Family Blood

William Beadle had everything he'd dreamed of: a pretty and good-hearted wife, beautiful children, social status, and plenty of wealth. But when he lost his fortune, William lost his mind. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, just a heads up. This episode contains topics of
suicide and violence that may be disturbing to some. Please
take care while listening. If you were someone you know
is struggling with suicidal ideations, please call the suicide Prevention
lifeline at three eight to five. And thanks for listening.

(00:21):
Take care of yourself. Okay, you're listening to American Shadows,
a production of I Heart Radio and Grim and Mild
from Aaron Mankey. It was dinner time when Dr Herbert

(00:44):
Simmons received the call. The woman on the other end
calmly asked him to come to her home on West
fourteenth Street. A girl in the house had killed herself
in the bathtub. The same woman had called the police
a half hour before, asking for the corner in the
town of East Orange, New Jersey. Didn't have a corner,

(01:05):
and the officer told her to call the doctor. Simmons
arrived at the dilapidated house and double checked the address.
Although he doubted that anyone could possibly live there, he
knocked and waited. A woman holding a candle and dressed
in black answered. She led him to the darkened house,
up the stairs and to the bathroom. In the flickering

(01:26):
candle light. Simmons noted the odd position of the body
in the tub. The girl's legs were folded underneath her,
and her left hand still clutched a washcloth. Her torso
slumped forward. Long strands of auburn hair floated in the water.
He knelt and raised her head. Large unseeing brown eyes

(01:48):
stared outward from an emaciated face. Simmons turned his attention
to the clothes stacked next to the tub. A suicide
note lay on top. She had apparently taken her life
to be reunited with her daughter, and the doctor looked
at the woman in black. He asked when the tragedy
had occurred. The woman replied that she didn't really know

(02:09):
that she had just discovered the corpse minutes before. She
called him. Who is she and who are you? Simmons asked.
The woman tersely answered that he had learned that soon enough.
Confused and a bit alarmed, Simmons asked a barrage of questions.
The woman, still resolved, turned to nervousness. She claimed the

(02:30):
last time she had seen the girl was earlier that morning.
Simmons got to his feet. The girl had been dead
for at least a day, He immediately summoned the police.
Detective William O'Neill questioned the woman in black. She gave
her name as Virginia Oceana Wardlaw, a former co owner
of the Montgomery College in Christiansburg, Virginia. The girl in

(02:53):
the tub was her niece, Ossie Snead. Although Ossie had
written a suicide note, Wardlaw couldn't explain why there was
no pen or ink in the home. His questioning began
to unraffle the dark truth that ward Law and her
sisters had kept for decades. When Ossie's brother died as
a child, her parents received twenty two thousand dollars in insurance.

(03:16):
In nineteen o one, her father died, Ossie's mother, Caroline,
cashed in another policy and moved in with her sisters
Mary in Virginia. All three took to wearing black dresses, hats,
and veils. Mary's son John died when his night shirt
accidentally caught fire while he slept. The sisters split the

(03:37):
eighteen thousand dollar insurance policy. Ossie married her cousin Fletcher,
and the two had a daughter named after Fletcher's mother Mary. Unfortunately,
the child died two days later. Fletcher disappeared, and the
sisters claimed had killed himself. Fletcher's insurance policy named his
mother and aunts as beneficiaries, but without a body, the

(04:00):
insurance company refused to pay. They tried forcing Osi to
write a will naming them as beneficiaries. They've also tried
to bribe a doctor, the milkman, and a plumber to
help them end Osie's life, all refused. The autopsy revealed
o c had been nearly starved to death, overdosed with morphine,
and placed in the tub to drown. O'Neill also discovered

(04:24):
small bones in the oven belonging to an infant. But
the most shocking detail came when investigators learned that Ossie's
mother had masterminded at all. Sometimes the monsters are the
ones closest to us. I'm Lauren Vogelbaum, Welcome to American Shadows.

(04:51):
William Beadle had good looks, expressive features, and the clear intelligence.
Those who met him said he possessed an easy going
disposition on commonly good sense and the manners of a
true gentleman. Historians believe William might have been born to
a man of means and his mistress sometime in seventeen
thirty in London, he spent time around the court and

(05:13):
suggesting he had been well provided for. William and his
sister grew up well liked and honest, by Ball accounts.
For a short time he met with a group of deists.
A Deism had become the religion of free thinkers in England.
They believed God revealed himself through human reasoning instead of
divine intervention as written in Christian Bibles. In seventeen fifty five,

(05:36):
William moved to Barbados, where he lived with the governor
and his family for the next six years. When he
returned to London, he established a merchant business. He sailed
to New York to take advantage of the growing mercantile
opportunities there. Eventually he settled in Fairfield, Connecticut, where he
met Lyddia Lothrop. The two married on April fifteenth of
seventeen seventy. The following year, they welcomed his son and soul.

(06:01):
Their second child, Elizabeth, arrived in seventeen seventy two. William's
business easily provided a comfortable living for his growing family.
After having amassed a considerable fortune, William moved his business
and family to Weathersfield, Connecticut in seventeen seventy three. Nestled
along the Connecticut River and brick paver streets, colonial homes

(06:22):
completed a picturesque landscape. The town, founded in the mid
sixteen sixties, was one of the oldest in the colony.
William and Lydia became well known, William for his wealth
and integrity in his business, and Lydia for her sweet
and kind nature. They welcomed little Lydia in seventeen seventy
four and Mary in seventeen seventy six. They seemed the

(06:45):
perfect family and doated on their children. William proudly told
neighbors about his children's endeavors and accomplishments. More success followed,
earning William more wealth than most other New England merchants.
He and Lydia enjoyed the company of the town is
most elite. Life in Weathersfield seemed as perfect as the
scenery itself. William was happy everything had turned out just

(07:08):
the way he had imagined in his youth. Times were changing, though.
In seventeen seventy six, anger toward the British swept across
the colonies following the Boston Tea Party, Parliament had Boston
Harbor blocked, which cut off supplies to the city and
the revolutionaries. As you might imagine, merchants lost a lot

(07:28):
of business, but a blockade proved to be just one
misfortune for the Beadle family. In seventeen seventy seven, the
value of continental paper currency began to plummet. At the time,
it took a dollar twenty five and continental currency to
purchase a dollar worth of gold or silver coins. A
Congress stopped issuing the bills by seventeen seventy nine, and

(07:52):
by seventeen eighty one it took a hundred dollars continental
to buy one dollar, where the gold or silver coupled
with the blocked ports and rye inflation due to a
lack of goods, shops preferred British pounds over the nearly
worthless colonial currency. A Congress had printed so many of
the bills to pay for the war that the value
continued to fall for five years. This greatly affected everyone

(08:16):
in Wethersfield, including William Beadle. A. Most businesses stayed afloat
by either charging more for goods and services or taking
only the British pound. William did neither. It was illegal
to not accept continental currency at face value. Obeying the
law and sticking to his code of integrity would be
William's downfall. It didn't take long for him to lose

(08:39):
much of his fortune. The Beatles slid into middle class status,
and for William, who had been one of the town's
wealthiest men, this wouldn't do. He wrote to a friend,
lamenting that he could no longer adequately provide for his family.
It wasn't exactly true. Although no longer exceptionally wealthy, the

(08:59):
family had plenty of food and could even keep the
services of a maid. Still, William ended the letter asking
if it were time for him to die. The Revolutionary
War dragged on, further reducing his wealth. To William, things
looked very bleak for him and his family. Had once
been wealthy and enjoyed the company of society's elite. Now

(09:22):
he stared down poverty. Soon afterward, William began carrying an
axe and a carving knife to bed. In William's mind,
without his fortune and social standing, the town would surely
mock and ridicule them. He reasoned that the lowest of

(09:45):
wretches on the street would despise them if they fell
into poverty. He worried that without his fortune, his family
would fall victim to the vilest and most vicious people
in all of Weathersfield. He thought of their friends and
social circles. Surely prominent men like Theadeus Burr, Colonel John Chester,
and Stephen Mitchell would no longer socialize with him. William

(10:07):
imagined people talking about him behind his back and laugh
ad met his family's misfortune. Though he continued to dress
and act as a well to do gentleman, he reasoned
there was only one thing to do, become meaner than
all of them. Had been an affectionate and devoted husband,
and took great pleasure in indulging his children. His family
had been one of his greatest joys. Yet for a

(10:30):
couple of years William contemplated ending his life. By seventeen eighty,
thoughts of suicide turned to homicide. Over the years, William
had remained a deist. He firmly believed in the right
to take his own life without consequences, even in the hereafter,
and in an extreme interpretation of the era's view of masculinity,

(10:51):
he felt that he had the same privileges over the
lives of his family members a Deists believed divine revelations
came from logic and rejected the writings Christianity as superstition.
In an enlightened age, free thinkers like the Deists chastised
those who believed literally in Christ's resurrection. The religion remained

(11:11):
more popular with the wealthy than with the lower classes.
Men spent time debating certain philosophies and opinions regarding Deism,
though they kept relatively quiet outside their circles, The Puritans
often took to violence against Deists. Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Payne,
and other Founding fathers practiced Deism, making the religion even

(11:32):
more appealing to William Beadle. With his beliefs intact and
his status and manhood at perceived risk, William wrestled with
a solution. If he killed himself, his family would suffer.
If he killed the children, his wife, being as attached
to the children as she was, would suffer. William tried
to resolve a way to spare his family, but in

(11:54):
his mind, the world had conspired against him and his children.
If he died, they would need to die too. He
came to an answer that made perfect sense, or at
least an answer he liked. His religious beliefs required only
that he seek the solution from within, and whatever sense
of morality came from his reasoning was the indisputable truth.

(12:18):
He saw his children as an extension of himself, so
killing them was his right. However, his wife presented a
different problem. At first, she wasn't his flesh and blood. However,
she belonged to him by marriage. Therefore she was his
to do with as he wished. In seventeen seventy two,
he struggled with how and when to spare his family

(12:42):
from poverty. That November, Lydia announced she wanted to visit
relatives in Fairfield for a while. William breathed a sigh
of relief. It was a sign that he wouldn't have
to kill his wife. He drafted a will and a note,
fully explaining what he planned to do to the children.
When he finished, he set a date November. Lydia returned early, though,

(13:06):
and on November seventeenth, Lydia told him of a terrible
dream she had had the night before. A man had
injured himself beyond recovery, and William had written her a letter.
Those spots of blood had covered the note. She could
make out that he was concerned for her. William wrote
another note to accompany his will. He felt terrible for

(13:26):
his wife, but her fear left him unfazed. Her early
return had been another sign he'd have to kill her too.
He loved his wife, she had a good heart and
wanted only to bring happiness to those around her. But
he reasoned that a woman without a husband stood little
chance of employment, much less the ability to support four children.

(13:49):
Having married before, she was also less likely to find
a suitable partner. After much internal debate, he felt at peace.
He interpreted that sense of well being God's support for
his plan. He jotted down one last entry, the hand
of Heaven is with us. Only one question remained, should

(14:10):
he kill his children first or his wife? On November,
William sent the maid on an errand to a neighbor's
house some distance away. We had written a letter and
asked her to wait for a written reply, regardless of

(14:31):
how long it would take. William made sure the answer
would require some thought, preventing the maid from returning until
after he carried out his plan. She wasn't family and
he had no right to harm or scare her. However,
the maid returned much sooner than he expected, and now
William could have taken his wife's early return, her dreams,

(14:52):
and the maid's return as a sign that he shouldn't
kill them. None of that dissuaded him, though it only
delayed his action. Let You continued to dream that terrible
things were about to happen to the family. The nightmares
frightened her so much that she told her friends when
they gathered to catch up with each other. William remained
convinced that Lydia's dreams were premonitions and therefore a sign

(15:15):
from the heavens. Clearly, God agreed with his plan. It
never occurred to him that she had picked up on
his paranoia that people were out to get him, or
that his taking weapons to bed might have frightened her.
On November twenty eight, Lydia told him she had dreamed
that their children lay dead and that she was also killed.
She recalled that she was free and happy after they

(15:38):
were all dead. To some the dream would have been
very telling in a different way, but Lydia's dream excited him.
He thought God was directing him to end his family's suffering.
He had failed his wife and children. William vowed not
to fail God. On December six, while his family slept,

(15:59):
he rose and took the axe he kept with him. Quietly,
he stood over his wife, axe poised, then he turned
and left the room. He entered the children's room next.
One by one, he stood over them and watched them sleep,
still gripping the axe and contemplating each of their deaths.
This practice run pleased him. It was the final proof

(16:21):
he needed. As he had imagined swinging the axe, he
had remained confident that he was doing the right thing.
He journaled, marveling at his restraint. The Christmas season was
in full swing, and on December ten, the Beatles hosted
a party for friends and family. Prominent guest Stephen mix
Mitchell noted William's cheerful and upbeat mood. William doated on

(16:44):
his family. After dinner and celebrations, guests began to leave
around nine pm. He asked them to stay, but all declined,
leaving the Beetle family to settle in for the night.
The children were exhausted and didn't need coaxing to go
to bed. Lydia was all so tired, and after tucking
her children in, she put out the candles and headed

(17:04):
to bed for some much needed rest. Some time before dawn,
William woke the maid and handed her a sealed note
addressed to doctor Joseph Farnsworth. Lydia was not well. He
said he needed the maid to dress quickly without waking
the children, delivered the letter to the doctor and bring
him back to the house. The maid did as she

(17:25):
had been told, though her employer's last words as she
headed down the path confused her. Don't rush, he called
after her. William watched her until she disappeared into the night.
He wouldn't have long. The doctor lived close. As Dr
Farnsworth read the letter, the maid noted the horror on
his face. She might have asked, though there's no record

(17:48):
that he told her what the letter said. Instead, the
doctor summoned Colonel John Chester and Stephen Mitchell. Still unsure
of what had happened, the maid accompanied the men back
to the Dolls home. She entered first. When they reached
the children's room and opened the door, she fainted. The
scene was so dreadful that Mitchell ran outside to catch

(18:11):
his breath. Farnsworth found Lydia in the couple's bedroom. William
had taken the axe to her twice then slit her throat.
The doctor followed a trail of bloody footprints out of
the room and down the hall. William was slumped forward
in a chair, the bloody knife on the end table.
He had taken two pistols, raised them to each side

(18:33):
of his head, and pulled the triggers. The bullets had
ended his life. Regardless of their religion, the townsfolk hoped
it had not ended his perceived suffering. The murders outraged

(18:56):
everyone in town and across the state as ours. The
residents in Weathersfield were concerned William Beadle didn't deserve a burial.
They strapped the knife to his chest and bound his
body to a sled. Residents lined the street while a
horse pulled the sled towards the Connecticut River. They spat
on his corpse and cursed his soul. Once the sled

(19:17):
reached its destination, men dumped his body into a shallow grave.
As satisfied that they were done with the likes of
William Beadle, they returned home and prepared to bury Lydia
and the children. Lydia was thirty two at the time
of her death. The oldest Beetle child Ansel was eleven,
the youngest Mary was just six. Oncember thirteenth, the townsfolk

(19:40):
carried the bodies to their final resting place. Attendees wept
as mother and children were laid together, and the marker
covering their grave told their story, their destruction at the
hands of the husband and father they loved and trusted.
After the funeral, the townsfolk hoped to put the tragedy
behind them. Instead, they wrestled with William's actions. How could

(20:03):
any one kill their whole family. Heavily religious, the people
there commonly thought of deeds as guided by either God
or the devil A William's act was unspeakable even for Satan.
Christian ministers took the pulpit warning congregations of the dangers
of deism. But even the most devoted churchgoers were faced

(20:24):
with something other than religion, the dark side of human nature.
Workers at a dock on the Connecticut River complained about
the smell of William's decaying body. A few men dragged
the corpse to another location away from the docks. The
next day, children came across the body, forcing the residence
to deal with dumping it once more. This time, they

(20:46):
hoped to be done with William Beadle. Congress eventually paid
off its war debts, Treasury notes replaced the once worthless
continental currency, and William waited another couple of years. He
might have recovered financially. Instead of a desperate and misguided man,
the townsfolk saw him as a monster who acted on
his worst fears and impulses. People began to look at

(21:09):
the narratives of such crimes, piecing together trails of clues
leading up to the offense itself. Williams heinous actions paved
the way for the true crime and horror genres. No
one had seen the murders coming until then. William seemed
like a devoted husband, doating father, and kind man. His
will and journals chilled them for years, something worse than

(21:33):
the devil had walked among them. William Beatle methodically, almost enthusiastically,
planned the murders of his family. In his neighbors minds,
William had done what the devil could not. His actions
whispered to them in the dark as they blew out
the candles before bed. Some couldn't help but wonder who
the people in their house really and truly were. There's

(21:58):
more to this, story. Dick around after this brief sponsored
break to hear all about it. Today, you'll still find
the Tuttle name in several places along the east side
of the Quinnipiac River. There's Tuttle Road, Tuttle Place, and

(22:20):
even Tuttle Elementary and the family had roots in the
area of dating back to the mid sixteen hundreds. William,
his wife, and their children arrived in the New World
along with his widowed mother, two brothers, and their families
in sixteen thirty five. The family were successful merchants in England,
but were excited about greater trade opportunities in the American colonies,

(22:43):
and they were not the only ones heading across the Atlantic.
Many families left England to avoid religious persecution, and the
Tuttles were strongly Protestant in a time when England was not.
History calls them Puritans, so when they're Minister John Davenport
set sail for the New World, and most of his
congregation followed. The brothers, John and Richard stayed in Boston,

(23:07):
while William settled in New Haven, Connecticut. He re established
his business, setting up ventures along the New England coast
and down into Delaware. In addition to his trade business,
William was named a commissioner, arbitrator and constable. The money
wasn't an issue for the Tuttles, and William and his
wife purchased a considerable amount of land In sixteen fifty six.

(23:29):
They lived in a mansion with their growing family of
eleven children. From there, drama followed the Tuttle family like
a loyal dog. By many accounts, at least one of
the children was deemed insane, another had been branded in adulteress,
and two became murderers. William died in sixteen seventy three

(23:52):
without leaving a proper will, throwing the family into chaos
over their father's accumulated wealth. They fought constantly. On November
eighteenth of sixteen seventy six, Benjamin Tuttle visited his sister Sarah,
who lived in Stamford. As Sara's husband left the house
one night without eating dinner, setting off a quarrel between

(24:12):
the siblings. Benjamin left in a rage, and Sara instructed
her daughter to shut the door behind him. Moments later,
Benjamin burst back in wielding an axe. He shouted that
he intended to take Sara to God after striking her
in the head, he pushed her body into the fireplace
and continued striking her with the axe. Upon his arrest,

(24:34):
he claimed had killed his sister because she might have
killed him first if he hadn't. Benjamin's niece and nephew
testified against him, and the court sentenced him to hang.
Before's execution, Benjamin willed his entire estate to another sister, Elizabeth,
who had her own issues. When it came out that
one of her seven children had been fathered during one

(24:54):
of her many affairs, Elizabeth's husband, Richard, filed for divorce.
The Richard had had his own affairs. One of his
mistresses was fined for her part. When Elizabeth and Richard divorced,
he married his mistress. Another sibling, Mercy Tuttle, took an
axe to one of her sons in and blamed the devil.
Her husband told the court his wife had not been

(25:16):
acting right lately, and just days before his son's death,
Mercy told him should have the children buried in the barn.
Her comment had puzzled him. The children were healthy, after all,
and when he questioned why she thought the children would
need to be buried, she replied that dreadful days were coming.
Sam Jr. Overheard the conversation and asked his mother if

(25:38):
she would do such a thing. She responded that she
certainly would, as long as it didn't hurt him. Other
neighbors also testified that Mercy was insane. The court found
her not guilty due to insanity, and Mercy returned home
to her husband and daughter. Psychologists remain curious about people
they call family and I leaders like William Beadle and

(26:02):
the Tuttles. Those who commit familiar side often seem to
believe that killing their family, even pets, will spare them
from humiliation or some other negative outcome. Experts believe there
are three reasons people commit familiar side. Sometimes they suffer
from a mental break or psychosis. Often they think God

(26:23):
or the devil guided them. The second is financial distress.
Nearly a third of familiar sides are due to financial strain.
The killers are otherwise upstanding members of society and are
seen as respectable. The last is the feeling of being
trapped in an intolerable situation. These cases typically involve divorce

(26:44):
affairs or the fear that children will be taken from them.
According to mental health professionals, men commit of familiar sides.
Out of deep shame or fear of losing control over
their family. From O. C. Snee into the Beatles and Tuttles,
a couple of things are certain. Though familiar side has

(27:05):
happened for centuries, studies regarding family annihilators are still new,
and it's one of the most horrifying types of homicides.
American Shadows is hosted by Lauren Vogelbaum. This episode was
written by Michelle Muto, researched by Ali Steed, and produced

(27:29):
by Miranda Hawkins and Trevor Young, with executive producers Aaron Mankey,
Alex Williams, and Matt Frederick. To learn more about the show,
visit grim and Mild dot com. From more podcasts from
iHeart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or
wherever you get your podcasts.