The documentary H. H. Holmes: America’s First Serial Killer follows the life of the brilliantly sadistic criminal mastermind, Herman Webster Mudgett, notoriously known under his alias, Henry Howard Holmes. Through his manipulative tactics, expertise in chemistry and anatomy, and meticulously devised creations, America would encounter one of its most monstrous and depraved beings to ever taint the nation with horror. Like many serial killers, H. H. Holmes had a traumatic childhood of receiving abuse from his parents and peers. With both of his parents being devout Methodists, a Protestant Christianity denomination, he had a profound religious upbringing, which appears paradoxical to his fascination with death as an adult. But there would come …show more content…
Once ready, he wanted to elude his former relations and acquaintances, hence born the new identity, Henry Howard Holmes. This rebirth enabled him to separate himself from his past and leave it behind, a past he loathes. Along with being devoutly religious, his parents were strict disciplinarians and demanded absolute obedience from him or otherwise he would be harshly punished. This authoritarian parenting approach was perhaps the root of his desire for manipulation and conning. As an adult, he now wants an inordinate amount of power and control in his life after lacking them from growing up with severely strict parents. He wants that gratification from overpowering others and challenging authorities. He’s able to scam creditors, evade law enforcement, lure women, deceive people from his tracks, lie to his wives where they would even defend him in court. He was still telling lies to the public on the scaffold before he was about to be hanged, leaving them to wonder the extent of his malevolence. He enjoys letting people believe in the falsehoods as he is one step ahead of …show more content…
H. H. Holmes achieved this, his dream career with the “Murder Castle.” After the Great Chicago Fire of 1871, Chicago was vigorously rebuilding into a booming financial city, excellent for real estate development and spawning job opportunities for people in the nation and around the world. The time was perfect for his new identity and to begin life as Henry Howard Holmes and he knew it too. He moved to Chicago after his streak of jobs across the Midwest and constructed his infamous murder hotel. He was able to take everything that he learned, from conning people to operating on cadavers, and now practice it on real humans and conduct a profitable business out of it. When building his hotel, he would pay for certain things with credit but didn’t intend to pay for it. He would create phony inventions and gain funders for them. He’d rent rooms from his hotel to tourists, especially when the World’s Columbian Exposition was open to the public in Chicago. And after he’d kill the customers during their stay, he would clean their skeletons and sell them to colleges and medical schools. It might appear that he’s a greedy, money-loving capitalist but he’s not doing this just for the sake of having money and being rich. He’s capitalizing on his obsession and for his obsession. He wants the money to fund his bloodlust craving, to be able to continue exercising his
They then realized what they had discovered, they saw the torture chamber holmes used to kill his victims. Holmes was first charged with insurance scams and then later on he was charged for first degree murder of Benjamin Pitezel.
Dahmer is known for his murders, which involved cannibalism and necrophilia. Jeffrey Dahmer’s evil past, including his childhood, murders, and trial, is a prime example of man's inhumanity to man. Statistically, murderers have a troubled background which includes abuse and sexual
The World's Columbian Exposition was a magnificent fair home to ingeniously creative inventions, astounding new attractions, and fascinating celebrities. Designed by renowned architect Daniel Burnham, this dreamland served as a grand display of Chicagoan pride. Little Americans know about the fair today however, and even fewer know about the horrifying secret that lies underneath it. During the fair, American was introduced to the monstrosity of serial killers by one H. H. Holmes. H. H. Holmes exploited the grandeur of the fair to lure innocent people to their demise.
Jeffrey Dahmer is a well known American serial Killer and Sex Offender who killed and dismembered seventeen men in 1978 through 1991. Looking into his childhood, at the age of four Dahmer went through a traumatic and irritating recovery. He had surgery to correct a double hernia but there was a noticeable change in him. He became withdrawn from his family especially right after the birth of his brother. Following this, Dahmer became fascinated with animal bones and started to study different ways on how to be clean and preserve them.
He also made his employees put him on their insurance so when he murdered them he got their money as well. He gave the bodies to many medical schools after murdering them. Holmes went to jail for fraud many times. One of his most diabolical crimes was with the Pitezel family.
Jeffrey Dahmer was a serial killer and sexual offender who committed his crimes between 1978 and 1991 and is widely known to this day. After sexually abusing, murdering, and dismembering his 17 male victims he was found to perform sexual acts to the corpse or even consume them. This gave way to his well known name of the “Milwaukee Cannibal”. Though given multiple diagnoses during trial he was deemed sane and sentenced to 17 life sentences in prison.
Introduction Worldwide Jeffery Dahmer was acknowledged as a brutal horrific killer. These murders were caused by many issues that he had, including: his childhood, cannibalism, manipulation, and attachment issues. Between 1978 and 1991 Jeffery was committing killings around his home in the Oxford Apartment block considered the black community. “When arrested FBI found seven human skulls, two human hearts, a bag of organs, and numerous severed body parts were among the atrocities they uncovered at the home where he killed 12 of his victims” (Caitlin Hornik, 2022, p.1). Dahmer was finally arrested on July 22, 1991…two years later, Dahmer was killed at the age of 34 by fellow inmate Christopher Scarver (Jeffrey Dahmer Murdered in Prison, 2010).
Harold Frederick Shipman earned the title Dr. Death when he was convicted as a serial killer estimated to have murdered well over two hundred and fifty of his patients (Harold Shipman, 2014). Harold Shipman was born in January 1946 in Nottingham, England and lost his mother to cancer at the age of seventeen (England, 2015). Nicknamed “Fred” growing up, Harold was very close to his mother, even known to be her favorite (Harold Shipman, 2014). Harold’s mother instilled in him a sense of entitlement believed to be the root cause for his well-known personality later in life that he was above most people (Harold Shipman, 2014).
In 1861, Herman Webster Mudgett was born in New Hampshire. He was born to Levi Horton Mudgett and Theodore Page Price, “ … his father was a violent alcoholic, and his mother was a devout Methodist who read the Bible to Herman” (Spikol 1). When Holmes was a child, his schoolmates forced him to look at and touch a human skeleton even though they knew Holmes had a fear of the local doctor (Spikol 1). The bullies brought him there initially to scare him, however it just made Holmes become fascinated and soon obsessed with death and the thought of death (“H. H. Holmes” 2). It has been said that Holmes was very intelligent at an early age.
Wretchedly, Harold Shipman was Britain’s most prolific serial killer. Unfortunately, Harold Shipman was found dead by his own hands, hanging in his jail cell at Wakefield prison on January 13, 2004, taking many secrets to the grave with him. Tragically, the former family doctor killed approximately two hundred and fifty of his patients over the course of twenty-three years. The fifty-seven year old was serving fifteen life sentences when he took his own life (Batty, 2005). Harold Frederick Shipman was born the middle child of a working-class family on January 14, 1946; however, quickly he became his mother’s favorite child.
America is infamously known for its notorious serial killers in the country’s history. The country has seen some of the most gruesome crimes, more specifically serial killing, and these infamous killers remain a strong impact on criminal studies and psychological research. Curiosity and interest continue to grow among psychologists, criminologists, and crime enthusiasts. In other words, people are intrigued by the psychology of serial killers; we want to know why serial killers kill. True crime has become a hot topic in pop culture, and there is no doubt that most of us may be familiar with Jeffrey Dahmer, widely known as the Milwaukee Cannibal or the Milwaukee Monster.
Gabriela Botero Lostio Ap Psychology 8 June 2015 Harold Shipman: Doctor or Murderer? Upon hearing the news of a serial killer, first question would come to mind would be why?
Rather than avoiding the spotlight, he craved media attention and seemed to enjoy taunting police with cryptic notes and clues as he left a trail of death behind him” (Chan). His need to kill was only for his enjoyment. “I like killing people because it is so much fun,” he
“I was born with the devil in me. I could not help the fact that I was a murderer, no more than the poet can help the inspiration to sing... I was born with the evil one standing as my sponsor beside the bed where I was ushered into the world, and he has been with me since.” This quote was said by one of the first documented serial killers. This paper is going to state the early life, fraud, kills, and death of H. H. Holmes.
Holmes had another con man that claimed dead so that way they could claim a $10,000 life insurance claim. They both would go and sell things that would “make you feel better” but in reality these were just poisonous liquids that he would use just to kill people. The Police would soon catch on to