Culture
Albert Fish, or “The Brooklyn Vampire,” is the worst killer in US history. He chose only children as victims, whom he killed and ate. This man's perversions were so horrible that no one ever doubted that he was mentally ill. Despite this, Fish was found to be sane and sentenced to death.
Albert was named Hamilton when he was born. Hamilton Fish was born in 1870 in Washington to a very respectable family. However, many of his relatives suffered from various mental illnesses. Hamilton spent his high school years in boarding school, where he first started receiving corporal punishment, as well as watching other students receive it. It was during this period that his first homosexual contacts began. When he came of age, he moved to New York City, where he changed his name to Albert because he was teased with “ham and eggs” at school.
His mother soon insisted on him getting married. His wife gave birth to him six children. She later assured that Fish was a good family man, although his behavior was very strange at times. For example, one day, he intentionally hurt his hand badly with a nail.
Fish was first arrested in 1903 for robbing the store where he worked. He was sent to jail, where he spent two years. But he wasn't destined to go down in forensic history as a burglar. Fish only became a serial killer in the 1920s when he was about 50 years old. However, the investigation revealed that he committed the first murder of a child in 1910 in Wilmington. Fish also raped boys several times, but he managed to go unpunished every time.
On the morning of July 14, 1924, 8-year-old Francis McDonnell disappeared. He was last seen leaving the playground accompanied by a thin middle-aged man with a gray mustache dressed in grey clothes. A few hours later, Francis's body was found in the woods. The child was severely beaten, raped and strangled with his own braces. The police began searching for the “grey man”, which was the name of the murderer. However, the investigation did not produce any results.
On February 11, 1927, 4-year-old Billy Gaffney went missing outside his home. The boy next door, Billy played with, said that they were approached by a thin old man with a thick mustache and took Billy away. The baby's body was never found. Another incident occurred on June 3, 1928. This time, the crime was somewhat different from the previous two cases. Eduard, 17, who was looking for a job, posted an ad in the newspaper. He was answered by a man who introduced himself as Frank Howard. Howard soon came to Edward's house; he was old, thin, and had a thick gray mustache. He made a good impression on the family.
Howard visited them again, ostensibly to finalize the young man's employment agreement. On his last visit, he offered to take one of Edward's younger sisters, 10-year-old Grace, to a children's party. After some hesitation, her parents agreed to let her go with a respectable and charming gentleman. Needless to say, they never saw their daughter again.
The police immediately began searching for the missing girl. It soon became clear that there was no such person as Frank Howard. However, no traces of the child were found and the case was closed several months later due to lack of evidence that Grace Budd was killed.
Ten years later, Fish, whose brain seems to have become even more vague, wrote a letter to the girl's mother telling her in detail what he had done to her daughter. He wrote that he took Grace to an empty house he rented in advance, stripped the baby, strangled her, and then cut the soft parts of her body and roasted them in the oven. He ate the girl for nine days.
The investigation into the case has been reopened. This time it was led by Detective William King, who worked very carefully on all options. After a while, Albert Fish was in the hands of the police.
The exact number of victims of the serial killer remains unknown. It is believed that he killed 7-15 people. Fish raped some of them. During the investigation, he described in detail how he killed children, cooked them and ate them. He was also prone to self-torture: he whipped himself, burned himself, and beat himself with a stick. During a medical examination, the accused found 27 needles that he had driven into his groin.
Ironically, psychiatrists found the offender to be sane. When Fish found out that he was about to be executed in an electric chair, he said that he was very interested in the punishment. On January 16, 1936, he was executed.