Jane Toppan, "The Nightmare Nurse"

Jane was born in 1857 as Honora Kelley. Her mother died when she was just a little girl, leaving to live with her alcoholic father. After living a few years in poverty, Jane and her sister were sent to Boston Female Asylum. After a few years, Jane was adopted by Mrs. Ann Toppan, and was given her new identity: Jane Toppan. Growing up, Jane was very jealous of her beautiful step-sister and built up a pattern of lies. She moved out in 1885 to become a nurse, knowing that there was nobody who wanted to marry her ("Jane toppan: female").

The facility that Jane began to work at had very low supervision and security. Thus, Jane was free to do whatever she pleased with no risk of being caught. She soon began experimenting with drugs on the patients that she wasn't so fond of. She regularly used Morphine and atropine to kill her patients and nobody suspected a thing. This was because to everyone else, Jane was known as "Jolly Jane." She came off as being happy and so careful of her patients who she spent so much time with. Little did her fellow workers know that the time Jane spent alone in her patients room was spent filling out fake charts and bringing them in and out of consciousness with drugs. Often times, she would even get into bed with them, claiming that she got a sexual thrill from being around people near death ("Jane toppan: female").

Thirty-one patients died at Jane's hand. She often referred to herself as the "Angel of Death," a bringer of "mercy," and a provident dispenser of mortal relief ("Jane toppan", 2010). It is said that Jane adopted this strange love of death during nursing school where she developed a strange love for autopsies ("Jane toppan, nightmare," 2007). Jane worked in a few medical hospitals including Massachusetts General Hospital and also became a private nurse in Cambridge. Her services were high in demand, even though many of her patients ended up dead ("Jane toppan: female").

Jane's death brigade would soon come to an end when she began renting a home from a family named Davis. Jane didn't pay her rent and when one of the daughter's of the family came to talk to Jane, she mysteriously ended up dead. The Davis's then asked Jane to move into their home. Soon after the other Davis daughter died. The father of this family soon became very concerned about all these healthy people dying and he got the help of a Harvard Medical School graduate to come and investigate. A few months later Jane was arrested for the murder of Minnie Gibbs, one of the Davis daughters ("Jane toppan: female").

Jane's trial took place in 1902. The court listened to testimony from Jane and from doctors all claiming that Jane suffered from insanity. It was suggested that the insanity was hereditary because her father and sisters all suffered from it also. For this reason, Jane was declared mentally insane and was sent to an asylum. She died there in 1938 at the age of 84 ("Jane toppan, nightmare," 2007).

References:

Jane toppan: female lust killer. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.bloggersbase.com/criminology/jane-toppan-female-lust-killer

Jane toppan. (2010, March, 28). Retrieved from http://www.serialkillers.ca/jane-toppan

Jane toppan, nightmare nurse. (2007, March 26). Retrieved from http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/321599/jane_toppan_nightmare_nurse_pg2.html?cat=17

Nannie Doss, "The Giggling Granny"

Nancy Hazle (later to become known as Nannie Doss) was born on November 4, 1905 in Blue Mountain, Alabama. She grew up avoiding her father and his abusive outbursts that ripped at the seams of her family. Because her father had little respect or disregard for her education, Nancy was pulled out of school during the sixth grade to help work on the farm. Nancy was a prisoner in her own home. She wasn't allowed to have friends, wear nice dresses or make-up, and was prohibited to talk to boys. She spent her nights working in the factory and reading romance magazines. She finally began to have a social life when she got her first job in 1921 (Montaldo).

Soon into her first job, Nancy met her first husband, Charley Braggs. Nancy and Charley got married when she was 16, just five months after they met. The couple moved into Charley's mother's house, which soon turned into a nightmare for Nancy. It turned out that her mother-in-law was no better than her father. Together, Nancy and Charley has four beautiful daughters. Buried underneath all the pressure of raising four children and having a husband who began to cheat on her, Nancy began to drink, smoke, and see other men. Some of Nancy's first murders were suspected to occur in 1927 when two of her daughters died unexpectedly from food poisoning. Soon after, Charley took his oldest daughter and left, suspecting that something strange was going on with Nancy. Little did he know how lucky he was that he got away while he had the change (Gansen, 2010).

After her husband left her, Nancy became obsessed with romance and started the search for her next husband using the personal sections in the local newspaper. She soon met Frank Harrelson and they got married in 1929. Soon Nancy found out that Frank was a drunk who had just been released from prison. While married to Frank, Nancy's oldest daughter had two children, one in 1943 and one in 1945, both of whom Nancy is accused of killing. Seven months later Frank was dead after Nancy accused him of forcing sex on her. She vowed to get even with him for that and did so by poisoning his liquor bottle with rat poisoning (Gansen, 2010.) Once again, Nancy turned to the personal adds in the paper to find love. After three days of knowing Arlie Lanning (an alcoholic womanizer), Nancy married him. Soon after they got married, Arlie was killed and his house (who would have gone to his sister) was burned to the ground. All the insurance money went to Nancy who then went to stay with her sister, whom she also killed (Ciampa).

In search of love once again, Nancy joined the Diamond Circle Club, a singles club, where she met her fourth husband Richard Morton, Luckily, Richard was no drunk, however, he was a well known womanizer and had a lot of debt. When Nancy's father died, her mother came to stay with her and Richard. Soon after, her mother died of "stomach pains," and three months later Richard died of similar symptoms (Ciamps). While married to Richard, Nancy had already found husband number five, Sam Doss. Sam was not like her previous husbands. He didn't drink, swear, have money issues, or threaten her in any way. He was one of the good ones and honestly cared about her. Sadly, soon enough Sam was sent to the hospital with a digestive track infection. After 23 days, Sam was sent home where Nancy prepared him a welcome home dinner of pot roast and coffee, laced with some nice arsenic. He was dead before midnight (Gansen, 2010).

Because Sam's death had arrived so quickly, the doctor on the case ordered an emergency autopsy and found the large amount of arsenic in Sam's digestive tract. Nancy was arrested soon after. She soon confessed to killing all four of her husbands, as well as to committing seven other murders. She was charged with murder and plead guilty on May 17, 1955, almost 25 years after she began killing. She was sentenced to a lifetime in prison, but died in 1965 of cancer (Gansen, 2010).

References:

Ciampa, Tara. (n.d.). Nannie doss. Retrieved from http://www.visionmagazineonline.com/nanni%20doss/index.htm

Gansen, Kristyn. (2010, January 18), Background and first two husbands of nannie doss. Retrieved from http://www.suite101.com/content/background-and-first-two-husbands-of-nannie-doss-a190826

Montaldo, Charles. (n.d.) Nannie doss, one of the most prolific female serial killers in u.s. history. Retrieved from http://crime.about.com/od/serial/a/Nannie-Doss.htm

Amy Duggan Archer-Gilligan and Her Murder Factory

Who was Amy Duggan Archer Gilligan and what did she do that was so wrong? Amy was born in Litchfield, CT in 1873 to the parents of James and Mary Duggan. There are no other records about Amy until 1890 when she attended Britain Normal School and then blank again until 1896 when she married her first husband, and victim, James Archer (Reynolds, Somerville, & Stevens). In 1901 her story begins when she and her husband found employment as in-home caretakers for John Seymore. Sadly, Seymore died in 1904. However, the lovely couple continued to live in Seymore's home after his death and raised money by caring for elderly boarders. Sadly, in 1907, Seymore's relatives decided to sell the house, forcing Amy and her husband to move elsewhere. They bought a brick house and opened their own elderly care home which they called the Archer Home for Aged People. In 1910, Amy's husband passed away due to kidney failure which originated from an unknown origin (Bovsun, 2010).

And here is where the story gets good. Soon enough, Amy snatched up her second husband, and victim, Micheal Gilligan. They married in 1913 and after only three months of marriage, Gilligan passed away. The cause: severe indigestion. Soon enough, the Archer Home for Aged People grew into a death sentence for any elderly person to walk through the door and sign up for the payment plan. Amy had two types of payment plans for her guests. The first option was to pay on a weekly basis. The second was to pay a single flat fee of $1000 and in exchange, the lovely Amy would care for you as long as you continued to breathe. Sadly, this didn't last long in the Archer house. Those who chose the second method of payment would pass away before they even unpacked their suitcase (Bovsun, 2010).

Within a few more years, suspicions started to rise and everyone was starting to wonder what was really going on behind those brick walls. Since the start of the nursing home in 1907, there had been an astonishing sixty deaths, fourty-eight occurring since 1911. However, Amy wouldn't be in business for much longer. When a man named Franklin Andrews passed away after being in Amy's care, his sister, Nellie Pierce was the first to act. Nellie didn't buy the fact that one day her brother was cheerfully working the Archer's home garden and dead the very next. Nellie went to the district attorney, and when they wouldn't listen, she went to the papers. Soon, there was enough suspicion for the police to act. The investigation lasted seven months (Bovsun, 2010).

Two years after his death, Franklin's body was recovered and an autopsy was preformed. Sure enough, he had not died how Amy said. Found in the autopsy was arsenic, almost enough to kill seven men. After this the police recovered Amy's second husband. Once again, arsenic poisoning was the cause of death. Soon enough, everyone was stepping forward, providing pieces of a very big puzzle. Local merchants told police that Amy had purchased huge amounts of arsenic to kill "rats" (Bovsun, 2010).

Amy's trial took play on June 18, 1917. She was convicted of murder and was sentenced to be hanged. However, the verdict was soon reversed due to a technicality. During the second trial, Amy pleaded guilty and was sentenced to life in jail. She was sent to the state prison, then to Wethersfield Cove, a prison that normally only housed men. Soon, Amy was declared insane and spent the last years of her life at a state mental hospital in Middletown. She died there in 1962 at the age of 89, outliving almost everyone who had been involved in her case. However, the legend of Amy Gilligan and her Murder Factory still stands strong. To this day there are plays, movies, and books about this woman and all the people she murdered behind those brick walls (Ryan, 1997).

References

Bovsun, M., (2010, January 17). The crime story behind classic comedy, 'arsenic and old lace'. Retrieved from http://www.nydailynews.com/2010-01%2017_comedy_and_killing_truth_to_arsenic_old_lace.html

Reynolds, S., Somerville, M., & Stevens, A., (n.d.). Amy archer-gilligan "sister". Retrieved from http://maamodt.asp.radford.edu/Psyc%20405/serial%20killers/Archer-Gilligan,%20Amy.pdf

Ryan, B., (1997, March 2). Whatever went wrong with amy? New York Times.