Three Dances With Death

Edgar Worthington was dead - he had been convicted of murder and executed - or was he?

Rockport, Texas - In late 1852, the town of Mattawan, Delaware, was at very long last its quiet self again. The tragedy that marked the past year was now, thankfully, at an end.

The strange story began with the engagement of a young woman named Mary Caroline Austin to Mr. Edgar Worthington. But it wasn’t long before Mary’s father realized what an unpleasant character Worthington was and forbade the marriage.

The elderly Mr. Austin’s low opinion of the young man’s character was proved correct by Worthington himself, who responded to his rejection by slashing Miss Austin to death with a razor.

Worthington was charge with murder in the death of Mary Austin and, at his trial, Worthington claimed that the incident was a suicide pact gone awry.

He claims Mary Austin had killed herself and, while his own injuries proved less than fatal, Worthington maintained that he did not die only through a cruel twist of fate (or of the razor).

His defense proved feeble and a jury found him guilty. Worthington was sentenced to death.

But his story won him enough sympathy from a group of friends they were inspired to help him escape jail before the death sentence could be carried out.

But even with the help of friends, Worthington’s freedom was short-lived, and he was soon recaptured. And, before anyone could help him cheat death a third time, Worthington was hanged.

Some time passed. The town calmed. The unpleasant affair was now finished.

Then someone came forward with a most bizarre tale. A Captain Karsoll, who had recently traveled to the American interior, returned to Mattawan with a report that while passing near St. Joseph, Missouri, he had seen, in the flesh, Edgar Worthington - the hanged man, and he was perfectly alive.

But surely there was some mistake, the town officials argued. They’d all seen him hanged in the usual public fashion. The rope was fitted snugly around his neck. He was dropped the customary distance. And just in case his neck didn’t break, they allowed the wretched killer to swing well past the time required to choke out his life.

When Worthington’s corpse was finally cut down, he appeared to be fully deceased. His body was turned over to the town physician and buried in the churchyard. The hanging was performed correctly in every respect - there was never any doubt on that point.

But Captain Karsoll was persistent in his story of seeing the dead man - enough so that Worthington’s grave was dug up.

Everyone was stunned when, inside the coffin, they found a log.

At his point, the Austin family took matters into its own hands. Mary’s brother immediately set out from Mattawan, intent on tracking down his sister’s killer.

The search ended when Mary’s brother found Worthington and shot him. As the man who had taken his sister’s life lay dying, the brother was able to extracted a full confession of Worthington’s bizarre escape from the gallows.

It seems that the town physician, like so many others, believed the defense of a suicide gone awry and thought Worthington unworthy of the rope. Immediately prior to the hanging, the doctor laid open his windpipe and inserted a tube (a tracheotomy, in other words) that would allow him to survive the hanging, assuming there was no fracture in the neck.

And now, Worthington finally lay dead.

A bullet fired in vengeance marked the end of a killer’s unholy three dances with death. - Dean Terry

Reference Sources~


Love, Suicide, and Murder!! The True History of the Unfortunate Loves of Mary Caroline Austin and Edgar Worthington by Arthur R. Orton, 1855

The Unfortunate Lovers by Edmund Lester Pearson, Kennikat Press, 1970 reissue