Dr. Thomas Neill Cream (1850-1892); Serial Killer.

Dr. Thomas Neill Cream, also known as the Lambeth Poisoner, was a doctor secretly specializing in abortions. He was born in Scotland, educated in London, active in Canada, and later in Chicago, Illinois. 

Cream established a medical practice not far from the red-light district in Chicago, offering illegal abortions to prostitutes. He was investigated in August 1880 after the death of Mary Anne Faulkner, a woman on whom he had allegedly operated, but he escaped prosecution due to lack of evidence. 

In December 1880, another patient, Miss Stack, died after treatment by Cream, and he subsequently attempted to blackmail a pharmacist who had made up the prescription.

On 14 July 1881, Daniel Stott died of strychnine poisoning at his home in Boone County, Illinois, after Cream supplied him with an alleged remedy for epilepsy. The death was attributed to natural causes, but Cream wrote to the coroner, blaming the pharmacist for the death after again attempting blackmail. 

Cream was arrested, along with Mrs. Julia A. (Abbey) Stott, who had become Cream's mistress and procured poison from Cream to do away with her husband. She turned state's evidence to avoid jail, laying the blame on Cream, which left Cream to face a murder conviction on his own. He was sentenced to life imprisonment in Joliet Prison. One night unknown persons erected a tombstone at Mr. Stott's grave, which read, "Daniel Stott Died June 12, 1881, aged 61 years, poisoned by his wife and Dr. Cream."

Cream was released on July 31, 1891, when Governor Joseph W. Fifer commuted his sentence after Cream's brother pleaded for leniency, allegedly also bribing the authorities. Moving to London, he resumed killing (mostly prostitutes) and was soon arrested. He was hanged on November 15, 1892. 

According to the hangman, his last words were reported as being "I am Jack the Ripper." Records show Cream was in prison during the last three Ripper murders in 1888.

Compiled by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D. 

"My Uncle Al Capone played Santa Claus." A True Story.

1930 was a terrible year for most of us. The Depression had set in deep. My old man and many other heads of families were laid off without an hour's notice. Small businesses closed down, hundreds of them. Families doubled up to save rent. 

Al Capone as Santa Claus.
Sent to me by Deirdre Marie Capone, Al Capone's Grandneice.

In Burnham (a village in Cook County), there were exactly three people outside of city hall with steady jobs - the mailman, the milkman, and a schoolteacher, and the schoolteacher only got paid every three or four months. Mom got work as a scrub-woman at the school. And now, when Al and the boys came around for volleyball, he'd slip her $10 and apologize for dirtying up the floor she'd just been washing. I hung on to my shoeshine stand for dear life.

The breadlines. The soup kitchens. Al ran his own soup kitchen in Chicago. Beggars coming around to your back door for a crust of bread. Food was cheap enough, but nobody had money to buy it. The corner drugstores sold cigarettes two for a penny. Who could afford a full pack at 15¢ for 20 cigarettes? There was always a long line in front of the roll-your-own cigarette machine. If you rolled them thin enough, you could get 50 cigarettes out of a 10¢ package of loose tobacco. We practically lived on the three-day-old bread Dad brought home from a bakery. A full gunnysack (burlap sack) cost 25¢, and we kids would rummage through it, hoping to find a sweet roll or two.

Christmas 1930. I'll remember it as long as I live. None of the kids expected any presents. But maybe a chicken dinner. We still had a few hens scratching around the backyard. Then, the miracle happened. We were gathered around the Christmas tree - such as it was, just bare branches - when a loud knocking on the front door came. Dad opens up, and it's Santa Claus, whiskers, a red suit, and a big bag on his back. I yelled, "Al!" and threw myself at him. He clapped his hands, and six of his boys came in, each lugging a box of groceries that could have fed the whole neighborhood. They helped Mom stack them neatly on the pantry shelves. There were expensive gifts for everybody - a watch set in diamonds for Babe and slip-over sweaters for my brothers Edward, Sam, Don, and me. Don got a wind-up train and a whole set of tracks. My sister Kathy got the most beautiful doll I have ever seen, with an entire wardrobe. And a large turkey with all the fixings. I never tasted anything so good in my life.

Deirdre Marie Capone, Al Capone's Grandneice.
Edited by Dr. Neil Gale, Ph.D.