IL IL - Elfrieda 'Fritzie' Knaak, 29, Lake Bluff, 30 Oct 1928

[Robin Hood]

An interesting quote from a member of the coroner's inquest jury: "We do not say this was suicide but what evidence was presented leaves us no other course."

Mmm, IMO it should have been left as an open verdict, then again it might spoil the stats.

 

[Ausgirl]

If they even had that choice?

I would like some info on Luella Roeh

Me, too! There's a lot of Roehs in Illionois at the time. No "Luella" or "Louella" that I can find. I'm hoping like heck it isn't a misspelling.

We know she was married.
I think she'd be found in range of Elfrieda's book sale route, which seems to have been focussed on the train between Chicago and Highland Park.
Using a pseudonym was pretty smart, given the content. She sure could have taken it from the place where she lived, good call. Did you find a Luella in that area, Robin?

ETA: The non-use of ticket is odd. She was seen to board and depart the train, and on it as well, as far as I know. How did the ticket system work back then, that "non-use" of a ticket is notable?

 

[Ausgirl]

Got her!

Mrs. Luella Roeh, wife of H.P. Roeh, of Libertyville, Illinois!

Hubby is Hans P. Roeh of E. Park Avenue, Libertyville. Libertyville is about 6 miles directly west of Lake Bluff.

Wonder if it's this guy:http://encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/1099.html

John J. Lynch was appointed the temporary president of a village whose name—Round Lake Beach—the state of Illinois refused to accept because of the prior existence of the village of Round Lake. After months of lobbying, the Illinois Secretary of State accepted the village name as sufficiently unique. Hans Roeh was elected village president at the end of April 1937.

Telegraph-Herald - Dec 2, 1928
Mrs. Roeh was rather reticent to day concerning her friendship for Miss Knaak.

Wonder why. :B

 

[Robin Hood]

If they even had that choice?



Me, too! There's a lot of Roehs in Illionois at the time. No "Luella" or "Louella" that I can find. I'm hoping like heck it isn't a misspelling.

We know she was married.
I think she'd be found in range of Elfrieda's book sale route, which seems to have been focussed on the train between Chicago and Highland Park.
Using a pseudonym was pretty smart, given the content. She sure could have taken it from the place where she lived, good call. Did you find a Luella in that area, Robin?

ETA: The non-use of ticket is odd. She was seen to board and depart the train, and on it as well, as far as I know. How did the ticket system work back then, that "non-use" of a ticket is notable?

I had a guess to be honest that B.Lock was the area she lived in. I had a quick search on LDS but couldn't see anything, lots of Roehl and similar spellings. I think the answer may be in the phone book of the time.

Re the ticket, not sure if the ticket was clipped on the train or when you entered the station at the barrier.

 

[Robin Hood]

Got her!

Mrs. Luella Roeh, wife of H.P. Roeh, of Libertyville, Illinois!

Well done !

lol 'Chum'

Will go get some breakfast and see what I can find later, thank you very muchly.

 

[Robin Hood]

Roeh, Hans P. 713 E. Park av., Libertyville

http://www.fremontlibrary.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=245&Itemid=297

 

[Robin Hood]

Another entry this time in the 1930's phone book, seems they moved

Roeh, Hans P., r 128 E. Broadway, Libertyvle-779

 

[Ausgirl]

From the Lake County library obit collection: Roeh, Euala Esther. Mar. 15, 1962, p. 5M

Does Luella = Euala?

 

[Robin Hood]

From the Lake County library obit collection: Roeh, Euala Esther. Mar. 15, 1962, p. 5M

Does Luella = Euala?

Possibly, I shall keep looking, it seems plausible.

 

[Stella]

What puzzles me as much as anything is how she did not die from shock within a few hours after the incident. It seems almost impossible for her to have hung on for another 3 days!

 

[Ausgirl]

Stella, I wonder the same thing, I really do.

One of the doctors tending her for those three days said he thought she hung in there by sheer willpower alone. She had an incredibly tenacious spirit, and I think that's part of why I feel such a compulsion to figure out the truth of it. I really do not believe Elfrieda wished that terrible fate on herself. I believe the gut feelings of her family and the Sheriff were correct - somebody not only lured her to Lake Bluff that night in order to harm her, but also somehow convinced her to accept responsibility for her suffering. For me, it's now just a matter of figuring out the who and the why.

You know, given that medicine wasn't so advanced back then, either, I think the doctors and nurses must have done a brilliant job looking after her.

 

[Robin Hood]

From the Lake County library obit collection: Roeh, Euala Esther. Mar. 15, 1962, p. 5M

Does Luella = Euala?

I can't find a thing on the name, the only suggestion I have is that she used Luella but was burried/cremated under her correct name. Maybe the obit was a mis spelling in transcribing.

I can see why a religious cult was suggested too, not many other theories to apply as to why you wouldn't just tell who burnt you.

Hypnotism, cult, love, Schizophrenia or some sort of guilt applied via brainwashing.

Hitch and his 'classes' as Ausgirl discussed earlier may have some bearing.

 

[Robin Hood]

Here's a link to the private investigator A.V. Smith asigned to help with the investigation, George Hargrave himself couldn't see how Elfrieda had managed to burn herself in the way she had.

http://griffyclan007.wordpress.com/2011/03/27/history-of-hargrave-secret-service/

If only their records were available.

 

[Ausgirl]

From the link above:
The “lady in red” that acted as an undercover agent in the capture and shooting death of Dillinger outside a Chicago theatre was employed by the Hargrave Secret Service.

It was the Knaaks who employed Hargrave. And, wow. That family certainly did not mess about in their search for the truth, did they? To think - that was George Hargrave himself, on the case.

As for Hargrave's opinion - yes, I doubt he was the type to have scales on his eyes. The Sheriff (who also strikes me as a very decent cop) agreed with Hargrave, on that. Hey- I wonder if Hargrave's Chicago office still has the records? Hm.. 'nother email in the works, I think...

I've done a fair bit of reading into cults, their leaders and the people who get sucked in by them. Seems lots of really smart, capable people lose their families, jobs, savings, homes, minds, self-esteem and even their lives to cults. Happens all the time. I truly believe Hitchcock was after setting himself up as a for-profit guru, and had messed with Elfrieda's head pretty badly. Luella's letter describes Elfrieda pulling a very typical stunt of cult recruiters, in getting Luella to feel dependent on her and then directing her toward 'the boss'. Too, all her talk about astral love and spiritual purity, and blah blah, that's pure cult-speak. And people who give themselves over mentally and emotionally to that degree can stay very loyal, even on their deathbeds. We all know what happened with Heaven's Gate - and then there's that highly litigious "religion" which has directly caused the horrifically cruel deaths of some members who believed right to their dying moment that the cult wanted the best for them.

In short, I am quite convinced she'd been brainwashed for some time prior to her death. And I believe that this is what her mind was filled with, when she lay with a shattered skull, doped up to the eyelids, in that hospital bed and swore black and blue she "did it for love, for purity".

I think Elfrieda could not, on any level, handle the knowledge that she'd been betrayed. Not until those last few moments of her life, anyway.

It just all makes me so damned sad for her.

 

[Robin Hood]

I found Hargraves here http://www.letterboxing.org/BoxView...=Lake_Bluff_Furnace_Death_Mystery_Series_of_3

''A thousand blind alleys! States Attorney A.V. Smith assigned the Hargrave Secret Service to solve this mysterious death. Detective George Hargrave wondered how Elfrieda could have possibly burned the back of her head but not her face? How could she have endured the pain of putting first one arm into the furnace fire, then the other? And how did she burn her limbs and feet? Also, how did Miss Knaak get into the Village Hall Police Station? Once, Elfrieda admitted to having a key. Who gave her a key? Hitchcock denied having given her a key''

Anyway, they still might have some records, tis worth a shot.

 

[Ausgirl]

Aha! Then wonder if the family hired their own guy as well, or the papers just assumed the family hired him..will check it out, maybe there's yet another source of info, there. Anyway, good show, Robin!

One of the guys on that blog post has one of George's case books from 1930, so I asked him if he'd take a look for mention of Elfrieda.

 

[Robin Hood]

One of the guys on that blog post has one of George's case books from 1930, so I asked him if he'd take a look for mention of Elfrieda.

Cool.

 

[Robin Hood]

Just thinking out loud here, brain storming if you like. After You (Ausgirl) mentioned cults and Hitch's classes I can't help thinking that the encyclopedia selling is possibly some sort of way of 'spreading the word' IYSWIM.
I'm starting to think it strange a teacher and sunday school teacher gives up her job to sell books. We know the Roehs were fairly well off, we know that Hitch and son were far from squeaky clean, we know Elfrieda hung on every word the bloke said.
Elfrieda supposedly booked a 5 month course of lessons with Hitch, she also said he had saved her from some sort of hell 3 months previous (don't have the link at present).

I'm also struggling with a motive as to why somebody would murder Elfrieda and if they did why she wouldn't say who it was.


I haven't got a facebook account but a couple of folk here could possibly help us with more info

http://www.facebook.com/topic.php?uid=34838372276&topic=25129

 

[Ausgirl]

Just thinking out loud here,

I've had much the same thoughts, Robin - check out the way Elfrieda recruited Luella for the 'classes'. I read a few reports in the papers of people saying she was really good girl, but was a little obsessed with spiritualism. She was also selling those encyclopedias hard - even tried to sell some to the ticket lady at Highland Park the day she was hurt.

Elfrieda did book five months of classes, originally, but she had been seeing Hitch for the whole four years he'd been in Lake Bluff. In fact, they met up around the time he moved there, seems he didn't waste any time.

Motive -- pick one? Place was full of 'em, potentially.

1. Jealousy. Mrs. Hitch. (over Mr. Hitch/Elfrieda)
2. Jealousy. Mr. Hitch (over Elfrieda/Luella or some other person)
3. Jealousy. Luella (over Elfrieda/Hitch)
4. Revenge. Luella (over being dumped)
5. Convenience. Mr Hitch. (maybe he was tired of her demands)
6. Convenience. Barney. (maybe he was being blackmailed)
7. Fear. Mr. Hitch (maybe she threatened his marriage/to expose his crooked activities)
8. Lust. Chris Louis. (maybe he wanted what he couldn't have?)
-- I only include him because he, too, had a key. Not a serious contender at this point.
9. Loyalty. Frank/Oscar. (maybe one of 'em did it cause Hitch told him to)
etc, etc


Good contacts at the FB site. I'll have to make one to use as a contact, though - not using my personal one for crime sleuthing, even if they are all dead now. :B

 

[Ausgirl]

My turn at thinking out loud, ha. A few random thoughts:

Luella lived six miles from Lake Bluff. Where it all went down.

Elfrieda lived three and half miles from Highland Park. Where Mrs. Hitchcock was assisting with a musical recital that evening (I really wanna know if Frank Mandy was on the program for that..). Where Luella knew she changed trains for home.

Elfrieda's dad owned a pharmacy.

Hitchcock was a minor star on a vaudeville circuit, which loved mentalists/hypnotists and thought P. T. Barnum was the man. Sucker born every minute, hey Hitch. He was actually famed for doing impressions - seems he could mimic about anything convincingly. Like grief, say?

I read where "ill health" is listed as the reason Hitchcock left his career in movies.

Because, you know. Police work is so much less demanding than that. :waitasec:

He dropped off the Essanay map around the time they closed doors in Chicago and doesn't visibly surface again until four years before Elfrieda died. Wish I knew what he was up to between 1918 or so and 1924. No shows I can find. And if he was fit enough for police work, he was fit enough to return to his beloved career - must have been bitter to go from bit part actor to main role and then to director and working with Chaplin only to end up with zilch work of a sudden. You'd think he'd chase the lights, even if he did get sick for a time. Unless he found 'police work' and 'elocution lessons' way more profitable than any of that. Or maybe he'd burned some showbiz bridges on the way. Or developed a bit of a drug habit. Be handy to have a girl whose daddy owns the biggest pharmacy in the region wrapped around one's finger, if one had a bothersome laudanum/opiate problem, eh? Even more bothersome to replace her after she died. Kind of thing could lead a man to common burglary..

Somehow I highly doubt that he was actually busy reading "scripts from Hollywood and Broadway" while slothing about in a cast in lake Bluff after not working in film for nigh on ten years --- and whining/joking to the media about the heinous immolation and death of a girl who loved him being "not the right kind of publicity". Look at his behaviour throughout the case. He was milking it for all it was worth.

Guilty or not, I really do have a rather intense dislike for this man.