Serving proudly since 1873 as the beautiful Nebraska Panhandle's first newspaper

Across the Fence: Hell departed

It was late May, 1873 when LeRoy Dick, appointed officer for the township of Osage, Kansas, along with an organized group of 75 men from Montgomery and Labette counties descended the surrounding hills to the Bender homestead. The Bender Inn had been abandoned for several days and nearly all merchandise, household goods and possessions had been removed. Officer Dick gathered up a few remaining items that might provide clues or perhaps evidence of what had happened inside the four walls of the 16 x 24 foot cabin.

Among the items that officer Dick confiscated were a carpenter's claw hammer, a cobbler's hammer, a small sledgehammer and a Roman Catholic prayer book. Officer Dick thumbed the pages, but found the inscriptions written inside to be in German and could not decipher them. Colonel Ed York from Fort Scott, Kansas had been searching for weeks for his missing brother and was among the 75 men who had joined officer Dick. Colonel York discovered a common kitchen paring knife with a blood stained blade hidden behind a mantle clock and slipped the gory weapon into his coat pocket.

The stench inside the cabin was nauseating and several of the searchers covered their noses and mouths with a handy kerchief. It was discovered that the sickening smell came from beneath the floor under a trap door that had been nailed shut. Prying the door open the posse discovered a stone walled cellar the floor and walls of which were covered with dried and clotted blood.

Expecting to find decomposing bodies beneath the cabin's floor, several men put their weight against the cabin walls and pushed it off the foundation. Nothing was found. Daylight was fading and officer Dick had called off the search when Colonel York, already seated in his buggy, noticed an odd shaped depression in the prairie ground some distance from the cabin. Getting down from the buggy, Colonel York pulled his shovel from under the seat and walked to the site. Others joined him and silently began to dig. In the shallow grave, scarcely covering his feet, the body of Dr. William H. York was found. Colonel York's brother had been buried face down, the back of his skull had been shattered and his throat sliced from jawbone to jawbone.

The following morning the men returned with shovels, spades and plows and exhumed an additional nine bodies, each with smashed skulls and slit throats. Dismembered body parts of other victims were found and determined to be from at least three separate persons. One grave contained two bodies, that of a man and an infant girl, the man's skull had been shattered and his throat cut. The baby had been buried alive.

As the gruesome scene unfolded, one of the men who was helping gazed in numb horror across the field of graves and mutilated corpses and declared the place to be "Hell's Half-Acre."

A neighbor of the Bender's named Brockman was one of many who were watching the grizzly proceedings when someone suggested the he must be involved or at least have knowledge of what had happened. The men who had uncovered the bodies accosted Brockman and demanded a confession. When the neighbor swore ignorance they tossed a rope over a beam in the Bender house and hung the man until he became unconscious then revived him and continued the interrogation. They repeated the hanging two more times before finally releasing him and, according to one who was there, he staggered home "... as one who was drunken or deranged."

What was the nature of the horrendous discoveries at the Bender Inn?

After the Civil War the Osage Indians were removed from the southeast corner of Kansas and relocated on Indian Territory further to the southwest. The vacated land was opened for white settlement and in 1870 five families of "spiritualists" settled near Osage Township in Labette County. Among those families were the Benders, who homesteaded a section on the old Osage Trail and established the Bender Inn. John "Pa" Bender was a man in his late fifties and Mrs. Bender was some years younger. A son John, in his mid-twenties, and a daughter, Kate, in her early twenties made up the rest of the family. Young John and Kate were the only members of the family who spoke fluent English and Kate was said to be a quite striking and seductive woman. She professed to be a spiritual healer able to cure blindness, infirmities and all manner of illness and also claimed to be clairvoyant.

The Bender Inn provided a resting place for travelers, where they could take a meal or spend the night.

From 1871 to 1873 it became well known that many people had simply disappeared in Labette County. In fact, disappearances became so frequent that some travelers chose to bypass that portion of the trail near the Bender Inn. In the winter of 1871-72 two unidentified men were found with crushed skulls and slashed throats. During the year of 1872, Ben Brown, W.F. McCrotty, Henry McKenzie, Johnny Boyle and Jack Bogart went missing in Labette County.

In December of 1872 George Newton Langcor and his infant daughter, Mary Ann, were returning to George's parents home in Iowa. George's young son had died of pneumonia earlier that winter and his wife, Mary Jane, had died during the birth of little Mary Ann. George and Mary Ann had left their homestead near Independence, Kansas and were following the old Osage Trail.

Before leaving, George had purchased a team of horses from his neighbor Dr. William York. George and his baby girl never reached Iowa. In the late winter months of 1873, at the Langcor family's request, Dr. York began searching for the missing father and daughter. He tracked them to the Bender Inn and was never heard from again.

Dr. York's brother, Colonel Ed York, began the search for his missing brother and he, along with 50 troops from Fort Scott, conducted a thorough search of the area. At the Bender Inn, Colonel York was told that the Bender family had seen the doctor but that he had only stayed at the Inn a short while before continuing on. They suggested that he had perhaps fallen victim to marauding Indians. However, Colonel York's searching always pointed back to the Bender Inn, the last place that anyone had seen his brother William.

Colonel York then went to the people of Labette and Montgomery counties and convinced the authorities to launch a legal search. At a community meeting a search warrant was issued and the authorities announced that they would search every homestead on the Osage Trail. John Bender Sr. and John Jr. were at that meeting and the Bender family disappeared from Labette County.

The search of the Bender property unearthed 16 bodies, all of which had crushed skulls and slit throats, all except little Mary Ann Longcor.

A wagon canvas that hung from ceiling to floor across the middle divided the Bender cabin. The back half was living quarters for the four Benders and the front half, with cook stove, dining table and a few saleable goods, was the "inn" where travelers took their meals. Guests were encouraged to take "the seat of honor" at the table in front of the canvas curtain that divided the room. Young Kate would distract and enchant the guest while either John Sr. or John Jr., hidden behind the canvas, would strike the visitor on the back of the head with a small sledgehammer. The victim, dazed, unconscious or dead, would be seized by Kate or Mrs. Bender, who would slash his throat to insure death. The body was then thrown into the cellar beneath the house where in would "bleed out" and be later buried under cover of night.

Detectives traced Mrs. Bender and Kate to St. Louis, Missouri, and though witnesses in Labette County identified them, a judge ruled that there was insufficient evidence for a trial. Young John Bender died of apoplexy in a border town between Oklahoma Territory and Texas. Although he was tracked to that lawless area authorities were reluctant to pursue him. Most officers of the law who ventured there seldom returned. Research has found that John Jr. was not a Bender but was born John Gerhardt in Germany. Kate was neither his sister nor his wife. Mrs. Bender was likely John Benders common law wife and Kate was in fact one of her twelve daughters by previous marriages.

In 1884 a man matching the description of John Sr. was arrested in Montana for a murder in Salmon, Idaho, where the victim had been killed by a blow to the head with a hammer. When the prisoner was informed that authorities were waiting for a positive identification from Labette County, Kansas he severed his own foot to escape the leg irons that held him and bled to death. Neighbor Brockman, who had been hung three times at the Bender house, was later convicted of the rape and murder of his 18-year-old daughter.

Sometimes the evil in the hearts of mankind and the actions of their brutal natures are beyond comprehension.

Among the notes written in German on the pages of the prayer book found by Officer Dick were these chilling words, "big slaughter day, Jan eighth" and "hell departed."

M. Timothy Nolting is an award winning Nebraska columnist and freelance writer. To contact Tim, email; [email protected]

 

Reader Comments(0)