The first anonymous letter was received in 1894 by a prominent Berwick, Pennsylvania resident. The poison pen letter seemed to have been written by a not-particularly-educated person but someone who was well-informed about the resident to whom it was addressed.

Then another prominent citizen received a letter.

That was how it began.

Image from berwickborough.org/

The letters were definitely out of place in Columbia County and Berwick, the little town where this human drama played out. It was a quiet place on the shores of the Susquehanna River, about 125 miles northwest of Philadelphia.

The author of the letters lashed out in all directions, with impressive results: the splotchy, poorly-spelled letters ruined reputations that took years to build and divided the lives of many formerly devoted people.

Mrs. J. D. Creasy told of the scurrilous attacks her daughter had endured. “I was worried until almost wild over the letters received in our family! Both my daughter and the young man who was calling on her received letters intended to estrange them. Attacks were made on the character of each to the other. My daughter was a mere child and cried herself sick before telling her father or myself.”

The letter writer timed the missives with precise cruelty. “A young woman on the eve of her marriage was the recipient of a letter charging her intended husband with intimacy with other women. As the letter was anonymous, she took a sensible view of the affair, and the marriage went on.”

The poison pen author succeeded in breaking up at least one marriage. “The wife of a prominent business man received a letter charging her husband with infidelity,” The Plain Speaker reported. “A quarrel was the result, a separation followed, and the husband accused the wife’s mother of being the author of the missive.”

The letter writer didn’t stop with married or betrothed couples. Many parents received critical letters about their children. Mrs. Crisman received letters informing her about the bad character of her son. “I cried all night over the contents,” she admitted. “My husband told me to pay no attention to them, but they nearly broke my heart.”

Mrs. J. H. Catterall received multiple letters that attacked herself and her daughter.

Because the letter writer was so prolific, I suspect many people who received anonymous letters didn’t tell anyone. The letters primarily targeted wealthy and prominent people. There may have been a grain of truth to some of the letters they didn’t want to broadcast, or perhaps they were just embarrassed by the accusations.

One of the fine homes in Berwick, PA

Eventually some people did go to the police. An investigation commenced but the police struggled to identify probable suspects. They looked for people who would know all of the recipients, but the number of people who had received these anonymous letters was astounding. And at no point ever did the poison pen writer give any reason for writing the letters.  “The mystery was profound,” the Kalispell Bee admitted. “Letters were kept and compared in the effort to identify the author.” Authorities even examined the writing exercises of local students to see if their handwriting corresponded to the cruel letters, but there was no match.

For six years, the flood of slanderous letters continued, leaving a path of destruction behind them, similar to the most wicked twister that ever barreled across the plains.

In 1899, Judge Kurtz received ugly letters concerning his daughters, who were 14 and 18 years old respectively.

Mrs. B. H. Dobson received two letters, one in 1899 and one in 1900.  “Both were vile beyond comparison. In fact I did not see the last one. My husband got it and refused to let me have it, on the ground that it was not proper reading for a woman. In the first letter we were advised to leave the town and told we had no friends. In the last, we were told to leave or our house would be burned.”

Eventually, the letters became threatening. “Men received letters to the effect that their houses or barns would be burned and their property damaged in other ways. Women were threatened with being blinded with vitriol if seen upon the streets after nightfall.” (That last sentence might ring a bell if you are a regular reader of this site! 🔔 We’ll come back to that.)

Click here to read Part 2.