The Devil Was Let loose in The Neighborhood: Part 2

The Holy Alliance

To help track down their family’s killers, John Parke’s brother, David, and John Castner’s father, Abraham, offered a $1,000 reward. The state of New Jersey and the freeholders of Warren County put up an additional $800, which added up to a bounty that was five times more than the average worker made in a year.

Paranoia swept up and down the river as people tried to determine which one of their friends or neighbors could commit such a cold-blooded crime. Several men including Moore Furman, Jacob Davis, and Peter T.B. Van Doren formed the “Holy Alliance Company.” Their purpose was to nab the killers and collect the enormous reward, which they agreed to divide equally no matter which one of them was responsible for the capture. They began their crusade by zealously arresting anyone that appeared mildly suspicious.

The week following the murders, District Attorney William Morris, arrived in Washington, New Jersey, to personally head the investigation. The quadruple-murder was now front page news and he was under intense pressure to catch and convict the killers. He had been a prosecutor in Warren County for 25 years but even for a veteran attorney, Morris knew that the high-profile case was a rare and challenging opportunity that could make or break his career. He set up court in Doolittle’s Tavern and along with magistrates George Creveling and Jacob Davis, and Judge William Robeson, he began the examination of suspects, many of whom had been dragged in by Moore Furman and the Holy Alliance.

Very few escaped the scrutiny of the Holy Alliance. In one case a man from Hackettstown said he had seen the murders in a dream and identified Edward Thompson as one of the killers. Moore Furman immediately arrested Thompson and brought him before the magistrates. He was quickly cleared of suspicion and freed. The first member of the Parke family to be arrested was William Hulshizer, whom Parke referred to in his will as “my sworn enemy.” Hulshizer had the motive but Sarah Parke, who was at the Hulshizers’ on the night of the murders helping them nurse their sick son, swore that Hulshizer was home all night and only left for about 20 minutes to check on the animals in the barn. 

The People Called For It

Several days before the murder, Joe Carter borrowed $10.00 from Peter Van Doren and still hadn’t paid him back. When Constable Van Doren, who was also a member of the Holy Alliance, found out that Joe had paid out over $75.00 on foreclosures the two days following the murders, he became suspicious and went to find out where Joe had gotten the money. Initially Joe told him he couldn’t remember but when Van Doren pressed him, Joe came up with a pretty far-fetched explanation. According to Joe Carter, he knew that bankruptcy was just around the corner, so he hatched a mercenary scheme to keep his wife and family from total financial ruin. He would continue to live on credit and loans as long as possible. All the while he would salt away any cash he could get his hands on and provide a small nest egg to start over with. Joe claimed that he had saved seventy-five to eighty dollars since a business trip to New York City in December.

Van Doren was infuriated that Carter would come to him for a ten dollar loan when he supposedly had almost eighty dollars saved up. He told Joe that he didn’t believe his story and suspected that he had something to do with the murders. He also told him that he had a lot of explaining to do and advised him to turn himself over to the magistrates for examination. On May 22, Van Doren, acting under orders from Moore Furman, arrested Joe Carter for suspicion of murder. 

The sole reason for Joe’s arrest was the fact that he had over $75.00 on the two days following the murders. Under examination, Joe was able to show that during a trip to New York, he had accumulated almost $40.00 through some creative business transactions and had saved another $40.00 since then. Several witnesses came forward on Joe’s behalf and testified that they had seen him with a roll of bills before the murders. William Dilts claimed he saw Joe with a roll of money after his trip to New York. He also testified that sometime before the murders, Joe told him that he had around $40.00 in cash but wasn’t going to pay it out to anyone in case he was foreclosed on. After an eleven-day investigation, the magistrates unanimously decided that there was insufficient evidence to charge Joe Carter with murder and they set him free. 

Prosecutor William Morris wasn’t satisfied with the magistrate’s decision and decided to convene a grand jury to continue the investigation. Once again, the only evidence against Joe Carter was the $75.50 that he paid out on the days following the murder. To everyone’s surprise, the grand jury handed down an indictment for four counts of first degree murder and one count of attempted murder. A reporter for the Sussex Register later wrote that the grand jury had indicted Joe Carter with “no more evidence than had been elicited before the magistrates” and “with not enough proof of guilt to have sent a vagrant pilferer to the whipping post.” Some of the members seated on the grand jury admitted later that there was no proof of guilt but indicted Carter because they thought that “the people called for it.” 

In August 1843, a circus of witnesses, family members, neighbors, reporters, and spectators swarmed the Warren County Courthouse in Belvidere, New Jersey, for the trial of Joe Carter. Carter was tried for the murder of John Castner first. The prosecution team consisted of Attorney General George Molleson, Warren County District Attorney William Morris, and attorney John M. Sherrerd. The defense was handled by attorneys Alexander Wurts, Phineas Kennedy, William Clemson, and Jacob Miller. New Jersey Supreme Court Justice James S. Nevius presided over the court. 

Wicked Participation

The prosecution argued that Joe Carter, fearful that John Parke was going to rewrite his will and leave the bulk of his estate to John Castner, murdered Parke so that his wife Olivia (one of John Parke’s 18 nieces and nephews) would receive her inheritance. They also claimed that though some money was left at the Parke house after the murders, the killer or killers took enough to suit their immediate needs. (The prosecution would argue that since three fence posts were found in the sink hole where John Castner’s body was found three men participated in the murders. Jesse Force would later testify that all three fence posts were, in fact, put there by John Castner before the murders to warn unwary travelers.)

The state also decided that Joe Carter, as overseer of the roads, had lured John Castner out of the house on the night of the murders under the pretense of inspecting the sink hole and discussing how much Castner would be paid to fill it in. 

William Morris opened for the prosecution by previewing their case to the jury. He claimed the state would show that $15,000 dollars had been stolen from the Parke house and said they would prove that Joe Carter was in a bad financial situation but had paid off $75.50 on several debts shortly after the murders. He further asserted that John Parke was known to have had several “New Hope” bank bills before his death and that Joe Carter was found with notes of the same type in his possession. Morris vowed the state would also show that Joe Carter wrote a letter to a justice in Phillipsburg referring to the murders hours before anyone in Joe’s area could have heard about the news. He further promised that the prosecution could prove that the horse and wagon tracks found near Rounsavell’s foot log, a short distance from the Parke home, belonged to Joe Carter and that on the night of the murders, a wagon carrying the killers was heard rolling through New Hampton on the way to Changewater. Finally, Morris claimed that Joe Carter was slow to arrive at the murder scene after the discovery of the bodies and that his behavior in the following days showed that he was guilty of the crimes.

Throughout the trial, the defense was able to rebut and, in most instances, refute the state’s entire case. The only real challenge was verifying Joe Carter’s alibi on the night of the murders. According to Joe, he was home asleep in bed. His only witness was his wife, Olivia, but at the time; a wife wasn’t allowed by law to testify for or against her husband.

The prosecution failed to prove that John Parke was intending to change his will and couldn’t determine how much, if any, money was stolen from the house. In fact, one witness, who knew Parke well and helped tally up his fortune after the murders, said that they actually found more money in the house than he thought Parke had. Several witnesses also came forward and testified that Joe Carter had been trying to pass off several New Hope bills weeks before the murder but since the bank went under no one would accept them as legal tender.

The prosecution had also planned to show that John Castner never left the house alone at night and that Joe Carter had lured him outside on the night of the murders to inspect a sink hole in the road. Several defense witnesses disputed the prosecutions claims outright and testified that Castner had gone out alone at night on many occasions. Others swore that Joe Carter had come to an agreement with Castner regarding the repair of the sinkhole weeks before the crime. The fact that Castner was killed 45 feet from the sink hole further weakened the state’s assertions.

On the day of the funerals for the four slain victims, Joe Carter was due in court in Phillipsburg. To explain his absence he wrote a letter to the judge, John Howell, Esq., telling him that due to the confusion over the murders he wouldn’t be able to make it to court. The prosecution alleged that Joe Carter had written the letter on the morning of the murders, at least two hours before news of the tragedy reached Washington. Therefore he couldn’t have known about the crime unless he was one of the killers. Unfortunately for Morris and the prosecution, they couldn’t produce the letter. Judge Howell had misplaced it before the trial and believed he used it for scrap paper. In his testimony, he admitted that he couldn’t remember when he received the letter, whether it was dated, or even the specific contents.

Instead Morris relied on the testimony of Washington blacksmith, Abraham Cougle, who made at least two trips to Phillipsburg the week of the murders and delivered the letter for Joe Carter. Though Cougle’s cross examination was full of uncertainties, he swore that he delivered Joe Carter’s letter to Phillipsburg on the day the bodies were discovered and that Joe had given it to him two hours before news of the crime reached Washington. The defense brought out several witnesses to dispute Cougle’s testimony including Henry Hummer and Peter Parke. Carter was with Parke at his shoe shop when he wrote the letter to Judge Howell. Parke testified that he gave Carter the paper to write the letter on and even addressed the envelope for him. He also swore that the letter was written two days after the murders.

Since the murder weapon was never found, the only physical evidence that linked Joe Carter to the crime were the horse and wagon prints that John Smith found near Rounsavell’s foot log on May 5. Initially, Smith was excited about his discovery but was soon disappointed when he found out that a local man named John Rhinehart had parked his horse and wagon at the exact spot on the crowded day of the funerals. (Rhinehart admitted that he parked his horse and wagon there on the day of the funerals but testified that when his horse’s prints were later compared to the one’s that Smith discovered, they didn’t match.) Smith forgot about the hoof prints until early July. It was now almost two and a half months after the murders but he went back to Rounsavell’s foot log anyway and covered several of the prints with large flat stones to protect them from the elements. A week later they were examined as part of the investigation into Joe Carter.

The prosecution’s most important witness was William Dilts, a blacksmith from Washington that had shoed Joe’s mare, Maria, two days before the murder. Dilts claimed that the nails in Maria’s shoes had an unusual pattern that he could easily recognize. He also testified that he had brought Maria out to Rounsavell’s foot log and compared her feet to the prints and that they were an exact match. The defense pointed out that the tracks were almost 3 months old when they were examined and had been altered by rain and the elements. They also elicited testimony that a week before Dilt’s brought the horse out to the foot log to compare to the tracks, he had reset her shoes, and reshaped one that was too large. 

Next Morris paraded out six witnesses who swore that around nine o’clock on the night of the murders they heard a horse and wagon bounce noisily through New Hampton and cross the bridge near Simonton’s Mill on the way to Changewater. Only one of the witnesses actually claimed to see the wagon and he admitted that he was 50 to100 yards away, behind a bush, and that it was too dark to identify the horse, wagon, or occupants. Though the prosecution’s claim was weak, the defense brought out its own witnesses anyway, including John Smith. Smith was near the bridge in New Hampton at nine o’clock and testified that he neither heard nor saw a wagon on the night of the killings in Changewater.

The rest of the prosecution’s case was based on Joe’s observed actions after the murders. Two neighbors claimed that Joe waited almost a half an hour after he had heard the news of the crime to ride out to Changwater. Others testified to variety of “guilty” behavior on Joe’s part such as blushing or dropping his head when they asked him about the killings. As with all of the allegations, the defense brought witnesses that countered the prosecution’s claims.

In the end, there was no murder weapon, no proof of a robbery, no physical evidence, and no eye witnesses. The Sussex Register called the circumstantial evidence against Joe Carter “fanciful and fragile” but many in the courtroom were still convinced of Joe Carter’s guilt. According to several accounts, the community had largely decided that Joe Carter was guilty. The Sussex Register claimed that “a diseased public opinion” called with “vehemence” for a conviction and said that the “mercenary desire to clutch the reward of $1,800, has added fuel to the fire.” The newspaper complained of “secret examinations…held to entrap the prisoner” and “invisible agents” that spied on Carter’s every move before the trial. “Every word, gesture and motion has been narrowly watched,” they reported. “Whether he smiled or frowned…each visible semblance of mental action has been heralded as unmistakable evidence.”

The paper charged that Joe Carter had been sacrificed to satisfy the “appetite of the public” and that very few “dared to hazard an opinion favorable to his innocence.” They also condemned co-counsel for the prosecution, John M. Sherrerd, for intimating that “all the material witnesses in behalf of the prisoner stood attainted with the guilt of wicked participation in the unnatural massacre!” Peter Parke later wrote that it was as if, “the devil was let loose in the neighborhood.”

At one point, the jury had been deadlocked at six to six but, after more than 24 hours of deliberation, they returned to the crammed courtroom. The crowd of spectators collectively held their breath as the jury rendered its decision – the prisoner was found “not guilty” for the murder of John Castner. Joe Carter and his family wept openly when the verdict was read. 

The defense immediately moved that the other three murder indictments against Joe Carter should be dropped or that he should be tried immediately but William Morris wouldn’t relent. Judge Nevius left the decision to the New Jersey Supreme Court.

Separate and Distinct Acts

Joe Carter’s defense team, which now included former New Jersey Governor Peter Vroom, made their first argument before the New Jersey Supreme Court in February, 1844. The Chief Justice was Joseph Hornblower, the two associate justices were James Nevius (who just presided over Carter’s first trial) and Ira Whitehead (who was scheduled to be the judge at Carter’s second trial.) The defense argued that during the first trial, evidence regarding all four victims was allowed. They reminded the court that they had objected at the time, but that Judge Nevius had overruled on the grounds that the murders were “one transaction and so intimately connected that they could not be separated.” They contended therefore, that to try Joe Carter for the murder of John Parke would be to try him twice for the same offense, a violation of his Fifth Amendment rights. They also pointed out that the prosecution insisted that one killer murdered all four victims with the same weapon. Therefore, logic dictates that if Joe Carter didn’t kill John Castner he couldn’t have killed any of the victims.

William Morris countered that since time elapsed between each murder and each murder was committed in different locations, they were “separate and distinct acts.” He argued that for the murders to be a single act they would have to occur simultaneously and not one after the other. The Supreme Court agreed with the prosecution’s argument. This meant that William Morris would have three more chances to get it right. Joe Carter would be tried for the murder of John Parke next.

When William Morris went back to court on June 4, 1844, he was much better prepared than he had been at Joe Carter’s first trial. Though his case against Carter was essentially the same, Morris had sharpened his argument. The tiresome testimony regarding Joe Carter’s finances was boiled down for clarity, Morris put more emphasis on his strongest points, and the prosecution witnesses seemed more convincing on the stand this time.

The biggest difference in the state’s case was the testimony of two new witnesses regarding the prosecution’s claim that a wagon was heard going over a bridge in New Hampton on its way to Changewater at nine o’clock on the night of the murders. The most damning of the two testimonies came from John Smith. 

Smith was a defense witness at the first trial and had disputed the prosecution’s witnesses by testifying that he was near the bridge at New Hampton around nine o’clock on the night of the murders and did not hear a horse wagon. Now Smith claimed that not only did he hear the wagon but he saw it as well. He further stunned the courtroom when he swore that Joe’s horse, Maria, was pulling the wagon and that Joe Carter and Henry Hummer were driving it. Again, the defense tore gaping holes in the prosecution’s case and produced testimony to refute most of their claims. As in the first trial, two of their strongest witnesses were Peter Parke and Henry Hummer.

On the morning of June 24, the jury retired to decide Joe Carter’s fate. While they were out of the courtroom, it was announced that John Parke’s brother, Abner Parke, his nephew Peter Parke, and Henry Hummer had also been arrested and indicted for the murders. At six o’clock that afternoon, the jury returned with a guilty verdict. Joe Carter was sentenced to death.

What Horrid Murders We Have Up Here Among the Mountains

Henry Hummer went to trial for the murder of John Castner on October 22, 1844. The prosecution’s entire case hinged on John Smith. Smith testified in Joe Carter’s second trial that he saw Carter and Henry Hummer on a wagon in New Hampton on the night of the murders. But to Morris’s humiliation, Smith now claimed that he wasn’t sure which night he saw the wagon or who was in it. He further stated that he only “guessed” it was Carter and Hummer in the wagon when it was suggested to him by some of his neighbors. The pillar of the prosecution’s case completely collapsed. The defense, without having to call a single witness, asked the court to dismiss the case. The judge agreed and dismissed the remaining three murder indictments as well. Henry Hummer was a free man.

Abner Parke was tried for the murder of John Castner on December, 5 1844. According to Sharon and Robert Meeker, Abner invited suspicion with comments he made to several of his neighbors, though the exact contents of those conversations have been lost to history. The prosecution swore in over 90 witnesses to testify against Abner Parke but the defense was able to produce three witnesses that swore Abner was asleep in bed on the night of the murders. The jury deliberated for two hours before finding him not guilty. 

As Abner walked out of the courtroom, free on bail, Peter Parke was dragged in. The only apparent reason for Parke being a suspect was his connection to Joe Carter.

Like Abner Parke, Pete had several solid witnesses to testify that he was home the night of the murders, but William Morris had two bombshell witnesses for the prosecution that had been conspicuously absent from both of Joe Carter’s trials.  The first witness was the notorious Jesse Tiger. Tiger, described by some as a common drunkard and chicken thief, testified that a week before the murders he ran into Peter Parke at the Mansfield Cemetery. According to Tiger, Pete asked him if he’d like to go fishing up in Changewater some night with five other men. He then told Tiger that while they were out that way, Joe Carter would get John Castner to come out to the sink hole and they could murder him and “have money enough” for all. Tiger also said that Carter had come to him with the same scheme but that he had declined both offers. Pete maintained that he knew Tiger by reputation but had never spoken to him until a month or so after the murders, when he came into the shoe shop with William Hulshizer.

The second surprise testimony came from a woman renowned as the town gossip. She testified that she saw Pete and Joe Carter leaning on a fence behind John Parke’s house on the morning the bodies were discovered. According to her testimony, one asked the other if he looked guilty. The other answered no and then asked if he looked guilty. When they saw her standing in the doorway they were supposedly startled and one said loudly, “what horrid murders we have up here among the mountains.”

It took the jury four hours to find Peter Parke guilty. He was also sentenced to death. 

That same day, Abner Parke was re-arrested. Abner went on trial for the murder of his brother, John Parke, on June 3, 1845. Once again his offhand comments had gotten him into trouble and several of his neighbors testified to hateful and malicious comments that he made about his murdered brother. The most damaging testimony, however, came from a church sexton named Joseph Bowlby, who said that he saw Abner Parke out walking sometime between midnight and two a.m., on the night John Parke was killed. The defense was able to discredit Bowlby by introducing testimony from the earlier trial, in which he twice swore that he hadn’t seen Abner Parke at all on the day (or night) of the murder. After ten hours of deliberation, Abner Parke was found not guilty, once again. 

In January of 1846, the prosecution made a motion to try the remaining two murder cases (Maria Castner and the baby, Maria Matilda) against Abner Parke. The court had previously “discharged” Abner and denied the motion, finally bringing an end to the trials.

I’m Damned If I Won’t Take It Like A Man

After the defense had exhausted all their appeals and all pleas for clemency had been turned down, the court scheduled the executions of Joe Carter and Peter Parke. In the days before the executions, Joe Carter was visited by his family, including his two small children. During the visit, Joe’s brother pleaded that if he was guilty of the crimes in any way that now was the time to confess. “I am innocent,” Carter replied. Before the visit ended, Carter’s daughter turned to him and asked, “Poppa, are you coming home with us tonight?” Joe Carter could no longer hold back the tears. He bitterly told one visitor that “the state of New Jersey will have to atone for my innocent blood.”

Peter Parke also maintained his innocence. In his “Protest,” written in the months before the execution, he blamed public prejudice for Joe Carter’s conviction and said that if the Holy Alliance had command of 1,000 men it would have “exterminated” the entire Parke family, “from the oldest to the cradle.” He was convinced that he was being executed for supporting Carter during the trial and believed he’d be a free man if he had gone against his conscience and renounced his friend. “They were determined to execute me,” he lamented, “innocent or guilty.” Peter Parke was leaving behind a wife and three children.

Throughout the afternoon and night before the hangings, thousands of people poured into Belvidere, including several local militia companies, one of which marched in with fife and drums blaring. Estimates soared to over 10,000 spectators.

The condemned men were led to the specially-built, double-gallows at noon on August 22, 1845. They had been scheduled to be executed at 1:00 p.m. but in a final gesture of their contempt, they requested to be hanged an hour earlier. Both men were pale and gaunt after months in jail enduring what Peter Parke called “the horrors of the mind.” After prayers were said for the salvation of their souls, Joe Carter stepped up to Peter Parke, grabbed him by the hand and kissed him goodbye. He told Parke that he hoped their suffering would soon be over and that they would next meet in heaven. They both then called upon God as their witness and proclaimed that they were innocent of the crimes they were about to die for. They stood facing each other as the noose was tightened around their necks and then Carter reached out to shake Parke’s hand one more time. Both men kept their composure and Joe Carter fulfilled a vow he made two long years before on the first day he was brought in for questioning by Peter Van Doren. “I’m as innocent as you are,” he proclaimed, “but if they can find me guilty, I’m damned if I won’t take it like a man.”

At a quarter past twelve, hoods were drawn over their faces and the platform they were standing on was cut out from underneath them. It was a short drop and both men struggled at the end of the rope. Joe Carter reportedly died within five minutes but it allegedly took Peter Parke at least fifteen minutes to slowly strangle. After thirty-five minutes, they were cut down and lowered into their wooden caskets. 

Murderer’s Crossroad

Some say that two crimes were committed against the Parke family – the murders and the executions and between the two they ended up burying six members of their family. Sarah Parke, who was at her sister Rebecca’s on the night of the murders, inherited the Meeting House Farm and lived there most of her life. When she died at the age of 97, the farm was sold in accordance to John Parke’s will and the last of his money was dispersed among his heirs. Among the benefactors were the children of Joe Carter and Peter Parke who ended up receiving an inheritance from the man their own fathers were hanged for murdering. 

The two orphaned Castner boys, Victor and John P., who were also survivors of that gruesome night, moved in with William and Rebecca Hulshizer. The Hulshizer’s son survived his illness and Rebecca received her $100 a year until her death in 1865. William Hulshizer sold his farm to the railroad in the 1850s and made a small fortune. He died in 1869.

Shortly after he was discharged by the Supreme Court, Abner Parke left New Jersey in disgust and moved to Ohio with his family, which included his daughter Olivia (Joe Carter’s widow) and her two children. Abner worked as a farmer and lived with his daughter until his death in 1872.

Henry Hummer continued to live near Washington after his acquittal and became a boat man on the Morris Canal. He died in 1878, at the age of 67.

After his son Peter was hanged, David Parke and most of his family also went west. David settled in Indiana and was joined by Peter’s widow, Rachel and their children but before he left he was dealt one more injustice. Immediately after the hangings, Moore Furman, leader of the Holy Alliance, filed suit to collect the $1,000 reward put up by David Parke and Abraham Castner. In a cruel twist, David Parke was now expected to pay the man who was responsible for his son’s conviction and eventual execution.

Abraham Castner died a short time later but David fought the case alone. In 1848, it reached the New Jersey Supreme Court and in a bitter rematch William Morris, representing Moore Furman, faced off against Alexander Wurts and Peter Vroom, the former defense attorneys for the executed prisoners, who now defended David Parke. In its decision, the court reminded Morris that an earlier ruling in the case held that the murders were separate and distinct acts. Therefore to collect the reward Moore Furman would have to prove that he was responsible for a conviction in all four murders. Since no one had been convicted of Maria Castner and her daughter Maria Matilda’s murder, the court ruled that David Parke didn’t have to honor the contract.

Joe Carter and Peter Parke were buried together on a corner of Henry Carter’s farm, near the intersection of the Asbury-Andersontown Road and the Port Colden-Changewater Road. Though descendants of the Carter family still own the tiny plot, the exact location of the graves has been lost to time. The intersection is still known today as “Murderer’s Crossroads.”

The small villages along the Musconetcong, torn from their rural slumber by the vicious crimes, hoped that the nightmare was finally over. After the executions, they suffered a barrage of criticism regarding the investigations and trials, and papers like the Sussex Register continued to raise the haunting specter of innocence. Finally, the Belvidere Apollo came to the county’s defense. They stood firmly behind the jury’s verdict and stated that the “vast majority of our people…saw the brand of Cain stamped visibly on Carter’s brow” and claimed that nine-tenths “were fully convinced of the guilt of the accused.” Alluding to the Holy Alliance, the Apollo wrote that their course was governed by “sound wisdom, entirely consistent with their duties as good citizens” and that they deserved gratitude for their “strenuous efforts…in furthering the ends of justice.”

Finally, they reminded readers of the “memorable and extraordinary scenes” that the county had to endure over the past few years and challenged “every community…which shall be visited with a similar calamity to come forth from the ordeal with a reputation as high.”

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