Appalachian History

(...continued)

The "Anesthetic Prowler" or "The Phantom Anesthetist," he was supposedly a dark, mysterious figure responsible for dozens of Virginia victims falling ill from mysterious gasses flooding their homes. Whole families reported sudden attacks of choking, dizziness, headaches and various respiratory ailments.

However, lacking tangible evidence of a culprit or culprits, the press began to express suspicion. The first case to generate skepticism occurred in Fincastle on the night of February 24, 1934, when Ms. Mamie Brown dashed from her residence screaming that she had been gassed. A crowd quickly formed and was led to her house by C.E. Williamson, constable of the local jail, who determined that someone had "tossed a common fly killing fluid into the kitchen--apparently as a joke."

At about 9 PM on the 25th, a watchdog at the Chester Snyder farm near Cloverdale began barking. Prepared for the gasser, Snyder immediately leaped out of bed, grabbed a shotgun and fired at what he perceived to be the outline of a man walking in a nearby field. The incident may have been unrelated to the gasser, and although it was reported as a possible attack, on January 28th, a journalist jokingly interviewed Mr. Snyder's dog. "He the dog was friendly and apparently willing to 'make copy,' but when he was asked whether a man he detected prowling...was the 'gas' man, the pup merely pointed his ears....and barked a single bark."

By January 30, some citizens expressed the view that "the whole gassing case is a mere hoax, or figment of imagination of reported victims." A day later, a Dr. Driver, while believing in the reality of the gasser, told a meeting of the county Board of Supervisors that not all cases appeared to be genuine gassings. He also disclosed that at one of the allegedly gassed homes the offending fumes were traced to a coal stove. Sheriff L.T. Mundy typified the mood by declaring himself a Doubting Thomas unless he got gassed himself.

On February 3, 1934, the last gasser case reported in Botetourt County took place at the Troutville home of Mr. A.P. Scaggs; seven persons, along with the family dog, became ill. As usual, the attack occurred between 8 and 9 PM. A doctor was summoned to treat the victims, all of whom, dog included, recovered fully. While there were subsequent claims of gassings in Botetourt County, none involved symptoms or the detection of gas. Instead the gasser appeared to move to nearby Roanoke County that same day, when three persons were sickened by fumes at the Hamilton residence.

The gasser next struck in a residential section of Roanoke at about 8 PM on Wednesday, February 7, as Mrs. A.H. Milan of Rorer Avenue was in her living room with her 12-year-old daughter when a "funny" smell was noticed issuing from the door. Several minutes later, the daughter experienced dizziness.

However, Mrs. Milan had felt ill for several days before the attack. Although her daughter felt no aftereffects, as a precaution Mrs. Milan spent the night in the hospital. The following night during a two-hour period the Roanoke police received reports of five additional attacks, only to be frustrated by a complete lack of clues. The first call was received at 8:55 PM, when an employee of the city health department and three family members detected a strange smell in their house and briefly felt faint. Most of the remainder of the calls consisted of reports of residents smelling fumes but not becoming sick.

Roanoke County gassings peaked on the night of February 9th with seven separate reports. This marked a major turning point in the case when the investigating police noted that "In no instance did the officers detect any nauseating fumes, and no occupants of any of the homes were affected." In most instances, a mundane source of the odors was readily detected by the police. In one case, three detectives rushed to a home, only to implicate coal fumes from a stove as the cause. At another residence, gasser fumes were believed to have emanated from a passing car.

A further revelation eroded public confidence in the gasser's existence. On the night of February 11th, five more gassings were reported, but police announced a possible break in the case: A bottle had been used to scoop up a sweet-smelling, oily liquid found in the snow near the scene of a suspected attack at a home in Botetourt county, the first incident reported there in over a week.

On February 12th, a local chemist told police that the mystery liquid was a mixture of substances that were harmless to humans and most likely an insecticide "similar to that of fly exterminators used in practically every household." Reported gassings ceased entirely in both counties after the night of February 11, 1934.

In all, Roanoke police had received 19 calls, the last of which occurred when several officers responded to a gassing that was traced to burning rubber, prompting them to suggest that the "gas man" was a "product of overwrought imaginations." This conclusion was supported by an editorial in the Roanoke Times proclaiming: "Roanoke Has No Gasser."

The editorial stated: "This newspaper has so believed in the gasser's nonexistence from the first, but it seemed best to permit the police to go ahead and investigate without whatever handicap they might be under were cold water to be thrown on their search in advance."

The mad gasser episode of Botetourt County had finally played itself out.

Sure, lots of people had gotten sick, and dozens more had reported seeing dark, mysterious figures up to hideous no good stalking the night. The authorities had been run ragged with reports, but there had been no leads, nothing solid; nothing but suggestion, victims suffering from anxiety and fear, and the bizarre power of mass hysteria.


sources: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_kmske/is_/ai_n28753705
Little Green Men, Meowing Nuns, and Head-hunting Panics, by Robert E. Bartholomew, McFarland, 2001
www.roanoke.com/columnists/kennedy/wb/121141



Mad+Gasser+of+Botetourt+County mass+hysterias appalachia appalachian+history appalachian+mountains+history

Whether or not gas will be employed in future wars is a matter of conjecture, but the effect is so deadly to the unprepared that we can never afford to neglect the question.

General John Pershing, 1919

At 10 PM on December 22, 1933, Mrs. Cal Huffman detected a gassy odor in her Fincastle, VA home, and became nauseated. Despite the incident, she retired to bed while her husband remained awake in hopes of catching the perpetrator, having assumed that their house had been broken into. About 30 minutes later the smell of gas permeated the house; Mr. Huffman telephoned the police. Officer O.D. Lemon arrived about midnight, but found nothing out of the ordinary.

Immediately following Officer Lemon's departure at one in the morning, a third attack reportedly took place. This time, all of the seven or eight family members experienced choking fumes that made them temporarily ill. The Huffman's 20-year-old daughter Alice fainted. When nearby Troutville physician S.F. Driver arrived on the scene, he judged Alice so gravely ill that he administered artificial respiration to resuscitate her.

In a few hours, she appeared to be completely recovered, but later she relapsed and was described as "seriously ill." After this third attack, Mr. Huffman and another person inside the house thought they might have seen a man running away. The only clues found at the scene were a woman's high heeled shoe imprint near the window where the gas was believed to have entered the house, and a second print under a porch where it was thought the gasser may have hidden.

The Roanoke Times reported GAS ATTACKS ON HOMES CONTINUE on December 27, adding a new case involving Mr. and Mrs. Clarence Hall of Cloverdale. The couple returned home from church about 9 PM; within five minutes they detected sickening fumes that left a sweet taste in their mouths. Symptoms included nausea, smarting eyes, and weakness. The next evening, a relative thought he saw a figure with a flashlight near a side window of the Hall residence.

The gasser struck again on Wednesday the 27th at Troutville as welder A.L. Kelly reported that he was attacked in his residence about 10 PM while in an upstairs room. Curiously, no one else in the house was affected. This was followed by a temporary cessation of reported incidents and their press coverage. A few days after the most recent episode, the press expressed the view that the gasser "has concluded to call a halt to the series of mysterious attacks."

The gas attacks resumed on January 11. At about 10 PM, one Mrs. Moore, of Howell's Mill, reported hearing muffled voices in the yard following a rustling shade at a window that had been broken for some time. Because the room immediately smelled of gas, "Mrs. Moore grabbed her baby and ran out to give the alarm, but not until experiencing a marked feeling of numbness."

The couple who owned the house and lived upstairs were unaffected by the gas; in fact, they were unaware of the incident until they heard Mrs. Moore's cries. The owner of the house, Homer Hylton, stood guard the remainder of the night, fearing another attack. Later, it was revealed that on or about the same night the home of G.D. Kinzie of Troutville was gassed by what a physician concluded was a potentially lethal chlorine gas. "Nocturnal dispensers of a nauseating and benumbing gas went abroad in Botetourt County again last night," bleated The Roanoke Times the following day.

On Tuesday night, January 16, a Mr. F.B. Duval reported to the police that, upon arriving at his home near Bonsack at about 11:30, he learned that his family had been gassed. On his way to meet the police, he caught a fleeting glimpse of a man he assumed to be the perpetrator, running toward a nearby car. On Friday evening, January 19th, at 7:30 PM, a Mrs. Campbell was sitting near a window at her Carvin's Cove house when she noticed the curtains flutter, immediately followed by a strange odor, whereupon she felt ill.

Two nights later, Mr. and Mrs. Howard Crawford returned to their house in Colon at about 9 PM after visiting with friends, when Mrs. Crawford, while lighting a lamp, was overcome by fumes.

By Tuesday, January 23rd, the fear of being the gasser's next victim had reached such proportions that families living in remote areas of the county were sleeping with neighbors and vigilante farmers were "reported patrolling roads at late hours of the night or sitting on their doorsteps guns in their hands." One police officer expressed concern that "some innocent person passing a house or calling upon a neighbor may be wounded or killed through nervousness" by persons fearing that they were next on the gasser's list.

On the morning of the 24th, Mrs. R.H. Harteel of Pleasantdale returned home at about 4:30 after sleeping with a neighbor to find that the house had been gassed. During the day of the 24th, police inadvertently heightened tension after a misunderstanding resulted in reporting three separate attacks on homes in the vicinity of Carvin's Cove two nights earlier.

In actuality, there had been only a single report at the home of a man named Reedy. Immediately upon detecting the odor, one of his sons grabbed a shotgun, ran outside, and fired at what appeared to be a man running across a field. The escalating number of reports prompted members of the Virginia State Assembly to pass a bill calling for a maximum prison term of 10 years for anyone convicted of releasing noxious gasses in public or private places. In the event that the incident caused injury, the gasser would be "deemed guilty of malicious wounding and punished with from between one and 20 years in the penitentiary in the discretion of the court."

On the evening of Sunday, January 28th, five people at the Ed Stanley residence near Colon Siding were overcome by noxious fumes. While none of the victims lost consciousness, a Mrs. Weddle had to be carried from the house suffering from extreme nausea. When one of the victims, Frank Guy, managed to reach fresh air, he saw what appeared to be four men running near the woods, grabbed a shotgun and fired. The next day the county Board of Supervisors voted to offer a $500 reward for the apprehension and conviction of the culprit or culprits.

(stay tuned for part 2 on Monday, 12/22...)


sources: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_kmske/is_/ai_n28753705
Little Green Men, Meowing Nuns, and Head-hunting Panics, by Robert E. Bartholomew, McFarland, 2001
www.roanoke.com/columnists/kennedy/wb/121141



Mad+Gasser+of+Botetourt+County mass+hysterias appalachia appalachian+history appalachian+mountains+history