Welcome back to Myths & Mischief! This is your Lovable Lord of Lore, today’s mischievous myth is the second installment of the tale of the death of America’s master of the macabre, Edgar Allen Poe.
This is the 2nd part of a short story that gives a possible explanation of famous author Edgar Allen Poe’s demise.
When Thompson got to the office, there was a message on his desk. A man named Roderick Felt had reported being a witness of a beating near Ryan’s Tavern. When Wilson arrived, he told him to follow as they went to “pay a visit to this Felt character before paying a visit to Griswold.”
“Do we know anything about this Roderick Felt?” asked Wilson?
“Only what was on the note, he owns and runs a shop across from Ryan’s Tavern.”
The two returned to scene where Poe was found, it was in clear view of Felt’s shop. It was a general store, like so many others across the nation. There was nothing that made it stand out, and there were people shopping for groceries when the inspectors entered. The proceeded to walk up to the counter and inquired the location of Mr. Felt.
“I am Roderick Felt.”
“We got a report that you witnessed a crime, what can you tell us about it?”
Felt leaned in so his customers couldn’t hear what he was saying. “This is usually a relatively quiet street. It gets a bit rowdy on election days with the polling place being close by. Other than the occasional drunk wandering out of the tavern and making a spectacle of themselves there isn’t much that is notable.”
“What did you see?”
“Well, I was tidying up. We had more shoppers than usual since the voting started and one of the customers had knocked over some items in the display window. As I was resetting everything, I looked up as a carriage pulled up, immediately followed by a second carriage. Two large men jumped out of the first carriage and opened the door for the second carriage. Two men got out of the carriage and stumbled toward Ryan’s Tavern. The two men dragged a third man out of the carriage. He was unable to walk on his own accord.”
As Felt paused, Wilson interrupted “What happened then?”
The two men left him there when the men in the bar returned and loaded the other men back into the carriage and took off. Then the man attempted to stand up and asked a woman passing by for help. The men that she was with began beating the man, in what appeared to be defending her honor, but the first blow knocked him down, and they continued beating him until he was motionless.”
“What did you do?” asked Thompson.
“I started to head to the door to see if the man was alright, but he rolled over, then sat up. I decided to give him a minute to recover since it seemed like the threat was over.”
“Was it over?”
“Apparently not, when he collapsed again, I looked around at the customers and asked them to be patient for a moment, but before I got to the door, another man was at the side of him and seemed to be helping him. I returned to my customers, but I made it a point at the end of the day to report what I saw to the police. I didn’t hear back from anyone until you two.”
“We are investing the death of the man you saw, which is a different department than a common assault. We just learned of your statement. What can you tell us about these men?” inquired Thompson.
“I would assume since the first two men had multiple carriages that they have some access to resources, and the two that were beating that poor man were rather large and intimidating, but there was nothing else that struck me.”
“What can you tell us about the men that went into the tavern?”
“Besides their lack of coordination, they were disheveled, and it didn’t look like their clothes fit them well.”
“Do you think they were cooping?”
“That is what it looked like, but I couldn’t say for sure.”
“Is there anything else you can tell us that may be helpful, even the smallest details are sometimes important? For example, was he wearing a hat?”
“He was wearing a straw hat, but I can’t think of anything that would be helpful.”
“Did the man being beaten have any possessions or belongings that were taken by these men?”
“No, I didn’t see anything like that, they just left him in that state in the road, they didn’t appear to be robbing him.”
“Thank you for your time, if you think of anything else, please contact the station and leave a message for me, my name is Thompson, it won’t take as long for me to get the message that way. Mention Thompson specifically.”
“I don’t know if there will be anything else I can add, I’ve told you everything I saw inspector Thompson.”
Thompson gestured Wilson to start toward the door, “Thanks for reporting the incident, if everyone comes to us to report what they know, this case will be wrapped in no time.”
Outside the shop, Thompson and Wilson discussed what they had found out so far. There was now an eyewitness account that Poe was involved in what was most likely cooping which led to his death. They headed to Griswold office as they sorted out the possibilities of how cooping led to Poe’s death.
That’s it for today’s installment, this is your Lord of the Lore signing off.
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