Thursday, July 2, 2020

The Hall-Mills Murders (1922) nd Richard Lockridge's Preach No More (1971)

Richard Lockridge, Preach No MoreCopyright (C) 1971 Richard Lockridge


I have just finished reading Preach No More, by Richard Lockridge (1971), and the book reminded me of a real murder, the Hall-Mills murders, in 1922, which are described (wikipedia) this way:


The Hall–Mills murder case involved an Episcopal priest and a member of his choir with whom he was having an affair, both of whom were murdered on September 14, 1922, in Somerset, New Jersey. The priest's wife and her brothers were accused of committing the murders, but were acquitted in a 1926 trial. In the history of journalism, the case is largely remembered for the vast extent of newspaper coverage it received nationwide; it has been regarded as an example of a media circus. It would take the Lindbergh kidnapping trial in the 1930s to eclipse the high profile of the Hall-Mills murder.

And this reminded me of William Kunstler’s book, The Hall-Mills Murder Case: The Minister and the Choir Singer (1964).  The New York Times devoted a long article to it (February 2, 1964; https://www.nytimes.com/1964/02/02/archives/was-the-murderer-in-the-jury-box-the-minister-and-the-choir-singer.html).  I have not read Kunstler’s book, which I first learned of from a throw-away passage in A Right to Die, (one of the Nero Wolfe mysteries, by Rex Stout).  I have read the Times article.


At this point, I should warn you that I am about to discuss Preach No More in depth, and will (almost inevitably) include aspects of the book’s plot that are spoilers.  So if anyone reading this plans to read the book, you have been warned.


The essentials of the real-life murder and the fictional one are similar (but not identical).  Edward Wheeler Hall was an Episcopal priest and Eleanor Mills, who was married to the church sexton, was a member of the choir.  Their bodies were found in an isolated location, with love letters written by Mills scattered over the body.  It took a Hearst-led press campaign to convince the authorities to file murder charges against Hall’s wife Frances and her brothers, Henry and Willie Stevens.  After a lengthy trial and a brief consideration b y the jury, all three were found not guilty.


In Lockridge’s book (which is fiction, rather than fact), a fundamentalist preacher from Arkansas (Jonathan Prentiss), has come to New York for a series of “meeting at Madison Square Garden, accompanied by his wife, his chief assistant, Rev. Higgs, his choir director, the core members of the choir (most of whom are hired locally), and others.  Prentiss’s ministry is carried out largely through large “revival”-style meetings in large cities.  The meetings are highly scripted and choreographed, but center on his sermons (and he is called the Voice for the power and range of his speaking).

Prentiss prepares for his events by arriving a week or two in advance of his staff, to roam the city, observing in particular what he (and, again, his staff) regards as evidence of the depravity of life in America’s major cities.  He also, we learn (and what is, it seems, not known by his staff, or by his wife), strikes up an acquaintance of a young woman to serve as his guide to the city (and, it seems, for other forms of companionship.  The mission’s photographer, who arrives with the rest of the performers, then assembles a movie/collage depicting the evils of which Prentisss will preach.  And, as you will surmise from this being a mystery novel and from the title, Prentiss does not live to complete his planned two-week series of meetings in New York.  Neither does his guide to the depravity of New York survive to sing past opening night.


Obviously, Lockridge’s version of the relationship between a minister and a choir girl differs from the reality of Kunstler’s history.  And Lockridge’s book ends with the arrest of the presumably guilty party.  And I can’t help but think that Lockridge knew of the Hall-Mills case (especially since Kunstler’s book was fairly recent, and the murders were even in the 1960s very well known), and that he based the murders, and the motives, on a more than 40 year old story.

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