NOTE: this site has been replaced by a much bigger, more detailed one that I wrote after a trip into the basement of the post office with the History Channel in June, 2012. CLICK HERE for the new one!
The murder castle of H.H. Holmes was torn down in 1938. There were rumors that it was haunted while it was still standing, and a few stories now circulate about the basement of the current building on the grounds.
The government bought it in order to put up a post office on the site. This one, to be specific:
INotice the fallout shelter sign on the door - apparently, nowadays people go to the basement to LIVE (at least in theory). t doesn't occupy the EXACT same footprint - the left hand side of the building would have been in the middle of Wallace Street in the Murder Castle's time - but it does occupy a portion of the grounds. The drugstore Holmes ran would have been on the right hand side, possibly stretching into the empty space besides the station. Dr. Holden's pharmacy, the other drug store Holmes took over, was across the street (in what is now an Aldi parking lot). As far as we know, not a bit of structure from either building remains, though I suspect we might find some foundation if we dug the place out. I don't think they'll be letting us do THAT anytime soon, though (update: the basement below IS said to be partly original - we'll have a full report late in 2012).
Here's a diagram showing what overlap there was, based on overlaying three versions of the Sanborn fire insurance maps. The "Castle" is in blue:
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As you can see, there's SOME overlap, but not a lot. The mysterious gas tank said to be used for cremations was well away from the post office itself. But I always say that if someone can come back from the dead, surely they can walk down a hall, too, right? Check back on this site for photos soon.
I DID just have a woman on the tour who lived near the castle when she was young - when it was still standing. She said remembered feeling spooked by the place - enough so that she'd cross the street so as not to walk by the site - but didn't know why until decades later.
11 comments:
According to what I've read the "castle" burned down while HHH was still in jail...not torn down or demolished as you suggest in 1938.
There was a fire there while he was still in jail that destroyed most of the evidence - but it didn't burn to the ground (many books have mistakenly said it did, though). The building was still there until the city bought it to tear down in 38; most of the pictures of it are from that era, in fact.
It's great that someone else has finally figured out that the Castle survived the 1895 fire and wasn't demo'd until the 1930s. It's obvious from some of the pics, which show '20s era automobiles and the name "Campbell" chipped off at the top of the corner turret (it once read "Campbell Block"). However, Wallace originally ran where the railroad tracks are now (in the 1890s, the tracks ran right in the street, "at grade"... old drawings show this). Wallace's right-of-way on the north side of 63rd was relocated a bit to the west, I believe. On the south side of 63rd, next to where the Castle stood, Wallace was vacated as the tracks were elevated. Therefore, the current post office's footprint is mostly west of where the Castle stood (there is some overlap, though). The grassy area east of the post office, right next to the "alley" (originally Wallace), would have been the location of the entrance to Holmes' drug store, right under the turret.
That sounds about right, S.R. On the tours I take to the site, I usually tell people the castle itself would have occupied roughly half of the footprint, owing to the fact that Wallace was a through street at the time (it still runs right up to 63rd on the North side of the street.
Do you happen to know when the pointed turret was added? We've got pictures of the thing with a pointed turret (circa 1905) that I haven't seen in other shots.
I didn't know that the Castle ever had a pointed turret roof (I've never seen the photo you speak of). I would guess it was added after the 1895 fire, though, possibly to give the building an updated or different look. (What a mess it must have been to establish title to the property after Holmes was gone.) Obviously the pointed turret roof was removed sometime before the 1938 demolition. Are there any good, clear photos of the Castle as it looked in Holmes' time? I wonder if other architectural details were altered after the fire as well. It's funny: most books of today describe the Castle as a strange, grotesque, out-of-the-ordinary structure; yet, architecturally, it's similar to so many commercial buildings of the era that had apartments above. I've seen a few 1880s-1890s buildings around Chicago that could almost pass as twins for the Castle... yet, I've seen none as large (wasn't it 150 feet deep?) as the Castle was. Maybe that's what made it unique.
There's one fairly good shot of it going around - it looks sort of unfinished, and surprisingly bright, compared to the pics from the 30s (the darkness was blamed on soot and age at the time). There's a small version of it at http://www.themediadrome.com/Images/history/holmes_castle.gif I've also seen a shot of the furnace inside of the sign shop from the 30s. I'm not 100% sure of the accuracy of either shot (I've never found an original source on the castle pic from the 1890s, but it DOES match newspaper drawings of the day). The earliest photos I have that I can source date to 1905 (though they were probably taken before then and kept on file). By then, it looked about like it would in the later pictures.
There was a guy who owned the place as of 1895, by which time Holmes had abandoned it (though he and his wives appear to have swung by from time to time). It was actually condemned at the time, even BEFORE the fire, as having been cheaply built and falling apart. Sources that mention the fire (it didn't warrant much attention at the time) seem to differ as to how much damage it did. I'd guess there must have been a big renovation in 1896 or so, but 1895 wasn't the only time it caught fire - there were a couple more in the building in 1905 and 1907 (and probably a few more)
I have heard rumors that at least part of the original basement existed after the 1938 demolition : Has anyone actually seen or heard of this?
Has anyone gone checked out that fallout shelter, access from the Post Office?
Who did the "finish out" of the shelter, and where are the plans?
hmmm damn I wish I lived in chicago.
A lot of people have speculated that some of the foundations wouldn't have been removed (this is common around here), but it's tough to confirm. Often, the reason that basements aren't removed is that it could mess with the nearby structures (for instance, the one original wall of the Iroquois theatre was shared with the building next door). in this case, there ARE no nearby structures, so there'd be nothing to stop them from tearing out the foundations in the 1930s, but it's anyone's guess. Certainly there's nothign visible around the grounds today to suggest the castle was there; it's all been fully landscaped. There ARE some bricks that appear to be foundations of Holmes' "sobieski street factory" on the North Side, though all that can be totally confirmed is that the bricks seem to date from the 1890s (and the tree that grew over one of them is certainly not new).
I wouldn't be surprised if there might be some structure left, but I don't imagine the post office is very keen on letting people into the basement (and only part of it occupies the same footprint to begin with). It's also in perhaps the most notoriously bad neighborhood in town, which has probably dissuaded some investigating in recent years.
Yeah you don't wanna go near that office. Bad part of town. and there are definitely other buildings in town that do look strikingly similar, almost exact dimensions, just different color brick, etc. holmes must have been inspired by other buildings downtown that have similar stylings.
From the drawing, why does the castle outline look so small compared to the post office. When you look at the pictures and people walking in front, it's clear that the castle is very large. Larger than the post office. Is that part of the castle drawn on the plans?
The castle was taller and more imposing than the post office, but certainly not larger. It was about 50 feet wide; the fire insurance drawings do make it look narrower than it seems to have been, though. Lining them up isn't an exact science. See also: http://www.chicagounbelievable.com/2012/06/murder-castle-today-or-good-grief-more.html
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