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"I was born with the devil in me. I could not help the fact that I was a murderer, no more than the poet can help the inspiration to sing -- I was born with the "Evil One" standing as my sponsor beside the bed where I was ushered into the world, and he has been with me since."

Herman Webster Mudgett, best known by his alias Dr. Henry Howard Holmes or H. H. Holmes, was a prolific American Serial Killer and Con Artist.

Background
Holmes was born in Gilmanton, New Hampshire in 1861, the third child of Levi Horton Mudgett and Theodate Page Price, a devout Methodist farmer couple descended from the first English inhabitants of the area. His mother was loving but his father canned him. As a child, Holmes was intelligent but also a loner and was bullied by his classmates. When he was six years old, he was forced to stare closely into the face of a doctor's skeleton that terrified him, while the other children placed the skeleton's arms around his body as if it was embracing him; his fear disappeared in that moment and was replaced by a morbid curiosity about the dead and human anatomy. Just after graduating high school with honors he married his first wife, Clara Lovering, whom he would abandon along with his first child in 1887 (the divorce proceedings were started but never finalized). Following failed enrollments in Darmouth and Vermont, he graduated from Michigan Medical School in 1884, where he displayed a talent for dissection, but was also briefly suspended for grave robbing, the way he obtained fresh bodies that he used to cash on fake life insurance policies.

Murders, Arrest and Execution
The number of murders committed by Holmes is unclear. His most complete confession, in which he admitted 27 murders, was made in 1895 after he was paid $7500 by William Randolph Hearst, when Holmes was already sentenced to hang for the death of Benjamin Pitezel. This confession is in conflict both with his previous ones and with the circumstances in which some of his claimed victims died (such as the year and place they took place in), and includes people that were proven to be alive at the time (like Kate Durkee and L. Warner) or that could not be proven to have existed. The 200 to 230 victims estimation was made by Chicago police on the basis of the "Murder Castle" dimensions, missing person reports and blood and bone findings on properties owned by Holmes.

Confirmed

 * 1891, Chicago, Illinois:
 * Pearl Conner
 * Julia Conner
 * 1892, Chicago: Emeline Cigrand
 * 1893, Chicago: Nannie Williams
 * 1894:
 * Early year, Momence, Illinois: Minnie Williams
 * September 2, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: Benjamin Frelan Pitezel
 * October 5, Irvington, Indiana: Howard Pitezel
 * Unknown October date, Detroit, Michigan: Carrie Pitezel and two of her children
 * October 25, Toronto, Ontario: Nellie and Alice Pitezel

Possible

 * 1884, Mooers, New York: Unnamed young boy
 * 1886, Philadelphia: Unnamed child
 * 1888, Morgantown, West Virginia: Mr. W. Rodgers
 * 1889, Chicago: Robert Charles Leacock
 * 1891, Chicago: Mr. Rodgers
 * 1892, Chicago:
 * February 8: Virginia Anna Betts
 * June 1: Emily Van Tassel
 * July 18: Gertrude Conner
 * Unknown date: Lizzie Perr
 * 1893:
 * January 17, Leadville, Colorado: Baldwin H. Williams
 * May to October, Chicago: Unnamed man
 * Late year, Chicago: Unnamed widow
 * 1894, Chicago: Charles Cole
 * Unknown date, Chicago:
 * Sarah Cook and Mary Haracamp
 * Robert Latimer

Refuted
The following people are sometimes counted as victims of Holmes, but were actually alive when he was arrested:
 * William J. Holton
 * Elizabeth Sanders Holton
 * Abbie Marie Holton
 * Thomas Russell
 * Kate Durkee
 * Mr. L. Warner

On Criminal Minds
H. H. Holmes is listed on the CBS website as one source of inspiration for unsubs featured on Criminal Minds. . His "murder castle" may have been the basis of prolific serial killers that built elaborate structures to murder their victims and dispose of the bodies, such as Charles Holcombe in Legacy and Henry Grace in Masterpiece.