Heartland Serial Killers by Richard C. Lindberg

While I've never read anything else by this author, this book seemed to be a well-researched look at 2 serial killers of a bygone era, including La Porte's own Belle Gunness. I decided to read this book because the Lake County Public Library doesn't have a recent documentary made about her, or a lending copy of another book written solely about the lady serial killer.

Let's start with Johann Hoch. He was a not very attractive man of German extraction who used the 
German newspapers, which were popular in Chicago at the turn of the century, in order to lure wealthy women to his marriage bed. How long he stayed married to them was the question. For some, it seemed only a few hours before he was off on the next train to the next town, with their life savings. Sadly, these were the lucky ones. More than a dozen, whom he stayed married to longer, became the victims of what the author thinks was arsenic poisoning. While the book does not contain any gory pictures of Hoch's matrimonial victims, it does contain a long list of the women he bilked and/or killed. He never seemed to attain the notoriety of another serial killer working in Chicago at roughly the same time,HH Holmes,but Hoch is nontheless made out to be a thoroughly despicable human being. Thankfully, he was caught by Chicago police and executed. 

Belle Gunness is another matter altogether when it comes to "justice served." Although she used pretty much the same method to lure her victims - she put ads in Scandinavian papers to get single men to come to her farm, she stayed in one place, like a black widow spider, and then disposed of her victims when they arrived at her farm. Of course, she kept whatever money and goods they may have brought along with them. She used her wealth to lure these fellows - she 
had a farm and was looking for help, and supposedly love. The book contains a letter she wrote to one of her suitors, which is a fascinating look at how she tried to sweet talk these poor victims out to her farm. Details on her crimes, how she dissected the men like animals and then stuck them in lime, or just buried them under buildings, or even fed them to her superfat chickens{!), are 
particularly gruesome. There is a graphic photo of her last victim, whose brother coming to track him down put a stop to the whole Gunness "murder for profif game. The Gunness story doesn't end well, however, as her farm burns down before police could investigate, and the headless{!) female body found in the ashes didn't fit her physical description. The book therefore details rumors about where she allegedly fled, who the body in the fire was, and asks the question of whether Belle Gunness was the real identity of one of the murderous duo of ladies working on the west coast, later known on film as "Arsenlc and Old Lace." 

In summary, this is an interesting non-fiction book about two really terrible human beings, and the sad, lonely people on whom they preyed in the old days. These killings were a function of their time, and thankfully with the advent of social security numbers and better media communication, nothing as terrible as this could happen in the United States today. 

Submitted by Gerti