The Axeman of New Orleans
Starting in 1918, and lasting roughly eighteen months, New Orleans and the surrounding areas were plagued by a serial killer who would later be known as The Axeman. The Axeman was the manifestation of the boogieman and almost exclusively attacked during the night.
The Axeman is thought to be responsible for twelve attacks and six deaths; striking people whilst they sleep in their own beds, often with weapons that he found in their homes and left at the scene of the crime.
The first reported Axeman attack took place on the 23rd May 1918 at 4901 Magnolia Street. Catherine and Joseph Maggio were attacked in their beds. Both were struck violently with an axe before their throats were cut with a straight razor. Catherine was almost entirely decapitated and Joseph also suffered severe injuries. Their bodies were discovered the next morning by Joseph’s brothers who resided in the same house as them. Nothing had been heard or seen and no valuables had taken, however, the bottom panel of the kitchen door had been knocked out. All that was found was an axe that belonged to the Maggio’s. Fingerprinting was around at the time but, unfortunately, hadn’t become common practice.
The second Axeman attack took place on the corner of Dorgenois and Laharpe streets on the 28th June 1918. Louis Besumer and Anna Lowe were discovered by a baker making deliveries the next morning. Louis survived the attack and Anna would survive for seven weeks before dying as a result of her injuries. Before her death, Anna supposedly reported that a large white man with a hatchet had attacked them. Similar to the previous attack, the bottom panel of their bedroom door was missing and a bloody axe belonging to the couple was found at the scene.
On the 5th August 1918, The Axeman attacked again. Mrs Ed Schneider was found by her husband in the afternoon at their home. She was still alive and rushed to hospital. In the week following the attack, Mrs Schneider successfully gave birth. The weapon was assumed to be the axe missing from their shed.
Five days later, on the 10th August on the corner of Tonti and Gravier Street, eighty-year-old Joseph Romano was found by his nieces, Pauline and Mary after they heard him struggling; his head had been bashed in. The two girls saw the attacker and reported that he was “dark, tall, heavy-set, wearing a dark suit and a black slouch hat.” Romano died two days after the attack.
Not long after the attack on Romano, a New Orleans newspaper recounted “Armed men are keeping watch over their sleeping families while the police are seeing to solve the mysteries of the ax attacks… extra police are being put to work daily.” The tactics seemed to work as there were no attacks for seven months.
On the 10th March 1919, Rose Cortimiglia woke to the sound of her husband, Charles, fighting off an attacker. Charles would lose the fight and the attacker would turn on Rose and her two-year-old daughter, Mary. Both Rose and Charles would survive the attack but their daughter would not. It would be found that (fitting the pattern) the axe used in the attack belonged to the Cortimiglia’s.
The Times-Picayune received a letter from someone claiming to be The Axeman on the 15th March 1919.
“Hell, March 13, 1919
“Esteemed mortal, they have never caught me, and they never will. They have never seen me, for I am invisible, even as the ether which surrounds your earth. I am not a human being, but a spirit and a fell demon from hottest hell. I am what you Orleanians and your foolish police call the Axeman. […] [the police] have been so utterly stupid as to amuse not only me, but his satanic majesty… but tell them to beware. Let them not try to discover what I am, for it were better that they never were born than for them to incur the wrath of the Axeman. […] Undoubtedly you Orleanians think of me as a most horrible murderer, which I am, but I could be much worse if I wanted to… At will, I could slay thousands of your best citizens, for I am in close relationship with the angel of death. […] Now to be exact, at 12:15 o’clock (earthly time) on next Tuesday night, I am going to pass over New Orleans. In my infinite mercy, I am going to make a little proposition to the people. Here it is: I am very fond of jazz music and I swear by all the devils in the nether regions, that every person shall be spared in whose house a jazz band is in full swing at the time I have just mentioned. If everyone has a jazz band going, well then, so much the better for the people. One thing is certain and that is some of those persons who do not jazz it on Tuesday night (if there be any) will get the axe.”
The letter inspired panic and on March 19th 1919 the city of New Orleans is said to have been truly alive. Jazz poured out of every home and those that didn’t have record players packed themselves into local jazz clubs. Nobody was killed that night.
The letter also inspired a piece of jazz known as The Axeman’s Jazz or Don’t Scare Me, Papa.
On the 10th August 1919, Steve Boca was badly injured in his home after waking to a man with an axe next to his bed. Boca survived the attack and managed to make it to a friend’s house who called the police. Boca could not give the police any more details, as he did not regain his memory of the attack.
A few weeks later, in late August or early September, at 2128 Second Street, nineteen-year-old Sarah Laumann was reportedly attacked by someone who entered through an open window. She regained consciousness but couldn’t recall the details of the attack.
The last of The Axeman’s reported attacks took place on the 27th October 1919 on the corner of South Scott and Ulloa Street. Esther Pepitone reportedly woke around one am to her husband, Mike, screaming. She ran to the bedroom to find that Mike’s head had been struck eighteen times. He died two hours later. Esther reported two figures in the bedroom but could not identify them as they left the scene. Unlike many of the other Axeman attacks, the weapon was a bolt with a heavy nut, most likely used to secure a circus tent at the circus that had stationed itself in a nearby avenue that weekend.
Theories
#1 Not all the killings were the work of the Axeman.
It is speculated that the murder of Mike Pepitone was actually a Mafia hit as his father had killed a man in the past.
The second supposed Axeman attack was also scrutinised as Louis Besumer was charged with Anna Lowe’s murder. Whilst investigating the attack, letters to and from Besumer were found written in Yiddish and Russian. The conclusion that Besumer was part of a German spy ring or a spymaster for the Kaiser was reached and that the attack had nothing to do with the Axeman. Before dying Lowe allegedly blamed Besumer and called him a Nazi spy. It was thought to be a domestic dispute. In court, however, Besumer was acquitted as the attack shared too many similarities with the Axeman’s attacks.
It is also possible that there were copycat killers.
#2 The Axeman was a supernatural being.
It was thought that the Axeman was a supernatural being that could shrink to fit through small gaps and then grow to a large size that matched the eyewitnesses’ reports. The letter in The Times-Picayune also helped plant this idea into many minds.
#3 Joseph Mumfre
After the murder of her husband, Esther Pepitone moved to Los Angeles and married Angelo Albano. On the second anniversary of Mike Pepitone’s death, Albano disappeared and was never seen again. Before they had married, Albano had ended business with a man that went by many names including Joseph Mumfre. On December 5th 1921, Mumfre visited Esther’s house at 5554 East 36th Street and demanded five hundred dollars and Esther’s jewellery, before he threatened to “kill [her] the same way [he] had killed [her] husband.” Esther killed him with a revolver.
When she was arrested for Mumfre’s murder, she claimed that Mumfre was the Axeman and that she had seen him run from her bedroom the night that Mike had been murdered. The LAPD noted there was evidence linking Mumfre to the death of Mike Pepitone and thus, Esther was acquitted. Upon investigation, the police found that Mumfre ran a blackmailing gang in New Orleans that preyed upon Italians; nearly all of the Axeman victims were Italians. Mumfre had been in and out of prison for ten years, the timings coinciding with the Axeman attacks. However, there was no enough evidence to directly link Mumfre to the crimes.
