The Case of the Miserly Millionaire

"About a mile and a half from the city of South Norwalk, in the State of Connecticut, rises an eminence known as Roton Hill. The situation is beautiful and romantic in the extreme. Far away in the distance, glistening in the bright sunshine of an August morning, roll the green waters of Long Island Sound, bearing upon its broad bosom the numerous vessels that ply between the City of New York and the various towns and cities along the coast. The massive and luxurious steamers and the little white-winged yachts, the tall "three-masters" and the trim and gracefully-sailing schooners, are in full view. At the base of the hill runs the New York and New Haven Railroad, with its iron horse and long trains of cars, carrying their wealth of freights and armies of passengers to all points in the East, while to the left lies the town of South Norwalk—the spires of its churches rising up into the blue sky, like monuments pointing heaven-ward—and whose beautiful and capacious school-houses are filled with the bright eyes and rosy faces of the youths who receive from competent teachers the lessons that will prove so valuable in the time to come."

These are the opening lines of a book called Bucholz and the Detective, written by Allan Pinkerton (or at least published under his name) in 1880 (text at Project Gutenberg). Bucholz and the Detective is the True Crime story of a murder that took place on Roton Hill in December 1878.

The story begins when a Johan Heinrich Schulte showed up in Norwalk in February 1877. Schulte, a bachelor, had only recently arrived from Germany. His worn clothes and patched shoes gave no suggestion of wealth, but when he purchased an eight acre farm on Roton Hill for the full asking price of $8,000, he pulled the cash from his pocket.

Schulte bought the farm from a man called Major George Hoyt. He's on the 1867 Map of Norwalk, on Highland just north of the train tracks. George Hoyt shows up on that map a few doors south of Ira Ford Hoyt (not a close relative), whose land would eventually be part of Brien McMahon High School. So our George must have lived a little south of where the school is today, perhaps somewhere around Highland Court. Major Hoyt's honorific was from his time as a musician in the Civil War. George and his wife Lorinda were active in the Methodist church and in temperance activities, but by 1877 they were in their mid-70s and presumably getting too old to maintain the farm. In fact when they sold the place to Schulte they were already renting it to Stephen and Amelia Waring. Stephen Waring was a hat maker by trade, so the Warings were most likely not working the farm.

After buying the Hoyt property Schulte apparently returned to Germany for a few months. When he returned in the Fall he was accompanied by a young servant called William Bucholz, a former soldier who spoke very little English. They took up residence with the Waring family.

Schulte was a man of eccentric habits. He was reputed to keep large sums of money on him, and he made Bucholz precede him when he went to the train station or went down to Long Island Sound to bathe. He interacted with others very little, even eating his meals in his room. Of course he spoke little English, but that was true of Bucholz as well, and the latter was considered outgoing and friendly. Bucholz made friends at the pubs in South Norwalk and with the Waring family, including the 20-year-old son Samuel and especially 16-year-old daughter Sadie.

On December 27th, 1878 Schulte went to New York on the train. Bucholz accompanied him to the station, but not to the city. Instead he spent time with his English tutor, and later accompanied Mrs. Waring to South Norwalk to attend to some errands. When Schulte returned on the 6:10 PM train Bucholz met him at the platform, which at the time was near the intersection of Main and Haviland, north of the modern station. They stopped at the neighboring Davis House saloon for a beer, then set off for home. Bucholz took his usual lead, and they followed their customary route: along the tracks toward Rowayton for about a mile, then up through the woods toward the house. Somewhere along that path, Schulte was assaulted and killed with a blow to the head. Bucholz ran to the Waring home, calling for Sammy Waring.

Bucholz explained the situation to the Warings. After regaining his composure he grabbed a pistol and Samuel Waring grabbed a rifle, and then the whole family went next-door to Dilazon Allen's residence. Mrs. Waring and her two daughters stayed there, while the others roused John Dingee and another neighbor and went looking for Schulte. At this point Schulte's fate was unclear. After they found the body, Bucholz and Samuel Waring went into town to fetch the coroner, while the others stood watch over the scene. The coroner quickly formed a jury, and the whole group went to the scene to witness the examination. Afterward the body was brought back to the Waring house, to await the funeral director.

In the following days many facts came to light. Someone had bound several trees together, as if to provide a hiding spot. A couple of shifty-looking types had been spotted near the scene of the crime. And although Schulte's coat had been ripped open and his purse stolen, the old man was still carrying some $20,000 in cash in a hidden pocket, mostly in the form of German marks.

The well-liked Bucholz initially had the sympathy of the locals on his side, but State's Attorney James H. Olmstead was immediately convinced of his guilt and called for his arrest while the coroner's inquest was still in progress. As I understand it, the theory was that Bucholz had conspired with the two shifty types to murder and rob his employer.

What followed was a bewildering series of accusations and explanations. The old miser had apparently marked his all of his bills, for example, and Bucholz had some of them in his possession. But then again he would, wouldn't he, if he was being paid by Schulte? The Pinkerton Agency was hired by the German Consul to investigate, and sent a detective into prison with Bucholz for several weeks, during which he gained his trust (and gave Allan Pinkerton an excuse to write the book). Olmstead said he found blood corpuscles on the Waring axe, but Sadie Waring testified that the axe handle had been broken, and that she and Samuel had burnt out the old handle in the stove before re-grinding the axe, so clearly no traces could have survived.

Newspapers across the east coast carried sensational stories of the murder and its aftermath, and daily reports of the trial.

Bucholz was found guilty of first degree murder, but the sentence was overturned when it was found that Joseph R. Lockwood, a member of the jury, had discussed the case with Thomas Bour, who was not on the jury, during the trial. That's probably bad enough, but the fact that they were both arrested and fined suggests that there was more to it. A second trial ended on a hung jury.  Finally, on his third trial in 1880, Bucholz was convicted of second degree murder and given a life sentence. I don't know what became of him, but in 1891 he was still in prison, petitioning for release.

An Extended Digression: Pinkerton's book actually describes two crimes connected to Roton Hill.  For some reason Chapter 18 takes a break to discuss an entirely different case, the Adams Express Train Robbery of 1866. I'm not sure why he brings it up, but he tells the whole story of how a gang planned and carried off a $200,000 gold heist and ended up getting caught at the home of Josiah Tristram, an English-born shoemaker who lived at 378 Flax Hill. Tristram also testified in Bucholz' trial. Pinkerton never mentions that Tristram lived less than a mile from Schulte; he only links the two events because the trials were both in Bridgeport.

The book Bucholz and the Detective runs for some 180 pages, so this is the merest summary. The book might be the best easily-available summary of the case, even though The Norwalk Hour in 1916 said that it included "so much fiction that the value of the book for historical value is nil." That's harsh.