THE DARK SIDE OF BOSTON TOUR - THE DISAPPEARANCE OF OLD CHIN AKA DR. GEORGE PARKMAN

Okay....okay, so I have been slacking in the blogging department lately so let me continue the remaining stories on the Dark Side of Boston Tour.

Sooo...this story is a little interesting, you have three main people involved and they are:

1. Dr. George Parkman, who comes from a very wealthy family.  Every one knew him.  Always traveled by foot and was very shall we say frugal.  Owned many properties and was always lending money to people so was always collecting rent and payments on loans.  And in my opinion he kind of sounds like a loan shark pretty much.
2. John White Webster, was a popular lecturer and a mineralogist at Harvard Medical College.  And had many financial troubles.  His family has been forced to give up a mansion that he built in Cambridge.  He was in debt to a number of friends and one of the people he owed money to was Dr. George Parkman.
3. Ephraim Littlefield, was actually the janitor at the new Harvard Medical College.  He and his wife actually lived in the basement of the medical college, right next to professor John Webster's laboratory.  And he knew Webster as well as the other Harvard doctors well.  

So here the story starts where John Webster borrowed $400 from Parkman in 1842, and 1847 rolls around where little of the loan was repaid.  But he gave Parkman a note for $2,432 and this included what was unpaid from the $400 he already owed Parkman as well as another loan.  But this time the loan was secured by a mortgage of some of Webster's personal property which also included a cabinet of minerals.  

One year later he was still in financial distress and borrowed $1,200 from another person and secured this loan with the same cabinet of minerals that he used for the loan he got from Parkman.  Well the word was out on the street and it got back to Parkman that Webster had done this.  This outraged Parkman and then went to Harvard and demanded to receive the money from the sale of Webster's lecture tickets to repay Webster's debt.  So of course Webster was bothered by this as he didn't get paid so on November 23, 1849 after Parkman was done running around town collecting debts Webster visited him at his home and asked Parkman to meet him at the medical college that afternoon.  Parkman agreed and the last time anyone saw Parkman was about 1:45pm entering the college on North Grove Street.  Well later that afternoon Ephraim Littlefield found it odd that Webster's rooms were locked from the inside and hear a bunch of water running.  This was odd indeed.  On November 24th, Littlefield saw Webster with a bundle and he was asked to make a fire and he did so and didn't think anything of it at that time.  The following day Parkman's nephew along with a police officer was questioning Webster if he had known of Parkman's whereabouts.  And he did tell them that he had met with Parkman regarding his debt of $483.64 and was making an installment payment.

Well on November 26, this is 3 days after Parkman disappeared, Parkman's family not only contacted the police but then offered a $3,000 reward if Parkman was found alive.  Wanted posters printed up, posted and distributed; a little later $1,000 was offered if his body was found.  

As the days go on...Littlefield began to grow more and more nervous as some people began to link him to the disappearance of Parkman.  And he even became more suspicious as Webster's behavior increasingly became very odd. So he began spying on Webster watching from underneath the door and even though he could only see as far as his knees....he notice some weird movements.  At least 8 trips back and forth to the furnace.  After Webster left, Littlefield let himself into the room through a window since all the doors were bolted.  And he found kindling barrels that were empty even though they had been recently filled.  So wanting to know more he borrowed a hatchet, drill, crowbar and a mortar chisel and then asked his wife to stand guard. He got through two layers of brick but the stopped because he had to go to a dance, leaving the remaining layers for the next day.

He returns and is chiseling away and finally managed to get a hole in the wall and there was a strong draft and it blew out his lantern.  As he looked around he was ignoring the foul fumes coming from the room, he saw something.  And this was a human pelvis, as well as a dismembered thigh and the lower part of a leg.  When he saw this he began to tremble quite a bit as this is very disturbing and yelled for his wife and told her exactly what he had seen.  He immediately rant to the home of another professor, Dr. Bigelow who then found the Marshal and they all returned back to the room.  Now of course Ephraim Littlefield is thinking that the remains were of Dr. George Parkman.  But the Marshal didn't want to jump to conclusions and dispatched several officers to arrest Webster for the charge of murder.

At first Webster denied being involved and then blamed Littlefield for ruining him and tried to point out that Littlefield was the one involved.  

This case gets more and more interesting as not only was the few body remains found was identified by Parkman's wife as well as his brother-in-law, confirmation was made by Parkman's dentist.  And how...now remember my title is called The Disappearance of Old Chin...which was Parkman's nickname due to the protruding jawline he had.  And his dentist had to make a mold of his jaw to make a set of false teeth.  And he had kept the plaster impression because Parkman's jawbone was very unique and he identified  the jawbone found fit his plaster mold exactly.

And there you have it folks...the first usage of forensics to help solve a crime.

So no one really knows what exactly happened between Parkman and Webster...but word on the street was that Parkman demanded Webster to give him the collection of minerals since he had borrowed more money from someone else and neglected to pay anything back to Parkman.  

So...Webster was found guilty and sentenced to execution by hanging.  So in June of 1850 as a last bid to save his neck, Webster ended up writing a confession.  Admitting to killing Parkman but in self-defense and killed him with one blow to the side of Parkman's head with a stick of wood.  One blow...was all it took.  So the sentenced remained unmoved even with his confession and he was publicly hung on August 30, 1850.  He was buried in Copp's Hill burying ground which is still located in The North End of Boston.

So there you have it...one of the most famous murder cases happened right here in Boston...see so much to learn in Boston.  Lots of history and everything definitely was not perfect here.

Well....until next time!