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[1835] The Last Execution in Kennebec County

Maine Ghost Hunters — Thu, 02 Oct 2025 22:24:56 +0000

Joseph J. Sager and Phoebe Sager

Joseph and Phoebe Sager were a middle aged couple residing in the city of Gardiner when the unfortunate incident involving Phoebe’s death, occurred. Phoebe was a 48 year old milliner and dressmaker at the time of her death, and 36 year old Joseph was a saddle and harness maker, and a shop worker. While Phoebe was often sick, she was also known to have a drinking problem that wasn’t at all under control. On the day of her death she fell violently ill after drinking a wine and egg mixture Joseph prepared for her, to have with her breakfast. A local doctor was summoned to help her, but despite his best efforts to help her over the course of the following 6+ hours, he could do nothing to alleviate the excruciatingly painful episodes of unstoppable vomiting, including “bloody vomit”, and she eventually died; the date of her death was October 5, 1834.

Phoebe repeatedly told people who were present with her, during her final few hours, that her husband made her drink the wine concoction. He insisted she drink it, and finish it. This caused the physician to become immediately suspicious. He then noticed a white powder residue in the wine decanter she drank from that morning, and also in the container that held the cream that was added to the wine. His suspicions would eventually lead to a startling discovery.

Another very important person in the murder case against Joseph Sager was a young woman named Ann Rafter. Ann Rafter was a Catholic servant of the Sager household at the time of Phoebe’s untimely passing. During this time in Maine’s history anti-Catholic sentiment was at its height. Catholics were persecuted, ostracized, vilified, and openly discriminated against.

Irish Catholic, Ann Rafter, became the principal witness in the case.

Joseph Sager accused Ann, their house servant, of poisoning Phoebe and there was rumored to be an actual confession by Ann, herself, to that effect but it was never found in any of the documentation or evidence.

But… … another compelling rumor was floating around that she never went to confession again after the trial.

Determining Phoebe was murdered

After Mrs. Sager died her body was sent off for an autopsy. The Doctor present at the time of her death had collected the cream container that had the white residue in it and requested the medical examiner send the contents of Mrs. Sager’s stomach to be analyzed, along with the residue, to Professor Cleaveland at Bowdoin Medical School.

Both contained arsenic.

Trial and Execution

The case of the ‘State of Maine vs. Joseph J. Sager’ started on Tuesday October 23, 1834 when Sager pleaded “not guilty” to the charges of murdering his wife.

The facts of the case were presented as follows;

Joseph Sager, aged 36, was accused of killing his 48 year old wife – Phoebe – by poisoning part of her breakfast – a drink he prepared for her made of wine, an egg, and white sugar. The visiting Dr. sent to treat Phoebe noticed the wine carafe she drank from at breakfast had a white sediment in it. The cream container on the dining table also had this sediment in it so the Dr. saved it and had it tested. The sediment was found to be arsenic, leading to a charge of murder against her husband Joseph.

Two Judges presided over the trial simultaneously, as Maine law at the time stated if the life of a person was at stake during a trial it was to be done with 2 Judges sitting on the bench. The 2 Judges were; Chief Justice Nathan Weston and Judge Albion Paris, who had also served as Maine’s 5^th Governor.

Prosecuting attorneys on behalf of the state were; Attorney General – Nathaniel Clifford (a future Justice of the US Supreme Court) and County Prosecuting Attorney – James W. Bradbury (a future US Senator).

The Legal Defense Attorneys on behalf of Joseph J. Sager were; the Honorable Peleg Sprague, who was the Primary Defense attorney and a current, sitting, US Senator from Maine, at the time; Frederick Allen; and George W. Bacheldor. Court proceedings were held in the old South Church in Augusta, Maine. Oliver Bean of Readfield was the jury foreman.

Joseph J. Sager was found “GUILTY” of the murder of his wife Phoebe Sager by a jury of his peers on Monday October 27, 1834, just 22 short days after her passing. Judge Weston sentenced Sager to death by hanging with the date of the execution to be carried out on Friday January 2, 1835 at the corner of State Street and Winthrop Street in Augusta.

The Trial was a full-house sensation every single day. The courthouse was mobbed with people and no seat was left open. The balcony was full, too.

Joseph J. Sager collapsed into his chair when the “guilty” verdict was read. He was sweating, shaking, and sort of hyperventilating. His representation filed a motion for a new trial based on the claim that material evidence had been suppressed at the trial but the motion was denied

The day of Joseph Sager’s execution, Friday January 2, 1835, was a very cold, snowy, and windy one.

The hanging took place at the gallows in Augusta on the corner of Winthrop and State Streets near the Southwest corner of the jail. Sager was Llkely walked from the jail, across the street to “Winthrop Street Square” where the gallows was erected.

His very last words were “Gentlemen, I am innocent” with a little hitch in the word “innocent” when they tightened the rope around his neck.

The Controversy

The controversy surrounding Joseph J. Sager’s execution had a lot to do with his persistent claims of innocence. Sager claimed his innocence until the very end, even blaming Ann Rafter, the family’s Irish servant for the murder of Phoebe; anti-catholic rhetoric was all the rage among certain political groups during this time, and so blaming an Irish Catholic girl was seen as quite the tactic of desperation. His claims of innocence persisted even though he had been caught pre-meditating his wife’s death on a number of occasions. One example of this was when he told a Kennebec River Steamboat crew member he knew that he’d be a widow soon. Not only did he say this with an odd sort of exciting anticipation, he actually handed this friend a hand written list of women he thought he might be interested in once his wife passes.

Another curious bit of circumstantial evidence that didn’t bode well for his case was that Joseph encouraged Phoebe to drink all of the liquid mixture he mixed for her, telling her “the goodness being all at the bottom” in the carafe the arsenic was found. The only witness to this act, however, was by their servant, Ann Rafter which, of course, Sager had a vested interest in discrediting. Another subject of controversy was that most newspaper articles and historical documentation said the Dr. who tended to Phoebe, as she lay dying, took a container with the arsenic in it with the intent of having it tested and studied by proper authorities, but curiously, there was also the rarer mention that it was Ann Rafter who was said to have carried out this deed. And one doesn’t likely need to be told how much of a conflict of interest it would be if Rafter actually *was* the one in possession of the carafe with the white powder in it, as she was considered the prosecution’s star witness and her influential testimony led to the hanging of Joseph J. Sager.

The Hanging of Joseph Sager

The gallows was constructed near the Southwest corner of the Kennebec County jail. There were between 8,000 and 12,000 people present to view the hanging. To give you a rough idea of what this might look like, in person; in 1830 the population of Augusta was 3,980. In 1840 the population of Augusta was 5,314. This was 1835. So, this singular area of the city of Augusta was a convergence point of 8,000 to 12,000 people – which is easily two, to three times, the population of the entire city at the time – all standing in one small space at the same time.

That day the weather was horrible – snowy, windy, cold, and raw. The crowd was belligerent – men were drinking until ‘plastered’ and treated this execution like it was some sort of entertainment. There were also lots of women, elderly, sick, and children present. People traveled from great distances and spent the night to see the hanging.

There were armed soldiers present – the Augusta Light Infantry – surrounding the gallows. The day was chaotic and at many times, a dangerous place to be. A sea of 8,000-12,000 people pushing forward toward the gallows, to the point the soldiers had to get under the platform for safety. In one instance, someone hollered “FIRE!” which caused the mob to panic.

Militia situated themselves to guard the gallows and then the Sheriff and 2 deputies went to Sager’s cell to bring him to the hanging spot. The Sheriff saluted Joseph Sager at his cell – it’s said to make him feel better about this situation. Joseph didn’t put up any kind of fight and when they led him to the gallows he was carrying the noose on his own right arm.

When this all started just 3 and a half months earlier in October of 1834, Sager was ‘built’ physically. He was a man with physical stature. But, by the day of his hanging he’d lost so much weight he was almost unrecognizable.

Sager’s last words proclaimed his innocence. He wrote them down but had to have been in a state of utter panic when doing so, and so the words were just a mash-up of incoherent gibberish basically pleading for his life. They were read by Reverend Benjamin Tappan who then turned to the crowd and warned them, basically, not to live a life that would lead to this. To look at Joseph Sager and to understand that life choices can have serious life consequences.

Joseph Sager’s mother was in the courthouse begging Governor Dunlap and his advisors to stay the execution, to no avail. Where they were situated inside the courthouse offered them a vantage point with a good view of the gallows when the execution was taking place. Joseph firmly believed his mother’s pleas would save his life.

A Quaker from The Society of Friends in Fairfield also made his way into the Governor’s presence to beg for Sager’s life but the Governor was too busy watching the crowd and the gallows that he didn’t even make eye contact with the gentleman.

George W. Stanley was the Kennebec County Sheriff at the time, and he was responsible to drop Sager where he stood on the platform.

Stanley led Sager to the platform, let his last words be spoken, then put a black hood over Sager, adjusted the noose, took his hand and humanely said “goodbye”. When Sager proclaimed his innocence Stanley told him “this is now a matter between you and your god”. Stanley then walked down the gallows steps and slashed the rope holding Sager in place.

When the trap door was released the words “sickening thud” were used to describe the ‘drop’ and it’s thought he died instantly.

Sager dropped over 10 feet and then just hung, twirling around lifeless, as people gawked – for 20 minutes before his friends and family were allowed to cut his body down and carry it off to be given a proper burial. Dr. Franklin Gage declared him dead. He was lowered onto a horse sled and driven as fast as possible to Hallowell.

The Mystery

Joseph Sager’s body was rushed off in a hurry, to Hallowell, where his friends had a master plan of electrocuting him back to life. The concept they planned to use on him was a much misunderstood version of “galvanism”. Galvanism is named after an Italian doctor named Luigi Galvani – a man who hooked up a dead frog to an electrical charge, and witnessed the legs moving. It was the basis for the plotline in Frankenstein when the mad scientist brings the monster to life by electrocuting it into reanimation.

These efforts failed, of course, and Sager was buried in a secret location on an island in one of the ponds in Winthrop. 50 Years later, January 2, 1885 a newspaper article printed by the Daily Kennebec Journal specified Joseph Sager was buried on Horse-Shoe Island in Cobbosseecontee Pond.

But still, there were people who persisted in their belief that he was brought back to life and ushered out of the state by friends & family, escaping to Texas to live out the remainder of his natural life.

Some say if you go to the spot Sager was hung and you ask aloud “Sager, for what were you hanged?” a voice would reply “nothing”. So this question of his innocence or guilt was clearly in the collective conscious of the local community.

This hanging bothered people and was ultimately the last execution ever conducted in Kennebec County.

The post [1835] The Last Execution in Kennebec County first appeared on Maine Ghost Hunters.

[1931] The Haunting of Hendrick’s Head

Maine Ghost Hunters — Thu, 01 May 2025 12:41:21 +0000

[1931] The Haunting of Hendrick’s Head

The Mysterious Traveler

Hendrick’s Headlight in located in the quaint little mid-coast town of Southport, Maine. It looks a lot different now than it did back in the early 1930’s. The town was smaller, quieter, and when summer was over there were a lot less people around. It was the kind of town where everyone knew everyone else. And when a stranger came through – well, you likely knew that, too.

That’s what happened on Tuesday, December 1, 1931 when the bus service rolled into town and out stepped a middle aged woman dressed head to toe in all black clothing, carrying a single suitcase, and looking to rent a room at the old Fullerton Hotel. Honestly, nothing really stood out about her, besides the fact that she wasn’t from around here. But then again, the existence of a year round hotel in this tiny coastal town told you all you needed to know about how common it would be for a stranger to stop in for a night or two.

She rented a room under the name Louise G. Meade and immediately headed out to see the coastline. She walked down the main street, past a few shops and when she saw Mrs. Pinkham outside the post office she stopped and asked directions on how to get to a place she could take in a “sweeping view of the ocean”. Mrs. Pinkham obliged and told her the best place to see the open ocean was down by Hendrick’s Head Light, but advised it was getting late in the day, it would be dark by the time she headed back to the hotel, and the temperature was dropping fast – locals were expecting the first snow of the season on this night. None of that seemed to matter. Louise thanked Mrs. Pinkham, told her she knew where Hendrick’s Head was, and headed out for the trek toward the ocean.

Not long after this exchange, Lightkeeper Knight stumbled into the town post office. It was briskly cold outside. The wind was beginning to pick up and folks were getting ready for winter weather to settle in. The waves crashing on the shoreline, visible from the lighthouse Mr. Knight and his wife were in charge of, were a testament to everything Mrs. Pinkham had warned Louise about. So naturally, she asked Mr. Knight if he’d seen Louise on his walk to the post office, and if he’d given her fair warning about the dangers of the wind, the surf against the rocks, and how fast the sun sets out this way. But, to her surprise, he told her he never saw the visitor. She insisted there was no way he could have missed her, since there is only 1 road from the lighthouse to the post office, and this woman was on it – she’d seen Louise leave toward that direction with her very own eyes. But Mr. Knight was quite certain he saw no one. But, he assured her, on his way back to the lighthouse, he’d keep a keen eye out for the traveller and would assist her if she needed it.

As it turned out, Mr. Knight would never get the chance.

On his way home he made a conscious effort to take notice of anyone who might be present on the road toward the lighthouse. All the residences down this way were summer homes, so they were boarded up and empty. There were no lights, and no sign of any activity once tourist season was over. However, as he got closer to the lighthouse he happened to look over toward one of the neighboring cottages and he saw, what he thought, was the silhouette of a person walking on the side of the cottage. Now, by this time of the evening it was starting to get quite dark. Not yet completely night time, but definitely on the later end of dusk. Mr. Knight saw the silhouette and hollered out, asking who it was and did they need help, numerous times, but he got no response. And the visual happened so quickly, he really wasn’t sure if he had actually seen what he thought he saw. He wondered if it was a trick of light, or if his mind was playing tricks on him, simply because he was so focused on not missing Louise if they crossed paths again.

Well – the next day arrived and it was noted that this woman in black had not returned to her hotel room after heading out to see the ocean, and naturally, folks got worried. So a local fisherman, who was also good at tracking, followed the path Mrs. Pinkham had told him Louise took away from the post office, and he tracked her straight down the road, noting quite curiously, that her tracks led off into the bushes on the side of the road right where she would have crossed paths with Mr. Knight. He surmised that when Mr. Knight came into view she stepped out of view, so as not to be noticed, and when Mr. Knight was out of earshot and eye line, Louise came back out onto the roadway and continued her walk toward the water.

The Search

This being a typical small Maine community, the townspeople weren’t letting this one go. They were worried for the traveler and feared something had happened to her down near the water on Tuesday night, so by Sunday Morning, December 6, 1931 there was a concerted effort put forth amongst the local fishermen to scour the coastline and the nearby waters in search of her body. And they did – they found her. She wasn’t far from a nearby beach, and the undertow had her trapped in a seemingly endless cycle of surfacing, getting pulled under, then surfacing again. If they weren’t actively looking for her she very well could have gone unnoticed for quite a time.

The Mystery

Now comes the mystery. It’s what you’ve been waiting for, isn’t it?
Well, here are some things you should know;

When searchers recovered the body they saw immediately that her wrists were bound by a leather belt that was looped through her handbag, and then threaded through the handles of an electric flatiron. Essentially, whoever fastened this setup was aiming at weighing her down while preventing her from struggling her way free.

One of her hands was partially inside of her bag, and the other was “hooked on her belt”.

When the contents of her suitcase were investigated it was noted that all of her clothing – every single piece of clothing – had no tags of any sort. All of the tags had been purposely and carefully removed – all except those she was wearing when she went to the ocean.

The name she gave the Fullerton Hotel when she checked in was Louise G. Meade from Pittsburgh, PA. But, despite an overwhelming effort by Southport authorities to locate her next of kin, or at least someone who knew her, all of those efforts failed. Ads and articles were run in newspapers all over the country. Since the clothes she was wearing were known to come from Lord and Taylor in New York – New York City detectives came to Southport to investigate the body. Her description was blasted to every police department within reason, but nothing came of any of it. No one claimed this mysterious woman as missing.

And, probably one of the most enigmatic of all the clues left behind about who this stranger might be, was found inside the handbag she had on her when she was recovered from the water. Inside this bag was a “waterproof packet” with a string of numbers no one has ever been able to identify. These numbers were purposely – and in an obviously premeditated fashion – placed inside a packet that water couldn’t penetrate.

If she was murdered, did the murderer leave a water tight clue behind? And if they did, why would they do that?

If she committed suicide, did she bind her own hands? And if she did, why would she do that?

If she did bind her own hands, why did she show no signs of struggle before eventually drowning? When she was recovered it was noted one hand was partially resting in her handbag, the other was resting loosely around her belt, as if neither had moved once she was in the water. A resident of the town who helped with the investigation made mention he knew of a number of people who had committed suicide by drowning and no matter how determined they were to end their lives there was always that final moment of desperation when they tried to stop it before it was too late. This woman showed no signs of struggle. Not one.

The Resolution

After a month of failed attempts to identify the ‘woman in black’ that Southport residents knew only as “Louise G. Meade” they finally decided to bury her amongst their own in a small family cemetery on the road to Hendricks Head on January 8, 1932. She wasn’t given a headstone, and she was buried “off to the side”, but that was to be expected given the circumstances. In family cemeteries all of the plots are generally taken by groups of family members and so the only available place for unexpected deaths is “off to the side”. More than 25 years later the fieldstone left to denote her burial spot was replaced with an unmarked stone, here in Union Cemetery in West Southport.

The Mystery Continues

As for the haunting of Hendricks Head? There are 2 well known parts:

For decades, there have been repeated sightings of a mysterious black limousine witnessed during the anniversary week of her demise at the shoreline of Hendricks Head, as if someone is looking out over the water in mourning for the woman we know only as Louise G. Meade. It’s also seen around the same time of each year at the cemetery she was laid to rest, but no one has ever made a solid connection between the two. Only noting that the limousine started showing up after her death, and has continued to be witnessed at the locations of her demise and burial.

To this day there are sightings of the lady in black out here at Hendricks Head. Not always in the same place, and not always under the same circumstances – but always right around the date she was taken out to sea, and always right around that certain time of night when the light gets so low you can almost call it “dark”. Some folks say the fog brings her back, others say it’s the bright glow of a full moon that will reveal her apparition. But there’s only one thing they can all agree on – ‘The Lady of Dusk’ haunts the shores of Hendricks Head and no only really knows why.

Wrapping Up

If you’d like to visit the shores of Hendricks Head you’ll have to come to Southport, Maine. There’s limited parking down near the lighthouse but it’s worth the drive. It’s beautiful out here. And who knows, maybe you’ll be one of the lucky ones to catch a glimpse of The Lady of Dusk. If you do, we want to hear from you!

If you’d like to honor the otherwise anonymous woman we know only as “Louise G. Meade”, her unmarked stone can be found at the Union Cemetery in West Southport – “off to the side”. We ask if you visit her final resting place you do so with consideration for the fact that she has been buried here away from all those she had ever known in her life. She’s had no one to visit her grave site, to keep her final resting place clear of debris or overgrowth, or to put flowers on her grave to express their mourning of her passing from their lives. She deserves nothing but the utmost respect from all of us. We ask that you please pay your respects with these notions in mind.

The post [1931] The Haunting of Hendrick’s Head first appeared on Maine Ghost Hunters.

Elephant Mountain B-52 Crash Site

Maine Ghost Hunters — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 17:10:10 +0000

Elephant Mountain B-52 Crash Site

Introduction

The Elephant Mountain B-52 Crash Site is an outdoor memorial, honoring one of the most tragic plane crashes Maine has ever known. 7 Men lost their lives on a routine training mission back in 1963 and the wreckage remains, strewn across the forested landscape of Elephant Mountain.

History of the Crash

January 24, 1963 a B-52 plane was flying overhead while conducting a training run on ‘evading Russian radar’. The Soviets had developed a new radar technology which required American pilots to learn how to fly under it to remain undetected while in enemy territory.

The B-52 aircraft is capable of amazing things, including flying more than 600 miles an hour and at altitudes that exceed 50,000 feet. So it’s built to be rugged, but also dynamic in terms of its function during wartime. The problem was, flying at such a low altitudes prevented some of the safety features from being as effective as they were designed to be.

When this B-52 plane was originally designed the Soviets hadn’t developed this new radar technology, so there really wasn’t any need to consider flying at high speeds at low altitude. During this particular run the flight crew had a choice of testing over the mountains of the Carolinas, or over the mountains in Maine. And, of course we know, they chose to fly over Maine.

The weather conditions the day of the test flight were typical for winter in the mountains of Maine. It was -14º and the wind was howling upwards of 50mph. When you combine that with having to fly 500 feet or below, to avoid being caught on radar you wind up with a very challenging situation – both, for the pilot and the structure of the plane. The turbulence on the plane, from the wind drifting off the mountains is what really brought this mission to its knees. But the construction of the plane didn’t help, either.

The B-52, at this time, was really built for higher altitude work, and not at all designed for quick maneuvering – at any altitude. So when the flight crew realized the turbulence was unmanageable at the low altitude they were flying, the pilot was directed to bring it up so they could fly over it. This is when tragedy struck.

When the pilot attempted to get to a higher altitude through all of the turbulence, a loud bang was heard. Then it turned right with the nose of the plane pointing right down to the ground. There was nothing that could be done. There was no regaining control so the pilot ordered everyone abandon the aircraft.

The 3 men in the cockpit could just use their ejection seats, which is what they did. All 3 successfully ejected. 1 hit a tree and died on impact, 1 hit a tree and hung 30 feet above ground overnight, and the other hit the ground so hard he cracked his skull, shattered 3 ribs, and bent the framing of his ejection seat. The 2 survivors were in very bad shape.

Worse news is, these large B-52’s weren’t made for low altitude ejections, so the plane had to be above 200 feet for the lower deck ejection seats to work. They ejected downward, so if they weren’t above 200 feet the seats would launch the person straight into the ground and death would be unavoidable. So the lower level ejection seats were non-functional, and there were spare crew on board during this training mission – and spare crew don’t have ejection seats, so they have to jump out of the plane manually by forcing open the doors and donning a parachute.

It was only seconds after the last flight crew member ejected that the plane hit the side of Elephant Mountain.

It was going well over 300mph.

There was nothing the bottom deck crew could do.

The reason for why the plane crashed was investigated and deemed a ‘turbulence induced structural failure’ and after a few more crashes and a bunch more lives lost on other missions, the problem was fixed.

Reported Phenomena

It’s no surprise … We’ve been told by numerous people over the years that there’s something about the wreckage on Elephant Mountain that brings immense sadness and anxiety, and that some people have had to vacate the memorial area while their family remains to investigate the debris – and that we should come up here to check this place out for ourselves.

How to get to the Elephant Mountain b-52 Plane Crash Site

To get here you’re going to want to drive to Greenville. From the center of town you’ll take the Lily Bay Road for about 6 and a half miles until you reach Prong Pond Road. You should be seeing signs put up by the Moosehead Riders Snowmobile Club that point you in the direction of the wreck site from here. It’s still a ways in, and we recommend hitting up a few websites to print out driving directions in case the Snowmobile Club signs fall down or go missing. The trail rating is “easy”. It’s a well groomed trail and there is even a little parking area for 3 to 4 cars just outside the entry gate.

Please respect this place like you would a graveyard, because that’s what it is. 7 men lost their lives in this crash, and the place this plane landed is sacred ground.

Do NOT remove anything from this site.

Do NOT carve your name into any of the remaining pieces

Do NOT desecrate this site by leaving any marks indicating you were here.

This is a mass grave and should be respected as such.

The post Elephant Mountain B-52 Crash Site first appeared on Maine Ghost Hunters.