Tipton residents poisoned in the 1800s honored with cemetery memorial
May 25—A Tipton mother and daughter were poisoned in 1876. Although their gravestones have disappeared with time, some Tipton residents still keep their story alive.
Those residents recently decided to raise funds to erect a monument honoring the deceased — 37-year-old Hannah King and 9-year-old Mollie King — along with the more than 1,100 people who are buried in unmarked graves in the old part of Fairview Cemetery.
Jill Curnutt-Howerton, executive director of the Tipton County Historical Society, explained the initiative started several years ago, when the Tipton County Circuit Court asked if the organization could house, clean, refile and archive roughly 38,000 old court documents.
As the Historical Society went through the documents, members marked files they found interesting.
Gae Matchette, who works at the Historical Society, was particularly interested in the King case. She retyped court documents surrounding the case and sifted through old newspaper articles to compile a book's worth of primary sources that detailed how Hannah and Mollie King died and chronicled the three ensuing court cases that landed the suspected killer in prison.
She said it took more than a year, occasionally taking breaks, to compile the information.
With most of the information in one place, Matchette and Curnutt-Howerton cued in Tipton author Janis Thornton, who was working on a vintage true crime book at the time. The King case appeared in her 2020 release, "No Place Like Murder: True Crime in the Midwest."
"It's just kind of a strange story that people from Tipton would never know about, I don't think," Thornton said about the King deaths. "I think it was the timeframe and the people involved and location that drew me to it."
Around the same time, Historical Society researchers realized there were more than 1,000 unmarked graves in Fairview Cemetery. Matchette said the cemetery manager was just as surprised as they were to learn how many burials were unmarked.
Historical Society members decided to put up a monument honoring the unmarked bodies, with special attention called to Hannah and Mollie King.
When Thornton caught wind of the idea, she decided to help. During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, she held a book signing event for "No Place Like Murder" in front of the cemetery's mausoleum and donated proceeds toward the monument's cost.
"How many book signings have you gone to in a cemetery? I thought it was kind of a cool thing to do," Thornton said.
At least 30 people attended, she said, adding it seemed like a pretty good crowd for a Saturday afternoon in a cemetery.
Since the book signing didn't raise enough to pay for the granite monument in its entirety, the Tipton County Foundation footed the rest of the bill.
They had to wait a while for the monument's construction. It was finally placed in April, at the entrance of Fairview Cemetery's old plots, in a spot that shouldn't overlap with any burials.
"It's beautiful," Thornton said of the monument. She added she felt honored Curnutt-Howerton and Matchette considered her a part of the initiative.
Murder suspected
Hannah Ellen VanBuskirk King Snyder was born in 1839. She married David King, son of Samuel King who donated the 100 acres of land that started Tipton, in 1856.
They had six children, though only one, Cassius King, lived to see adulthood.
David joined the Army in January 1865, toward the end of the Civil War. Less than two months later, he died of inflammatory rheumatism caused by an injury.
After her husband died, King had a brief relationship with Aaron Niles Lane, who was married. Although she and Aaron never married, they did have a daughter together, who was named Mollie.
Fast forward nine years and King met Daniel C. Snyder, a Civil War veteran who was discharged due to several wounds that made it difficult for him to walk, at a New Year's Eve party.
They hit it off and, after six weeks of dating, married on March 9, 1876.
Their dog died nine months later. Folks assumed it had rabies.
King's daughter died a few days later, on Sept. 6, 1876. Most people once more assumed the death was due to rabies.
Her half brother, Cassius King, suspected she had been poisoned. Days before his sister died, he noticed the coffee waiting for him at the breakfast table was too bitter. He was fairly certain Snyder poured it, too. When he approached his mother with the theory, she was eager to hear his thoughts but didn't seem to think there was any validity to the theory.
King died six days after her daughter. She had the same symptoms as her daughter and suffered a drawn-out, painful death. More people began to suspect murder.
According to Tipton County Circuit Court documents, a few doctors who cared for King and her daughter suspected they were poisoned.
Another doctor who had treated King's family for years, A.M. Vickrey, assumed she and Mollie died from spinal meningitis.
Vickrey was asked by the coroner to help in a post mortem. He mentioned the request to Snyder, noting a rumor that the two women had been poisoned. Snyder told him the post mortem seemed like a waste of time.
The women's stomachs were eventually exhumed, where investigators found lethal remnants of strychnine, which is used as a pesticide.
Cassius brought the evidence to authorities and Snyder was arrested on murder charges.
Three trials
According to a June 21, 1895, Tipton Advocate article, the ensuing trial was "long and tedious."
Court documents show the defense claimed King poisoned her daughter, then herself. Snyder's brother John claimed King told him she had tried to ingest arsenic after marrying Snyder.
He also said Snyder was relatively calm after King and her daughter died, and Snyder assumed he would be arrested first if authorities decided to investigate the matter.
However, most witnesses said they never heard King say she wanted to die. Some witnesses said King had expressed a desire to leave Snyder, though. Several also noted King declined to use poison when her house had a rat infestation.
Doctors called to testify went into lengthy descriptions of the women's symptoms and how they attempted to treat the various ailments they thought the women had. Each doctor was certain they hadn't prescribed anything that would kill King or her daughter, and said they hadn't left strychnine at the house.
Snyder was charged with murder and sentenced to life in prison. The charge was appealed, though, and another trial in June 1877 found him guilty of manslaughter instead. He was sentenced to 21 years in prison with hard labor.
Hoping for a better outcome, Snyder's lawyers asked for a change of venue and a third trial. Their request was granted and a jury in Delaware County found him guilty of murder again. He was once more sentenced to life in prison.
After the trial
Snyder's brother continued to believe he was innocent, though. As did a fairly large crowd of Tipton residents. A petition signed by 800 people — including every juror, judge and prosecuting attorney, according to The Tipton Advocate — and sent to Gov. Claude Matthews, who pardoned Snyder after he served 17 years in prison.
Matthews shared a bit of advice with Snyder, according to The Tipton Advocate: stay away from Tipton.
Some Tipton residents appeared to have believed Snyder's innocence for a while, until he was charged with stealing a horse and buggy in June 1895.
An unsigned article that appeared in The Tipton Advocate on June 21, 1895, stated, "His friends are thoroughly disgusted and will not offer him any assistance, in fact it is the general feeling that he should be sent to the penitentiary to the fullest limit that the law will allow. In fact, he should be kept there the remainder of his life."
Snyder was sentenced to two years in prison and fined $50.
He later moved to Russiaville, married Emma Jane Stroup Castle, then relocated to Tipton. On March 23, 1920, Castle died while making breakfast. She went to pour coal oil into the stove, but her oil had been switched out with gasoline, according to a June 7, 1929, Tipton Daily Tribune article.
Snyder moved back to Russiaville after the incident.
Matchette said she would have liked to have seen Castle's death investigated.
Thornton thought Castle's death was suspicious, but isn't certain Snyder killed her.
On June 6, 1929, Snyder died in a Russiaville train accident. He was walking along Indiana 26 — likely going to a fishing pond, according to a Tipton Daily Tribune article the following day — and was hit by a Clover Leaf freight train.
"Isn't that wild and whacky?" Matchette said. "He finally got his."
Curnutt-Howerton, Matchette and Thornton have several thoughts on Snyder's potential motives for killing his wives.
All three noted King had a notable amount of land that could have been appealing to Snyder. Curnutt-Howerton pointed out he could have been filled with rage after serving in the Civil War, and Matchette thought he might have hated women.
"He sure had it out for women," Matchette said.
While the Historical Society still plans to compile information on other interesting cases they poured over while cataloguing antique court documents, Curnutt-Howerton said more stories like the King deaths will have to wait until the organization finishes its current project: a book about five Sanborn maps that document the growth of Tipton.
Thornton is also planning to publish another book. She hopes to have it out by the end of the year and said it will be titled "No Place Like Murder II."
James Bennett III can be reached at 765-454-8580 or james.bennett@kokomotribune.com.
