In the 1920s, a serial killer prowled around North America, killing women who were renting rooms in their homes, or random women he encountered. In my neck of the woods, this killer was dubbed “The Gorilla Strangler”.
He was born Earle Leonard Ferral on May 12th, 1897 in San Fransisco to an English mother and a Spanish father. Before the age of two, he lost both of his parents – at separate times – to syphilis. Orphaned, he was then sent to live with his maternal grandparents, Lars and Jennie Nelson. Their first order of business was changing the child’s name to match their own.
Nelson was raised strictly alongside his aunt and uncle – who were 10 and 8 years older than him, respectively. His grandparents were devout Pentecostals who held extremely puritan beliefs. They taught their children that sex was dirty, and adhered to a “Hellfire and Damnation” style of tutelage. Nelson was required to become quiet, submissive, and unable to defend himself.
This didn’t last long, though. By age seven, he was expelled from the Agassiz primary school for exhibiting odd, or ‘morbid’, behaviour. At age ten, he was in a cycling accident where he collided with a streetcar, causing severe damage to his head and scalp. He woke after a six-day coma. Afterwards, his behaviour was described as erratic, and he was known to suffer from frequent headaches and memory loss.
Uninhibited from acting recklessly, Nelson began really acting out: talking to people who weren’t there, compulsively quoting the Bible, and watching women, sometimes even women in his own family, undress.
As a young teenager, Nelson began visiting brothels, pubs, and bars around San Fransisco’s Barbary Coast red-light district. He also grew to be quite physically strong, with big hands and long arms.
Nelson’s criminal career also began quite early. In 1915, he was sentenced to 2 years in Sen Quentin State Prison for breaking into a cabin in Plumas county. He was paroled on September 6th, 1916, and isn’t heard from until he’s arrested again in Stockton on March 9th, 1917 for petty larceny. He was released after six months. After that, Nelson was arrested in LA for burglary where he spent approximately 5 months in LA County Jail where he escaped.
In order to make money, Nelson also came up with a scheme. In late 1917, he enlisted in the military, but deserted after six weeks. This went on and on – enlisting at different branches, using different names, earning a little money, and then deserting before being called to action.
This was put to a stop in 1918 when he was committed to Napa State Mental Hospital for behaving oddly and erratically during one of his stints with the Navy. The Navy psychologist in charge of his case stated in Nelson’s file that he was “living in a constitutional psychotic state”.
Nelson managed to escape the hospital at least three times, earning him the nickname ‘Houdini’. On May 17th, 1919, he was formally discharged from the Navy in absentia. No longer a member of the Navy, the hospital couldn’t keep him on. He was released, and his file was closed with a note stating he had ‘improved’.
For whatever reason, Nelson began using the pseudonym ‘Evan Luois Fuller’ and worked as a janitor at St. Mary’s Hospital. There, he met Mary Martin, a 60-year-old administrative worker. They began dating, and were married quickly in August of 1919.
Mary separated from him after only six months. She said he made her life a ‘living hell’ with his “jealous rages, bizarre sexual demands, religious delusions, and increasingly violent behaviour”. Mary knew she wasn’t safe, so she left him.
Nearly two years later, on May 19th, 1921, Nelson found himself in trouble with the authorities again. Posing as a plumber, he gained entry to a residence and attempted to sexually assault the 12-year-old daughter of the residents. The girl screamed, and Nelson fled. He was captured riding a trolley a few hours later.
At a competency hearing, Nelson was determined to be a danger to himself and to society. As a result, he was recommitted to Napa State Mental Hospital. However, his nickname held true, and he managed to escape twice before being discharged from the hospital in 1925.
Following his release, there are two different theories. On theory states his murder spree began the very year he was released. Others claim it began a year later, in 1926. Either way, he did go on an extravagant murder spree.
If the first theory is to be believed, Nelson didn’t waste a lot of time before he began in Philadelphia. He was free, unemployed, and homeless. He began looking for boarding houses with ‘rooms for rent’ signs in order to find lodging. And then his pattern emerged.
On October 18th, 1925, in Philadelphia, the body of Mrs. Olla McCoy was discovered. On November 6th, 19 days later, Mrs. May Murray was found strangled to death. Three days later, the body of Lillian Weiner was also discovered strangled, sprawled across her bed.
All three bodies had many similarities. Each woman fought desperately for their lives, and were sexually assaulted after death. Each woman had their wrists bound with a strip of cloth knotted with a particularly ‘complicated sailors knot’. At each residence, it was found that items of clothing had been stolen, only to turn up at a pawn shop.
While uncertain if these three women are the first victims of Earle Leonard Nelson, they do fit the pattern he established and that is officially attributed to him. He would find ‘rooms for rent’ signs, attack vulnerable women when they were alone, and then pawn off stolen items in order to make money.
The dates of the murders are also quite uncertain – the dates mentioned are what I presume are when victims were found, otherwise the timeline of Nelson’s actions just simply doesn’t make sense.
In early 1926, Nelson travelled back to San Fransisco. On February 20th, 1926, he posed as a potential renter named ‘Roger Wilson’ and encountered Clara Newman, the 60-year-old, wealthy landlady of the 2037 Pierce Street boarding house. Nelson strangled her, raped her, and left her in a vacant apartment in the house.
He pulled the same trick in San Jose, strangling 63-year-old Laura Beale with a silken cord. Her body was found on March 2nd, 1926
Back in San Fransisco, Nelson strangled and raped 63-year-old Lillian St. Mary. She was found on June 26th, 1926. Roughly two weeks later, he strangled and sexually assaulted 53-year-old Ollie Russell in her boarding house.
On August 16th, 1926, 52-year-old Mary Nisbet was found raped and strangled. She was an apartment building proprietor. She was left to be found by her husband in the bathroom of a vacant apartment. Witnesses gave descriptions of a ‘smiling stranger’, a large man who was seen lurking outside of the building. And this sparked Nelson’s first few nicknames in the headlines: The Dark Strangler, The Gorilla Man, and The Gorilla Killer.
In fall of 1926, Nelson moved on to Portland, Oregon. There, he raped and strangled 35-year-old landlady Beata Withers. He son found her stuffed beneath a pile of clothes in a steamer trunk in the attic on October 19th, 1926.
The next day, October 20th, 59-year-old Virginia Grant was found murdered on a piece of property she owned. Her body was found hidden behind the basement furnace
On the 21st, Mabel Fluke, a landlady, reportedly disappeared from her home. She was found, strangled, in the attic.
After that, Nelson returned to San Fransisco – again. On November 18th, 1926, 56-year-old Anna Edmonds was found raped and murdered. A friend of Anna’s reported seeing a “strange, large” man in the parlour of her home, where Anna explained the man had shown an interest in buying the property as it was for sale. The friend’s description matched that of the Gorilla Killer.
On November 19th, 1926, an unnamed 28-year-old pregnant woman in Burlingame, California was showing her home that was for sale to Nelson, who posed as a buyer, when he attacked her. The woman survived the attack, and gave investigators a great description of what her attacker looked like. She said that he was 5 feet and 8 inches tall, well-dressed, well-spoken, stocky, with large hands.
Wanting to flee after the woman survived, Nelson headed back to Portland. On November 29th, 1926, Blanche Myers was found raped and murdered in her own home.
By this point, news agencies across both states were putting out warnings to the public to be on the lookout for The Gorilla Strangler, and urging people to call in with tips. A local Portland woman called, and claimed she’d had a suspicious boarder in her boarding house who seemed to fit the bill.
She told police that the man used the name ‘Adrian Harris’. On the day of Blanche’s murder, she told police that the man told her he was leaving for Vancouver, Washington. He implied that he would not be returning for some time. What was odd, though, was that he’d paid up for several days, and insisted on giving her as well as the female boarders parting gifts. The police confirmed that the gifts belonged to Florence Monks, a wealthy woman who had been murdered and raped in Seattle on November 23rd, 1926.
Figuring he was done with the west coast, Nelson spent a year heading east – stopping off and backtracking here and there along the way.
On December 23rd, 1926, Nelson’s trail led to Council Bluffs, Iowa where 41-year-old Almira Berard was found raped and murdered. Nelson had garrotted her, changing his mode of strangulation just a little bit.
On December 27th, 1926, 23-year-old Bonnie Pace was found strangled and raped in her home in Kansas City, Missouri. On December 28th, 28-year-old Germain Harpin and her 8-month-old infant were both found strangled in their Kansas City home.
Continuing east, Nelson found himself back in Philadelphia. On April 27th, 1927, 53-year-old Mary McConnell was found raped and murdered in her home. He stole several items, intending to pawn them for cash, but the woman at the pawnshop he visited wouldn’t take them. He left without incident.
Using the name ‘Charles Harrison’, Nelson rented a room in Buffalo, New York on May 27th, 1927, from 53-year-old Jennie Rudolph. Three days later, she was found strangled, raped, and stuffed under a bed in her home. Jennie’s brother added to the Gorilla Killer’s description, stating the man looked to be in his 30s, had a stocky build, a dark complexion, and black hair that was slicked back.
On June 1st, 1927, boarding house manager Fannie May and boarder Maureen Atorthy were found raped in murdered at the boarding house where Maureen resided and Fannie managed. Fannie had been garrotted with an electric cable.
Two days later, on June 3rd, 27-year-old Mary Cecilia Sietsma was found strangled with an appliance cord in Chicago, Illinois. Her husband found her, and also reported that many articles of men’s clothing had been taken from their home.
A few days later, on June 8th, 1927, Nelson tried to hitch a ride out of Michigan. Just outside of the town of Luna, Michigan, a Winnipeg, Manitoba man, W. E. Chandler, found Nelson hitchhiking and offered him a ride. He took Nelson as far as Noyes, Minnesota, a small town near the Canadian border at Emerson, Manitoba.
Nelson decided to walk the rest of the way north. After crossing the border, he was picked up by Mr. And Mrs. Hanna, also from Winnipeg, and they took him the rest of the way into town, dropping him off at a streetcar stop on the corner of Corydon and Osborne.
From there, Nelson walked along Osborne Street and then down Broadway Avenue. Making it to Main Street, Nelson walked into a second-hand store and traded in the clothes he stole from the Sietsma home for “a blue herringbone coat, pants, black boots, a grey felt hat, and a dollar in cash”.
After that, Nelson walked from Main Street back down to Broadway, and to Smith Street, where he noticed a ‘room for rent’ sign. Introducing himself as ‘a religious man’ named Mr. Woodcots, he rented a small room from Mrs. Katherine Hill.
That evening, 14-year-old Lola Cowan disappeared after leaving her home. Two days later, on June 10th, 1927, Emily Patterson also went missing. She was found by her husband later the same evening. She’d been raped, strangled, bludgeoned with a claw hammer, and stuffed under he son’s bed. She was also clutching bloody hair in her fist, presumably from her attacker. Police discovered that several items were missing from the home.
A local jeweller told police that he’d unknowingly bought jewelry from the Patterson home the day after the murder, and multiple items of clothing were found at a second-hand store nearby.
Not too far away, a local barber told police that a man had come in asking for a hair cut and a shave. He noticed the mad had blood and scratch marks on his scalp. He said the man became agitated when he inquired about them, and requested they not be touched. Police figured they had a traveller, and began looking into boarding houses.
During their search, police came across Mrs. Hill’s boarding house on June 12th, 1927. When police searched the room the new boarder occupied, the found the body of Lola Cowan under the bed.
Following the discovery, the city of Winnipeg posted a $1,500 reward for information. Mr. Chandler called in, and told police about the man he’d driven to Noyes. Police had reason to fear that the man who’d horrifically murdered a young girl and a woman might flee back to the United States.
In an effort to catch him, police sent descriptions of “The Gorilla Strangler” to U.S. police stations and post offices. Armed with descriptions of the killer, constables in Killarney, Manitoba, roughly 20 km from the North Dakota border, arrested a man named ‘Virgil Wilson’ who fit the description. He was held in the local jail, but managed to escape the very same day.
Nelson wasn’t quite free and clear, though. In an attempt to flee, Nelson caught a train, but neglected to notice that the train was transporting members of the Winnipeg Police. 12 hours after his escape, he was recaptured. Earle Leonard Nelson was officially arrested and taken to Rupert Street Station in Winnipeg where he was photographed, fingerprinted, and measured.
Winnipeg police officers sent the photographs out to other police departments in the United States, which resulted in multiple positive identifications from witnesses in Illinois and California.
News of his arrest made the headlines, with the Manitoba Free Press dubbing him The Gorilla Strangler.
Throughout this ordeal, Nelson maintained the identity of ‘Virgil Wilson’. However, his identity was confirmed as Earle Leonard Nelson when the San Fransisco Police Department forwarded their prints for Nelson to Winnipeg and they were found to be a match. The prints also matched those left behind at several crime scenes, as well as teeth marks he’d left on some of his victims.
Nelson refused to admit to his guilt, though he made an early admission which he very quickly recanted.
Nelson’s trial began on November 1st, 1927. His ex-wife testified against him, and witness after witness after witness testified that he was the man seen at various boarding houses, around pawnshops, and “linking him to property stolen from victims’ homes”.
On November 5th, 1927, a jury deliberated for forty minutes before finding him guilty of murdering Lola Cowan and Emily Patterson. He was quickly sentenced to death.
On January 13th, 1928, Earle Leonard Nelson was executed by hanging at 7:30AM at the Vaughn Street Jail in Winnipeg.
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Sources
The Strangler – Detective Sergeant John Burchill – Winnipeg Police Service Historical Stories
50 Years Before Ted Bundy, Earle Nelson Was the Most Prolific Serial Killer in American History – William DeLong – All That’s Interesting
Earle Leonard Nelson Wikipedia page