Ep. 43 - The Revenants of Two Bad Marriages

David Gring built a grist mill in Berks County in 1811. Today, that mill and Gring's homestead are owned by Berks County and used as a Visitor's Center and offices. In 1875, the Gring home would host the dead bodies of four members of the Bissinger family following a murder-suicide. A mother, Louisa Bissinger, took the lives of her children in retaliation for a wrong by the father. The tragic circumstances have left the ghosts of the family to haunt this area of Berks County in Pennsylvania. And then there was Ethel Major. A woman an ocean away from Pennsylvania. She was not happy in her marriage. Her husband was an angry man and their relationship had gone sour long ago. Rather than leave her husband, she decided to make the ultimate break. And for that, she paid with her life. She spent the end of her life at HM Prison Hull in Yorkshire, England. And it would seem that her spirit has decided to stay at that prison in the afterlife. Join us as we share these tragic tales that have left revenants of two bad marriages.

Ethel and Louisa came from two different countries and two different time periods, but they both had the same dissatisfaction in their marriages. For Louisa, rather than murder her husband, she wanted to cause him as much pain as possible. Philip Bissinger had been born in Germany in 1842. When he was three, his family immigrated to America and settled in Baltimore. He made his way to Berks County in Pennsylvania and in September 1861 he enlisted in Company G, Pennsylvania 79th Infantry Regiment. Throughout the Civil War, he was promoted to Sergeant Major and then 1st Lieutenant and then ending at Full Captain. He mustered out of the army in September of 1864. Shortly after that, he met Louisa Eben and the couple were married in 1865. Philip opened the Café Bissinger in Reading and he became an influential and respected man in Berks County. His professional life was successful, his marriage on the other hand was a disaster. Louisa and Philip didn't get along almost from the start. Philip moved his mother into their home and the two of them were belligerent towards Louisa. The poor treatment was observed by the neighbors. Despite the unhappiness, Louisa and Philip had five children, Mollie, Lillie, Philip Jr., Louis and an unnamed child. Louis passed in 1869 and the unnamed child in 1874. And Louisa was pregnant again in 1875.

Philip, unhappy in his marriage, had seemingly replaced Louisa with another woman. The newspaper reported after the tragedy, "The report commonly accepted is that Bessinger had bestowed his affection upon an unmarried woman from Philadelphia who was frequently at his house. and who was boldly accorded authority denied his wife. On Monday, as it is stated, a quarrel took place between the husband and wife on this account, and he ordered her out of his sight. He told her he would give her $2,000 to go away and return no more, she to take the two girls, and he to keep the boy, and threatened to kill her if she returned." So things have really escalated here. Louisa was having none of this. Philip wasn't going to separate her from one her children. This fight took place on August 17, 1875. 

Later that afternoon, she left the house with the couple's three children, the group dressed in their Sunday best. They boarded a street car and they rode out of the city. This was a distance of a little over two miles and the group got off the street car and then made their way down the Union Canal towpath to lock number 49 East. Louisa was carrying a basket and she had the children helping her to fill it with rocks. The group passed the canal office and she said to the office manager, "It is warm." He replied, "Yes indeed." She then said, "We have to carry a basket and take the children with us." When they got to the canal, Louisa tied the basket around her waist and then gathered the children in her arms and threw herself and the children into the canal. Louisa sank immediately and lost hold of the children, who all struggled to stay afloat.

A witness saw Louisa make the jump and he saw the children come up. He couldn't swim, so e ran to Gring's Mill, which was nearby, to get a boat. His efforts were fruitless because by the time he reached the children, they were drowned. The bodies were recovered later that day. The children were Lillie age 9, Mollie age 6, and Phillip Jr. age 3, and it was later found that Louisa had been pregnant. The bodies were all taken to the Grist Farmhouse near the Grist Mill. The father was told the news a little after that and he was in the company of the woman who had caused so much consternation. The county was devastated, The children had all been adored as they were often at the father's dining establishment. Louisa was well liked too. She had carried no suicide note and people found the act completely out of character. Captain Philip Bissinger was placed under police protection because people were very angry and blamed him for what happened.  

The paper reported on August 21, 1875, "Yesterday the funeral of Mrs. Philip Bessinger and her three children, whose death by drowning occurred here on Tuesday, took place here. Intense excitement prevailed, and a very large concourse of people followed the bodies to the grave, the procession comprising over thirty carriages and not less than one thousand people on foot. For an hour before the time for the funeral, the house was surrounded by excited people, and the excitement was so great that a detachment of police kept guard on the premises." The newspaper also reported, "When the bodies were lowered into the graves, the people hooted Bissinger, and made a rush for him." The police had to save his life. They threw him into a carriage, which was shot at several times. Philip later wrote the newspaper that his wife had just believed rumors and that there had been no extramarital affairs. Fred Eben, Louisa's brother, answered those remarks by calling Philip "the murderer of my sister and [their] four children."

The anger must have settled because Philip went back to work at his restaurant. He eventually married the woman with whom he had been having the affair, Ida Sebald Rosenthal. They had no children. The Charles Evans Cemetery sits on 25 acres in Reading, Pennsylvania and is named for the lawyer who donated the land, Charles Evans. The Bissinger family is buried here in a plot marked by a large headstone that reads "Bissinger." In front of that marker sit two block stones that read "Husband" and "Wife." These are for Philip, who died at the age of 84 in 1926, and his second wife, Ida. Adjacent to them are the graves of Louisa and the three children she murdered. But their spirits are not at rest.

People claim the ghosts of Louisa and her children haunt the towpath near Lock 49. On several occasions, they are seen gathering stones, but vanish shortly after being spotted. Some claim to hear the disembodied voices of children not only talking, but also their cries for help. Charles J. Adams III wrote in his book Ghost Stories of Berks County about his attempt to try to investigate the ghosts at the lock. (Pg. 90) 

Olivia wrote, "Me and a group of friends went here after hours, immediately before the bridge, there was a rock thrown at a trashcan out in the distance. While approaching the lock we saw lights out in the distance. After we arrived back at the bridge and we were walking to the car we heard a distant scream of a woman, and as soon as we started running all of the lights turned off. Really freaky would definitely check this out."

Bernice wrote, "I have been running at Grings mill for years. I have not sensed anything, but there were times i thought i saw someone out in front of me. I would get closer and all of sudden i lost sight of the person. I thought it must of been my imagination, but now it makes me wonder. It was just recently that I heard this story. I still love going there and makes me feel sad that something like this happened."

And now let's talk about a woman who decided to off her husband, rather than herself. Ethel Lillie Brown was born in 1892 in England. She had a daughter, she named Auriel, at the age of 23, out of wedlock. Quite scandalous for the time. Her parents decided to handle the situation in the best way they could to avoid the controversy and they told everyone that the baby was their child and thus she was Ethel's sister. Ethel would never tell anyone who the girl's father was. Four years later, in 1918, Ethel met Arthur Major. She was swept off her feet and for a few years, things went very well for the couple. In 1920, they had their son Lawrence. They lived in Ethel's mother's house until 1929 and then moved to Kirkby-on-Bain. Things continued to be fine for a while, but eventually local gossip made it to Arthur's ear and he found out that Auriel was not Ethel's sister, but her daughter.

Things went south for the couple. Arthur started drinking heavily and beating Ethel. He demanded that she tell him who was the father of her daughter. Ethel refused and the beatings would continue. She soon found out that Arthur was stepping out on her as well. She decided to make a public display of it and accused Arthur of receiving letters from another woman in the Spring of 1934. Most believe those letters were written by Ethel herself. This only further inflamed a bad situation. Ethel was profoundly depressed at her situation and found it preferable to walk a mile or so to sleep at the home of her gamekeeper father, Tom. Sometimes, she even opted for sleeping in a garden shed rather than going home. For Ethel, things had come to a head and Arthur needed to go. So she did what several other women of her time did, she bought herself some strychnine.

On May 22, 1934, Ethel made some corned beef and seasoned it with more than pepper and garlic. Arthur must not have noticed that she herself didn't dig in and later that day he fell violently ill. He went to bed suffering from abdominal pain frequent spasmodic contractions of the leg and thigh muscles. He was in so much pain, he could not speak. Ethel told him and others that it must have been bad corned beef that had made him sick. Arthur managed to recover and he was soon out of bed. This was not part of the plan and Ethel made sure to dose Arthur one more time with strychnine, but this time, she made sure that it was enough. The following day, Ethel went to their doctor and said her husband was dead. She asked for him to issue her a death certificate and told the doctor that the cause of death should read epilepsy. Apparently, at that time, the doctor didn't need to do a thorough examination and could just take a wife's claim on what was the cause of death. Ethel then saw the Rector, Canon Blakeston, to arrange the funeral service.

Ethel may have gotten away with murder if she hadn't thrown out the poisoned food in a way that the neighbor's dog was able to get a hold of some of it. The dog went into convulsions and died and the neighbor knew that something was not right. A mysterious letter to the coroner arrived claiming that this neighbor's dog had died after eating something put out by Mrs Major. A halt was put on the funeral and a post-mortem examination was ordered to be conducted on Arthur's body. A lethal amount of strychnine was found. Ethel was hauled in for questioning and during the interview with Detective Inspector Young, she said, “I didn’t know my husband died of strychnine poisoning.” Ethel had just revealed herself because the police had never mentioned the cause of death to her. Only the murderer would know that fact. When the missing key to a box where strychnine was kept by her father turned up in Ethel’s handbag, she was charged with murder. Her reply to when presented the charges, “I am not guilty, sir.”

Ethel faced a jury at Lincoln Assizes on October 29 and a large crowd attended the trial. The jury heard the compelling evidence, some of which contained a statement she had made about her husband claiming she could not bear to sleep in the same room as him because “I could not stand it. From the smell of him he had a disease.” She also wrote, “He was a detestable man and I feel very much better in health that he has gone.” It did not make the jury sympathetic to her and it took them less than an hour to reach a verdict.

The Grimsby Telegraph reported, “Sunlight was streaming through the high windows of the court when they returned. They filed in slowly with grave faces … men and women in the public gallery awaited the verdict but there was a long interval before this became known. When at last Mrs Major was brought up from the cells she had to be half carried into the dock with a wardress on each side of her. One glance at the jury seemed to convince her that her fate was sealed. When she looked at the solemn faces, her face puckered and then she broke into compulsive sobs. She seemed to have aged ten years during the hour of waiting for the verdict.” The verdict was read aloud and when Ethel heard "Guilty," she collapsed and had to be carried out of the court. The jury recommended that she be sentenced with mercy in mind, but Sir John Gilmour, who was the Home Secretary, did not care to show her mercy in the sentence. The sentence was death and Ethel was taken to Hull Prison.

The Lord Major at Hull Prison, Ald Stark, sent a telegram to Buckingham Palace asking that the King and Queen consider intervening with the execution and give Ethel a stay. There was a lot of distress at Hull and in society in general at the thought of a woman, who was also a mother, being put to death.The telegram fell on deaf ears. The Victorian designed prison would become the last home for Ethel and it would not be long before she made her walk to the gallows. On December 19, 1934, Ethel Major was hanged at Hull Prison She would be the last person and only woman to be executed at Hull. The staff had to half-drag and half-carry her to the gallows. She was barely conscious when the executioner, Albert Pierrepoint, put the noose around her neck. She died at precisely 9 am. She continued to deny all the way to the end that she had killed her husband.

There are many accounts of prisoners and prison staff having strange experiences at Hull Prison and most of those are related to Ethel Major. Her full-bodied apparition has been seen on several occasions and many claim that she haunts the prison because nobody knows where she is buried. Even Find-a-Grave claims that her burial is unknown. But Hull Prison has an exhibition that features a burial map of the 10 prisoners who were executed at the prison. These included, Arthur Richardson, William James Bolton, Charles William Aston, Thomas Siddle, John Freeman, William George Smith, Hubert Ernest Dalton, George Emanuel Michael, Roy Gregory and Ethel Lillie Major. The document indicates where Ethel is buried, so perhaps if she is actually restless in the afterlife, it was because of the extreme emotions she was facing as her impending execution approached.

Paul Adams writes in his book, Ghosts & Gallows, True Stories of Crime and the Paranormal, "The haunting is well known and despite there being no documented evidence, it was confirmed to me by Rob Nicholson, the prison historian at HMP Hull, that various prisoners have claimed to have seen Ethel Major in their cell at various times and subsequently had requested a transfer to another part of the prison.As well as prison inmates, a former Prison officer at one time reported feeling horribly sick after allegedly seeing her apparition." 

Two interesting and macabre stories and also tragic. Is it possible that a spiritual residue was left behind by these murders? Do either Louisa or Ethel regret what they did? Are their spirits at unrest for this reason? And what of Louisa's children? Are their spirits still here or is something residual haunting the lock area? Have these crimes left hauntings? Are there revenants from two bad marriages? That is for you to decide!