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105. The Sausage Factory Murder of Chicago · Who Did What Now With Katie Charlwood

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Speaker 1: You're listening to you an airwave media podcast.
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Speaker 2: Hello delicious friends, and welcome to Hooded What Now the
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Speaker 2: history podcast that's not your history class with me your
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Speaker 2: host Katie Charlewood, history harlote and reader of books. So
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Speaker 2: I am just backroom tour.
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Speaker 1: I say, just back. I was back last night and I.
0:35
Speaker 2: Was super tired, and I decided to sleep instead of
0:40
Speaker 2: recording a podcast, and you're all having to suffer for it.
0:42
Speaker 1: I'm sorry.
0:44
Speaker 2: I just wasn't feeling it and you can even hear
0:46
Speaker 2: my voice still isn't fully back. So, like, one of
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Speaker 2: the gigs was in this little speakeasy down the stairs,
0:52
Speaker 2: and so it was a very small room and they're like,
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Speaker 2: you don't need a microphone because it's so small, and
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Speaker 2: I just keep thinking I do because I need to
1:02
Speaker 2: project otherwise. And it's clearly not doing me too well
1:06
Speaker 2: because my throat's not doing great. My voice is a
1:08
Speaker 2: wee bit dodgy, but that's fine. So I did pick
1:12
Speaker 2: up a really cute copy of a really cute copy
1:17
Speaker 2: of Lessons in Chemistry. So it's it's like a hardback,
1:21
Speaker 2: but like the fab book cover hardback, you.
1:23
Speaker 1: Know, the sexy kind.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's caught like a periodic table of elements
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Speaker 2: on it. It's fab And as I was buying it,
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Speaker 2: clearly clearly the book clerk man Tommy and was like, yeah,
1:39
Speaker 2: she's gonna want this recommendation.
1:42
Speaker 1: And he goes, oh, have you read this before?
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Speaker 2: He says of the book I'm purchasing, and I went, yes,
1:48
Speaker 2: but this cover was prettier. I make no apologies for friends.
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Speaker 2: So I'm buying this book. And he goes to this
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Speaker 2: selection of books that are sitting on the till on
2:02
Speaker 2: the desk thing whatever it is, counter even who knows
2:08
Speaker 2: what it is, but one of those and so he
2:09
Speaker 2: points to that and he goes, hey, there's this book
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Speaker 2: where people die and they think those women is killing
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Speaker 2: people via butter.
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Speaker 1: And of course I'm.
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Speaker 2: Sold like butter mudder. I am here for butter murder
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Speaker 2: like that is that is the way to go. So
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Speaker 2: I'll let you know how this book goes. And I've
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Speaker 2: been sent a few like bits and pieces, and it'll
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Speaker 2: be nice to read something that's not you know, for
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Speaker 2: this or for work or for research, but like for fun.
2:41
Speaker 2: But it's been it's been a fun, exciting, like weekend.
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Speaker 2: I love going on tour. It's actually really really fun.
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Speaker 2: I just need to be bitter organized and to maybe
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Speaker 2: go into smaller pockets, like I don't mind traveling long distances.
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Speaker 2: I just feel like there were easier ways to do it.
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Speaker 1: I'm just fucking exhausted. I'm so tired. But I know
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Speaker 1: I'm planning the US next year in the Northeast. Definitely.
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Speaker 2: After that, I'm not sure. I just know the safety
3:13
Speaker 2: and travel in one location, so I'm like, I'm gonna
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Speaker 2: do this and yeah, so that's that. But I know
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Speaker 2: what you're thinking, you're thinking, what your jibber jabber in
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Speaker 2: fact me.
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Speaker 1: In fact you, I will, But first we've got to
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Speaker 1: get our source on. Our sources are.
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Speaker 2: Crime and Criminals by Jay Sanderson, Christians and Alchemy of Bones,
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Speaker 2: Chicago's Good Murder Case of eighteen ninety seven by Robert Lurzel,
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Speaker 2: The Bloody Century by Robert Willom, Forensic Anthropology by Clyde
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Speaker 2: Colin Snow, The Sausage Vat Murder by Troy Taylor, Celebrated
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Speaker 2: Criminal Cases of America by Thomas Samuel Duke. We have
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Speaker 2: an article by Adolph Lutgert in The Saint Louis Republic
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Speaker 2: and of course, our favorites Martyr by Gaslight and the
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Speaker 2: Smithsonian dot Com. I'll sitting comfortably good, then let's begin.
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Speaker 1: Our story starts.
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Speaker 2: Kind of at the end. So it's the seventh of
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Speaker 2: May eighteen ninety seven in Chicago, Illinois, and the police
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Speaker 2: are searching A. L. Lutgert's sausage factory because his wife
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Speaker 2: Louisa is missing and no one has seen hiding her
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Speaker 2: hair of her for the past six days. Her younger brother, Deirdrec,
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Speaker 2: who is just up the high door, completely worried that
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Speaker 2: he hasn't seen or heard from his sister for nearly
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Speaker 2: a week, he goes and reports her disappearance, her suspicious
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Speaker 2: disappearance to the police, and so they decide to have
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Speaker 2: a little look around. And as they're searching the al
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Speaker 2: Lutgert sausage factory, they are hit with the stench, a
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Speaker 2: stench that leads them to a vat which should not
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Speaker 2: be in use, but has recently been in use, and
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Speaker 2: so they empty and drain the vat, and after a
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Speaker 2: quick peek inside, Adolph Lutgert is handcuffed, thrown in the
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Speaker 2: paddy wagon, and driven off to jail, after which the
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Speaker 2: sausage King of Chicago would be tried in one of
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Speaker 2: the most infamous crimes of the Gilded Age. But how
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Speaker 2: did we get to hear? We'll just roll back a
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Speaker 2: wee bit, so this all starts in Well, we're still
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Speaker 2: in the nineteenth century, the eighteen hundreds, and Adolf Ludwig
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Speaker 2: Ludgert is born, as many men are, a son. He
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Speaker 2: was born on the twenty seventh of December eighteen forty
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Speaker 2: five in Gutter's law, Westphalia or Vestfalia. It's it's now Germany.
6:22
Speaker 2: It's just a region that, after the Franco Persian War
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Speaker 2: became Germany. He is one of ten children, because of
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Speaker 2: course he is. And he has a twin who lives
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Speaker 2: I think nearly as long as he does, like almost
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Speaker 2: as long as he does.
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Speaker 1: No, I'm wrong.
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Speaker 2: His twin dies in like eighteen ninety four. He outlives
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Speaker 2: his twin, which seems sad, but at least his twin
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Speaker 2: never got to see how awful Adolf was. AnyWho, I'm
6:55
Speaker 2: going ahead of myself a little bit. He has a
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Speaker 2: fairly normal childhood number four of ten. Again, if you're
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Speaker 2: not like the first kid of the last kid, doesn't
7:06
Speaker 2: really matter whereabouts in the middle you are because you're
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Speaker 2: still a middle child. So eh, So about seven, goes
7:13
Speaker 2: to school, learns the three hours reading, writing, arithmetic. I
7:17
Speaker 2: don't know why arithmetic comes under our We're just gonna
7:20
Speaker 2: let it go. He's wrong, but we're just gonna letric go. Okay,
7:26
Speaker 2: good talk. So he learns the basics and he has
7:30
Speaker 2: enough to get by, but he doesn't go much further
7:33
Speaker 2: than that. And when he's fourteen, he starts to his
7:37
Speaker 2: apprenticeship in tanning. So just like his dad, he's learning
7:40
Speaker 2: to tan except he's doing it with Nobel I think
7:46
Speaker 2: his name is. And so he stays with Ferdinand Nobel
7:51
Speaker 2: and he works with them for about two and a
7:54
Speaker 2: half years, and he lives with them and does that
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Speaker 2: and then he's like not really feeling this.
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Speaker 1: And so he moves to England.
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Speaker 2: So he moves to England, who works roundabout and does
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Speaker 2: like a bunch of odd jobs and he ends up
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Speaker 2: like scrubbing restaurants at night. Like that's like a really
8:14
Speaker 2: big sort of better job for him. In fairness, eh,
8:19
Speaker 2: it's single. They're not exactly the most welcoming of areas,
8:25
Speaker 2: so anyway I say that, but like at the time,
8:29
Speaker 2: they didn't like immigrants, which is totally different to how
8:34
Speaker 2: it is now. Yep. So anyway, he's like, nah, can't
8:39
Speaker 2: be doing this not feeling it, and so he says
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Speaker 2: fuck this for Game of Soldiers and decides to travel
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Speaker 2: to America, and that's what he does. He's like, I'm
8:51
Speaker 2: gonna live the American dream, you know, bring me your
8:56
Speaker 2: poor whatever.
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Speaker 1: Blah blah blah. Off.
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Speaker 2: He goes, you're right in America when he's seventeen years
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Speaker 2: old and has thirty dollars in his pocket, which, by
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Speaker 2: the way, a fuck.
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Speaker 1: Ton of money.
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Speaker 2: Back then, I only had thirty dollars. It's sorry, you're
9:10
Speaker 2: what's that's a shit ton of money in the eighteen hundreds, Like, buddy,
9:16
Speaker 2: I know what inflation is. Anyway, he noticed that like
9:21
Speaker 2: a lot of like Germans were traveling to the States
9:25
Speaker 2: and he thought, well, that's handy. So he goes there
9:27
Speaker 2: and he kind of hangs out with his own community
9:30
Speaker 2: and he kind of tries to get jobs here and there,
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Speaker 2: and there isn't a lot of tannery work for him,
9:35
Speaker 2: which is what he knows. But he ends up working
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Speaker 2: with his Irish dude named Ryan, who ends up help
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Speaker 2: getting him a job like building things and moving like ricks,
9:46
Speaker 2: because that's what the Irish do. We move places and
9:50
Speaker 2: then build every thing for you. Yeah, that'll show them,
9:54
Speaker 2: and so they do that. So he's moving around and
9:57
Speaker 2: he's trying to get work. And by the time he
9:59
Speaker 2: gets to Chica because he hears the Chugag is the
10:02
Speaker 2: place to be, he has three cents in his pocket,
10:07
Speaker 2: which I don't know if you know that, but like
10:10
Speaker 2: that's much.
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Speaker 1: Less than very tallars.
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Speaker 2: Like whatever he's working at, it's not working. Like he said,
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Speaker 2: he'd make good money tanning if the work was steady,
10:20
Speaker 2: but he just could not get steady work. He's like,
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Speaker 2: I'll make belts. People have enough belts. People need this,
10:27
Speaker 2: and so he ends up sort of moving around getting work,
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Speaker 2: going to different tanneries. He starts like staying in saloons
10:35
Speaker 2: in like bars because they would have sort of boarding
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Speaker 2: above them, and he would stay in these places and
10:41
Speaker 2: he would try and get work and he.
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Speaker 1: Would do odd jobs.
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Speaker 2: And so he does this until like the early eighteen eighties.
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Speaker 2: Sorry that's a lie. Eighteen seventies is so in eighteen
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Speaker 2: seventy two, at this point he saved his money and
10:56
Speaker 2: he started investing in property and booze, so like this
11:02
Speaker 2: is pre prohibition, so he's he's making money just like
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Speaker 2: he's more like a distributor, so he's not making the
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Speaker 2: booze and he's not serving the booze, but he's like
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Speaker 2: buying booze from A and delivering it to B.
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Speaker 1: So he's distributing.
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Speaker 2: It, which makes him a pretty penny and he can
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Speaker 2: afford like property and there in eighteen seventy two, he
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Speaker 2: meets Caroline Ripke, who is also a German immigrant to America.
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Speaker 2: So they get married, they start having kids. They have
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Speaker 2: two children, Arnold in eighteen seventy four and Max in
11:40
Speaker 2: eighteen seventy five. Now Max doesn't reach two years old,
11:45
Speaker 2: he passes away before then, but Arnold no stopping him,
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Speaker 2: strong as Knox. And then he ends up having this store.
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Speaker 2: So he's running the store then, and he has a
11:55
Speaker 2: little cottage and then he kind of buys properties like
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Speaker 2: up in Dominic Street. And then in eighteen seventy seven,
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Speaker 2: tragedy strikes his wife.
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Speaker 1: Caroline dies.
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Speaker 2: Now you're thinking, my, that's fucking suspicious, which maybe we
12:17
Speaker 2: don't really know much about their marriage. We don't know
12:19
Speaker 2: much about her like because there's no one to tell
12:23
Speaker 2: us anything about her. Nobody seems to know or care.
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Speaker 2: But the fifteenth of November eighteen seventy seven, Caroline passes away. Now,
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Speaker 2: Caroline's cause of death is listed as perrotinitis due to
12:42
Speaker 2: intestinal bacteria released into the abdominal cavity. Basically that means
12:48
Speaker 2: there could be like a rupture on her bowl, or
12:50
Speaker 2: she could have had appendicitis, like one of those now
12:54
Speaker 2: that could have happened, and we can't really blame that
12:57
Speaker 2: on him this time, you know. But he's really sad
13:02
Speaker 2: about it, obviously, because he's a widower now, and he
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Speaker 2: remains a widower for a full two months because in January,
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Speaker 2: so November eighteen seventy seven, she dies January eighteen seventy eight,
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Speaker 2: he's remarried. He remarries Louisa Brickney's. So Louisa, like her husband,
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Speaker 2: had emigrated to the US when she was seventeen, and
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Speaker 2: she'd done so with her younger brother Deirdrich and her
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Speaker 2: sister Volhelmina. So for a while she was working in
13:37
Speaker 2: Fox rever as a maid. And when she meets him,
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Speaker 2: she's twenty three and.
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Speaker 1: He's almost thirty two. So there's a ten year age gap.
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Speaker 2: He's already got a kid, but she doesn't have to
13:49
Speaker 2: worry about that because he sends the child away his
13:52
Speaker 2: oldest son to love with his mother in law. So
13:57
Speaker 2: Caroline's mom and so that Caroline's mom is are living together,
14:02
Speaker 2: and so he sends his oldest boy to go live
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Speaker 2: with them.
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Speaker 1: I was only boy at this point.
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Speaker 2: So Louisa, she's originally from Bretmen in Germany, and she's
14:16
Speaker 2: very teeny tiny. I mean she's toty. She's like barely
14:20
Speaker 2: five foot. She has big eyes, she's like waver thin,
14:25
Speaker 2: she's very schmall, she's very etty betty. And he's a
14:31
Speaker 2: big burley motherfucker. And I have opinions about this, but
14:35
Speaker 2: like it's not her fault. She's small and you know,
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Speaker 2: has very fine features and she I'm just saying she
14:42
Speaker 2: looked like a little and large. Just also opinions, so many, opinions,
14:48
Speaker 2: so many. But Louisa, she's really really close with her family.
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Speaker 2: You know, they emigrated together. They spoke like, if not
14:58
Speaker 2: every day, every other day. You're just a very close
15:01
Speaker 2: knit family.
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Speaker 1: And so.
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Speaker 2: She marries this entrepreneur effectively, and he starts thinking that
15:13
Speaker 2: people in Chicago love German sausage. So yeah, from eighteen
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Speaker 2: seventy nine he has this sausage business. And the thing
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Speaker 2: about sausage making in this time period is like you
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Speaker 2: would manufacture it in the winter, so because that's when
15:29
Speaker 2: you would make it, but people couldn't make it in
15:32
Speaker 2: the springtime and summertime they couldn't figure it out. So
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Speaker 2: basically spring summer from like eighteen seventy ninety eighteen eighty three,
15:42
Speaker 2: so for four years, the Ludgertz would go live on
15:46
Speaker 2: this farm that he bought because he just fucking bought
15:49
Speaker 2: a farm, because of course he did.
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Speaker 1: It's probably where he had.
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Speaker 2: The pigs to make the sausages. One would assume he
15:56
Speaker 2: built this house in this farmland. And Louisa, she's not
16:02
Speaker 2: exactly keen on it, but it's fine, it's fine. And
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Speaker 2: her brother ends up coming out to like live with
16:11
Speaker 2: them for a little bit because he knows farming, and
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Speaker 2: Adolf Ludger doesn't know farming. He bought a farm, doesn't
16:20
Speaker 2: know how to fucking farm. Didn't think that might have
16:23
Speaker 2: been like a prerequisite or anything.
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Speaker 1: No, no, no, no, fuck, it doesn't matter.
16:28
Speaker 2: But yet d drink ends up coming and staying and
16:30
Speaker 2: working on the farm every little bit just to kind of.
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Speaker 1: Get it going.
16:35
Speaker 2: And so they end up moving back and forth and
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Speaker 2: things are getting a little bit better and better and better,
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Speaker 2: and Adolf eventually just like builds.
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Speaker 1: This factory and then he has a house like just.
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Speaker 2: South of it, so it's like really really close. They're
16:52
Speaker 2: almost right next to each other. Like they're so ridiculously close,
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Speaker 2: these two buildings. But yeah, so he is trying to
17:01
Speaker 2: get his hands into everything, right, So he's got many fingers,
17:05
Speaker 2: many pies. He's like selling lumber, he's like doing the
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Speaker 2: sausage stuff, stuffing the sausage woe would assume all that
17:13
Speaker 2: kind of thing, doing the farmy stuff ish, Gudric's mainly
17:17
Speaker 2: doing the farmy stuff. So he ends up doing that,
17:21
Speaker 2: but once a week at this point, he's having to
17:23
Speaker 2: head back into Chicago, and his wife is there on
17:27
Speaker 2: the farm where she doesn't fucking want to be, but anyway,
17:30
Speaker 2: there she is. So he goes out one day and
17:33
Speaker 2: he comes back in the evening and everybody is shaken.
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Speaker 2: They're worried as fuck, and he's like, what happened? So
17:42
Speaker 2: while he was away, a man escaped from the local
17:47
Speaker 2: asylum or the nearest asylum, ends up at the farm
17:52
Speaker 2: and starts like chasing Louisa, and so this dude is
17:58
Speaker 2: just running after her luck. Her brother was there and
18:01
Speaker 2: just like stopped him, but Louisa really wasn't king and being.
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Speaker 1: On the farm after that.
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Speaker 2: Now at this point as well, they had a couple
18:11
Speaker 2: of kids, so they end up having four kids together.
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Speaker 2: That's Louisa and Adolf, not Louisa and her brother Dudrich.
18:19
Speaker 2: We've been through this before. Your family tree should not
18:23
Speaker 2: be a wreath. I would also like to apologize to
18:26
Speaker 2: any Germans listening, because clearly I can't pronounce.
18:30
Speaker 1: For shit, and my voice is not great, and.
18:34
Speaker 2: So I know I'm not doing the right like noises
18:40
Speaker 2: you know, you know, you know, Barbara, you know the
18:45
Speaker 2: noises right, I can't They're not coming out right and
18:47
Speaker 2: I know, and I'm sorry, So formal apology Germans in Germany.
18:53
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, Cala. The German R was so hard.
19:00
Speaker 2: Someone once explained to me that it was like the
19:03
Speaker 2: letter R is dying in your throat, which is apt,
19:08
Speaker 2: but I still struggle with it. Anyway, back to this
19:14
Speaker 2: weird situation, Ludgerts end up having four children together, Louise,
19:23
Speaker 2: Louis yes really Elsie, and Elmer now Louise and Elsie.
19:33
Speaker 2: They both pass away from cholera before either reach the
19:37
Speaker 2: age of two, and at some point Arnold ends up
19:41
Speaker 2: coming back to live with them. So the boys are
19:46
Speaker 2: all alive and they're all living together with Louisa and Adolf.
19:52
Speaker 2: Now she wants to get the heck at Dodge and
19:54
Speaker 2: he goes fine, and so they.
19:57
Speaker 1: Move to Chicago. And so they move back to Chicago, and.
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Speaker 2: Things start going really really well for Adolf.
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Speaker 1: Like.
20:07
Speaker 2: He figures out away, don't know how he does it,
20:10
Speaker 2: but he figures it away to make sausage in both
20:14
Speaker 2: winter and summer. Like he is an annual sausage procurer
20:21
Speaker 2: slash creator, sausage maker, this sausage king.
20:25
Speaker 1: He gets labeled.
20:27
Speaker 2: The sausage King of Chicago because he is the only
20:30
Speaker 2: motherfucker who figures out how to do this. And so
20:36
Speaker 2: this is where things start getting a bit wild. So
20:41
Speaker 2: their relationship starts getting a bit strained because for all
20:48
Speaker 2: of his success, he's he's so driven with becoming more successful.
20:55
Speaker 2: He seems to be forgetting you know, life at home,
21:01
Speaker 2: Like he is so sausage driven like he's the absolute
21:05
Speaker 2: brat first, I fucking forgetting nothing, go fuck yourselves.
21:09
Speaker 1: And so he's the absolute worst.
21:13
Speaker 2: And so he is so obsessed and so focused on sausages,
21:19
Speaker 2: like I don't care who you are, Like you should
21:24
Speaker 2: not be so into sausages that it is messing up
21:28
Speaker 2: your personal life. Like I feel like that's just a
21:32
Speaker 2: golden rule like to live by. I feel like I
21:35
Speaker 2: shouldn't have to explain it to people.
21:37
Speaker 1: But here we are.
21:44
Speaker 2: So Adolf, who at this point has changed his name
21:47
Speaker 2: to Adolf Lewis Lutgert because his middle name was Ludwig.
21:52
Speaker 2: And he's like, I need something slightly less German, because
21:56
Speaker 2: Adolf Lutgert isn't a German name.
22:00
Speaker 1: Paw, buddy, come on. So, yeah, he is making so
22:08
Speaker 1: much money.
22:10
Speaker 2: And he is taking all of this and instead of
22:15
Speaker 2: investing it in a home and in making sure like
22:19
Speaker 2: the best schools for his kids and all this kind
22:21
Speaker 2: of stuff, like instead of really making sure there was
22:25
Speaker 2: more what's the word miscellaneous cash? Is not what I
22:30
Speaker 2: mean disposable income, Like there's not a huge amount of
22:33
Speaker 2: disposable income because he's making money, but a lot of
22:36
Speaker 2: that money, the majority of it is just being invested
22:41
Speaker 2: back into the business, which is fine for the most part,
22:48
Speaker 2: but like you're going to make sure you have like
22:51
Speaker 2: savings and a bunch of other shit, because what happens
22:54
Speaker 2: if something bad happens? What happens if something bad happens?
23:01
Speaker 2: M M. So yeah, he's he's putting all this money
23:07
Speaker 2: in and and in things things start taking a turn
23:13
Speaker 2: for the worst. So there's the Great Panic of eighteen
23:19
Speaker 2: ninety six or the Big Panic of eighteen ninety six.
23:22
Speaker 2: There's there was also a panic in like eighteen ninety two.
23:25
Speaker 2: There's a few panics. Chicago is the same panic, different disco,
23:30
Speaker 2: I mean, jazz hole. It's fine, it's fine. It's the
23:34
Speaker 2: same panic, different jazz hole because they are they are panicking.
23:39
Speaker 2: They're panicing the fuck out because there's this fear that
23:46
Speaker 2: the silver standard is going to drop, and so if
23:52
Speaker 2: the silver standard drops, so does the gold standard. The
23:56
Speaker 2: silver standard, by the way, is basically what but what
24:00
Speaker 2: the divice is based on. It's the whole thing.
24:06
Speaker 1: Yeah, there you go, was it of.
24:08
Speaker 2: Oz It's about the silver standard and the and Alice
24:13
Speaker 2: in Wonderland is about math.
24:16
Speaker 1: Who to thunk it? There you go. There's some literary
24:20
Speaker 1: facts for the day.
24:21
Speaker 2: So, yeah, the silver standard, the word it's going to drop,
24:24
Speaker 2: like they're waiting for it to drop, and then they
24:26
Speaker 2: think of that drops. Then the gold you know, standard
24:29
Speaker 2: is going to drop, and banks start failing, and we've
24:36
Speaker 2: lived through a recession. Most of you have at least
24:39
Speaker 2: lived through a recession, unless you're quite young, in which
24:42
Speaker 2: case you've lived through it but might not even know it.
24:45
Speaker 2: Oh my god, or some of you not. No, you
24:47
Speaker 2: have to have been born after two thousand and six,
24:51
Speaker 2: right right, Please tell me you're born after two thousand
24:54
Speaker 2: and six, because honestly, oh, no, babies, we babies. No,
25:03
Speaker 2: I'm like old father time, I'm the crypt keeper. So, yeah,
25:08
Speaker 2: there's a recession. Things start closing, banks start failing, and
25:14
Speaker 2: Adolph starts losing money, and he tries to make other
25:18
Speaker 2: investments and then they just go down the train train,
25:21
Speaker 2: they go down the drain.
25:23
Speaker 1: And so he starts.
25:26
Speaker 2: Hiding this kind of thing from Louisa and and it
25:31
Speaker 2: doesn't work because she finds out that they're losing money
25:36
Speaker 2: and she's she's already mad at him because she already
25:39
Speaker 2: said to him, like, you need to be more careful
25:41
Speaker 2: with your money. You need to like invest it in
25:43
Speaker 2: things that are safe and not just you know, your
25:46
Speaker 2: fucking sausage factory, like the a l looked at sausage factory,
25:51
Speaker 2: like he named his factory after himself. I feel like
25:56
Speaker 2: there were better things.
25:58
Speaker 1: Is that just a thing?
25:59
Speaker 2: Do you just name your after yourself? Not like a
26:03
Speaker 2: company name that isn't your name? Is that everyone did it? Okay,
26:10
Speaker 2: clearly I'm not upon business history. But yeah, he's he's
26:16
Speaker 2: losing money and he's tanking fast, and so things at
26:20
Speaker 2: home are not going great. Like him and Louisa are fighting.
26:26
Speaker 2: She's already pissed off, and it gets to the point
26:29
Speaker 2: where like they're not even spending any.
26:32
Speaker 1: Time like in the house together.
26:36
Speaker 2: He ends up staying in the factory with his two
26:41
Speaker 2: great dans, like he loves these great danes. I should add,
26:46
Speaker 2: like one day the great Danes, one of his danes,
26:49
Speaker 2: like I don't know, let's call him a hamlet. He disappears,
26:54
Speaker 2: and so he runs to the police the day of
26:58
Speaker 2: like untils and they have to like find his dog,
27:02
Speaker 2: and like, I get it, you're a dog lover, but
27:04
Speaker 2: also it's gonna make sense that you're why this is
27:07
Speaker 2: weird and so he's really panicking about it, and in
27:10
Speaker 2: a way, they find the dog. Everything's fine, dog's great
27:14
Speaker 2: great dead. And so he does this and that happens,
27:19
Speaker 2: and he ends up moving into this like little bed
27:22
Speaker 2: in his office. He's just like sleeping in there, which
27:25
Speaker 2: is handy because he's not sleeping alone a lot of
27:28
Speaker 2: the time. Because see, well, well their marriage is kind
27:31
Speaker 2: of on the rocks. Adolf takes it upon himself to
27:36
Speaker 2: to start spending time with a widow who happens to
27:40
Speaker 2: have a fuck ton of money.
27:43
Speaker 1: How convenient.
27:45
Speaker 2: Not only is he doing that, but he's a man,
27:49
Speaker 2: he has needs. And he decides to shag his maid,
27:55
Speaker 2: his housemaid who works for him and his wife, and
28:00
Speaker 2: it gets it gets worse because the housemaid is Louise's niece, Like, like,
28:14
Speaker 2: what is wrong with you? Don't shag your relatives. I
28:19
Speaker 2: don't care if we're not blood related. I don't give
28:21
Speaker 2: a fuck, right like your son is related to that.
28:27
Speaker 1: Don't do that. Don't do that. Don't shag your relatives. Again,
28:33
Speaker 1: I feel like these.
28:33
Speaker 2: Are rules I shouldn't have to say out loud, but
28:36
Speaker 2: here we are.
28:38
Speaker 1: So anyway, it gets to the point.
28:40
Speaker 2: Where he starts to get like really stressed out, and
28:45
Speaker 2: he he's like, fuck, I'm gonna have to sell my
28:48
Speaker 2: sausage factory. So he's to shut down the factory. Like
28:51
Speaker 2: the sausage ain'ts selling at this point, and he has
28:56
Speaker 2: to like figure out what he's going to do, and
28:59
Speaker 2: so he tries to sell and when he tries to
29:01
Speaker 2: sell it, like he turns down like a bunch of
29:04
Speaker 2: these offers because he's looking for this cash and he's
29:07
Speaker 2: looking for it faster, and as it turns out, Adolf
29:13
Speaker 2: got fucking scammed, so he managed to not sell it
29:17
Speaker 2: and ended up losing a ton of money. And so
29:22
Speaker 2: all this frustration builds up, and he's not exactly nice
29:26
Speaker 2: to his wife, and by not exactly nice trigger warning abyus,
29:33
Speaker 2: he is known to be violent with her, Like they
29:37
Speaker 2: fight sort of tempestuously all the time. Anyway, at this point,
29:40
Speaker 2: there's lots of sort of pent up aggression and anger
29:43
Speaker 2: and rage. But like then he starts hitting her, which
29:50
Speaker 2: you know, he's a big guy. She's not even five
29:55
Speaker 2: foot She's tiny, right, She's so small like that that's
30:02
Speaker 2: beyond horrible, like.
30:05
Speaker 1: So shitty to do.
30:07
Speaker 2: And they're fighting and arguing until one day Louisa simply
30:11
Speaker 2: isn't there anymore. On the first of May eighteen ninety seven,
30:17
Speaker 2: she goes out and then nobody sees her. Her sons
30:23
Speaker 2: how we boys are asking where their mom is, like
30:27
Speaker 2: they're where's mom? You know, fair question to ask, you know,
30:32
Speaker 2: And Adolf tells them that their mother ran off with
30:39
Speaker 2: another man, that she said she was going to do it,
30:44
Speaker 2: and she made good on her promise and she just
30:46
Speaker 2: fucked off right. Then her brother Deirdrich He's like, I
30:54
Speaker 2: haven't heard from.
30:55
Speaker 1: My sister in a while.
30:56
Speaker 2: This is weird, and so he goes to visit and
30:59
Speaker 2: he asks where she is, and Adolf tells her that, oh,
31:03
Speaker 2: she's off visiting, you know.
31:05
Speaker 1: Your sister.
31:07
Speaker 2: And dear Drek's like, I feel like I know if
31:10
Speaker 2: that was happening, and so the boys are like, oh, no,
31:13
Speaker 2: mommy ran away with this man and deer drik his hackles.
31:17
Speaker 2: Ropie's like that doesn't sound right, and then he goes
31:22
Speaker 2: and he checked with his sister r Anyway Wilhelmina, and
31:25
Speaker 2: she's not there either. She hasn't heard from her, and
31:28
Speaker 2: so then he goes to the police and he's like,
31:31
Speaker 2: my sister's messing but her husband hasn't reported her, messing
31:37
Speaker 2: her husband who reported the dog missing after an hour
31:41
Speaker 2: but didn't report his wife. Now the police are like, ah,
31:46
Speaker 2: that's a bit weild, that's a bit suspicious. And so
31:50
Speaker 2: they go and interview Adolf, going like, hey, where's your
31:54
Speaker 2: wife and his story changes. He's like, she's with her sister,
31:59
Speaker 2: she's with some man, she's back in Germany. And the
32:03
Speaker 2: police are like, yeah, this is really bloody suspicious this
32:07
Speaker 2: is and so they ask a round if anybody's seen her,
32:12
Speaker 2: and the night watchman of the factory, which has been
32:16
Speaker 2: closed down for about ten weeks at this point, he says, yeah,
32:22
Speaker 2: I thought I saw her going into the factory with
32:24
Speaker 2: the boss on like such and such a night.
32:28
Speaker 1: So may first and he's like and also, I don't
32:33
Speaker 1: know of this is weird.
32:34
Speaker 2: But the day before he was like, I need you
32:37
Speaker 2: to get this and this that it supplies, you know,
32:43
Speaker 2: for the factory, because it needs to be cleaned.
32:47
Speaker 1: And the officers go, okay, let's look into this.
32:50
Speaker 2: And so the day before, so the thirty of the Vapril,
32:55
Speaker 2: Adolf Lutgert had purchased arsenic and potash. It's basically like
33:03
Speaker 2: these mind salts that contain potassium. Now you can get
33:08
Speaker 2: it in like wood ash. One of the ways they
33:10
Speaker 2: get it is they would take wood ash and they
33:12
Speaker 2: would soak it in a pot and water in a pot,
33:16
Speaker 2: and it would sort of be bottled up in lech
33:20
Speaker 2: leachified leach headed. There's a word for it, and it
33:24
Speaker 2: involves wood leach, and so it would become that potash,
33:30
Speaker 2: and so it would be used in like agriculture. She's
33:32
Speaker 2: a fertilizer, and it's used in food manufacturing, and so
33:37
Speaker 2: obviously it's used to make sausage.
33:41
Speaker 1: And so he used it for that.
33:43
Speaker 2: Now now again factory not open, but he's got that anyway,
33:48
Speaker 2: and he's got arsenic, which he says is for the
33:51
Speaker 2: wrap problem in the factory, which that in itself is
33:56
Speaker 2: fair enough. Louisa is missing, and after interviewing Adolf and
34:03
Speaker 2: interviewing the night watchman, who on May first, after himself
34:10
Speaker 2: showed up, was like, Hey, I needed to grab a
34:13
Speaker 2: few things for me and then you can take the
34:15
Speaker 2: rest of the night off, which was again weird, but
34:18
Speaker 2: the night watchman at the time didn't think about it,
34:21
Speaker 2: and it was only after when he was questioned he
34:23
Speaker 2: was like.
34:24
Speaker 1: Oh no, like he thought.
34:26
Speaker 2: He saw Louisa accompany her husband into the factory, which
34:32
Speaker 2: he thought again was a bit odd, to be honest.
34:35
Speaker 2: So she goes in and that's the last time anyone
34:38
Speaker 2: sees from her. Naturally, the police are like, we have
34:42
Speaker 2: to search this factory. Remember it's like really close to
34:44
Speaker 2: the house as well, it's so fucking close, and they're like,
34:47
Speaker 2: we need to like have a proper like search. Lets
34:51
Speaker 2: go in, and so they start looking through the factory
34:55
Speaker 2: and they come across the vat and in the vat
34:58
Speaker 2: is pot ash, the remnants of a metal boned corset,
35:05
Speaker 2: bone fragments, and he called ring with the initials l
35:13
Speaker 2: L on them on. Of course this like reddish brown,
35:18
Speaker 2: sticky liquid sort of see liquid like go that's in
35:25
Speaker 2: and around this pot is vat, I should say. So Naturally,
35:34
Speaker 2: everyone's like, shit, these are bones and and women's clothing,
35:41
Speaker 2: women's undergarments, and you know, a ring with the missing
35:48
Speaker 2: women's initials on it.
35:50
Speaker 1: And so.
35:52
Speaker 2: He is arrested and then taken to jail before going
35:58
Speaker 2: to court. By the time the trial begins in August
36:02
Speaker 2: of eighteen ninety seven, the rumor mill is swirling the
36:08
Speaker 2: body parts of a woman were found in the sausage vat,
36:14
Speaker 2: and people start thinking, what if she was in the sausages?
36:20
Speaker 2: What if he went off Sweeney Todd. Now, luckily the
36:24
Speaker 2: sausage factory was not in bloody use, it wasn't in use.
36:28
Speaker 2: Nobody ate her to our knowledge, Like, it's unlikely. It's
36:34
Speaker 2: just more likely that he killed her with arsenic and
36:37
Speaker 2: then dissolved her body. And you know that she wouldn't
36:42
Speaker 2: have been hard to lift, and she would have fitten
36:45
Speaker 2: it quite easily because she was a wee person. She
36:48
Speaker 2: was teeny toty teny and schmall, she fit in there
36:52
Speaker 2: quite easily. So forensic experts come forward and they start
37:00
Speaker 2: like dissolving bodies in potash, like they're trying to see
37:04
Speaker 2: if they can make it happen. So the prosecution they're like, yeah,
37:09
Speaker 2: this is definitely a thing, and the defense are like,
37:13
Speaker 2: oh no, the bones would have been bigger than this,
37:16
Speaker 2: or would have been that, because he's all argument is like,
37:19
Speaker 2: it's peg bones for making sausages, which is fine if
37:25
Speaker 2: there wasn't part of a skull made of tarsal bones,
37:31
Speaker 2: tophal anks, bits of ribs, and you know again, you
37:38
Speaker 2: know there's a ring there with her initials on it,
37:42
Speaker 2: that's her ring, and part of a fucking corset.
37:46
Speaker 1: Like it's a twelve foot vat as well, it.
37:49
Speaker 2: Wasn't as if she wasn't going to fit into it.
37:51
Speaker 2: Like they had to drain it and like scour through
37:54
Speaker 2: the go like greasy, sludgy stuff, and they found all
38:01
Speaker 2: of these pieces. Now they could have easily like not
38:07
Speaker 2: searched as hard, but they did it anyway, thank Christ.
38:11
Speaker 2: But yeah, now the prosecution suggests then he killed Louisa
38:17
Speaker 2: with arsenic and then disposed of her body in the vat,
38:23
Speaker 2: which I mean there were easier ways. There were easier
38:28
Speaker 2: ways now, dissolving her body, especially if you wanted to
38:34
Speaker 2: marry the widow, just seems like a bad idea when
38:38
Speaker 2: it was better to have her like be found somewhere.
38:40
Speaker 2: I'm just saying, maybe he panicked.
38:42
Speaker 1: What did he panic?
38:43
Speaker 2: Because he bought three hundred and fifty eight pounds of
38:46
Speaker 2: potash and so much arsnack, like too much even it
38:51
Speaker 2: just feels like premeditated, just a weep it. So the
38:58
Speaker 2: first trial ends up with a hung jury, like they
39:02
Speaker 2: can't agree because the evidence is so circumstantial and you've
39:06
Speaker 2: got these experts who are just you know, playing tennis
39:10
Speaker 2: with each other effectively. It doesn't help that there were
39:14
Speaker 2: sightings of Louisa all over like the US, like she
39:22
Speaker 2: was seen in Boston and she was seen here, and
39:24
Speaker 2: she was she wasn't she was not. But so they
39:31
Speaker 2: end up putting him on trial again, and it's in
39:35
Speaker 2: January of eighteen ninety eight, and so they end up
39:39
Speaker 2: having George Dorsey, who's an anthropologist, and they have him
39:45
Speaker 2: with this. He gives his testimony about how the bones
39:49
Speaker 2: are definitely hers, how it's the skull of a small female.
39:54
Speaker 2: I mean, if it's a small skull, I get it.
39:56
Speaker 2: But I don't think they can determine, you know, gender
40:03
Speaker 2: or sex. I should say, I'm pretty sure they can't like.
40:06
Speaker 1: Figure that out at that point. I'm fairly certain.
40:11
Speaker 2: Adolf Ludgert he is cross examined in the second trial
40:14
Speaker 2: for like eight and a half hours, like it is
40:17
Speaker 2: a lot, but you know, the experts were so convincing
40:23
Speaker 2: that the jury were like, no, you're guilty.
40:26
Speaker 1: And so he ends up in Juliette.
40:31
Speaker 2: He gets sent to prison, where he lives for one
40:35
Speaker 2: year before.
40:36
Speaker 1: Dying of something and Louisa.
40:44
Speaker 2: She doesn't get buried because there's nothing to bury at
40:46
Speaker 2: this point. There's fragments, you know, and her children. They're
40:53
Speaker 2: supposed to go into the care of her brother, Deirdrich,
40:57
Speaker 2: but he doesn't show up for court for some reason.
41:00
Speaker 2: We don't know why.
41:02
Speaker 1: He just doesn't.
41:04
Speaker 2: And then they end up staying with their maternal grandmother.
41:08
Speaker 2: And they have fairly typical lives considering they do. Okay,
41:12
Speaker 2: they have long lives, They get married, they have their
41:14
Speaker 2: own kids, which is a weird heritage to have. My
41:18
Speaker 2: grandfather was the sausage King of Chicago and also a murderer,
41:25
Speaker 2: but he went to jail and he died, so yay,
41:29
Speaker 2: that's something. But yes, So when's old timey crime the
41:34
Speaker 2: sausage King of Chicago murders. I'll have a better name
41:39
Speaker 2: for it when I actually type it up. I like
41:41
Speaker 2: to apologize for my tiredness.
41:43
Speaker 1: I'm barely I'm barely here.
41:47
Speaker 2: I really wanted to make sure I got an episode
41:48
Speaker 2: it for you guys, and I hope it wasn't too annoying.
41:54
Speaker 2: Old timey crime it's what I go back to. But
41:57
Speaker 2: I've got some cool stuff like ready for next week.
42:00
Speaker 2: I'm pretty excited for some We're kinda go, we're going
42:05
Speaker 2: to talk about a mastress or two, you know my favorite,
42:10
Speaker 2: back to Harlot's for a wee bit and then who
42:13
Speaker 2: knows what we'll discuss. I mean, I'll probably chat about
42:16
Speaker 2: a dude there too. But yes, so when the story
42:22
Speaker 2: of the Sausage Fat Murder, if you like the story,
42:26
Speaker 2: please do going to write a review of five stars.
42:28
Speaker 2: If you don't want to rate a review of five stars,
42:30
Speaker 2: don't say anything. It's fine a level of compliments and crisps.
42:36
Speaker 1: But so is that. That's that's how that is.
42:38
Speaker 2: And you can follow me on the socials.
42:43
Speaker 1: I've got the Patreon now as well. And so if you.
42:47
Speaker 2: Don't want to follow on like TikTok or Instagram because
42:50
Speaker 2: you don't want like meta knowing your data or whatever,
42:52
Speaker 2: I know somebody had an issue and TikTok is something
42:55
Speaker 2: they just couldn't get into. And TikTok's being such a deck,
42:59
Speaker 2: such a deck that I'm now sort of posting any
43:03
Speaker 2: videos I'm posting anywhere else, I'm going to post on TikTok.
43:05
Speaker 1: For the free followers to just kiss fuck it.
43:09
Speaker 2: But all of the live shows will be going up
43:12
Speaker 2: slowly but surely on the Patreon for the paid.
43:15
Speaker 1: Tears, so that'll be going up soon.
43:17
Speaker 2: And the Murder of Order Ackroyd will be continuing soon.
43:21
Speaker 2: Part of the Who Done It What Now? That starts
43:23
Speaker 2: sin Enough and yeah, I think that's that's it. Oh,
43:27
Speaker 2: the Glasgow show the next to trip not Trip Tour.
43:31
Speaker 2: The next show has been announced. It's June second, twenty
43:34
Speaker 2: twenty four, and yeah, that's that's happening and the place
43:40
Speaker 2: is accessible. Yeah, So for recommendation time. For reading, we're
43:47
Speaker 2: going to recommend Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Germers. The
43:53
Speaker 2: book's over there but I can't see ex top mglasses on.
43:56
Speaker 2: But yeah, it's really good anywhere. I bought a second
43:59
Speaker 2: copy of it, but it's fabulous read that. For watching,
44:04
Speaker 2: I'm going to suggest Artful.
44:06
Speaker 1: Dodger because clearly I have weird issues with my childhood.
44:12
Speaker 1: It's it's okay.
44:14
Speaker 2: I also like surgeons and the thing about old timey surgeons,
44:17
Speaker 2: I think it's fascinating. So that's interesting, and it's I'm
44:21
Speaker 2: learning about sides, so that's nice. And for listening, listen
44:25
Speaker 2: to Taylor's rest new album why Not. You should totally
44:27
Speaker 2: do it it's a good time. Yeah, that's everything, and
44:31
Speaker 2: so I shall see you next time. Adios au revoir
44:37
Speaker 2: of Weird as Them My Friends by