Book summary “Three sisters in black”: summary

Introduction

You often wonder how aristocratic families fall from social grace into desperate poverty and criminal obsession. The central idea of this book is that rigid family pride, when combined with financial ruin and isolation, can drive people to orchestrate chilling conspiracies.

Norman J. Zierold explores the dark true crime mystery of three eccentric sisters and their fatal mistreatment of a young relative for insurance payouts. You will examine the grim discovery of a body in a bathtub, the bizarre rituals of the household, and the complex legal battles that followed.

• How did an aristocratic Southern lineage descend into extreme neglect and murder?
• What role did heavily borrowed insurance policies play in the tragedy?
• How did the justice system handle the complex sanity inquiries and trials?

1. The Discovery of the Crime

The Bathtub Tragedy

On November 29, 1909, at 4:40 P.M., the police received a call reporting an accident. Dr. Herbert M. Simmons and Sergeant William H. O'Neill responded to the scene at 89 North Fourteenth Street in East Orange.

The police discovered Ocey Snead's nude body submerged in a bathtub in an empty, unheated house in East Orange under suspicious circumstances.

Dr. Simmons inspected the cheerless gray frame house and was greeted by Virginia Wardlaw, a tall woman dressed all in black with heavy veils. The officers found the body of a young woman in a crouching position in a half-filled bathtub.

A suspicious suicide note rested near the scene. It was written in bold handwriting that did not match the victim's physical incapacity. The autopsy later revealed that Ocey Snead's emaciated body weighed only 80 pounds.

The Arrest

Chief of Police James Bell questioned Virginia Wardlaw for hours with commissioners and mayors. She remained laconic and refused to reveal her background during the fruitless interrogation.

Virginia Wardlaw maintained absolute emotional detachment and hid her face behind heavy veils throughout her interrogation and arraignment.

Chief Bell booked her as a material witness before finally charging her with murder. During her court arraignment, she initially resisted removing her mourning veil until ordered by the recorder.

Prison authorities confiscated her handbag, which contained 23 dollars. The three sisters in black soon became the center of a national murder mystery.

2. The House of Mystery and Neglect

Prior to the tragedy, the family lived in extreme isolation in Brooklyn and Tennessee, subjecting Ocey to severe starvation, forced wills, and bizarre rituals.

Flatlands Secrets

Neighbors and local tradesmen in the Flatlands section of Brooklyn described a heavily shuttered and sheeted brick structure where three veiled women in black lived with the sickly young Ocey Snead. They burned refuse at night and kept the rooms completely bare of furniture.

At 1693 East 48th Street, janitor George Kelly and a reporter found dark stains, a mass of yellow hair, and bones in the kitchen range. The monthly rent amount for the Flatlands house was 25 dollars. The local community called the property the House of Mystery.

Medical Evidence

Physicians who treated Ocey Snead testified that she was starved, kept in isolation, and subjected to bizarre rituals by her aunts. Doctors such as William R. Pettit and J. Wachsman reported that the patient suffered from severe malnutrition and general weakness because the elderly women in black refused to follow medical instructions. They fired her nurse, discharged helpers, and chanted with Bibles around her bed.

Dr. Pettit climbed through a window on a visit and found Ocey Snead nearly starved, with a smile that vanished the moment one of the women in black entered the room. Virginia Wardlaw cited the value of invalid insurance policies as 20,000 dollars, claiming this was the reason they could not afford prescriptions.

Virginia Wardlaw orchestrated the rapid drafting and revision of wills that transferred Ocey Snead's entire estate to her elderly, nearly blind grandmother. Attorneys William E. Fee and Julius V. Carabba were separately brought in under mysterious conditions to draft or amend Ocey Snead's will. Ocey signed the documents listlessly in the presence of her veiled aunts, leaving her property and insurance proceeds to her grandmother Martha Eliza Wardlaw.

Lawyer Julius Carabba was brought to the Flatlands house on a rainy night where the veiled women chanted with Bibles before forcing Ocey to agree to a will. The estimated total value of real estate owned by Ocey Snead in Virginia, Ohio, and Georgia reached 16,000 dollars, while her September 8 will allocated the sum of 500 dollars to her infant son.

3. The Insurance Motive and Financial Struggles

The Financial Plot

The financial motive behind the mistreatment centered on seven heavily borrowed insurance policies on Ocey Snead's life totaling 24,000 dollars. Investigations at major insurance companies revealed a complex network of loans, policy reassignments, and duplicate issues managed meticulously by Virginia Wardlaw. These policies could only yield their full value upon Ocey's death.

The primary beneficiary was eighty-four-year-old grandmother Martha Eliza Wardlaw.

Superintendent J. H. Haskell of New York Life kept a warning record after receiving a complex set of written inquiries about absolute assignments penned by Virginia Wardlaw.

Struggles and Loans

The family's obsession with insurance policies and wills was driven by a desperate struggle to service loans and keep up premium payments amid financial ruin. Lawyer Franklin Fort explained that the long-standing endowment policies were taken out to protect Ocey's future, and all family finances were crippled by the necessity of paying loan interest on them. Most policies were taken out nine years ago, while the most recent insurance policy was six years old.

Fort noted that paying over a year and a half of interest on insurance policy loans on November 23 crippled the family finances, leaving them to subsist on bread. The grandmother also expected 700 dollars from Virginia property to cover pressing obligations.

4. Wardlaw Lineage and Academic Reign

The accused women belonged to an aristocratic Southern family whose intense family pride and financial ruin led them to take over and disrupt academic institutions.

Southern Roots

You trace the family lineage back through prominent antebellum Southern figures and Scottish nobility. The Wardlaw clan descended from baronets and founders of St. Andrew's University.

John Baptist Wardlaw was born in 1816 and became a prominent Methodist clergyman. Ancestors included Revolutionary War Captain Hugh Wardlaw and Scottish baronet Sir Henry Wardlaw, whose family tree started around 1700, while Robert Wardlaw was born in 1670. Their distinguished background contrasted sharply with their current dire poverty.

Soule Female College

Virginia Wardlaw became president of Soule Female College in Murfreesboro in 1892. She initially maintained a successful administration before her sister Caroline took on business transactions and caused chaos.

Soule Female College was a prominent educational institution founded in 1851 in Tennessee. When the eldest sister Caroline Martin arrived in 1901, she gradually took over all business transactions, leading to unpaid bills, student withdrawals, and strange nocturnal activities. The town of Murfreesboro had a population of 4000 residents at the time.

Students reported seeing the three sisters roaming halls, mumbling around stoves, and visiting the local cemetery at night. Little Ocey Martin was repeatedly confined to her room under the pretext of illness while insurance policies were taken out on her life. A 15000 dollars policy was placed on the life of Ocey Martin, alongside a 7000 dollars insurance policy taken out for Ocey in Murfreesboro.

The Martin family history was marked by severe deprivation, mysterious fires, and the untimely deaths of children under suspicious circumstances. Mrs. Martin's son Hugh died at age seven from spinal meningitis, exhaustion, and convulsions after enduring severe neglect and deprivation. Her husband, former Confederate Colonel Robert Maxwell Martin, died of hemiplegia and chronic cystitis on January 9, 1901 after living in poverty and suffering business reverses, leaving behind a 20000 dollars insurance policy. Their Wilder Park mansion in Louisville previously burned down under mysterious circumstances with a 22000 dollars insurance payout.

While his mother enjoyed hot lunches, little Hugh Martin was given only crackers and odds and ends by other teachers, and died on November 30, 1888 at age seven years and three months. Colonel Robert Maxwell Martin had served in the Third Kentucky Cavalry before his death and burial in a Confederate burial ground.

5. Suspicious Deaths and Conspiracy Theories

Prosecutors argued that Ocey Snead's death and earlier suspicious fatalities were part of a long-hatched murder conspiracy orchestrated by the sisters.

John Snead's Death

John Snead returned to Montgomery College under pressure from his aunt Caroline Martin and died shortly after from severe burns under suspicious circumstances. At 28 years old, John Snead experienced a near-fatal fall from a train and dropped into an open cistern. M.G. Corello pulled John Snead out of an open cistern when he was allegedly taking measurements.

Weeks later, Virginia Wardlaw's cries brought teachers to find John's night garments on fire while soaked in kerosene. The alarm for John Snead's fire was raised at 8 o'clock in the morning. He possessed heavy insurance policies at his death.

The Prosecution Theory

Prosecutor Wilbur Mott argued that the suicide notes and insurance policies were part of a long-hatched murder conspiracy. Mott maintained that Ocey Snead was deliberately taken to the Flatlands of Brooklyn and East Orange to be murdered. He asserted that suicide notes were manufactured in advance to disarm police and secure endowment policies.

Mott pointed to an unfulfilled note leaving Dr. William R. Pettit 1,000 dollars as an attempt to buy passive aid for evil ends. The prosecution argued that even if Ocey Snead committed suicide, her mother and aunts were legally guilty of murder. They deliberately instigated and orchestrated her suicidal state by manipulating her mentality.

Prosecutor Mott maintained that aiding and abetting suicide constitutes murder under the law. The three women convinced Ocey that her husband would not return and placed her in an isolated house. Prosecutor Mott laid out a detailed timeline of how Mrs. Martin left the East Orange house at 4:00 PM. Miss Wardlaw waited 40 minutes before notifying the police to allow her co-conspirator time to escape.

The insurance amount on Ocey Snead's life totaled 20,000 dollars. Insurance companies were allegedly willing to spend 10,000 dollars on detectives and lawyers. The accused women faced strict Jersey justice amid accusations of inducing a suicide mania.

6. Legal Battles and Sanity Inquiries

As defense teams shifted strategies and claimed mental irresponsibility, Caroline Martin and Virginia Wardlaw faced intense legal scrutiny, extradition, and sanity hearings.

Extradition Hearings

Caroline Martin fiercely contested her extradition in a New York courtroom before Magistrate Cornell. Displaying sharp legal acumen, she cross-examined procedures, demanded codes and warrants, and challenged witnesses before being physically carried across the Bridge of Sighs to the Tombs Prison by six policemen.

When attendants attempted to remove her, Caroline Martin dropped her heavy weight to the floor and hooked her foot into the cast-iron underpinning of the benches. The maximum legal holding time without grand jury action stood at 48 hours. She wore a Mother Hubbard gown during the proceedings.

The Sanity Inquiry

Defense lawyer Franklin Fort publicly declared that Mrs. Martin was mentally irresponsible, leading to his dismissal by his client. After consulting with Virginia Wardlaw, Franklin Fort stated that Mrs. Martin had suffered from a mental disorder for 25 years and that her actions had repeatedly sabotaged family finances. Upon hearing this, Mrs. Martin fired Fort and hired veteran western lawyer Robert Haire.

Mrs. Martin replaced Franklin Fort with Robert Haire, a defense attorney who had previously represented outlaws like Frank and Jesse James, and hired three additional lawyers.

A special statutory inquiry without a jury was initiated to determine if Caroline Martin was mentally fit to stand trial for murder or should instead be placed in an asylum. On her 65th birthday, action was taken to declare Mrs. Martin insane, supported by affidavits from physicians. The court of common pleas appointed medical experts for the state, and Judge Jay Ten Eyck elected to hear the case without a jury in Newark's Hall of Records.

On November 2, Mrs. Martin entered the courtroom wearing a large black cape and a double black veil, facing the dilemma of being sent to an asylum if judged insane or standing trial for murder if judged sane. The defense announced it would bring forth 5 expert witnesses and 9 other witnesses. The proceedings also intersected with the jurisdiction of the court of oyer and terminer.

After reviewing the evidence and expert testimony, Judge Ten Eyck delivered a formal ruling declaring Caroline Martin sane within the meaning of the statute. The judge concluded that the evidence failed to overcome the presumption of sanity, that her beliefs had sufficient factual bases considering her circumstances, and that she was fully competent to understand her position and assist counsel in preparing her defense.

Judge Ten Eyck filed his written decision stating that Mrs. Martin was not insane and should not be removed to any asylum, clearing the way for her and her sister to be tried for murder. At 9:45 in the morning on December 5, Judge Ten Eyck received the prisoner alone in his chamber. The private chamber meeting concluded at 12 noon.

7. Tragic Conclusions and Aftermath

Virginia Wardlaw starved herself to death in prison, Caroline Martin pleaded guilty to manslaughter, and the surviving family members experienced final vindication and closure.

Virginia's Starvation

Virginia Wardlaw systematically starved herself by refusing food or secretly disposing of her meals while facing prolonged imprisonment. Chief Justice Gummere signed an order removing Virginia to a house of detention on August 8.

When Warden Richard McGuinness discovered Virginia Wardlaw was starving herself, he sent delicacies from his own table, but her resolve ultimately broke her body down until she died at a house of detention. Virginia Wardlaw sank into torpitude and passed away on August 9.

Caroline's Plea and Aftermath

Mrs. Caroline Martin abruptly changed her plea to guilty of manslaughter on January 9, 1911. During the court colloquy on January 9, 1911, Mrs. Martin exclaimed that she had done nothing to her daughter and would rather go to the electric chair ten thousand times than engage in hypocrisy.

Samuel Kalish revealed that Mrs. Martin administered morphine to Ocey to induce sleep and then placed her in cold water in the bathtub to revive her when the drug had a negative effect. Judge Ten Eyck sentenced Mrs. Martin to seven years in the New Jersey State Prison on January 23, 1911, noting the great moral turpitude involved in poisoning deaths.

Prosecutor Wilbur Mott moved to quash the indictment against Mary Snead since Mrs. Martin had pleaded guilty only to manslaughter, rendering accessory charges legally impossible. Albert Snead traveled from Colorado to stand by his mother, expressing absolute faith in her purity and character before taking her to his ranch. Mary Snead appeared in court and was given her freedom on Thursday, February 8, 1911.

Conclusion

Aristocratic pride and hidden financial desperation create a dangerous environment when combined with systemic isolation. You can protect yourself and vulnerable relatives by recognizing the warning signs of manipulation and extreme control before tragedy strikes.

Follow these practical rules to guard against similar conspiracies and financial abuse:

1. Watch for sudden isolation from friends and extended family members.
2. Question any arrangement where a dependent relative signs over life insurance policies or wills.
3. Monitor the living conditions and physical health of vulnerable dependents closely.
4. Report suspicious financial maneuvers and sudden changes in beneficiary designations to authorities.
5. Challenge rigid family loyalty when it demands the concealment of abuse or neglect.

10 Key Ideas

1. On November 29, 1909, police discovered Ocey Snead's emaciated, nude body submerged in a bathtub in an empty, unheated house in East Orange under suspicious circumstances.
2. Virginia Wardlaw maintained absolute emotional detachment and hid her face behind heavy veils throughout her interrogation and arraignment.
3. Prior to the tragedy, the family lived in extreme isolation in Brooklyn and Tennessee, subjecting Ocey to severe starvation, forced wills, and bizarre rituals.
4. The financial motive behind the mistreatment centered on seven heavily borrowed insurance policies on Ocey Snead's life totaling 24,000 dollars, with the primary beneficiary being eighty-four-year-old grandmother Martha Eliza Wardlaw.
5. The accused women belonged to an aristocratic Southern family whose intense family pride and financial ruin led them to take over and disrupt academic institutions.
6. Prosecutors argued that Ocey Snead's death and earlier suspicious fatalities were part of a long-hatched murder conspiracy orchestrated by the sisters.
7. Caroline Martin fiercely contested her extradition in a New York courtroom before Magistrate Cornell before being physically carried across the Bridge of Sighs to the Tombs Prison by six policemen.
8. After reviewing the evidence and expert testimony, Judge Ten Eyck delivered a formal ruling declaring Caroline Martin sane within the meaning of the statute.
9. Virginia Wardlaw systematically starved herself by refusing food or secretly disposing of her meals while facing prolonged imprisonment, ultimately passing away on August 9.
10. Mrs. Caroline Martin abruptly changed her plea to guilty of manslaughter on January 9, 1911, and Judge Ten Eyck sentenced her to seven years in the New Jersey State Prison.