Mysterious Death of Mary Rogers

She moved amid the bland perfume
That breathes of heaven's balmiest isle;
Her eyes had starlight's azure gloom
And a glimpse of heaven-her smile.
New York Herald, 1838


Locations
Participants
Associates
Compositions

Timeline

Y/M/D Description Place
1838/00/00 A poem dedicated to Mary Rogers appears in the New York Herald.
1838/00/00 Mary Rogers, the teenage daughter of a widowed boarding-house keeper, clerks at John Anderson's Tobacco Emporium frequented by NP Willis, J Fenimore Cooper, Washington Irving and Edgar Allen Poe and by reporters and editors of NYC's newspapers.
1838/10/04 Mary Cecilia Rogers, an attractive shop girl at John Anderson's cigar store at 319 Broadway (razed), disappears. Her mother, Phoebe, discovers what appears to be a suicide note.
1838/10/05 The New York Sun reports that the coroner has examined Mary Rogers' note and concluded that the author has a fixed and unalterable determination to destroy herself.
1841/06/00 Mary C Rogers becomes engaged to Daniel C Payne, a cork-cutter and boarder in her mother's house at 126 Nassau St in Manhattan.
1841/07/03 William Koekkoek of the USS NORTH CAROLINA, a former boarder at the Rodgers, makes a social call on Mary Rogers.
1841/07/25 Ms Mary Rogers leaves her mother's boardinghouse at 126 Nassau St to visit her aunt at 68 Jane Street, telling Payne and Phoebe she'll be back the next day. That night, a severe storm hits New York.
1841/07/25 At the corner of Theatre Alley, Mary Rogers is met and accosted by a young man, apparently an acquaintance, with whom she proceeds toward Barclay St as if for an excursion to Hoboken. NEW-YORK TRIBUNE, 2 August 1841
1841/07/26 By Monday night, when Mary Rogers fails to return home as planned, her mother, Phoebe Rogers, places an advertisement for the next day's Sun newspaper.
1841/07/27 Mary Rogers' mother's ad appears in 'The Sun' asking for anyone who might have seen Mary to have the girl contact her, as "it is supposed some accident has befallen her."
1841/07/27 Daniel Payne places a personal ad in the Sun asking for help in finding Mary Rogers.
1841/07/28 H G Luther and two other men, who are passing Sybil's Cave (Frank Sinatra Dr, Hoboken, S of skate park), near Castle Point, Hoboken, in a sail boat, are shocked by the sight of the body of a young female in the water. They bring it ashore. Hoboken, New Jersey
1841/07/28 After seeing the ad placed by Payne reporting Mary Rogers' absence, Arthur Crommelian of 19 John St crosses over to Hoboken where he arrives in time to identify the body found in the Hudson as Mary Rogers.
1841/07/28 Coroner's Inquest is taken at Castle Point, Hoboken, on the body of a female, found fastened by a rope and stone, near the shore - by a jury of thirteen men, duly summoned and qualified, by Gilbert Merritt, a Justice of the Peace.
1841/08/00 The Herald, the Sun and the Tribune report the death of Mary Rogers on their front pages in graphic detail. Publishing vivid descriptions of her corpse along with theories about what her killer or killers might have inflicted on her.
1841/08/00 Two boys collecting sassafras in a thicket for their mother, tavern owner Frederica Loss, find several items of women's clothing including a crumpled up petticoat and handkerchief embroidered with the initials MR.
1841/08/00 Speaking to reporters, Frederica Loss claims to have seen Mary having a lemonade with a tall, dark stranger on the evening of July 25 at Loss tavern. Later that night, Loss says, she heard a scream coming from the woods.
1841/08/06 NEW-YORK TRIBUNE: The terrible Murder of Miss Rogers excites daily a deeper and wider interest in our city. Well may it do so. - A young woman leaves her home on Sunday morning, and is unheard of till ... she is found horribly outraged and murdered ....
1841/08/11 Daniel C Payne, of No 47 John Street, cork cutter, goes to the police office, at the request of Justice Parker, to give information he might posses on the disappearance of Miss Mary C Rogers.
1841/08/12 Daniel Payne's testimony is published in the New York Evening Post.
1841/08/13 William Koekkoek's testimony is published in the Evening Post. Police thrice questioned Koekkoek about the death of Mary Rogers, but he produced an alibi to show he was not in her company on July 25th.
1841/10/07 After a drinking binge in Hoboken, Daniel Payne buys a vial of laudanum at a pharmacy, stumbles down to the Hudson, collapses onto a bench and dies. He leaves a note: "To the World - Here I am on the very spot. May God forgive me for my misspent life." Hoboken, New Jersey
1841/11/06 Frederica Loss is accidentally shot by one of her sons. The wound will prove fatal and she spends the next 10 days babbling incoherently in broken English and German. Hallucinating. She claims that the spirit of a young woman is tormenting her.
1842/04/00 In the spring, Edgar A Poe begins writing "The Mystery of Marie Roget", lifting whole passages from the New York Herald and the Tattler.
1842/08/11 Governor William H Seward issues a proclamation offering a $750 reward and enjoying all ministers of justice that they be diligent in their effort to bring the offender or offenders of Mary Rogers to condign punishment.
1842/10/17 Frederica Loss makes a deathbed confession to justice Merritt: Miss Rogers came to her house with a physician to have an abortion, but Mary had died. After disposing her body in the river, Loss' son tossed her clothes in the thicket.
1842/11/00 "The Mystery of Marie Roget" begins serialization in Snowden's Ladies' Companion.
1842/12/00 To accommodate rising interest in "The Mystery of Marie Roget", Snowden's Ladies' Companion reprints the first installment when it publishes the second.
1843/01/00 Poe delays the third and final installment of "The Mystery of Marie Roget" to alter the story based on emerging theories.
1843/02/00 The third and final installment of "The Mystery of Marie Roget" is published in Snowden's Ladies' Companion.
1881/00/00 After years of increasing instability and claims that the ghost of Mary Rogers haunts him, John Anderson dies in Paris.

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Area of Significance: True Crime


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