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Please note, that I may scatter my own personal commentary throughout the piece. These will be in italics.

Thank you.

Ocey’s lifeless form lay half submerged in the bathtub, her legs doubled, her left hand clutching a washcloth. The bare and foreboding home whispered in despair as she passed through the veil into the next life. The murder of Ocey Snead wasn’t just a crime that sent shivers down the spines of those inhabiting early 20th century New Jersey and New York - it was a story of the Three Sisters in Black; whose story has been etched in the whispers and shadows of true crime history.

Oceanna (Ocey) Wardlaw Martin-Snead was a woman born into a regal family deep in the Antebellum South. A family that had produced judges, politicians, reverends, surgeons, college presidents, and the best of society in those days. She was actually born in New York City but her southern roots ran deep!

Her father, Colonel Robert Martin was a Civil War Confederate “War Hero” (It’s all about perspective…). He led the charge to burn down New York City - a failed attempt. He led the charge to capture Vice President Andrew Johnson - another failed attempt, which resulted in his own capture and imprisonment. He was released and returned to the South after the war where he made and lost a fortune in the tobacco industry.

His wife, Caroline Belle Wardlaw-Martin, was a highly educated woman who worked in higher education. She had been released from a few jobs for “unstable behavior” (more on this to come). They would live together in an Antebellum mansion that would mysteriously burn down in the 1880s. After their home burned down, and they quickly collected a large insurance policy payout, they moved into a small house on their land. The house served their needs well until the birth of their first child, Robert Martin Jr.. Then their living conditions quickly became unsustainable.

The family would uproot their deeply southern ties and move to the city that Colonel Martin had once attempted to burn down - New York City. It was here that Oceanna (Ocey) was born in September 1885. They lived a typical high-brow life until 1900 when tragedy struck again. Robert Jr., suffered a severe head injury after taking a fall down the stairs. This trauma resulted in “brain fever” (aka encephalitis, swelling of the brain) and his untimely death.

Caroline had seen to it that everyone in the family was covered under a sizeable life insurance policy. Robert Jr.’s death brought the family a quick $22,000. Approximately $674,841.20 today.

To escape the shadow of Robert’s death, the family moved into a home on 5th Avenue. A few months after moving in Colonel Robert suffered a paralytic stroke in the home. Neighbors found him after some noise and commotion drew their attention. When they came upon the scene, they discovered him being tended to by his wife and hysterical daughter. Caroline snapped at Ocey, “Not to speak!”. Wouldn’t most daughters be hysterical to find their father has suffered a major stroke and is on the verge of death?

The Colonel clung to life for a few days but finally succumbed to his condition on January 12, 1901.

After the second death in a short period, Caroline took Ocey and moved back to her hometown of Murfreesboro, TN with a notable life insurance policy payout in her pocket. Two of her sisters lived there and they would be able to provide Caroline with employment.

Enter Virginia Wardlaw and Mary Snead.

Virginia was a spinster. Never marrying or having children, she chose to focus on her career. She was appointed president of the Murfreesboro Soule Female Academy in 1892. The school thrived under her “discipline and honor”. She aimed to provide a “traditional education for women with social grace.”

Mary had raised two sons, who were now married with their own families and had become a member of the school’s faculty.

All things were normal. Virginia and Mary may have had moments of awkwardness and little strange quirks but overall they were notable women.

Upon Caroline’s arrival, an odd reset button was pressed. She initially took on the job as a bookkeeper for the school. But soon enough, all three sisters were dressing completely in black dresses with heavy black veils.

Not only did their attire change but their behavior did as well. Buckle up everyone, this is a wild ride. They began going out together after midnight to “carry out strange rituals”. They hired a driver to drop them off at Evergreen Cemetery every evening where they would chant in unison, never in the same spot. They would weave their way through the headstones, focusing on different areas each night.

The most disturbing behavioral change was when they started to break into the girl’s dorm rooms while they were sleeping. They would stand over them while they slept and just watch them. Stare at them. Observe them. Like some kind of psychic vampire. Absorbing their energy.

Virginia, with her influence as president, would pick girls out of one class and place them in another. Only to move them back later, sometimes on the same day or weeks later.

These unsettling developments started to scare off the staff and the students. Frightened girls began to flee and soon the school descended into chaos. No longer was it ruled with Virginia’s stern but welcoming hand. Overall the vibe had shifted. There was now a dark cloud looming over the campus. All three sisters were asked to leave the school. The breaking point was the rumors that Caroline was embezzling. Seeing as how she did the books, that’s a big possibility.

You would think that this upsetting shift in behavior and rumors of embezzlement would dissuade any possible employers from hiring them - but their aunt Oceanna Pollock needed help managing the Montgomery Female College in Christianburg, Virginia. So the sisters made their way to Virginia one by one.

Virginia arrived first and adapted to her new role quickly. Easily falling back into a steady routine without Caroline’s presence.

“The remarkable purity and healthfulness of the atmosphere render the location pecularly eligible for a seed of learning.”

In the short amount of time between Virginia’s arrival and Caroline’s arrival, Montgomery Female College became a place of great learning.

Mary came next. She joined the faculty in a similar position to the one she held at Soule Academy. Everything was normal.

Caroline and Ocey joined next. Caroline was placed in an administrative role and Ocey joined the faculty with her Aunt Mary. Caroline immediately started implementing changes with the students and the curriculum. She was the catalyst for unhinged behavior in this family. She would move students from classroom to classroom during the day with no explanation. Just back and forth all day long. Several random doors in the school had heavy padlocks placed on them and then the strange behavior of three sisters escalated even further.

Their old patterns were returning; they began visiting the cemetery late into the night and performing “rituals” around the gravestones. They broke into girl’s dorm rooms to stand over them and watch them while they slept. No longer were they the punctual, stern educators they had once built themselves to be - now they were mysterious, dark, and unpredictable.

Remember when I mentioned that Mary had two sons? Caroline decided to take a trip down to visit her dear nephew, John Snead, at his Tennessee home with his wife. Her intentions were treacherous ones. She aimed to break up his marriage, leave his wife, and bring him back to Virginia so he could teach at the college. Make it a real family affair. It was noted that John claimed he “wouldn’t let her wreck his home” and sent her packing back to Virginia alone.

But it wouldn’t last.

Aunt Caroline returned a few weeks later with renewed vigor and managed, this time, to convince John to come back with her. What circumstances changed in just a few weeks? Maybe she had planted the seed while interfering in his marriage the first time. Whatever happened - he decided to go to Virginia with her.

However, the trip to his new home, new job, and new life was off to a rough start. John was seriously injured when he fell (or was pushed) from the train as it approached Roanoke. He survived but a few weeks later he was found by his Aunt Virginia almost drowned in the campus’ cistern. Virginia claimed that he had been “checking the water supply for the school”. Things are becoming curiouser and curiouser…This would not be John’s final brush with death. The last “accident” happened a week after the near drowning. He was found in his bed burned to death. The smell of kerosene hung heavy in the air, it was obvious that he had been doused with it and then lit on fire. Whether by himself or some other perpetrator, that was unclear.

Mary, Virginia, and Caroline were the ones to “find his body” and alert authorities. His death was ultimately ruled an accident and a large life insurance payout was handed over to the sisters in the black.

The thing about these sisters is that they always seem “lucky enough” to fall into a great sum of money when on the verge of financial ruin.

Caroline was not done with her nephews. O no. There was Mary’s other son, Fletcher. He lived in Tennessee with his wife Vashti and they had one happy son together, Robert.

In 1906, not long after John’s “accident”, Caroline visited Fletcher. She informed him that the family had property near Chatanooga and it needed “looking after”. She wanted to hire Fletcher as the caretaker. But he wasn’t allowed to bring his family! So off he went with sweet Aunt Caroline.

Before he left, Vashti was highly suspicious and she begged him not to go. However, when Fletcher brought up the money he could earn from this job she relented but made him promise to keep in touch. Whether that be letters or phone calls, she would never lay eyes on her husband again.

Vashti had been given a phone number for the boarding house that Fletcher would be staying in and she attempted to phone him multiple times. Caroline would always rush to the phone and say “he’s sick. Too sick to talk.” This became a pattern. She would call and Fletcher would be perpetually ill. When Vashti urged Caroline to send her husband home, she agreed. Surprisingly. Saying she would put him on a train in a “few weeks when he’s better.” When the train with her beloved never arrived, she traveled to Chattanooga herself to drag him home. In a wheelbarrow if she must. She found the boarding house he was said to be staying in but the landlady confirmed that Fletcher had been moved out by his Aunt recently.

Vashti followed their breadcrumb trail all over town until there was no more to follow. The leads had run dry and she couldn’t find him. She was eventually awarded a divorce by the courts. For abandonment I suppose.

The truth was, that Fletcher and Caroline had not stayed in Chattanooga for long. The supposed property that needed a caretaker was a farce. The pair had quickly moved on to Virginia. The family all reunited again. I really wish I knew what she told him. The lies she weaved to brainwash him. They must have been spectacular.

With the family all together again, Caroline began to play matchmaker. She wanted to set up her handsome, freshly single, bachelor of a nephew - with her own daughter Ocey. His first cousin. I’m speechless. Can you imagine your aunt convincing you to leave your established family, dragging you states away, then setting you up with your first cousin, her daughter?! She was successful. And she was successful! Can we just chalk this up to “different times?” Fletcher and Ocey were married in a secret illegal ceremony. Of course, they could never legally marry one another - they were fucking first cousins!

Rumors began to fly around town about the three sisters. It was said that they held rituals, and danced in graveyards, and when one of the students fell pregnant, they helped it “disappear” after it was born. Supposedly.

It only took two years for the students and the staff to become frightened enough to flee the school and in 1908 the school officially closed. The sisters were now in financial straits again and attempted to sell off some minor assets of the school; pianos, wardrobes, etc.… They even managed to sell the school itself to a man named Sydney S. after it sat abandoned for some time. There was no evidence that they had any ownership of the physical property but the sale appears to be legal.

All three women decided to try their hands at marriage to older rich men for some gold-digging but were “too strange” and this venture failed.

Forever on the periphery of their lives were creditors. Always lurking. Always waiting with a hand out for the cash they were owed. Circling closer and closer, making the women more and more desperate.

The family fled to New York. However, to not rouse suspicions, they left one at a time. Their creditors were becoming restless and threatening legal action. The sisters could not make it apparent that they were fleeing.

Fletcher and his cousin-wife, Ocey took this opportunity to put some distance between themselves and the three sisters. They chose to settle in East Orange, New Jersey in 1908, and by all appearances they were happy.

Ocey gave birth to their first child, a girl, they named Mary (after Fletcher’s Mom…and Ocey’s Aunt. So this child is Mary’s granddaughter and great niece. Same as Caroline. I’m sorry that I am stuck on this, but it makes me so wildly uncomfortable). Unfortunately, and I never wish this on any mother, the child died shortly after birth.

Events only escalated when the sisters showed up on their doorstep…destitute again. Seeing the writing on the wall, Fletcher ran. The memory of his brother’s death was branded onto him so he fled before they could do the same, or worse, to him. Sadly, it had been enough time since the passing of their daughter for Ocey to become pregnant with their son. From what I can deduce, he was unaware of the pregnancy at the time of his leaving.

Pregnant again and abandoned by her husband, Ocey’s mental and physical health took a sharp decline. The sisters decided that their best course of action would be to take ailing Ocey out of her matrimonial home and to their rented home in Brooklyn. Due to their strange behavior and the state of the house, it earned the nickname - the House of Mystery. Mainly because of the three spooky women that occupied it (Ocey never left so neighbors were unaware of her), the strange banging and other loud noises that happened at all hours, the overgrown yard, and because all of the windows had been shuttered up. It was always dark, always cold, and always foreboding.

Lacking the basic knowledge and empathy of how to tend to another human, let alone a pregnant one, the sisters summoned Dr. William Petit.

Dr. Petit observed two other women living in the home besides his patient, Virginia and Mary. Though a third woman would occasionally stop by and “check in on her”, he believed this woman to be Ocey’s mother. He was correct in his assumption, of course. That woman was Caroline. Dr. Petit later recalled, “All of these women must have slept on the floor” for the only cot in the house was occupied on the second floor by Ocey. The rest of the house contained meager furnishings and was, for the most part, empty. Upon his first examination of Ocey, he determined her to be “very frail and very depressed”. He diagnosed her with “general weakness, the result of lack of proper nutrition and proper care.” He gave instructions on how to care for her and left a prescription for “fresh air, a restorative diet, and medicine.”

When Dr. Petit returned for a follow-up visit, he found that the sisters had made no effort to help Ocey. Not a single thing. When confronted with this fact they informed him that they could not afford the proper care because they were paying very high premiums for life insurance. Red flag! Red flag! Danger! Danger! Ocey was being abused and severely neglected. Her body was in agony and her aunts were watching it happen. Probably hoping for her to just die already so they could collect the insurance payout.

As the pregnancy progressed, Dr. Petit was unoptimistic about Ocey’s chances of surviving labor and delivery. He reassured her that he would be there to assist and on August 1, 1909, David Pollock Snead was born. He was born “sickly” and Ocey needed a risky surgery to repair some damage caused by the traumatic birth. Mary and Virginia appeared “excited” at the news that she might not survive the surgery. Excited that she might die.

With proper care and nutrition, Dr. Petit was confident that baby David would go on to thrive but he and Ocey would need considerable care and support from the sisters. It was glaringly obvious that they were unable or unwilling to do the necessary work. When they did offer to help with David they fed him things like sweetened condensed milk and other things to make him sick. He was eventually taken to St. Christopher’s Hospital by his grandmother, Mary.

*St. Christopher’s Hosptial for Children. This was the oldest photo I could find.*

When Mary returned without baby David, she broke the news to Ocey that he had passed away. When in reality he had been abandoned by his grandmother at the hospital.

The weight of the world lay heavy on Ocey. She had now been abandoned by her once-loving husband, lost her daughter, suffered through a traumatic birth, and lost her son. The only person who seemed to be on her side was Dr. Petit.

The surgery was completed successfully, to her aunt’s disappointment, and when Dr. Petit returned to care for the surgery site the sisters refused him entry. They would ultimately allow a nurse to come in periodically to care for her but soon enough all access to Ocey was cut off. Multiple knocks and calls were left unanswered. On his final attempt to see Ocey, he knocked and knocked on the door but received no answer. He entered the house through an unlatched window and found her in a second-floor bedroom nearly starved and with no other food in the house. Ocey lit up when she saw him and said “She was excited to talk to him about something.” He would never learn what she was so excited about because at that moment an aunt came into the room and forced Dr. Petit to leave. He raised his concerns about her not having proper care or nutrition but was placated by the aunt saying that they would have some food delivered to the house soon for her. He was threatened with police if he were to ever return.

He made the vital decision to involve the police. This would be his second attempt to bring in the police to investigate his claims of abuse and neglect. His first attempt had been during Ocey’s pregnancy but his pleas had fallen on deaf ears. This time was not much different. The police went to the home, looked around a little but said there was no evidence of a crime, and left. Shame! Failure! Shame!

Creditors began to call again that fall so the sisters did what they did best - they fled. Dr. Petit returned to the house once more but found it abandoned.

Let’s set the stage...November 29, 1909. East Orange, New Jersey. An elderly woman with a southern accent phones the police requesting a coroner to 89 North 14th Street. There has been an accident.

The assisting county physician Dr. Herbert M. Simmons answered the call and was met at the house by Virginia in her typical heavy black attire. She led him through the house silently, Dr. Simmons took note of the lack of furniture and heat. He said that the house “appeared as though no one had lived there for a long time.”

Virginia came to a stop in front of the single bathroom and allowed Dr. Simmons to peer in. There he found Ocey. Nude, emaciated, clutching a washcloth, and laying beneath just a few inches of water. As the doctor assessed the scene he laid eyes on a note placed neatly beside the tub, resting on top of a neatly folded pile of clothing. It read…

“Last year my little daughter died. Others near and dear kindred to have gone to heaven. I long to go there too. I have been very weak and ill a long time. Death will be a blessed relief to me in my sufferings. When you read this I will have committed suicide. My sorrow and pain in this world are greater than I can endure. - Ocey W. M. Snead.

Virginia would give short answers to his questions about Ocey’s life, her marriage, her children, and the deaths. Dr. Simmons left the scene with a burning gut feeling that something was very wrong here. He had been witness to plenty of death and horror. Ocey had been dead for at least 24 hours, occupying the single bathroom in the home. How had Virginia not noticed her dead niece in all that time if she had been present in the home?

Immediately upon his departure, Dr. Simmons called Sgt. William O’Neill of the East Orange Police and explained what he had just been witness to. He told of the aunt dressed in all black, the virtually empty/abandoned state of the house, the state of Ocey herself, and all his other concerns. Sgt. O’Neill took this call very seriously and set off at once to see for himself.

He would arrive at 6 pm that very evening to an agitated Virginia. She demanded to know what business he had and seemed to be under the impression that she could report her niece’s death, request a coroner, they would take the body away, and she could be done with the situation. And collect the life insurance money.

She reluctantly allowed him inside to inspect the scene, and the premises, for himself. She led him to the bathroom, where Ocey still lay, and allowed him to read the note. He requested to be shown around the whole house, starting in the attic. She obliged but for every question he asked she would only reply with short, angry responses. O’Neill was shocked at how empty the house was and felt. The house was physically empty but the heavy cloud of “dark” that hung in every corner gave the house a depressive air. He found one small bit of life in what he assumed was Ocey’s bedroom. She had a cot, one small table, and a locket with a baby’s picture and a lock of hair tucked neatly inside. A note, in minuscule writing, said “David Snead’s first hair, 1909.”

By this time, it was dark, and Sgt. O’Neill followed Virginia silently from room to room with only a gas lamp to light the way. The remainder of the house held remnants of broken furniture and trash. At the end of his grand tour, he requested Virginia to accompany him to the station for further questions. She was gravely surprised but gathered a small bag of belongings and went without further argument.

Now at the police station, Virginia stopped cooperating. The situation was escalated and she was now being interviewed by Police Chief James Bell. Virginia appeared to have a, rather rehearsed, answer for everything and nothing. She would not provide information about their living situation, or why they lived in squalor but she appeared to be very poised and polished. Any information about Ocey; her family, background, names of any other relatives, or even her maiden name. Chief Bell shared with Virginia that Ocey’s death was “curious” to him. With the state of Ocey’s body being so frail, how could she have drowned herself? Would she have been able to fight against those primal instincts enough to actually kill herself in just a few inches of water?

Virginia Wardlaw was booked as a material witness and taken to the Essex County Jail.

Ocey’s autopsy was conducted the next day, November 30, 1909. Her cause of death was determined to be drowning but the starvation had been a contributing factor in her demise. She was said to have been “emaciated to the last degree” and only weighed 80 lbs. at the time of her death. This brings into question the note; Would she have been able to keep a steady hand to write the suicide note as it was?

A case was officially opened and investigators set to work tracking Virginia’s and Ocey’s movement to East Orange. A local cab driver attested to picking up the ladies from the train station sometime before November 24th and delivering them to the house on 14th Street. The same driver claimed to have picked up Virginia and taken her to a local doctor, Charles Teeter to request that he accompany her back to her home and certify a health certificate for Ocey. He initially protested but relented. He examined Ocey and found her extremely frail with the possibility of having bronchitis he deemed her healthy. What kind of health professional would look at Ocey, just days from her death at this point, and deem her “healthy”? There was nothing “healthy” about her or her living conditions. Was he bribed? This “health certificate” only continued to raise suspicions from investigators.

Several people and businesses turned up as having interacted with Virginia leading up to Ocey’s death. Almost every person she interacted with mentioned that she was always asking about medical treatments and local doctors. The most bothersome activity they uncovered about Virginia, was that she was not staying in the “house of squalor” but in the city’s fanciest hotels and enjoying fine dining.

Investigators continued to follow the threads of Virginia and Ocey’s life and it led them to Brooklyn, New York where they discovered The House of Mystery that the sisters had previously abandoned. It still sat abandoned. They managed to find the janitor in charge of the building (the superintendent) and made their way in. The inside was just as bleak and empty as the New Jersey house.

Upon a cursory walk through they found nothing of significance but when they were leaving they were approached by a reporter who had been stalking around outside the house, waiting. He asked if they had seen the “red spots that look like blood” by the door. They had not. Turning around they found and followed the faint trail through the house, up the stairs, and into one of the bedrooms where it dead-ended.

While the officials were busy following a dead end, the reporter opened the oven in the kitchen and made a nasty discovery. I can only imagine the yelp that must have emanated from him when he opened that door. "A mass of yellow hair wrapped up with two irregularly shaped bones”. One resembled a human femur and the other part of a skull (a nose bone and part of the eye socket). They were very small, child-size.

When the janitor was questioned, he said that Ocey and her husband Fletcher had come first, followed by two women in heavy black veils and dresses. Then a third woman in black arrived and Fletcher left. From that point on the women were constantly behind on rent. The house went from a normal happy family home to a den of horrors.

You might notice some conflicting accounts here if you have been following along closely. I am not 100% sure that this Brooklyn home was the home that Fletcher and Ocey initially moved to or if they moved to East Orange, New Jersey, Fletcher left, and THEN Ocey came to Brooklyn. The timeline is kind of…fuzzy here. However it happened, Ocey ended up in East Orange, New Jersey where she drowned after being slowly tortured by her family.

Thankfully, investigators were able to track down Dr. Petit and question him. He excitedly answered all their questions and informed them of his role in the situation. Dr. Petit had been the only one to truly show any concern for Ocey and he was devastated to hear of her passing. He would explain how every time he visited Ocey, one or more of the sisters would hover around so he was never able to ask Ocey anything personal or learn anything about her. Every question he posed to her would be readily answered by one of the sisters.

The air of intimidation that hung around Ocey while Dr. Petit or one of his nurses was present was obvious. Ocey was scared to talk to him. She was terrified.

Investigators invited Dr. Petit into the Brooklyn home where they showed him the suspected blood stains but he determined that they were most likely stains from tobacco juice left behind by a careless worker. The bones in the oven, he had no answer for but he didn’t believe they were human.

While the investigation continued, it was uncovered that a Brooklyn attorney had been recommended to Virginia through a friend at church. The most surprising thing about that is that she attended church. William Fee was invited over to the house just months before Ocey was moved to New Jersey. He was told that Ocey wanted to draw up a will as her old one would no longer suffice. She wanted to include provisions for her child (she was either very pregnant or David was a fresh newborn from what I can gather). Instructions were dictated by Virginia with Caroline supervising while Ocey just watched. Later, when asked about this meeting, William told detectives that he believed Ocey to be sick and dying so she was getting her affairs in order. “All her debts should be paid out of her estate and her son should inherit $500. The rest should be left to her grandmother, Martha Eliza Wardlaw.”

Chief Bell paid Virginia a visit in her Essex County Jail cell to inquire about the will and the state of Ocey that the attorney had seen her in. She vehemently denied all accusations of neglect or that she had conspired to kill her niece for some inheritance.

The case was now on the verge of going cold with no further leads coming in.

Until O’Neill came in with witness testimony confirming the neglect (I believe this testimony came from Dr. Petit, his nursing staff, and neighbors in the Brooklyn area). Bell no longer needed Virginia’s confession to pursue murder charges. There were two prevailing theories; that Ocey had attempted to take a bath, she was found in the tub by her aunt who then held her underwater, OR that Ocey had been placed in the tub by her aunt and was too weak to fight back when held under a few inches of water.

*An actual newspaper clipping*

The news of Virginia’s indictment for the murder of her niece went viral. The macabre story was being told from beginning to end in all of the newspapers.

Mary Snead was found to be living with her mother in a basement apartment in New York City. She confirmed most of Virginia’s story, adding only small insignificant details. The most important information she shared with investigators was the family incest secret. She let it be known that her son and niece were married and had birthed two children together. When asked about Ocey’s treatment after Fletcher abandoned them, she said they never mistreated or neglected Ocey.

“If she did without food or heat, they did so also due to a lack of money”

— Mary Snead

A warrant had not been issued for Mary at this point and thus she refused to tell them where Caroline was, or to leave her apartment. Officials were forced to leave but she remained under constant observation

Ocey Snead was laid to rest in the Mount Hope Cemetery in New York City on December 7, 1909. Mary attended the service graveside however prison authorities refused Virginia’s request to attend or even view the body. For good reason. If you murder someone and are caught immediately, you should NOT be able to go to their funeral. There would be no funeral without your involvement! Caroline did not attend her daughter’s funeral or send word.

*Ocey’s grave remains unmarked but is documented to be where the black hat sits in this image*

Sensational news coverage blanketed to community. Reporters began to portray Virginia as a crazy, eccentric, yet cunning woman. They spread rumors of suspicious deaths, weird behavior, and insurance fraud. Her lawyer attempted to present her as empathetic, of Christian faith, and able to express human emotion such as worry and concern. These attempts would be futile in the court of public opinion. She was a murderous freak to them.

As investigators continued to work the case, with reporters trailing them all over New York and New Jersey, they came to the belief that all four women had been living at the house in Brooklyn when they concocted the long, painful, drawn-out scheme to murder Ocey in order to collect a large insurance payout. More and more insurance policies were popping up everywhere for Ocey, though most of them were worthless because they had been borrowed against to their maximum value. The sisters had been using these as their basic income. The ultimate payout for Ocey’s death would have been $32,000 or approximately $1,090,000 today.

The press began to link the sisters and their “bizarre behavior” together as they followed detectives. They made the connection that Caroline appeared to be the ring leader in the murder to kill her daughter.

Caroline was eventually found in New York City on December 14, 1909. She was registered at the Bayard Hotel under Mrs. Maybrick.

*The Bayard-Condict Building*

The hotel manager had called the police to report the “bizarre actions of a guest who had checked in earlier that day. She was an elderly woman dressed in veiled, black clothing and was acting in a suspicious manner.”
Detective O’Neill would arrive at the hotel later that day with a swarm of reporters on his tail.

Caroline may have been discovered but they did not have enough evidence to tie her to the death of her only daughter. She refused to open the hotel door because O’Neill did not have a warrant. As a ploy to get her out of the room, they convinced her to change rooms so the reporters stalking the hotel wouldn’t know which room she was in.

This was a successful tactic.

Caroline was moved to a new room and her previous room was thoroughly inspected. She had left behind a small black tin box that was filled to bursting with suicide notes. As if she had been practicing the letter over and over and over. This was enough cause to issue an arrest warrant for Caroline. She was taken into custody and held by New York police for extradition to New Jersey.

From letters and information gleaned from acquaintances and friends, the police were convinced that Caroline was the guiding power of the family group. They were convinced that Mary had a part as well but they were unsure what exactly. They uncovered enough for an arrest warrant, though. Mary would be arrested two days after Caroline. Her basement apartment would be thoroughly searched and another batch of suicide notes were found. There seemed to be notes for every occasion. It sounds like a map of all the ways they could kill Ocey.

Finally in police custody, Caroline was officially interviewed. She gave the exact information that her sisters had given, almost verbatim. She explained that Ocey was “sickly and despondent and had been so for many months.” She claimed that her daughter often threatened suicide, that she had discovered the pile of suicide notes and confiscated them in an effort to dissuade her from continuing the behavior.

“It is the custom of educated and refined people to leave notes upon committing suicide. The illiterate and unrefined rarely do. It was perfectly natural then for her to make the note she left as nearly perfect as she could. It seems to a most natural thing to do.”

— Mother Dearest, Caroline

This seemed quite unnatural to investigators, though.

Fletcher was found in much-improved health working in Canada. He denied his identity at first but after some badgering, he relented and agreed to an interview but he refused to accompany them back to New Jersey. He claimed that he abandoned his wife and unborn child to avoid testifying in court against a childhood friend and former employer in a bank fraud case. Claiming “Southern pride was at the heart of the manner.” His mother and aunts had claimed him to be dead to protect him. He loved his wife and didn’t believe that they would hurt her.

He refused further comment. Oh, he knew. He knew that Ocey was in danger but he wanted to get out and save his own skin. Maybe he thought that if she had all the attention of the sisters they wouldn’t target him.

Prosecutor Wilbur Mott could try only one sister as the principal in the murder and the others as accessories. Caroline was most likely the ring leader however, Virginia was the only one known to be the house when Ocey died.

As the trial loomed ever closer, O’Neill continued his investigation. Upon further inspection of the bathroom at the house in New Jersey, he discovered a small vile of liquid that was determined to be morphine. This would match the findings of her autopsy. There had been liquid morphine in her stomach at the time of her death. The prosecutor put forth the theory that the sisters had been administering the morphine for several days leading up to her death. She would have been unconscious during her murder. She would not have been able to fight back or resist in any manner. It sounds like a relief to be honest. She went gently after so much torture.

The sister’s first court appearance was on January 29, 1910. It was a joint appearance and they were dressed in their normal heavy black veils and dresses. It was difficult to tell them apart as they all took turns to plead “Not Guilty”.

A trial date was set to start on April 11, 1910. However, a series of unfortunate events plagued the trial, causing multiple delays.
First, Virginia’s health declined rapidly. She became sickly in April and officials noted that she was starving herself. She was removed from the jail and admitted to a hospital. She was intentionally killing herself to keep from standing trial. Delay.

In May Detective O’Neill contracted scarlet fever. Delay.

In June, Martha Eliza Wardlaw (the sister’s mother, Ocey’s grandmother) and the infant David both died. Delay.

In August, the prosecutor suffered from sunstroke while on vacation and Virginia died from starvation (despite attempts to force-feed her). Delay.

From this point, the trial proved to be more difficult. The only person who had admitted to being in the house where Ocey died was Virginia and there was speculation that the prosecution might drop charges against the two remaining sisters. However, a new trial date was set for September.

Oh, but wait! There’s one more delay.

On September 24, 1910, Caroline’s 65th birthday, her attorney began proceedings to have Caroline declared legally insane. It is at this point of our story that I will introduce another sister, Bessie, and their brother Albert. They used the family money to hire this defense attorney. The court ordered her to be examined by three separate physicians and set a sanity hearing for November of that year.

The sanity hearing offered days and days of witness testimony to her mental instability. They told of her strange behavior, such as; collecting newspaper clippings, obsessively fretting over money, hoarding old clothing, and controlling (and ultimately ruining) her two sisters’ lives. She would continuously have outbursts in the court, yelling things like, “I have never said a thing he is telling!” and yelling directly at the presiding judge.

Even her brother Albert took the stand, testifying that she had always been “controlling, manipulative, and strange.” He noted that around 1890-91 there was a marked change in Caroline. She became more irrational, more bizarre, and was very quick to anger. She would refer to herself as “Salvatore” and claimed to be “equal to her creator”. Was she calling herself God?

Oddly enough, with each outburst, she would ever so slightly lift her veil to watch the judge’s reaction (I imagine the dark, heavy veil was difficult to see through properly).

On December 9, she was declared sane enough to stand trial. She was competent though the judge deemed her emotionally unbalanced. She even claimed herself to be sane and when the judge pointed this out a physician in the court stated,

“A common delusion of insane people. She says she is sane and the rest of the world is insane.”

Without the shield of insanity, her attorneys urged her to plead guilty to a lesser charge. On January 9, 1912 (404 days after Ocey’s death) Caroline pleaded No Contest to Manslaughter. She voiced her argument for “involuntary manslaughter” at the time of the plea agreement announcement, but the prosecutor raised his voice in return, “Manslaughter, Ma’am! This is not the time for you to talk!”.

She was sentenced to ten years in a state prison. O damn, a state prison in early 1900’s America. She was in the shit now. Most observers felt that because of her age and mental condition, she should serve some time in a mental institution or be released to her family to be placed in a private sanitarium. Her sentence was reduced to seven years.

After a tearful goodbye with her sisters Mary and Bessie, she left on February 8, 1912. She gradually became more and more despondent as time went on. Falling into periods of stupor followed by periods of hysteria.

Caroline Martin would die of heart disease on June 20, 1913. She was shipped home to the south for burial with barely a blip in the local newspaper.

As for Mary Snead. All charges against her were dropped. She was free to go and went to live with her, unknown up till now, son Albert Snead in Colorado. She would live until 1937 in obscurity.

As we bid farewell to the sisters in black, we find ourselves lingering at the crossroads of horror and true crime. Was it greed, desperation, or something more sinister driving these women to do the unthinkable? Perhaps the walls of their houses still whisper, revealing fragments of their story. I invite you to share your theories, musings, and speculations in the comment section below. What do you think really happened behind closed doors? In the shadows? When no one was looking? Let’s weave our own folklore around the Three Sisters in Black!

Now that we have journeyed through the whispers and fraud, I would like to show you the art that was inspired by this story.

The Dakota Building in New York City. You can read more in-depth information about the artwork in my Art Shop and purchase a print. Read more here…

Remember - the truth often wears a veil.

SOURCES:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocey_Snead

Morbid Podcast. Episode 571. "The Black Sisters and the Murder of Ocey Snead"

NJHM - The East Orange Bathtub Mystery 1 (archive.org)

Whispers of Fraud: The Death of Ocey Snead

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Whispers of Fraud: The Death of Ocey Snead

Howling Shadows: The Legend of the Cù Sìdhe

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