How the jazz-obsessed Axeman of New Orleans brought a city to its knees — and got away with it.
Wikimedia CommonsThe cover art for sheet music written in responses to the killings committed by the Axeman of New Orleans.
Jazz music blared into the New Orleans air from both crowded clubs and homes where families huddled inside throughout the evening of March 19, 1919.
Why? It’s what the Axeman requested.
The Axeman of New Orleans plagued the residents of New Orleans from May 1918 to October 1919. This serial killer’s weapon of choice was none other than an axe, though never the same exact one. And often, the Axeman of New Orleans would use whatever was available, like a hatchet, straight razor, or butcher’s knife.
Though he attacked about a dozen people with such instruments over the course of a year and a half, the Axeman of New Orleans was never caught.
The Beginning Of The Axeman Murders In New Orleans
Miriam Davis The scene of the Maggio murder, the first confirmed victims of the Axeman of New Orleans.
On May 23, 1918, Joseph Maggio and his wife, Catherine, were attacked in their home at 4901 Magnolia Street which doubled as a grocery store.
The assailant entered their home in the middle of the night and slit the couple’s throats and hacked them with an axe as they lay in their bed.
Inside the home, New Orleans police discovered the bloody clothes of the killer. He likely changed into a clean pair of clothes before fleeing the scene.
Police found the axeman’s razor on the neighbor’s lawn, and police soon discovered that it belonged to Joseph Maggio’s brother, Andrew.
Andrew Maggio owned a barber shop nearby and reportedly took the razor home two days before the murder because he wanted to fix a defect on the blade. The axeman likely stole the razor from the Maggio property.
Police quickly ruled out robbery as a motive given that nothing was stolen from the home. Andrew Maggio remained the police’s top suspect, but a lack of evidence and Andrew’s consistent statements to the police kept the case cold.
The Axeman of New Orleans Strikes Again
NOLA A newspaper article from August 15, 1918.
On June 27, 1918, Louis Besumer and his mistress Harriet Lowe were sleeping in their apartment that doubled as a grocery store when they were attacked.
The assailant attacked Besumer with a hatchet before attacking Lowe. Thankfully, the couple survived the attack and were discovered by a grocery deliverer in the morning.
At the scene, police discovered the hatchet in the home’s bathroom; it belonged to Besumer, similar to the situation at the Maggio scene.
Also in line with the Maggio case, police could not find any evidence of robbery, and the case went cold.
The next attack came on August 5, 1918, when a woman named Anna Schneider was attacked while sleeping. Her assailant hit her on the head repeatedly with a bedside lamp. Thankfully, she survived, but could not recall her attack.
Five days later, an elderly man named Joseph Romano was discovered by his nieces after suffering severe head injuries from an unknown assailant. The assailant fled the scene, but not before the two women caught a glimpse of him. According to them, the man was a dark-skinned, larger man who wore a dark suit and a hat. He had attacked Romano with an axe and left in the home’s backyard.
On March 10, 1919, the Cortimiglia family was attacked in their home in Gretna, Louisiana, a suburb of New Orleans across the Mississippi River.
Both Charles and Rosie Cortimiglia were attacked with an ax but survived. However, their infant daughter was not so lucky.
The next attack occurred on August 10, 1919. Steve Boca, a grocer, was attacked in his home with an ax while he slept. He survived the attack, but like Schneider, he couldn’t remember the incident.
Then, on September 3 of that same year, the axeman struck once again. Nineteen-year-old Sarah Laumann was attacked with an ax while she slept. She too survived the attack.
The last attack of the Axeman of New Orleans came on October 27, 1919. Esther Pepitone awoke to discover that her husband, Mike, had been murdered. She saw the assailant fleeing the scene but could only describe him as “large.”
Public DomainMike and Esther Pepitone.
The Night Jazz Music Filled The Streets Of New Orleans
On March 13, 1919, the New Orleans-based Times-Picayune newspaper received a letter from someone claiming to be the Axeman of New Orleans, only three days after the attack on the Cortimiglia family.
In the letter, the axeman stated that any New Orleans residence that didn’t play jazz music on the eve of St. Joseph’s day, March 18, would “get the ax.”
Esteemed Mortal of New Orleans:
They have never caught me and they never will. They have never seen me, for I am invisible, even as the ether that surrounds your earth. I am not a human being, but a spirit and a demon from the hottest hell. I am what you Orleanians and your foolish police call the Axeman.
When I see fit, I shall come and claim other victims. I alone know whom they shall be. I shall leave no clue except my bloody axe, besmeared with blood and brains of he whom I have sent below to keep me company.
Now, to be exact, at 12:15 (earthly time) on next Tuesday night, I am going to pass over New Orleans. In my infinite mercy, I am going to make a little proposition to you people. Here it is:
I am very fond of jazz music, and I swear by all the devils in the nether regions that every person shall be spared in whose home a jazz band is in full swing at the time I have just mentioned. If everyone has a jazz band going, well, then, so much the better for you people. One thing is certain and that is that some of your people who do not jazz it out on that specific Tuesday night (if there be any) will get the axe.
Many people, today and then, believed the letter to be a hoax.
“When you read the letter, this is a person who’s an educated person—he has a classical allusion to Tartarus [a place of torment in Greek mythology]. It reads like it was written by a fraternity or something. And the person who is the Axeman, from the description we’ve got of him, he’s a working man, he’s working class. And I just don’t think a working class person at that time would have been educated enough to write that letter,” historian Miriam Davis told Country Road Magazine.
Regardless of whether the Axeman of New Orleans wrote the letter, he and his crimes became irreparably linked to jazz music.
Possible Suspects And Motives Behind The Ax Murders
Various people were suspected of being the Axeman of New Orleans, though witnesses could only describe the attacker as “dark-skinned,” “heavy set,” and wearing a “downturned” hat. This scant description forced authorities to cast a wide dragnet for suspects.
Countless people faced questioning, and even some of the victims themselves were suspected of being the Axeman of New Orleans, as was the case with one man named Louis Besumer (who was separately suspected of being a German spy).
However, each case that the police made against their suspects fell apart due to lack of evidence.
Whoever he was, why did the Axeman of New Orleans turn to murder?
While we may never know, we do know what calmed his murderous urges. A letter, purporting to be from the Axeman, published in various newspapers, read that “every person shall be spared” where “a jazz band” is playing, causing residents to crowd jazz halls and play jazz records late into the night of March 19, 1919. No murders were recorded that evening.
Just as jazz calmed the Axeman down, racial biases may have riled him up. One theory holds that the attacks were racially motivated, given that most of the victims were Italian-American immigrants, who had been facing a general wave of bigotry in the U.S. during that era. Additionally, because of the Italian angle, investigators also questioned whether or not the attacks were Mafia-related. However, these notions could never be proven true.
More recently, however, some contemporary researchers say that they have identified the Axeman of New Orleans.
Crime writer Colin Wilson points to a man named Joseph Momfre, who was later killed in Los Angeles by victim Mike Pepitone’s widow. However, fellow crime writer Michael Newton searched New Orleans (and Los Angeles) records and found no trace of Momfre, nor Pepitone’s widow. But scholar Richard Warner stated in 2009 that the chief suspect at the time was a man named Frank Mumphrey, who used the alias Joseph Monfre/Manfre.
Although this lead is an intriguing one, the Axeman’s identity remains a mystery.
Nevertheless, the killer’s violent, jazz-loving legacy continues to haunt popular culture to this day. American Horror Story: Coven and The Originals have each featured the Axeman as a character. And Chuck Palahniuk’s 2005 novel Haunted resurrects the Axeman in the “Sister Vigilante” story.
While certainly obscure, the strange unsolved case of the Axeman of New Orleans is undoubtedly not forgotten.
After this look at the Axeman of New Orleans, read up on five more terrifying serial killers you’ve never heard of before. Then, read about another terrifying New Orleans resident, voodoo queen Marie Laveau.
