Early this year, a piece of land approximately 152 acres that once belonged to the “Bloody Benders” is up for sale. The news was soon went viral in social media.
What caught netizens attention was not just this piece of land but the history lying under it.
According to the Kansas Historical Society (KHS), “Bloody Benders” were a German family of four that settled in southeastern Kansas in Labette County in 1871. The group is believed to be one of the first serial killer families in America.
John Bender Sr., his wife Kate and their two children, named John and Kate, operated “Bender Inn” where they provide stays and foods to travellers — or so people thought.
However, locals began scouring the area after reports of people who had gone missing in their community began to surface.
In 1872, George Longcor and her daughter from Kansas wanted to move to another state went missing. The next year George’s best pal, William York trying to search for them following the path he mentioned, William went missing too.
William was a doctor and both his brothers were worried after they lost contacted him. One of William’s brother was army while another one was a senator in Kansas. The both of them suspected Bender’s family,
When the property was searched, the townspeople discovered a far grislier truth: The family had gruesomely murdered at least 11 people and buried their bodies throughout the land.
It was suspected that the Benders sat travellers near the curtain and used some sort of hammer to hit them in the back of the head, before they dropped their victim through the trap door and into the cellar below.
After the gruesome murders, it’s believed that the Benders had fled the area and were never found.
A historical marker erected near the site says, “Although stories abound, the ultimate fate of the murderous Bender family is uncertain. Some say that they escaped, others that they were executed by a vengeful posse.
“Their story is unresolved and remains one of the great unsolved mysteries of the old West.”
Info via CNN, A Day Magazine