to maintain my calm and hide my trepidation in light of what had only recently transpired, but eventually I did mention to my friend the claim of Adams that rumor was on the wind that he, Poe, had written the poems signed with my name, and the work, not to mention both of us, would soon be under public scrutiny.
“To his credit, Mr. Poe dismissed such notion as ridiculous. He instead offered me his best wishes for good luck for the book’s appearance. He mentioned to me a new poem of his own, at this point a mere sketch, but for which he seemed to have great hope.”
COLT WENT ON in his Herald confessional to claim Poe purportedly admitted the idea for the verse came directly from a line in Dickens’ Barnaby Rudge, one extolling an owl, Colt thought, which Poe had conjectured to him he might very well transform into a black bird, perhaps a crow, or raven.
Colt admitted he could not quite remember, and had not read Dickens’ book.
Once at the baths, Colt wrote, the two men fell back and spent the rest of the evening discussing the murder of Mary Rogers. Colt alleged they both knew this young woman from Anderson’s and shared remorse for her fate. According to Colt, Poe confessed to him that news of Mary’s death had distressed him greatly, more so than he might have thought.
At this point, Poe turned to him, confiding in a craving for opium. He asked if Colt knew of any person from whom such potion might be procured. Colt, invested in being immensely well-regarded among his fellows for his late night gallivants through the city’s darkest corners, what was known as “elephant hunting,” readily mentioned a retreat he knew, a place known as the Green Turtle’s, beneath the arch on Prince Street, warning Poe that the proprietress, a woman of enormous girth, was exceedingly dangerous.
Afterwards, the men bid good night and Colt went home. He reported he lived with his mistress, as he described her: his lady love, Miss Caroline Henshaw.
Upon his entrance into the bedchamber, Miss Henshaw awoke to ask where had he been. He said he told her he had been with a writer friend from Philadelphia, although he did not mention Poe’s name specifically.
Colt confessed he dared not tell Miss Henshaw what had transpired earlier in the day, and pretended instead to be inspired from his meeting with the unnamed poet. He retired to his desk to write, although he said he was not able to compose a word. Eventually she became quiet and slept, her breath regulating, and only then did he follow suit, slipping into bed and, after a long period staring sight-lessly into the dark, eventually falling asleep as well.
The next morning, having thought better of his predicament, he hired a burly man to carry the crate containing the body of Adams downstairs from the printing office. Refusing Colt’s assistance, the rough, powerful man hefted the makeshift coffin onto his back, muscling it down the stairs and into the street. Colt said he then paid the brute some twelve cents for his efforts and went off to Broadway, where he located a cartman, who would in fact be his undoing. When reward was offered for any knowledge of the whereabouts of Adams, this was the lout who came forward to tell the authorities how he had taken a suspicious oblong box from Colt’s granite building to a packet bound for New Orleans lying in the East River at the foot of Maiden Lane.
The boat had yet to sail, so the wooden crate was dug out from the hold, and sure enough, opening it, the captain and his mate found the printer, stinking, dead, stiff with rigor mortis, and in the most uncomfortable-appearing position.
Death of the Corkcutter Daniel Payne
The killing of Samuel Adams by John Colt succeeded, finally, in driving the murder of Mary Rogers off the front page.
BODY FOUND IN BOX
There was no question of Colt’s guilt. Here was his confession in full, printed word for word in the Herald.
The rest of the penny papers were left to scramble, taking up mere points of law, exemplified by cogitation in that weekend’s Tattler:
PREMEDITATED MURDER OR SELF DEFENSE?
The answer presumably to this curious legal conundrum would dictate whether “Homicide Colt,” as the headline writers had come to call him, would live or die.
And so with this debate ongoing, public opinion found itself thusly consumed, until three weeks later, the sixth day of October, when all reverted once more to Mary Rogers.
On that afternoon Mary’s betrothed, the forlorn corkcutter Daniel Payne, haggard and worn, appeared at Mrs. Loss’s roadside inn, the Nick Moore House.
As reported by Bennett on the front page of the New York Herald:
Mr. Payne stood in the establishment and inquired of Mrs. Loss the exact location of the spot where Miss Rogers had met her death.
The unhappy man then sat down and commenced to drink a number of brandies before stumbling out.
Two days later Payne was discovered, an apparent suicide, on what was believed to be the exact spot of Mary Rogers’ murder, in the same small clearing where Mrs. Loss’s two sons, Oscar and Ossian, had found the scattered articles of her person, leading many to speculate, even conclude, that the corkcutter was guilty of his intended’s murder.
Others besides Mrs. Loss had seen Mr. Payne drinking and wandering about the general area.
Mr. Samuel Whitney, a patron of the Phoenix Hotel, told how Mr. Payne had appeared at the hotel bar late the night following Mrs. Loss’s encounter with him at the Nick Moore House.
“He looked red and a little intoxicated,” Mr. Whitney said. “And he seemed weak and could hardly stand up.”
During the course of the evening, Mr. Whitney further reported, Mr. Payne spoke to him in the following manner:
“Suppose you know me? Well, I’m the man who was to have been mar ried to Mary Rogers.”
Mr. Whitney said Mr. Payne then mumbled, “I’m a man of a good deal of trouble.”
An empty and shattered bottle of laudanum from the Deluc Chemist on Nassau Street, only steps from the Rogerses’ home, was found near the body. The Hoboken police were quickly notified of the death and forwarded immediate word to High Constable Hays in New York City.
A storm rose up early that evening. Hays, with Acting Mayor Purdy, who again insisted on inviting himself to accompany the high constable and Sergeant McArdel of the Night Watch, rode over in a small boat through the squall to investigate.
Upon their arrival, wet and chilled, the high constable was handed a note found by Dr. Cook in the dead man’s pocket. It was addressed:
TO THE WORLD
“Here I am on the spot,” Payne
