford V-8 coupe (which he had probably also stolen) to make it look like a police car and then hid the coupe in a garage at 2960 S. Thirteenth Street. This garage had been rented for him by Paul Chovanec, a small, 16-year-old neighborhood boy whom Idzi dominated.  It is not known to what extent Paul Chovanec would assist in the ensuing crimes, but he undoubtedly was involved.

On Saturday, October 26th, the main event began when at 7:32 p.m. an explosion erupted under a 5-inch sewer outside the Shorewood City Hall at 3930 N. Murray Ave.  It tore a hole through the cellar, splintered one of the large columns supporting the roof and shattered every window in the structure.  Because of the smell of dynamite in the air, and the effects of the explosion, the police suspected that the explosion was the work of human hands, but no one had any idea who might want to attack Shorewood.

The next bombings occurred less than twenty-four hours later when two banks were targeted.   At 6:10 p.m. on October 27th, another bomb went off against the rear wall of the Citizens branch of the First Wisconsin National Bank located at 3602 W. Villard Ave.  It weakened the building's foundation and sprayed glass over the surrounding homes.  Using his stolen car that was made up to look like a police vehicle, Idzi then sped away to the site of his next target.  Less than 30 minutes later, another bomb exploded, this time at the East Side branch of the First Wisconsin National Bank at the corner of N. Farwell and E. North Avenue.  The dynamite had been placed on the ground at the rear of the building, so much of the force of the explosion went outward, wrecking near-by parked cars. 

Now the city knew that the explosions were the work of one or more individuals bent on terror.  The mood of the city darkened even more. Everyone was cautious and worried, not knowing when the next bomb might explode. For four days, the police searched frantically for clues, rounding up large numbers of random "suspects" in the desperate attempt to find the bomber through shear luck. The rest of the city waited, suspended in fear.  Then on Thursday, the next two bombs exploded in quick succession.  This time, the police stations were targeted.  At 6:47 p.m. a bomb that had been left on a window ledge of the Fifth Precinct Police Station at Third and Hadley went off.  Although the damage to the building and surrounding houses was severe, the occupants of the police building luckily escaped injury.  The same was true less than 11 minutes later when the second bomb went off, this time at the Third Precinct Police Station at Twelfth and West Vine Streets.

At this point, the police began to suspect how the bombers were eluding capture.  About the time of the first bomb exploded, three false alarms had been called in.  The confusion caused by the response to these false alarms and to the real bombing had let the bombers make their escape.  The police also suspected that the bombers were using the equipment stolen from the police car to disguise their own auto as a police vehicle.

Thursday was also the day that a "ransom" note of sorts and a blasting cap were discovered on a desk in the Palmer Street School.  The note apparently had been typed on a typewriter stolen from the school the Monday before.  The letter was so long, rambling, and filled with misspelled words and ungrammatical sentences that it was difficult to read.  It demanded $125,000 in set specified denominations and then went on:

plan mus be got or up go sity                           [My plan must be accepted or up goes
                                                                             the city
i gif far wrnig i do it to 125,000                       I give fair warning.  I do it, too.  $125,000
is leetl                                                                is little]

if no tak ofer wtmj by fri, it wel betoob         [If you don't take the offer on WTMJ by
bad dis is de las chance....                                   Friday, it will become bad. 
                                                                         This is the last chance.]

The note rambled on, taunting the police with their incompetence, bragging about how clever the bomber had been so that the police could not identify him, warning that if the offer to trade peace for money was not accepted three bombs would go off, at least one at a theater, and many people would be killed.

It ended, somewhat ironically and prophetically:

i no afrad to di so i no kar i e x con                 [I'm not afraid to die, so I don't care.  I'm 
an vet i handle dy. over there                               an ex-con
                                                                          and vet.  I handled dynamite over there.
i expert boms kin be timed elek caps i             I'm an expert.  Bombs can be timed
                                                                              with electric caps. I
mean not d e fuzes they b in to fast                   mean, not the fuses.  They burn
                                                                               too fast.]

The last reference about using electric caps and not fuses was probably a response to an article that had appeared in the newspapers.  All the bombs that had gone off so far had been set with simple burning fuses.  This, the article had explained, indicated that the bombings were the work of an amateur.  Professionals did not use simple fuses because they were too risky.  Real professionals used electric detonators.  Being called an amateur must have rankled Idzi.  He decided he would show them.  His next bomb would use a timed electric detonator, and it would be a super bomb.  The previous explosions had been caused by about five sticks of dynamite each.  His next bomb would use 35.

Again the city waited anxiously.  Friday and Saturday passed with no explosions, but several false alarms.  Sunday, November 3, started the same, but at 2:40 p.m. the tension in the atmosphere was released with a terrific explosion that was heard up to eight miles away.  The source  was a sheet metal garage in the rear of 2121 W. Mitchell Street where Idzi and Paul had been trying to set an elector detonator to their super bomb.  Whether the early detonation was caused by an electrical short in the wiring, a slip of the hand or some other error, we'll never know.

(Published in Milwaukee Sentinel)

The force of the explosion was so great that a large section of the garage roof  was blown over the alley and two whole houses before landing in Mitchell Street.  Windows in St. Vincent de Paul were shattered.  Nearby homes also sustained heavy damage.   Unfortunately, one of those was the upstairs bedroom across the alley at 2117-B Mitchell Street where nine-year-old Patricia Mylnarek was killed by the impact of the explosion.  Her mother Clara and brother Conrad were also injured.  Fortunately, there was a driving rain at the time which probably kept damage down by preventing fires and the sympathetic explosion of other dynamite stored nearby.  Still, the damage to person and property was significant.   Also sent to the hospital:

Lydia Tarnowski, 29, 1727 S. 21st Street
Albert Raddatz, 57, 2127 W. Mitchell Street, his wife, Mary, and their daughter, Edna Grebe, 34, 2618 W. Lincoln Ave.
Joseph Kowalski, 36, 1803 S. 39th Street
Gladys Pietrzak, 18, 2143 W. Maple Street
Lucille Gustafson, 34, 1721 S. 21st Street
Hilda Budnik, 37, 2121 W. Mitchell Street
Rose (Antoniak) Kleczka, 49, 2117 W. Mitchell Street

(Rose Kleczka was the wife of Ed Klezka, the owner of the house in which Patricia Mylnarek was killed.  Ed Kleczka was the brother of John C. Kleczka, see Featured Profile #8.)

Others escaped with their lives only through pure chance.  Joseph Doligalski, uncle of Idzi, had taken his car out of another section of the garage where the bomb exploded just before.  Earl Tarnowski, son of the injured Lydia, was in the basement of their house on an errand.  The explosion blew two basement doors off their hinges.  Earl just missed being seriously injured when one of the doors flew by, just grazing his head.

(As published in the Milwaukee Sentinel)

Idzi and Paul were obliterated instantly.  Tiny bits of their bodies were spread out over the Mitchell Street neighborhood.  [On a personal note, on this fateful afternoon, my mother was playing in her yard a few blocks away with her cousins, Dan and Leo Kitzke.  When they heard the terrific explosion, they ran toward its source out of curiosity.  They had not gone very far when they ran into their uncle Roman Kitzke who turned them back.  However, even by that time, they had seen human limbs and flesh hanging from the trees.]  The bits and pieces of Idzi and Paul that could be collected had to be buried in the same coffin because there was no way to tell them apart.

The reign of terror by Milwaukee's Mad Bomber had ended.

Sources: (references to page numbers in newspapers are to the page on Google News)

Balousek, Marv and J. Allen Kirsch, 50 Wisconsin Crimes of the Century, "Idzi's Reign of Terror", beginning p. 136.

"Bomber Blows Self to Bits, Child Killed,"  Milwaukee Sentinel, November 4, 1935, p. 1

"Hope May Be in Vain, But Parents of Rutkowski's Pal Await His Return," Milwaukee Sentinel, November 4, 1935, p. 1

"Police Find Four Deadly Missiles Hidden in Garage,"  Milwaukee Sentinel, December 6, 1935, p. 1

"Shorewood Blast Began Bombings,"  Milwaukee Sentinel, November 4, 1935, p.2.

"Two Killed in New Blast, Believe Bomber a Victim," Milwaukee Journal, November 4, 1935, p. 1

Felony Murder - The Death of Dominic Gapinski

Dominic Gapinski, as published in the Milwaukee Journal

By all appearances, the evening of April 3, 1908 should have been quite uneventful for the Board of the Skarb Sobieski Building Loan Association. It started out as every other Thursday evening with members of the Association coming to make their weekly deposit. The deposit was usually a small amount hoarded from the family budget, often only a dollar. Sometimes, after a good week, a few precious extra pennies could be added. But no matter how small the deposit, it was always made with the hope that, eventually, with hard work and persistence, enough could be set aside to qualify for a loan to buy or build a house of their very own.

That week, about 400 men had come to make their deposits. The Association used as its quarters the basement of the Mitchell Street Savings Bank so there was no safe available to it. All the money it had collected that evening, about $230 in cash and $380 in checks, sat in a strong box on the meeting room table. After the deposits had finished, the members of the Board and the officers sat down for other business. Maybe it was to decide who would be lucky enough to qualify for a loan. Maybe it was some other matter. Along with the Trustees and officers were two shareholders. The men were seated around a “T” shaped table. They included Frank Mucha (President), Michael Szymborski (Vice President), Frank Poznanski (Corresponding Secretary), Stanley Maternowski (recording secretary), and Trustees Michael Tomaszewski, Michael Anczak, John Paszkiewicz and Vincent Lewandowski.

Dominic Gapinski was the brother-in-law of Walter Celichowski (Featured Profile #13) and his partner in the business of Celichowski and Gapinski. He was also the Treasurer of the Association, and on that fateful evening, he was seated at the head of the table with his back towards the door. He was making out a receipt for Michael Salaty, and thus, he did not see three men enter the room. The others seated around the table looked at the new men with an inquiring expression. Were they shareholders with some new business? The oldest of the three men was about 24. He had blond hair and mustache and was wearing a light hat and light overcoat. The other two were perhaps 20 or 21. They were clean-shaven. They wore dark clothes, but no overcoats.

Suddenly, two of the men drew revolvers. They pointed them at the officers and cocked the hammers.

“Sit down, be quiet, hands up,” they ordered in “Russian Polish.” The last command was probably unnecessary. Everyone was in stunned silence. They were trying to comprehend exactly what was happening. Was this some kind of joke?

In a matter of seconds, it became all too clear. The eldest robber snatched the cash box from the table and headed for the door. This was something Dominic could not allow. He sprang into action. The door to the room opened inward, and Dominic threw his weight against it to prevent the robbers from escaping. Then, he grabbed the cash box and tried to wrest it from the robber. The two men struggled for a few seconds. Then the thief swore in anger, and in a flash Dominic collapsed to the floor, a bullet to the brain. The robbers fled, but the Association men sat stunned in their chairs. When they did finally take action, some tried to aid Dominic while others tried to chase the robbers, but they were too late in both cases. Dominic was dead and the robbers had disappeared without a trace, (However, the cash box and all but $200 in cash was eventually found in different places nearby.)

The police were notified “by telephone”, an event so new it was still noted in the newspaper. Within a short time, a description of the culprits had been circulated and police had been sent to the depot and the interurban trains to stop the felons from leaving the city. That very evening, Patrolman Kelly saw two men matching the description at First Ave. and Lapham Street. They fled when he approached. Patrolman Kelly chased them for a half mile until they disappeared into the maze of track and switching trains at the Northwestern Railroad yard. However, the game was still afoot, and other police were out chasing down other leads. Before the night was out, five men had been pulled in for questioning. In a cunning move, the police placed an informant, one who spook Polish, in a nearby cell. Soon, the informant heard two of the suspects make incriminating statements, and they implicated a third man was also already in custody. They were F. Szymeczak (20), Joseph Marusik (19) and Jacob Zajaczkowski (20). All three were Poles from Russian-controlled Poland and Szymeczak was just recently arrived from Cleveland. It was Marusik who was accused of doing the actual shooting. Szymeczak confessed almost immediately. (Perhaps he did not realize that committing a felony in which a death results can carry a murder rap, even if you don't pull the trigger.) By way of explanation, Szymeczak said, “I was hungry and I had nothing to eat. I had to do something to keep from starving to death.”

A fourth man was also implicated in the scheme to rob the Association. John Tarasinski, who resided in the same boarding house with the other men, was the supposed mastermind. It was said that he had been a depositor with the Association, but that he had withdrew all his money the week before the robbery. When he had done so, he had gotten $5 less than he had expected, and he had threatened to “get even.” In the end, all defendants were either convicted or plead guilty and sent to Waupun. However, Tarasinski continued to argue his innocence. He appealed his conviction all the way to the Wisconsin Supreme Court where it was upheld. The decision in Tarasinski v. State became a leading case in Wisconsin criminal law for a time. Concomitant with his appeals, Transinski asked the governor for a pardon, but was also disappointed in that cause. However, he did eventually get his sentence reduced from 25 years to 12 years.

At the time of his death, Dominic Gapinski was about 40 years old. He was married with six children who ranged in age from 17 to less then a year. His oldest son, Bernard, would eventually join the priesthood and serve in several local parishes. He became the principal pastor of St. Alexander's parish in 1958 and served in that capacity until his retirement in 1968. By coincidence, St. Alexander's is the same parish at which Bernard's uncle (and Dominic's brother-in-law), Bronislaus Celichowski, was serving as pastor at the time of Dominic Gapinski's death in 1908.

As an interesting coda to this story, the Tarasinski defense team was comprised of the husband-wife law partnership of Charles Peterson and Antionette Jankowska-Peterson. One suspects that Antionette's probable ability to speak Polish may have played a factor in why they were retained.  However, she was not relegated to the mere role of translator.  In fact, it was Jankowska-Peterson who gave the final argument to the jury. In doing so, she may have become the first woman attorney to take part in a murder trial in the state of Wisconsin. 

Antionette Jackowska-Peterson, as published in the Milwaukee Journal

 Sources (all page references in the Milwaukee Journal are to the page on Google News):

"Alleged Slayer Makes Threat,"  Milwaukee Journal,  April 7, 1908, p. 6.

"Fiends' Plot is His Reply," Milwaukee Journal, May 25, 1908, p. 1

"First Woman Lawyer to Argue in Murder Case in Wisconsin,"  Milwaukee Journal, May 27, 1908, p. 1

"Governor Will Refuse Pardon for Tarasinski,"  Milwaukee Journal, July 27, 1910, p. 1.

Messages to the Legislature and Proclamations of  Emanuel L. Phillipp, p. 55

"Police Say They Have Murderers,"  Milwaukee Journal, April 4, 1908, p. 1

"Sheriffs Dodge Polish Throngs," Milwaukee Journal, April 8, 1908, p. 4

Skarb Sobieski Building & Loan Association, 1908

Tarasinski v. State, (Wisc. Supreme Court, 1911) 146 Wisc. 508,  131 NW 889.

The Hattie Zinda Tragedy

This picture of Hattie ran in the Milwaukee Journal on Tuesday, November 15, 1909.

The night of Friday, November 12, 1909 was cold and dark, and the streets of Milwaukee were nearly deserted. Especially after 8 o'clock. That's when 14 year-old Hattie Zinda made her way home, walking north along Racine Street (now Humboldt Ave.) She had only just finished helping her ailing sister, Mary Ertman, with her housework at 929 Racine St. A gusty wind blew tiny clusters of dead leaves into small eddies of confusion. Who knows what thoughts eddied inside the head of Hattie as she hurried home that night? Perhaps she was thinking of her mother, Johanna (Watzek) Zinda, who had died just a few years previously. Perhaps she was thinking of the two men who had accosted her just the Saturday before. That had occurred about the same time in the evening. She had been crossing the Racine Street bridge over the Milwaukee River on her way home when two men, each about 25 years-old had approached her. They were well-dressed and had long black over-coats and black derby hats. 

“Isn't it pretty late for a pretty girl like you to be on the street?” one of them asked her.

“Yes, don't you think you should be at home?” said the other.

It was dark, and no one else was in sight. Hattie ignored the men and walked on, as quickly as she could. The men followed her, and she heard one say to the other, “We must get her.”

That did it for Hattie. She broke into a run. The men gave chase but could not catch her. She ran several blocks until she finally saw a man and a little girl near Lee Street. Using the last of her breath, she screamed for help and sprinted toward the safety of their company. Her pursuers gave up and disappeared into a side street. 

This portion of a 1901 map of Milwaukee shows the area of the tragedy.

For several days afterward, she was scared. But her sister on the south side of the river needed help. So, Hattie resumed her nightly treks over the Racine Street bridge.

Regardless of her obvious courage, Hattie must have been concerned as she made her way home the next Friday. Crossing that bridge without incident must have brought her a sigh of relief. She was nearly to her home at 909 Weil Street now.

Hattie was not the only one on Humboldt Avenue that night. Miss Rosella Peplinski and Miss Rosa Skarowski, friends of Hattie, were also there heading in the opposite direction of Hattie. They passed each other, without speaking, just before Hattie crossed over the Racine Street bridge. Shortly before they had seen Hattie, the two girls had also seen two well-dressed men leaning against the bar of a saloon about one block north of the railroad crossing of the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railroad on Humboldt Ave. As Hattie headed north, another resident observed her as she made her way toward safety. But then Hattie's progress, and the view of her by the bystander, were blocked by a freight train passing through. For more than five minutes, Hattie was forced to wait on the south side of the crossing, standing in the darkness, as car after car rumbled by. Finally, the caboose cleared the crossing, and as the sound of its wheels faded off to points west, Hattie's way home was now clear.

But, it was too late for Hattie Zinda.

What ensued on that bleak November night has been called “one of the most fiendish crimes ever committed in Milwaukee” and “the most sensational and gruesome murder mystery in the history of the city.” For years afterward, a mention of the “Zinda murder” in the Milwaukee papers would need no further explanation.

When Hattie failed to make it home that night, the rest of her family became frantic.  It was a large family; Jozef and Johanna had had 15 children, and it now included sons-in-law such as Stanley Dudek and William Kuszewski. They spent the whole night searching for her. They enlisted the help of neighbors. The word of the disappearance spread like wildfire and soon the whole Northside was inflamed. However, the police refused to act. They told the anguished relatives that they should look for Hattie in the nickel theaters; they would undoubtedly find her among the other little girls. It was not until the Zindas went to the office of a prominent Pole, and a man from that office went to the police, that the police actually began to act.

Although slow to respond, over the next several days, the entire Milwaukee police department would search for poor Hattie Zinda. Her picture ran on the first page of the Milwaukee Journal along with the details of her disappearance. Hundreds of citizens appointed themselves as private detectives to try to solve the mystery. They flooded the police department with theories. “Not in years,” read a Journal editorial. “have the people in Milwaukee been stirred to [such] depths . . . “ Speculation as to her fate was the topic. The fact that she had vanished while a freight train passed led some to the conclusion that tramps had grabbed her and sold her into white slavery. Meanwhile, her sister Anna Zinda (later Fliss) was positive the two men who had scared Hattie on Saturday had come back to carry out their evil intentions. The police seemed to agree and they let it be know that at least two men were involved in the abduction.

It was not until November 17^th that the body of Hattie was discovered in an abandoned shack near the corner of Humboldt and North Avenues. Detective John Shenar was searching nearby when he noticed a black hair ribbon fluttering on the sidewalk. Investigating further, he found the door of the shack locked, but a small window (no more than 11 inches wide) had been broken into. Inside lay poor Hattie Zinda. She had been raped and then strangled. Supposedly, tracks in the dust on the floor showed where her body had been dragged, but a broken chair and bruises all over her body indicated that Hattie had put up a fierce struggle. This was supported by the fact that an examination of Hattie's body disclosed some blond hairs still clutched in her hand. The discovery of the body brought an angry mob to the Zinda residence.  They demanded justice and hinted that a lynching would be too good for the perpetrators.

Piece by piece, the police formed their idea of the culprits. They were two men, apparently because two men had chased Hattie before and the two men who had been seen in the vicinity of the abduction. They were small, because the only way into the locked shed was through the small broken window, and at least one of them was blond. But there was other conflicting evidence. Stanley Grszwaczewski and John Gansezski were on their way to O'Gorman's barber shop about the time of Hattie's abduction when they saw a six-foot tall man with an overcoat and a black derby hat, not dressed as a laborer, standing next to the shack where Hattie's body was eventually found. The boys thought, “[i]t looked as though he wanted to rob someone.” John Worzala, who lived on Dousman Street near the railroad tracks and about a block and half from the scene of the murder said that he was awakened by his dog barking at about 10 pm on the night of the murder. When he went outside, he saw two men hop a north-bound train.

Meanwhile, services were being held for Hattie. An estimated 1,200 people, mostly strangers, passed by the coffin as it lay in the Zinda residence of Weil Street. The next day, thousands more gathered outside as Fr. Joseph Zinda, a cousin, gave the body the Last Rites. Then, from the house the solemn procession with the coffin walked to St. Casimir's, where an over-flow crowd of an estimated 4,000 people attended her funeral. She was then laid to rest in what is now St. Adalbert's Cemetery.

That same day came the “big break” in the case. On Tuesday, November 23^rd a bartender on Jones Island told the Milwaukee Journal that on the previous Wednesday (the 17th), two men had entered his bar at about 2:30 p.m. (after the body had been discovered, but before the evening paper came out announcing this fact.) The “two young men, both of them laboring under excitement, discussed ways and means of leaving Milwaukee....” One of the men was about 17, “short, heavy, and darkly complexioned; the other was a good sized man, about 22 or 23, light complexioned and light haired … He was about 5 feet 8 or 9 inches and about 180 pounds.” Evidently, the fact that neither of these men were likely to fit through an 11 inch-wide window, nor, given that they were working men, that they were probably not the "well-dressed" men seen near the crime, was lost in the excitement of this new evidence.

Intrepid Detective Eugene O'Gorman and Patrolman Bernard Ronowski were assigned to track these two men down, or at least track down some two men. Detective O'Gorman had learned that two men had “gone missing” a few days after the Zinda murder, and he felt this behavior was suspicious enough to arrest them for murder. (They might even have been the same two men whose conversation had been overheard in the bar on Jones Island.) O'Gorman and Ronowski spent the next three weeks hot on the trail of the “missing” men. The entire “chase” covered more than 2,000 miles throughout three states, and O'Gorman and Ronowski had to use such diverse means of transportation as trains and a mule team. If the truth be told, they was not “chasing” so much as “looking.” The detective had learned that one of the suspects had, months previous to the murder, talked of working in a lumber camp for the winter, so the detective went from lumber camp to lumber camp, looking for the men. He finally arrested them, in the same location where they had been since leaving Milwaukee: a lumber camp outside Blaney, Michigan. The men were Carol (Karol) Wojciechowski (36), and Adam Pietrzyk (25). They were both from Russian Poland. Wojciechowski could speak broken English, but Pietrzyk could speak none at all.

Karol Wojciechowski (left) and Adam Pietrzyk (right)

The two men were held captive for three days. (Remember, this is way before an accused was given the right to an appointed attorney or were told that they had the right to remain silent.) Then, on the third day, Adam Pietrzyk “confessed.” Speaking through interpreter,  attorney Michael Blenski, he stated that he had seen Wojciechowski accost Zinda and drag her into the railroad yards. He had heard the girl scream and heard the sounds of a struggle. That was all he confessed to, but it was evidently sufficient.

The next night, under the ominous threat both of a lynch-mob and a blinding snowstorm, the two men were taken to court for an unheard-of late-evening session. Within an hour, both had been convicted of first degree murder. Wojciechowski was apparently convicted on the strength of Pietrzyk's statement. Pietrzyk was apparently convicted because he had blond hair and Wojciechowski did not. Since Hattie Zinda was found to be clutching blond hair in her fist, Pietrzyk had to be involved in the murder. (It is unclear, but Wojciechowski may have also given a statement implicating Pietrzyk in the crime.) Before the clock struck midnight, both men had been sentenced to life imprisonment and put on a train to Waupun.

Throughout the rest of their lives, neither man would admit to any involvement in the murder. Pietrzyk would die of tuberculosis in the early 1920's while still in prison. Wojciechowski was finally paroled in 1940. Two years later, Governor Heil granted Wojciechowski, then 70 years-old, a full pardon. The pardon was made on the recommendation of the state pardon board which cited the fact that the evidence which convicted Wojciechowski was “partly circumstantial.”

In retrospect, it seems like there was more than one tragedy resulting from the death of Hattie Zinda.

Sources:

“All Night Hunt for Young Girl,” Milwaukee Journal, November 15, 1909, p.1.

“Boys Give Police Clew [sic] in Zinda Murder Case,” Milwaukee Journal, November 19, 1909, p. 1

“Deer Hunter is Guilty of Crime,” Dubuque Telegraph-Herald, November 19, 1909, p. 12

“Find Body of Missing Girl,” Mansfield (Ohio) Daily Shield, November 17, 1909, p. 1

“Find Hair in Grip of Murdered Girl,” Dubuque Telegraph-Herald, November 20, 1909, p. 10

“Find No Trace of Girl”s Slayer,” Dubuque Telegraph-Herald, November 18, 1909, p. 5

“Girl Murder Mystery Recalled,” Milwaukee Sentinel, December 11, 1934, p. 1.

“New Theory in Zinda Case,” Milwaukee Journal, November 23, 1909, p. 1

“Offer $1,000 Reward for Hattie Zinda's Murders,” Milwaukee Journal, November 18, 1909,

p. 1

“Pardon is Granted in Murder Case,” Milwaukee Journal, September 26, 1942, p. 15

“Pardon Given to Old Murderer,” Milwaukee Journal, September 27, 1942, p.2

“Police Silent on Zinda Case,” Milwaukee Journal, December 8, 1909, p. 1.

“Says Dead Girl is True Martyr,” Milwaukee Journal, November 20, 1909. p. 1

“Sentinel Will Re-Enact Zinda Slaying Over WISN,” Milwaukee Sentinel, May 8, 1934, p. 17.

“Seventeen Years for Murder?” Milwaukee Journal, April 19, 1926, p. 6.

“Slayers of Girl are Given Terms,” Dubuque Telegraph-Herald, December 12, 1909, p, 21

“Zinda Case Solved,” Milwaukee Journal, December 9, 1909, p. 1.

“Zinda Girl Murdered, Signs of Awful Struggle,” Milwaukee Journal, November 17, 1909, p. 1