The Blooming Grove Pitchfork Murder

 

A hush fell over the courtroom on a crisp Friday autumn afternoon in 1907. It seemed as if the entire population of Milford was crammed into the tiny Pike County courthouse for the reading of the verdict, even though acquittal was the word being passed around the gallery in knowing whispers. Those from remote Blooming Grove Township were especially doubtful of a conviction; for John Newman was a cantankerous old-timer-- a hot-tempered, drunken scoundrel if ever there was one-- an ornery cuss who many believed had gotten what was coming to him.

But, what should've been a speedy deliberation by the jury dragged on for an hour, then another, and the locals slowly trickled out of the courthouse in confusion as they returned to their homes. There were dinners to cook, laundry to be washed, errands to be run before the downtown shops closed their doors for the weekend. Some pointed to the bell atop the old building. "They'll ring the bell when the verdict is ready," some insisted. "They always ring the courthouse bell for a murder verdict."

But the bell did not ring that night. At around eleven o'clock that evening, October 25, Judge Charles B. Staples rapped his gavel. The jury had reached a verdict, but the only ones present to hear it were the judge and the half-dozen attorneys from the prosecution and defense-- and the two trembling figures standing at attention: the rugged, 27-year-old stepson of the murdered man, William Valentine Podlewski, and his diminutive 74-year-old Polish immigrant mother, Dora.

"Have you reached a verdict, Mr. Foreman?" asked Judge Staples.

"We have, your honor," was the reply. "We, the jury, find Dora Newman guilty of murder in the second degree."

A Murder in Blooming Grove

On August 3, 1907, a peaceful summer morning in Blooming Grove turned to horror with the accidental discovery of 75-year-old John Newman's body partially concealed behind a crude stone wall. John was found in a seated position in his overalls with his back against the wall, the legs stretched out and the head drooped forward.

From the condition of the body, it was clear that John had not died of natural causes; though John's face showed evidence of a vicious beating, the old farmer's brand new striped shirt was clean and remarkably free of blood. Passersby who had discovered the corpse at around nine o'clock that morning reported that there was a strong smell of turpentine about the body, indicating that an attempt had been made to clean off the blood. The discovery was reported to the constable, who arrived late that afternoon. Meanwhile, Dr. George T. Rodman performed a post-mortem examination.

When the doctor arrived, he found the body covered by a tablecloth. The first thing he noticed when he lifted the cloth were several bruises and cuts on the head, but it soon became clear that the direct cause of death was pulmonary hemorrhage due to a gaping wound beneath the fourth and fifth ribs. Someone had obviously changed the dead man's clothing to conceal the crime, and this seemed to suggest that the murder had been committed by a member of the victim's family.

Suspicion soon fell upon two of John's stepsons, William and Anton Podlewski, who were the result of Mrs. Newman's previous marriage. While Anton lived in a nearby boardinghouse, William and his wife lived on an adjoining farm. Some neighbors had overheard Anton threatening his stepfather; others told stories about frequent quarrels between the old farmer and his wife's children. The two young men were located and hauled off to jail by Constable Levi Ford, and later that evening the constable and a relative who was visiting from New Jersey, Manley Lord, entered the Newman home in search of clues, accompanied by Andrew Keiser and Mahlon Perry. They failed to find a murder weapon, but discovered a bloody sheet, rolled up and concealed in a box in one of the bedrooms. Julia Newman, a daughter of the victims who had come to Blooming Grove as executrix of her father's estate, found a bottle of turpentine on one of the rooms.

With Anton and William Podlewski in custody, it seemed to be an open and shut case. But then a neighbor came forward and made a startling claim.

The Mushroom Picker's Story

A neighbor, Mary Yeager, just happened to be prowling the woods in search of wild mushrooms in Sunday morning when she observed Dora Newman emerge from her kitchen and throw a butcher knife and what appeared to be a hammer into the yard. Puzzled by this bizarre behavior, the nosy neighbor retrieved the objects, and was even more perplexed when the hammer turned out to be a common kitchen implement-- a potato masher.

Mrs. Yeager gathered up the items and confronted Dora, who admitted that she had killed her husband. According to the 74-year-old woman, she and her husband had gotten into a quarrel the night before. This didn't exactly surprise the neighbor, as this sort of fighting seemed to be a weekend tradition in the Newman household, often fueled by jealousy and strong liquor. The argument became so heated that John seized a butcher knife and lunged for his wife. To defend herself, Dora grabbed the mallet-like potato masher and struck her frenzied husband on the head. He toppled to the floor, but Dora believed that the blow had only stunned him. Out of fear that John would stagger to his feet and renew his attack, Dora scrambled outside and grabbed a pitchfork. She stabbed her husband in the stomach until life was extinct.

Dora then enlisted the help of her two sons to conceal the crime, which was done in a rather haphazard manner by carrying the body to the edge of the 50-acre Newman property and hiding it behind a stone wall bordering the woods, where it was found the following morning. Shocked by Dora's confession, Mrs. Yeager relayed this information to authorities, and the aged widow was taken into custody, joining her two sons in jail, while District Attorney George R. Bull gathered facts and statements from neighbors.

The district attorney, however, immediately had some doubts about the veracity of Mrs. Newman's story. Upon further investigation, he became convinced that Dora may have had a financial incentive to dispose of her second husband. Not long before John's death, he had sold some valuable cattle without his wife's knowledge or consent. Another possibility was that one, or both, of Newman's stepsons had done the killing, and Dora "confessed" to her neighbor to shield Anton and Valentine from prosecution.

Dora Goes on Trial

On October 24, 1907, Dora Newman became the second woman in the history of Pike County to be tried for murder. Although Dora and her two sons were indicted for the murder, they elected to be tried separately. District Attorney Bull and Assistant District Attorney Kimball opened the prosecution's case by calling forth a stream of witnesses who had observed the body of John Newman propped against the stone wall. They all agreed there wasn't a drop of blood on the dead man or his clothing.  Mrs. Yeager, the mushroom hunting neighbor in whom Dora had confessed, was also called to testify.

The defense, however, scored points by sowing seeds of doubt. When Andrew Keiser and Mahlon Perry testified about the bloody sheet they had found in the Newman bedroom, the defense, on cross-examination, raised the possibility that the cloth could have been used to strain elderberry wine. Another witness, Dr. Alton Catterall, testified that he had been summoned to the Milford jail to treat Dora's injuries. He found the prisoner bruised and battered, and she said that her husband had chased her out of the house with a knife. Photographs of Dora's injuries were entered into evidence in an attempt to establish a defense of self-defense. The defense attempted to prove that John Newman met his death accidentally, by running into a pitchfork which Dora had picked up as she was chased from the home by her husband.

Charles B. Staples, as a Dickinson College student.

 

Dora Takes the Stand

Though she had been in the country for thirty years, Dora spoke very poor English, and when she took the stand, her testimony was translated by a Polish interpreter. According to Dora, she and John had been married for about five years. On the day of the quarrel, all seemed well until John commanded her to pick up a pitchfork and pile hay. She protested, claiming that she was suffering from arthritis.

"You damned old fool!" replied her husband. "If you can't work, I have no use for you. If I have to work alone, I won't feed you and you'll have to move out of my house." Dora claimed that John then punched her, and she defended herself by picking up the potato masher, which he wrestled away from her.
"He grabbed a knife on the table, and I ran outdoors. I shut the door behind me and held it for a while. He overpowered me and I ran down the steps and picked up a pitchfork." She said that was when John decided to charge at her, impaling himself in the process. "He was still breathing, and I said, 'John, don't make me any more trouble.' I got a cup of water and sprinkled it on his head... I put more water on his head and tried to talk to him, but could get no answer. I lifted him up into a sitting position, shook his head, and found that life was extinct. I dragged him to the wall about two or three steps away."

Dora testified that she then cleaned up John's body with turpentine, and, about an hour later, she encountered Mrs. Yeager. "She tried to talk to me but I could not understand. I told her the same story I have told on the stand," she insisted. 

Dora's testimony failed to provide answers to key questions. When and how did John's clothing get changed? What became of the pitchfork, and why wasn't it found by authorities? Why had she told Mrs. Yeager that she had struck John in the head with the potato masher, but denied having done so on the witness stand? Additional witnesses refuted claims that Dora couldn't speak or understand English-- they had seen her shopping in Hawley, transacting business in English with the shopkeepers. A surprise witness for the defense, a 10-year-old nephew of William Valentine Podlewski named Alex Porter, claimed to have witnessed the fatal accident, and corroborated Dora's testimony. However, the child's testimony fell apart under cross-examination by the prosecution, who got Alex to admit that he had been coach on what to say by his "Uncle Will."

After the Verdict

After the verdict had been read, Judge Staples passed sentence, remarking that neither he nor the jury believed Dora's story about her husband running into the pitchfork. It was the court's opinion that Dora hadn't done the actual killing, but that she knew who did and was concealing it. Nonetheless, the jury had rendered its decision, and Judge Staples sentenced Dora Newman to 18 months imprisonment at the Eastern Penitentiary. "Were it not for your age, you would have received a more severe sentence," added Judge Staples.

Immediately after Dora's acquittal, District Attorney Bull told that court that the Commonwealth did not have sufficient evidence to convict William Valentine Podlewski, and the jury acquitted the co-defendant on the spot without leaving the box. The trial of Anton Podlewski was then continued to December to give the prosecution time to prepare its case.

The case of the Commonwealth versus Anton Podlewski was taken up on Monday, December 16, 1907, but the proceedings were a rehashing of the previous trial. District Attorney Bull proved ineffectual and was unable to establish any link between the defendant and the death of his stepfather. Two days later, the Commonwealth rested its case, and after a deliberation of less than thirty minutes, Anton Podlewski was found not guilty.

 

Justice Was Never Served

During the trials of both Dora Newman and Anton Podlewski, neighbors had testified that Dora's sons detested their stepfather because of his abusive treatment of their mother. There is little doubt that John Newman was a vile husband with a violent temper, and perhaps this might explain why the district attorney put together such a weak case for the prosecution. Nevertheless, a man had been murdered, and justice had to be served. However, in the case of John Newman, it never really was. 

While it seems impossible for a tiny, elderly woman like Dora, bent and hobbled by arthritis, to carry out the murder, or drag the body of her dead husband to the stone wall, she was the only defendant to pay for the crime-- though her punishment was short-lived.

Because the defense had filed an appeal, Dora was never sent to Eastern Penitentiary. Instead, she was held at the Milford jail until February of 1908, when she was pardoned by Governor Edwin S. Stuart. Ultimately, it was a technicality which set Mrs. Newman free; the Board of Pardons concluded that Dora had been wrongfully convicted because the evidence produced at the trail was later found to be untrue. During the trial, Mrs. Yeager testified that she had been standing "about 30 feet" from the gate when she saw Dora throw the knife and potato masher out of the house. Dora's attorneys, Hyram Baker and O.L. Rowland, later measured the distance and found it to be closer to 400 feet.

So who really murdered John Newman with a pitchfork in Blooming Grove in 1907? William Valentine Podlewski? Anton Podlewski? Or Dora Newman? It could only have bee one of these three individuals, though the answer is likely to forever remain a mystery.








   
Sources:

Wilkes-Barre Times, Aug. 6, 1907.
York Dispatch, Aug. 6, 1907.
Wilkes-Barre Times, Aug. 9, 1907.
Wilkes-Barre Times Leader, Oct. 25, 1907.
Pike County Dispatch, Oct. 31, 1907.
Pike County Dispatch, Dec. 19, 1907.
Pike County Dispatch, Dec. 26, 1907.
Pike County Dispatch, Feb. 27, 1908.