December 17, 2024 • 30 mins
Stephen Terrell, a novelist and retired attorney, shares the gripping story of his great-uncle John Terrell, who became notorious for a murder that shocked Indiana in 1903. Terrell's book, "The Madness of John Terrell: Revenge and Insanity on Trial in the Heartland," delves into the complexities of family history and the dark legacy that can emerge from it. As Stephen recounts the intriguing details of John’s life, including his rise to wealth through oil discovery and the tragic events that led to the fatal confrontation with his son-in-law Melvin Wolf, listeners gain insight into the societal issues of the time, such as bullying and mental health struggles. The discussion also touches upon the legal proceedings that followed, highlighting the stark contrasts in public perception of John Terrell as both a respected businessman and a man driven to violence. This episode not only uncovers a captivating true crime narrative but also invites reflection on enduring social challenges that echo through history.
Get your Copy of The Madness Of John Terrell Revenge and Insanity on trial in the heartland HERE
Takeaways:
- The podcast discusses the complex history of the Terrell family, including a notorious murder case from the early 1900s.
- Stephen Terrell's book, 'The Madness of John Terrell,' explores themes of family, violence, and societal perceptions of morality.
- The trial of John Terrell revealed deep community divisions regarding his character and actions, influenced by his atheism.
- Throughout the episode, the importance of sharing stories and understanding our family histories is underscored.
- Listeners are encouraged to reach out for help if they or someone they know is struggling with suicidal thoughts.
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(00:00):
You are seen, you are worthy.
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Welcome to True Crime Authorsand Extraordinary People, the podcast
(00:26):
where we bring two passions together.
The show that gives newmeaning to the old adage truth is
stranger than fiction.
And reminding you that thereis an extraordinary person in all
of us.
Here is your host, David McClam.
What's going on, everybody?
And welcome to episode of TrueCrime Authors of Extraordinary People,
(00:46):
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(01:07):
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Remember, there is nothing inthis world that is worth your life.
All right.
If you pay attention to thecalendars, you know it is time for
yet another fabulous author.
I have a good one for you today.
Let me tell you who our guest is.
(01:29):
He is a novelist and retiredIndiana attorney with decades of
experience in trials andappeals at the state and federal
levels.
He has been a frequent speakerat legal conferences and seminars
and was selected to theIndiana State Bar Association's General
Practice hall of Fame.
He is the author of theMadness of John Terrell, Revenge
(01:49):
and Insanity on Trial in the Heartland.
Please welcome author Stephen Terrell.
Hey, Stephen.
Welcome to the show.
Thank you very much.
It's great to be here.
It is my honor and privilegeto have you here today.
Let me start by saying happybelated pub day as your book just
did release on October 29th of 2024.
How does it feel?
(02:10):
It.
It feels great.
It was a long time coming withthis book.
About three and a half, fouryears in the writing and the research
and the editing of it.
But it was a great publication day.
I did the release, the launchparty, if you will, at the Wells
(02:30):
County Public Library, whichis in the county seat of Bluffton,
where all of this book tookplace, or most of it.
And it was fascinating being there.
Had a large crowd, basicallystanding room only, and sold all
the copies of the book I hadwith me.
So, no, it was a good day.
(02:52):
Well, before we get into thisbook, which is very fascinating,
let me ask you, is thereanything else about Steven Terrell
that we should know that we.
Don'T Well, I think yougenerally covered it in your introduction.
I am a retired lawyer,practice for 40 plus years basically
(03:12):
centered around litigation andyeah, and then I always wrote on
the side.
And when I retired I stumbledonto this story and spent a good
part of the last, as I said,last three and a half, four years
working on it and writing it,researching it.
(03:32):
So let's jump into thatbecause this is where it becomes
very fascinating.
John Terrell is related to you.
This is back believe in the 1800s.
You were bored during thepandemic from what I read and you
started digging through yourfamily tree.
Can you tell us a little bitabout how you decided to do that
and what led to this story?
(03:54):
I've always had an interest infamily stories and in fact quite
a few of my short stories hadtheir genesis with family stories
and I took them and then ranwith the stories.
My family was very large and Iwas at the very young end of it.
You wouldn't guess it bylooking at me now, but I had more
(04:18):
than 40 aunts and uncles andthey passed down lots of stories.
And so I had an interest infamily genealogy, had done some work
on it before.
But when the pandemic hit andI had a, had just retired, had a
lot of time here and decidedto do a little more in depth work
(04:38):
on my family tree.
And then I stumbled upon mygreat uncle who I had no knowledge
of at all.
John Wesley Terrell.
The first thing I did after Ifound his death and birth dates was
I did a search onNewspapers.com for his death notice.
I had his death notice, hisdeath date in 1916.
(05:03):
And so I searched on papers inthe area where I live and where I
thought he likely lived orgrew up.
And sure enough the firststory that popped up referred to
the notorious John Terrell andhis murder of his son in law which
had captivated Indiana back in 1903.
(05:25):
You know, doing these familytree researches.
It happened to me too.
I have like some great unclethat was a part of some big robbery
back in the day.
So I went down the rabbit hole too.
I'm like man, is this guyreally related to me?
Is this really true?
So sometimes when we do these,you know, these family tree researches,
(05:45):
we find things that we never knew.
Sometimes we find things wedon't want to know.
Yeah, I, I wrote an articlewhen I found this.
I, I do a column for theAmerican Bar association and I wrote
a column for them not longafter I found out about this.
It was about finding amurderer in their family tree.
And the gist of it was before,you know, you read advertisements,
(06:11):
you see them on televisionabout people finding out they're
related to some king or somehero or whoever.
Well, the bad guys have.
Some have relatives, too.
And so before you start, asyou said, going down that rabbit
hole, you might want to thinka bit now.
Before we get into some of theother parts.
(06:32):
One of the other things youdid find out about your great uncle
is that he was the wealthiestman in Wills county after he discovered
oil in his land.
Now, when I'm reading thispart, forgive me if you haven't heard
this before, but it kind ofsounded like the Beverly Hillbillies
to me because as you could,going on the same thing, Jack Clampet
did you.
They wanted to move to Beverly Hills.
(06:53):
He moved to another town witha bigger house.
How did that part make youfeel that he was actually a very
wealthy man?
Oh, actually, I didn't havemuch of a reaction other than surprise.
But I did know a little bitabout Indiana history and the gas
and oil booms in Indiana inthe 1880, late 1880s, up through
(07:13):
the early 1900s.
And so it was a little bit ofa surprise to see this, but not a
shock.
I.
You aren't alone about theBeverly Hills Beverly Hillbillies
reference.
I had a little bit of thoughtsabout that, except the difference
here was that John was a veryastute businessman, and he already
(07:36):
was an astute businessmanbefore he ever struck oil on his
property.
By the end of 1896, he had sixoil wells producing on his property,
and he was buying businessproperty, buying farm property, was
(07:57):
talking with some businessmenabout forming a bank.
So he was a very shrewd andsharp businessman, unlike the Persona
of Jed Clampett.
You definitely get thatbecause in the part of your book
where the guy comes and says,well, here's your answer, because
he had been asking how fardeeper you got to go to get oil,
(08:18):
and the guys was covered in it.
And he says, isn't this losing money?
Yeah.
So you totally get thatbusiness end of him.
At the very beginning of yourbook where you thanked people, you
were thinking various familymembers, and you said, thank you
for the stories, even thoughthey hadn't talked to you about this
one.
Why do you think they neverbrought this one up to you?
(08:39):
I don't know.
It's.
I mean, the obvious answer isthat people didn't want the black
sheep of the family, so tospeak, to be known for that story
to be passed around about theTerrell family.
And it really does Surprise me.
As far back as that was, I'msurprised that it, the story didn't
(09:03):
get passed down at least tosome extent.
I have a cousin who also isvery knowledgeable about my aunts
and uncles who were, you know,by the time I came along, quite older.
And he was very interested ingenealogy also.
And he confirmed from hisstandpoint that he had never heard
(09:25):
this story.
Wow.
Well, I do want to tell theaudience, even though that you do
say we're just going to talkabout Melvin here in a second, that
he does that he did kill hisson in law in the very beginning
of the book.
I want people to go buy thisbecause you know, that is not the
end of it.
So don't think he gave you the story.
He actually pulls it back andhe goes into, in depth into the story
(09:45):
of everybody, including John Terrell.
So when it comes to Melvin,what's your thoughts on Melvin?
Well, if I can just pause onand follow up on point you made there
a bit that's a point I make inmy presentations is that this isn't
just a story about a murder.
There are lots of true crimebooks out there that are, you know,
(10:08):
and.
But once you tell the story ofthe murder, that's just a small part
of this because it really isthe story of these three people.
And in fact, even more thanthat, if you count John's wife who
we talk about, I talk aboutbooks, I'm sure, you know, it's a
story about people.
It's a story about a time whena lot of people have misperceptions
(10:30):
about what the world was likeat, at the turn of the century in
rural America.
As for Melbourne, you know, Itagged him as the cat of Wells county
and I think that pretty wellsums it up.
I mean in 1903, you know,every generation I think thinks it
(10:50):
invents sex.
And every generation is wrongbecause it's been around a long time.
And Melvin, you know, got twogirls knocked up by the time he was
what, 21 years old.
He first got a young 15 yearold girl pregnant and there's fascinating
(11:14):
little story about her in thefootnotes of the book.
But then he got Lucy pregnant.
John's youngest daughter.
Yeah, he was, he was a young man.
His father was relativelywealthy who was certainly well regarded
in community.
He ended up I think trying to take.
(11:35):
And he was according todescriptions and according to the
picture we have of him, he's avery good looking young man.
And he didn't apparentlyhesitate to take advantage of that.
Yeah, he Definitely did seemlike, seemed like the playboy from
back in that day.
And I agree with you on thatbecause when I read this stuff, you
(11:57):
know, I was born in 72 and alot of people don't talk about, you
know, the sexual revolutionthat happened in 1800, 1900s.
And you're right, everybodythinks it's just something new within
our time frame, but it really wasn't.
Everything that we have nowwas created long before us.
John, though, do we think?
Because I feel like Melvinkind of antagonizes him a little
(12:18):
bit.
Is he kind of known around thetown as a no nonsense kind of guy?
Does people think John Terrellis a bad man at this point?
Well, there's a difference ofopinion about him and you'll see
that come out when you readthe section about the trial.
There was a lot of evidencethat came in about his reputation
(12:39):
for his moral standing in thecommunity and also his reputation
for, for being violent in the community.
And so it went both ways.
You had at the trial, inrebuttal, at the trial, you had some
of the most prominent citizensin all of Wells county, you know,
(13:01):
office holders, bankpresidents, insurance company presidents,
all these people who came inand testified about John's upstanding
reputation.
And yet on the other side, youhad a lot of people come in and testify
about his, his lack of good morals.
(13:21):
And that was primarily based,and this was a 1903 trial that was
primarily based on the fact hewas an atheist.
And that did not set well andWells county in 1903.
And to be honest, it wouldn'tset well in Wells county today.
(13:44):
And the interesting thingabout that with John was the fact
that his father, my greatgrandfather, and his grandfather,
my great great grandfather,were both fundamentalist preachers.
And yet John was very much anavowed atheist.
I'm going get into trial in aminute, but I do have the interesting
(14:04):
question.
So in the part of the bookwhere Melvin decides that he wants
to, in my opinion, antagonizeJohn, he's riding by in his horse
and boogie doing things heshouldn't be doing.
Do you think for any instancethat he felt like John was dangerous
or would shoot him because hekeeps saying, well, what is that
old man going to do?
Yeah, I, I don't think thatthat crossed Melvin's mind.
(14:28):
That's a guess on my part.
I don't have any firm evidenceone way or another.
But based on his actions, hehad been antagonizing not just John,
but Lucy.
They were separated is themodern term.
At the Time.
And also antagonizing John'sson and antagonizing John's two daughters
(14:53):
and their families, doingthings like running them off the
road with his wagon, flashinghis gun in one instance, having his
good buddy, who was known as abrute around the community, a thug,
had him confront John's sonand threatened him, in fact, even
(15:16):
slapped on John's son Jacob.
This guy slapped Jacob'sgirlfriend, later his wife.
Wow.
So kind of, in a way, I mean,I don't condone violence of any kind,
but I do feel like thatsometimes people pushes us to that
limit.
(15:36):
Do you, even if you didn'tlike the guy, do you think without
all of the antagonizing thatMelvin did, that this would have
ever happened?
Oh, no, no, I don't think it would.
I think it was caused by hisantagonist, antagonist antagonizing
of John and John's family.
His abuse of.
Of Lucy, which was severe.
(15:57):
His abuse of the other membersof the Tero family.
And I think it just.
That one day it just snappedand he was going to put an end to
it.
Now back to the trial.
There is a lot that goes tothe trial.
You guys need to read that.
But the most captivating part,and I think you kind of hit a little
bit on it, is, is that he wasdone with.
(16:18):
In 15 minutes they came backwith the verdict.
Do you think that that was fair?
You touched on him beingatheist, you know, Bible belt back
in that day.
Do you think that was fair orthey did use that against him?
Oh, I think it's hard to.
To say what goes on in ajury's mind.
They certainly made up theirmind long.
(16:40):
The trial went on.
The transcript, which I foundwas 2500 pages long.
The trial lasted three weeksand that included numerous night
sessions.
I'm sure that jury made up itsmind despite instructions for them
not to make up their mindbefore they are given the case.
(17:03):
I'm sure they discussed it andthey knew what they were going to
do.
The vote was 12 to 0 on thefirst vote to convict.
The only multiple ballots theyhad, they had three ballots on what
his sentence should be.
None of the jurors voted forthe death penalty, which was on the
(17:25):
table.
And 11 to 1 they voted infavor of life in prison.
And it did not take.
There was one vote, one personto wanted to give a lighter sentence,
but it only took him two votesand he folded.
And they came back with thejury verdict in about 15 minutes
(17:48):
from the time they startedconsidering it.
That, by the way, just pointout there are several other jury
things in this matter.
There was a subsequent jurytrial about John sanity.
There was a jury trial about aguardianship and John sanity.
There was a trial betweenMelvin and Lucy on fraudulent marriage.
(18:14):
In all three of thoseinstances, the jury was only out
five, ten minutes.
Oh, wow.
Now, I won't give it away, butI will tell the audience after he
shoots Melvin, that's not the end.
Got to read this for yourself.
But do you think that the mindwas already made up because of the
brutality of how everything unfolded?
(18:36):
Well, first of all, you haveto keep in mind I always found this
fascinating.
The number one reason whyjurors were kept off the jury panel
was their opposition to thedeath penalty.
And one could argue that, youknow, the jurors that were opposed
to a death penalty might havebeen more receptive to listening
(18:58):
to a defense.
The second aspect of it was,and the state made a really good
case of this.
The initial case the state puton only took about a day and a half.
And the emphasis of thelawyers was a team of lawyers on
(19:22):
both sides.
And the emphasis of thelawyers for the prosecution was put
on that no man should beallowed to take the law into his
own hands.
No matter what Melvin did.
It wasn't John Terrell's placeto take the law into his own hands.
And it did seem that thatmessage got across very clearly to
(19:46):
the jurors.
So after knowing this story,reading about it, writing the book,
how do you overall feel aboutJohn Terrell?
Mixed feelings.
I mean, obviously this was solong ago.
I did not know him.
I do know that my dad had oneoccasion to run into him, and I know
(20:09):
that only through his sister.
My dad never talked about it.
I never heard about that untilI had written this.
And my sister mentioned, justin passing, basically that my dad,
when he had been young, hadmet John Terrell, had visited him
(20:29):
once with.
With my grandfather.
I have mixed views about himas somebody who practiced law, who
believes in.
In the rule of law.
And I can't condone somebodyjust taking the law into their own
hands the way John did.
Yet, on the other hand, he.
(20:50):
His family was so abused thatI do understand his finally snapping
and taking matters into hisown hand as to what followed.
And again, you know, the.
The trial isn't even the endof this.
It goes on.
(21:12):
And as to John's ultimatequestion of his sanity, I can tend
to lean with what I see.
That nobody could have fakedinsanity for as long as John did
from the end of the trialuntil he's death some 13 years later.
(21:33):
Yeah, I, I think that.
And whether he was faking itor not, if he was faking it, he created
his own prison.
I, I kind of feel that becauseI'm going through a situation right
now where there's peoplethat's trying to push me into that.
And I think that sometimespeople go that on because they want
to see what the worst thingyou will do and it can end deadly.
(21:55):
I don't condone violence likeyou don't either, but sometimes it's
just like beating a dog withthe stick.
One day you're going to hithim the wrong way and that's going
to be it and things are goingto happen.
Some, sometimes, some extremecircumstances, you just go, the guy
deserved it.
(22:16):
So now, after finding this outby doing a deep dive into your family
tree, has this deterred youfrom moving on with that project
or has it encouraged you tokeep going?
Oh, no, no.
I, I found it fascinating andI found some other fascinating stories
in my family tree.
On my other side of thefamily, there's my first cousin who
(22:39):
actually may have gotten awaywith murder.
Oh, wow.
He was, he shot a guy who wasgoing to run off with his wife and
police arrested him, chargedhim with first degree murder, but
when the case went to thegrand jury, they refused to indict
(23:01):
him.
Oh, wow.
The interesting story aboutthat and I was really touched by
your beginning.
About 988.
For a lot of reasons, I'velost friends to suicide.
I have worked with a groupcalled the Indiana Judges and Lawyers
Assistance Program for a longtime, which deals with judges and
(23:23):
lawyers, people in the legalcommunity who have issues with mental
health and trying to deal with that.
And in the story I just toldyou about my cousin, he ended up
spending a good part of hislife after that shooting, ended up
going into a mental statemental hospital and spending a good
(23:48):
part of his life in that.
In part, I think it was due tothe impact of having shot and killed
someone even though he wasnever tried for.
Yeah, that kind of weighs on you.
That's why I said to thepeople that's trying to get after
me, I'm like, it's something Iwould never do because I have a conscience.
(24:10):
And I know I wake up everymorning realizing that I took somebody
away because they made me madby something that they said.
So it's always best to justremove yourself from those current
situations.
What has your family feltabout the writing of this book?
Oh, they've been excited about it.
They've Been found it fascinating.
(24:31):
It might have been a differentcase if I wrote about somebody who
everybody knew in the family.
But this happened so long agothat even John's children had passed
away by the time I was, Ithink Lucy died when I was 7 years
old.
This is from research, thisisn't from knowing her.
(24:54):
But.
So nobody in the family reallyknew these people.
So I just think they found itrather fascinating.
Well, I do.
I, I thank you for writingthis book because I've been written
before to saying that a lot ofcrime from back in those times, 1800,
1900s, never gets covered.
Some people think that maybecrime was hush hush.
So when this book came across,you know, when I got email from you
(25:17):
and I got this book, I'm like,oh, this is fascinating.
And I, I read it to my wife.
The, the excerpt from it, I'mlike, this is about a guy who is
related to this guy and thishappened in the 1800s.
He's like, we never hear these things.
We see the westerns.
But I, I thank you forbringing this out.
I think it's something that wecan all learn from that.
Even in those times we had theexact same problems.
(25:40):
Bullying was going on.
It maybe just not as widelytalked about then as it is now.
But I do think that it's goodto see that some of these same issues
was happening back long before us.
Yeah.
And I think if that struck meabout this in the writing process
as much as anything because.
And if you've gone through thebook, you've probably seen some of
(26:01):
these.
We've gotten an issue of incest.
When Lucy finds Melvin in bedwith his stepsister.
There's an issue with regardto abortion.
There is the issue with regardto opiates because at the time when
Lucy, Lucy attempts, she sawabuse, she attempts suicide with
(26:22):
laudanum, which is a tinctureof alcohol and opioids.
And so those problems weren't.
And you mentioned bullying.
Those problems aren't new tous people in 1890, 1900, 1903, when
this took place, we're muchcloser to us and the same problems
(26:48):
and the same issues we deal with.
Teenage pregnancy, another one.
All of those things that wedeal with now and we think are new
and they're awful for societyand it's terrible.
We've never been like this before.
In fact, we seem to havealways been like this, certainly
(27:09):
over the last 140 years.
So why should people go outand buy a copy of the Madness of
John Terrell?
Revenge and Insanity on Trialin the.
Heartland because it's a hellof a story.
That's about the best thing Ican say it is.
You know, whether I tell itthe best, whether somebody could
(27:32):
have told it better, I don't know.
I think it's pretty good myself.
But it's just a hell of astory about a man who is driven to
the brink and takes action andwhat happens to him after that and
what happens to his entirefamily if I can't.
(27:53):
The the opening of the book,the first paragraph is attributed
to Lucy the daughter and saysMelvin Wolf was a mean, lying, cheating
son of a bitch and thehandsomest man I ever saw.
Right to the day my PA put ashotgun against his head and blew
(28:14):
his brains all over DocSaunders office.
Blew him straight to hell.
Blew the rest of our lives tohell too.
In closing, is there anythingyou would like to say to your fans
or readers that may belistening to this today?
Hope you've enjoyed the broadcast.
I hope you enjoyed the bookand if anyone out there has wants
(28:37):
to discuss this with me,anybody in their at their book club
has a need for a speaker,please feel free to contact me.
It's a stephen with aph@terrellrites.com well.
Stephen, I thank you forjoining me today.
(28:59):
I'm about to finish this book.
I will be finishing it today.
It is an interesting read.
It is a page turner and I knowin some degree it could, even though
you didn't really know him, itcould be hard to write these things
about a family member and putit out there.
So I do appreciate you.
Anytime you want to come backon the show, you know how to get
a hold of me.
Feel free to reach out.
(29:19):
Okay, great.
I have enjoyed it.
Thank you sir.
All right guys, that was thegreat Stephen Terl.
You can get your copy of theMadness of John Terrell, Revenge
and Insanity on Trial in theHeartland at Amazon and any other
places that books are sold.
Once again, I want to thankyou guys for joining us today.
(29:41):
I know you have many TortureVoices in True Crime interview podcast
and I am grateful that I amone of the ones that you continue
to choose.
You have been listening to theonly three faceted podcast of its
kind.
Be good to yourself and eachother and always remember, always
stay humbled.
An act of kindness can makesomeone's day.
(30:02):
A little love and compassioncan go a long way.
And remember that there is anextraordinary person person and all
of us.
I'll catch you guys on thenext one.
Don't forget to rate, commentand subscribe.
Join us on social media.
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(30:23):
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(30:45):
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The world loses one person tosuicide every 40 seconds.
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Welcome to True Crime Authorsand Extraordinary People, the podcast
(00:26):
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Here is your host, David McClam.
What's going on, everybody?
And welcome to episode of TrueCrime Authors of Extraordinary People,
(00:46):
of course, I'm your man, David McClam.
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(01:07):
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All right.
If you pay attention to thecalendars, you know it is time for
yet another fabulous author.
I have a good one for you today.
Let me tell you who our guest is.
(01:29):
He is a novelist and retiredIndiana attorney with decades of
experience in trials andappeals at the state and federal
levels.
He has been a frequent speakerat legal conferences and seminars
and was selected to theIndiana State Bar Association's General
Practice hall of Fame.
He is the author of theMadness of John Terrell, Revenge
(01:49):
and Insanity on Trial in the Heartland.
Please welcome author Stephen Terrell.
Hey, Stephen.
Welcome to the show.
Thank you very much.
It's great to be here.
It is my honor and privilegeto have you here today.
Let me start by saying happybelated pub day as your book just
did release on October 29th of 2024.
How does it feel?
(02:10):
It.
It feels great.
It was a long time coming withthis book.
About three and a half, fouryears in the writing and the research
and the editing of it.
But it was a great publication day.
I did the release, the launchparty, if you will, at the Wells
(02:30):
County Public Library, whichis in the county seat of Bluffton,
where all of this book tookplace, or most of it.
And it was fascinating being there.
Had a large crowd, basicallystanding room only, and sold all
the copies of the book I hadwith me.
So, no, it was a good day.
(02:52):
Well, before we get into thisbook, which is very fascinating,
let me ask you, is thereanything else about Steven Terrell
that we should know that we.
Don'T Well, I think yougenerally covered it in your introduction.
I am a retired lawyer,practice for 40 plus years basically
(03:12):
centered around litigation andyeah, and then I always wrote on
the side.
And when I retired I stumbledonto this story and spent a good
part of the last, as I said,last three and a half, four years
working on it and writing it,researching it.
(03:32):
So let's jump into thatbecause this is where it becomes
very fascinating.
John Terrell is related to you.
This is back believe in the 1800s.
You were bored during thepandemic from what I read and you
started digging through yourfamily tree.
Can you tell us a little bitabout how you decided to do that
and what led to this story?
(03:54):
I've always had an interest infamily stories and in fact quite
a few of my short stories hadtheir genesis with family stories
and I took them and then ranwith the stories.
My family was very large and Iwas at the very young end of it.
You wouldn't guess it bylooking at me now, but I had more
(04:18):
than 40 aunts and uncles andthey passed down lots of stories.
And so I had an interest infamily genealogy, had done some work
on it before.
But when the pandemic hit andI had a, had just retired, had a
lot of time here and decidedto do a little more in depth work
(04:38):
on my family tree.
And then I stumbled upon mygreat uncle who I had no knowledge
of at all.
John Wesley Terrell.
The first thing I did after Ifound his death and birth dates was
I did a search onNewspapers.com for his death notice.
I had his death notice, hisdeath date in 1916.
(05:03):
And so I searched on papers inthe area where I live and where I
thought he likely lived orgrew up.
And sure enough the firststory that popped up referred to
the notorious John Terrell andhis murder of his son in law which
had captivated Indiana back in 1903.
(05:25):
You know, doing these familytree researches.
It happened to me too.
I have like some great unclethat was a part of some big robbery
back in the day.
So I went down the rabbit hole too.
I'm like man, is this guyreally related to me?
Is this really true?
So sometimes when we do these,you know, these family tree researches,
(05:45):
we find things that we never knew.
Sometimes we find things wedon't want to know.
Yeah, I, I wrote an articlewhen I found this.
I, I do a column for theAmerican Bar association and I wrote
a column for them not longafter I found out about this.
It was about finding amurderer in their family tree.
And the gist of it was before,you know, you read advertisements,
(06:11):
you see them on televisionabout people finding out they're
related to some king or somehero or whoever.
Well, the bad guys have.
Some have relatives, too.
And so before you start, asyou said, going down that rabbit
hole, you might want to thinka bit now.
Before we get into some of theother parts.
(06:32):
One of the other things youdid find out about your great uncle
is that he was the wealthiestman in Wills county after he discovered
oil in his land.
Now, when I'm reading thispart, forgive me if you haven't heard
this before, but it kind ofsounded like the Beverly Hillbillies
to me because as you could,going on the same thing, Jack Clampet
did you.
They wanted to move to Beverly Hills.
(06:53):
He moved to another town witha bigger house.
How did that part make youfeel that he was actually a very
wealthy man?
Oh, actually, I didn't havemuch of a reaction other than surprise.
But I did know a little bitabout Indiana history and the gas
and oil booms in Indiana inthe 1880, late 1880s, up through
(07:13):
the early 1900s.
And so it was a little bit ofa surprise to see this, but not a
shock.
I.
You aren't alone about theBeverly Hills Beverly Hillbillies
reference.
I had a little bit of thoughtsabout that, except the difference
here was that John was a veryastute businessman, and he already
(07:36):
was an astute businessmanbefore he ever struck oil on his
property.
By the end of 1896, he had sixoil wells producing on his property,
and he was buying businessproperty, buying farm property, was
(07:57):
talking with some businessmenabout forming a bank.
So he was a very shrewd andsharp businessman, unlike the Persona
of Jed Clampett.
You definitely get thatbecause in the part of your book
where the guy comes and says,well, here's your answer, because
he had been asking how fardeeper you got to go to get oil,
(08:18):
and the guys was covered in it.
And he says, isn't this losing money?
Yeah.
So you totally get thatbusiness end of him.
At the very beginning of yourbook where you thanked people, you
were thinking various familymembers, and you said, thank you
for the stories, even thoughthey hadn't talked to you about this
one.
Why do you think they neverbrought this one up to you?
(08:39):
I don't know.
It's.
I mean, the obvious answer isthat people didn't want the black
sheep of the family, so tospeak, to be known for that story
to be passed around about theTerrell family.
And it really does Surprise me.
As far back as that was, I'msurprised that it, the story didn't
(09:03):
get passed down at least tosome extent.
I have a cousin who also isvery knowledgeable about my aunts
and uncles who were, you know,by the time I came along, quite older.
And he was very interested ingenealogy also.
And he confirmed from hisstandpoint that he had never heard
(09:25):
this story.
Wow.
Well, I do want to tell theaudience, even though that you do
say we're just going to talkabout Melvin here in a second, that
he does that he did kill hisson in law in the very beginning
of the book.
I want people to go buy thisbecause you know, that is not the
end of it.
So don't think he gave you the story.
He actually pulls it back andhe goes into, in depth into the story
(09:45):
of everybody, including John Terrell.
So when it comes to Melvin,what's your thoughts on Melvin?
Well, if I can just pause onand follow up on point you made there
a bit that's a point I make inmy presentations is that this isn't
just a story about a murder.
There are lots of true crimebooks out there that are, you know,
(10:08):
and.
But once you tell the story ofthe murder, that's just a small part
of this because it really isthe story of these three people.
And in fact, even more thanthat, if you count John's wife who
we talk about, I talk aboutbooks, I'm sure, you know, it's a
story about people.
It's a story about a time whena lot of people have misperceptions
(10:30):
about what the world was likeat, at the turn of the century in
rural America.
As for Melbourne, you know, Itagged him as the cat of Wells county
and I think that pretty wellsums it up.
I mean in 1903, you know,every generation I think thinks it
(10:50):
invents sex.
And every generation is wrongbecause it's been around a long time.
And Melvin, you know, got twogirls knocked up by the time he was
what, 21 years old.
He first got a young 15 yearold girl pregnant and there's fascinating
(11:14):
little story about her in thefootnotes of the book.
But then he got Lucy pregnant.
John's youngest daughter.
Yeah, he was, he was a young man.
His father was relativelywealthy who was certainly well regarded
in community.
He ended up I think trying to take.
(11:35):
And he was according todescriptions and according to the
picture we have of him, he's avery good looking young man.
And he didn't apparentlyhesitate to take advantage of that.
Yeah, he Definitely did seemlike, seemed like the playboy from
back in that day.
And I agree with you on thatbecause when I read this stuff, you
(11:57):
know, I was born in 72 and alot of people don't talk about, you
know, the sexual revolutionthat happened in 1800, 1900s.
And you're right, everybodythinks it's just something new within
our time frame, but it really wasn't.
Everything that we have nowwas created long before us.
John, though, do we think?
Because I feel like Melvinkind of antagonizes him a little
(12:18):
bit.
Is he kind of known around thetown as a no nonsense kind of guy?
Does people think John Terrellis a bad man at this point?
Well, there's a difference ofopinion about him and you'll see
that come out when you readthe section about the trial.
There was a lot of evidencethat came in about his reputation
(12:39):
for his moral standing in thecommunity and also his reputation
for, for being violent in the community.
And so it went both ways.
You had at the trial, inrebuttal, at the trial, you had some
of the most prominent citizensin all of Wells county, you know,
(13:01):
office holders, bankpresidents, insurance company presidents,
all these people who came inand testified about John's upstanding
reputation.
And yet on the other side, youhad a lot of people come in and testify
about his, his lack of good morals.
(13:21):
And that was primarily based,and this was a 1903 trial that was
primarily based on the fact hewas an atheist.
And that did not set well andWells county in 1903.
And to be honest, it wouldn'tset well in Wells county today.
(13:44):
And the interesting thingabout that with John was the fact
that his father, my greatgrandfather, and his grandfather,
my great great grandfather,were both fundamentalist preachers.
And yet John was very much anavowed atheist.
I'm going get into trial in aminute, but I do have the interesting
(14:04):
question.
So in the part of the bookwhere Melvin decides that he wants
to, in my opinion, antagonizeJohn, he's riding by in his horse
and boogie doing things heshouldn't be doing.
Do you think for any instancethat he felt like John was dangerous
or would shoot him because hekeeps saying, well, what is that
old man going to do?
Yeah, I, I don't think thatthat crossed Melvin's mind.
(14:28):
That's a guess on my part.
I don't have any firm evidenceone way or another.
But based on his actions, hehad been antagonizing not just John,
but Lucy.
They were separated is themodern term.
At the Time.
And also antagonizing John'sson and antagonizing John's two daughters
(14:53):
and their families, doingthings like running them off the
road with his wagon, flashinghis gun in one instance, having his
good buddy, who was known as abrute around the community, a thug,
had him confront John's sonand threatened him, in fact, even
(15:16):
slapped on John's son Jacob.
This guy slapped Jacob'sgirlfriend, later his wife.
Wow.
So kind of, in a way, I mean,I don't condone violence of any kind,
but I do feel like thatsometimes people pushes us to that
limit.
(15:36):
Do you, even if you didn'tlike the guy, do you think without
all of the antagonizing thatMelvin did, that this would have
ever happened?
Oh, no, no, I don't think it would.
I think it was caused by hisantagonist, antagonist antagonizing
of John and John's family.
His abuse of.
Of Lucy, which was severe.
(15:57):
His abuse of the other membersof the Tero family.
And I think it just.
That one day it just snappedand he was going to put an end to
it.
Now back to the trial.
There is a lot that goes tothe trial.
You guys need to read that.
But the most captivating part,and I think you kind of hit a little
bit on it, is, is that he wasdone with.
(16:18):
In 15 minutes they came backwith the verdict.
Do you think that that was fair?
You touched on him beingatheist, you know, Bible belt back
in that day.
Do you think that was fair orthey did use that against him?
Oh, I think it's hard to.
To say what goes on in ajury's mind.
They certainly made up theirmind long.
(16:40):
The trial went on.
The transcript, which I foundwas 2500 pages long.
The trial lasted three weeksand that included numerous night
sessions.
I'm sure that jury made up itsmind despite instructions for them
not to make up their mindbefore they are given the case.
(17:03):
I'm sure they discussed it andthey knew what they were going to
do.
The vote was 12 to 0 on thefirst vote to convict.
The only multiple ballots theyhad, they had three ballots on what
his sentence should be.
None of the jurors voted forthe death penalty, which was on the
(17:25):
table.
And 11 to 1 they voted infavor of life in prison.
And it did not take.
There was one vote, one personto wanted to give a lighter sentence,
but it only took him two votesand he folded.
And they came back with thejury verdict in about 15 minutes
(17:48):
from the time they startedconsidering it.
That, by the way, just pointout there are several other jury
things in this matter.
There was a subsequent jurytrial about John sanity.
There was a jury trial about aguardianship and John sanity.
There was a trial betweenMelvin and Lucy on fraudulent marriage.
(18:14):
In all three of thoseinstances, the jury was only out
five, ten minutes.
Oh, wow.
Now, I won't give it away, butI will tell the audience after he
shoots Melvin, that's not the end.
Got to read this for yourself.
But do you think that the mindwas already made up because of the
brutality of how everything unfolded?
(18:36):
Well, first of all, you haveto keep in mind I always found this
fascinating.
The number one reason whyjurors were kept off the jury panel
was their opposition to thedeath penalty.
And one could argue that, youknow, the jurors that were opposed
to a death penalty might havebeen more receptive to listening
(18:58):
to a defense.
The second aspect of it was,and the state made a really good
case of this.
The initial case the state puton only took about a day and a half.
And the emphasis of thelawyers was a team of lawyers on
(19:22):
both sides.
And the emphasis of thelawyers for the prosecution was put
on that no man should beallowed to take the law into his
own hands.
No matter what Melvin did.
It wasn't John Terrell's placeto take the law into his own hands.
And it did seem that thatmessage got across very clearly to
(19:46):
the jurors.
So after knowing this story,reading about it, writing the book,
how do you overall feel aboutJohn Terrell?
Mixed feelings.
I mean, obviously this was solong ago.
I did not know him.
I do know that my dad had oneoccasion to run into him, and I know
(20:09):
that only through his sister.
My dad never talked about it.
I never heard about that untilI had written this.
And my sister mentioned, justin passing, basically that my dad,
when he had been young, hadmet John Terrell, had visited him
(20:29):
once with.
With my grandfather.
I have mixed views about himas somebody who practiced law, who
believes in.
In the rule of law.
And I can't condone somebodyjust taking the law into their own
hands the way John did.
Yet, on the other hand, he.
(20:50):
His family was so abused thatI do understand his finally snapping
and taking matters into hisown hand as to what followed.
And again, you know, the.
The trial isn't even the endof this.
It goes on.
(21:12):
And as to John's ultimatequestion of his sanity, I can tend
to lean with what I see.
That nobody could have fakedinsanity for as long as John did
from the end of the trialuntil he's death some 13 years later.
(21:33):
Yeah, I, I think that.
And whether he was faking itor not, if he was faking it, he created
his own prison.
I, I kind of feel that becauseI'm going through a situation right
now where there's peoplethat's trying to push me into that.
And I think that sometimespeople go that on because they want
to see what the worst thingyou will do and it can end deadly.
(21:55):
I don't condone violence likeyou don't either, but sometimes it's
just like beating a dog withthe stick.
One day you're going to hithim the wrong way and that's going
to be it and things are goingto happen.
Some, sometimes, some extremecircumstances, you just go, the guy
deserved it.
(22:16):
So now, after finding this outby doing a deep dive into your family
tree, has this deterred youfrom moving on with that project
or has it encouraged you tokeep going?
Oh, no, no.
I, I found it fascinating andI found some other fascinating stories
in my family tree.
On my other side of thefamily, there's my first cousin who
(22:39):
actually may have gotten awaywith murder.
Oh, wow.
He was, he shot a guy who wasgoing to run off with his wife and
police arrested him, chargedhim with first degree murder, but
when the case went to thegrand jury, they refused to indict
(23:01):
him.
Oh, wow.
The interesting story aboutthat and I was really touched by
your beginning.
About 988.
For a lot of reasons, I'velost friends to suicide.
I have worked with a groupcalled the Indiana Judges and Lawyers
Assistance Program for a longtime, which deals with judges and
(23:23):
lawyers, people in the legalcommunity who have issues with mental
health and trying to deal with that.
And in the story I just toldyou about my cousin, he ended up
spending a good part of hislife after that shooting, ended up
going into a mental statemental hospital and spending a good
(23:48):
part of his life in that.
In part, I think it was due tothe impact of having shot and killed
someone even though he wasnever tried for.
Yeah, that kind of weighs on you.
That's why I said to thepeople that's trying to get after
me, I'm like, it's something Iwould never do because I have a conscience.
(24:10):
And I know I wake up everymorning realizing that I took somebody
away because they made me madby something that they said.
So it's always best to justremove yourself from those current
situations.
What has your family feltabout the writing of this book?
Oh, they've been excited about it.
They've Been found it fascinating.
(24:31):
It might have been a differentcase if I wrote about somebody who
everybody knew in the family.
But this happened so long agothat even John's children had passed
away by the time I was, Ithink Lucy died when I was 7 years
old.
This is from research, thisisn't from knowing her.
(24:54):
But.
So nobody in the family reallyknew these people.
So I just think they found itrather fascinating.
Well, I do.
I, I thank you for writingthis book because I've been written
before to saying that a lot ofcrime from back in those times, 1800,
1900s, never gets covered.
Some people think that maybecrime was hush hush.
So when this book came across,you know, when I got email from you
(25:17):
and I got this book, I'm like,oh, this is fascinating.
And I, I read it to my wife.
The, the excerpt from it, I'mlike, this is about a guy who is
related to this guy and thishappened in the 1800s.
He's like, we never hear these things.
We see the westerns.
But I, I thank you forbringing this out.
I think it's something that wecan all learn from that.
Even in those times we had theexact same problems.
(25:40):
Bullying was going on.
It maybe just not as widelytalked about then as it is now.
But I do think that it's goodto see that some of these same issues
was happening back long before us.
Yeah.
And I think if that struck meabout this in the writing process
as much as anything because.
And if you've gone through thebook, you've probably seen some of
(26:01):
these.
We've gotten an issue of incest.
When Lucy finds Melvin in bedwith his stepsister.
There's an issue with regardto abortion.
There is the issue with regardto opiates because at the time when
Lucy, Lucy attempts, she sawabuse, she attempts suicide with
(26:22):
laudanum, which is a tinctureof alcohol and opioids.
And so those problems weren't.
And you mentioned bullying.
Those problems aren't new tous people in 1890, 1900, 1903, when
this took place, we're muchcloser to us and the same problems
(26:48):
and the same issues we deal with.
Teenage pregnancy, another one.
All of those things that wedeal with now and we think are new
and they're awful for societyand it's terrible.
We've never been like this before.
In fact, we seem to havealways been like this, certainly
(27:09):
over the last 140 years.
So why should people go outand buy a copy of the Madness of
John Terrell?
Revenge and Insanity on Trialin the.
Heartland because it's a hellof a story.
That's about the best thing Ican say it is.
You know, whether I tell itthe best, whether somebody could
(27:32):
have told it better, I don't know.
I think it's pretty good myself.
But it's just a hell of astory about a man who is driven to
the brink and takes action andwhat happens to him after that and
what happens to his entirefamily if I can't.
(27:53):
The the opening of the book,the first paragraph is attributed
to Lucy the daughter and saysMelvin Wolf was a mean, lying, cheating
son of a bitch and thehandsomest man I ever saw.
Right to the day my PA put ashotgun against his head and blew
(28:14):
his brains all over DocSaunders office.
Blew him straight to hell.
Blew the rest of our lives tohell too.
In closing, is there anythingyou would like to say to your fans
or readers that may belistening to this today?
Hope you've enjoyed the broadcast.
I hope you enjoyed the bookand if anyone out there has wants
(28:37):
to discuss this with me,anybody in their at their book club
has a need for a speaker,please feel free to contact me.
It's a stephen with aph@terrellrites.com well.
Stephen, I thank you forjoining me today.
(28:59):
I'm about to finish this book.
I will be finishing it today.
It is an interesting read.
It is a page turner and I knowin some degree it could, even though
you didn't really know him, itcould be hard to write these things
about a family member and putit out there.
So I do appreciate you.
Anytime you want to come backon the show, you know how to get
a hold of me.
Feel free to reach out.
(29:19):
Okay, great.
I have enjoyed it.
Thank you sir.
All right guys, that was thegreat Stephen Terl.
You can get your copy of theMadness of John Terrell, Revenge
and Insanity on Trial in theHeartland at Amazon and any other
places that books are sold.
Once again, I want to thankyou guys for joining us today.
(29:41):
I know you have many TortureVoices in True Crime interview podcast
and I am grateful that I amone of the ones that you continue
to choose.
You have been listening to theonly three faceted podcast of its
kind.
Be good to yourself and eachother and always remember, always
stay humbled.
An act of kindness can makesomeone's day.
(30:02):
A little love and compassioncan go a long way.
And remember that there is anextraordinary person person and all
of us.
I'll catch you guys on thenext one.
Don't forget to rate, commentand subscribe.
Join us on social media.
One link to the link tree hasit all.
(30:23):
Feel free to drop us aline@True Crimeandauthorsmail.com
cover art and logo designed by Arsliff.
Sound mixing and editing byDavid McClam.
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Theme music legendary by New Alchemist.
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(30:45):
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