A SERIAL KILLER IN NEARBY CLARKSBURG’S QUIET DELL: 1932
Serial killers come in all shapes and sizes. They come from all walks of life and all corners of the world. We see cases on television and in newspapers and many of us think that a serial killer like that could never come to our hometown. We can’t help it. It’s in our nature to resist such hideousness.
Unfortunately, it did come to nearby Clarksburg’s Quiet Dell in 1932, when a man by the name of Harry F. Powers moved there in 1927 after responding to a woman who had responded to his own “Lonely Hearts” advertisement. But before I continue with our story, let me tell you a little more about who this cold-blooded killer was and from where he came.
The son of Wilko and Jantje Woltjer Drenth, Harry F. Powers was born in Beerta, Reiderland, Groningen, Netherlands on Nov. 17, 1893, and was of Dutch descent. His real name was Harm Drenth. He was the youngest of 3 living children, Grace Grietje Drenth, Jacob Drenth, and Harm. He had a younger sister who was stillborn.
On April 6, 1910, he came to the United States from Rotterdam, Netherlands at the age of 17 on the ship “Rijndam” where he settled in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. According to the ship’s passenger list, Harm Drenth aka Harry F. Powers was only 5’2” tall with blonde hair, blue eyes and was fair skinned. He had traveled with a couple of his Dutch friends and had $25 on his person for the trip. His family made the move to America about a year later. He boarded with a man named Henry Kamp in Belmond, Iowa soon after his arrival and lived with him from 1911 to 1912.
By 1915, Harm and his family were living in Boone, Wright, Iowa. He was 22 years old, still single and living with his parents. They then moved on to Cumberland, Wisconsin and then to Crookston, Minnesota that same year.
According to the 1920 U.S. Census Record, the 27-year-old killer was still living with his parents who had Americanized their names to William and Jennie Drenth. He was still using the name Harm Drenth.
By the 1930 U.S. Census, Harm Drenth aka Harry F. Powers was now 32 years old and living in Clarksburg, WV. He had changed his name to Harry F. Powers and married 17-year-old Luella B. Strother in 1927. It was written elsewhere that Luella was the owner of a farm and grocery store in the area. But according to the 1930 U.S. Census record, her sister, Eva was the owner. Luella and Harry F. Powers were then working in Eva Strothers’ grocery store.
Powers wasted little time before commencing with a diabolical plan that made him what newspapers of the day called “one of the worst serial killers of the century.”
Even though he was now a married man, he began taking out “lonely hearts” advertisements. It didn’t take long for the responses to begin pouring in. Postal records were later found showing that Powers was receiving up to twenty letters per day. He knew that he needed a private place to conduct his evil plots and deeds. Therefore, he constructed a garage with a basement at his home in Quiet Dell before acting on his plans.
Powers soon began corresponding with Asta Eicher, a widowed mother of three young children, Greta, Harry, and Annabel. For this victim, he used the alias name Cornelius Orvin Pierson. The exchange of letters from the widow in Park Ridge IL and Powers who was living in Quiet Dell took place for a short time before Harm Drenth a.k.a. Harry F. Powers a.k.a. Cornelius Orvin Pierson made the trip to IL to visit the young widow. He convinced the young mother to leave her children with a neighbor named Elizabeth Abernathy who cared for them until she received a letter saying that “Pierson” (Powers) was coming to pick the children up to join their mother. Shortly after arriving, he gave a check supposedly signed by Asta Eicher to one of the children to cash at their local bank. Upon the child’s return, he learned that the bank would not cash the check because they felt the signature was forged. He gathered up the three children and left telling the neighbors that they would be traveling with him and their mother to Europe. This was the last that Asta Eicher and her children were ever heard from alive.
Powers’ fifth victim was a nurse named Dorothy Pressler Lemke of Northborough, Massachusetts. Like Asta, Dorothy was looking for love in the “lonely hearts” advertisements. Like Asta, Powers lured her with promises of the love they both had craved so desperately. He quickly convinced her to go with him to Iowa so they could be married. He even convinced her to withdraw $4,000 from her bank account. Miss Lemke did not notice that he didn’t send her things to Iowa, but instead sent them to Fairmont, WV. That was the last time that Dorothy Lemke was ever seen alive.
The disappearance of Powers’ first victims, Asta Eicher and her children, caused the Illinois State Police to begin investigating the possibility of foul play. Upon a thorough search of Asta Eicher’s house, the police discovered love letters from a man named “Pierson.” The letters created a trail back to Quiet Dell near Clarksburg, WV.
Law enforcement, led by Doddridge County-born Chief Clarence A. Duckworth, and at the time, the Clarksburg City Police soon discovered that Pierson and Powers were the same man. Powers was living in Quiet Dell with his wife, Luella. Chief Duckworth was the son of William and Mary Magee Duckworth of Greenwood area. He was responsible for much of the investigation that led to the conviction of this mass murderer.
Harry and Luella Powers’ house was searched. Then the police went to the garage. There they found evidence of the crimes in rooms built under Powers’ garage. There was hair, bloody clothing, an almost completely burned bankbook, and most disturbing of all was the small bloody footprint of a child.
News of the multiple murders soon spread throughout the community and neighbors began coming by to see what was happening. As luck would have it, a 15-year-old young man brought forth information which led to the most damming evidence of all. He told the police about helping Powers dig a ditch on his property. Evidence of the ditch was still clearly visible, and the police quickly began to unearth the ditch. Late afternoon brought the remains of one of Asta Eicher’s children. Dusk fell upon the team, but the team kept working. During the night, they uncovered the remainder of the bodies. Law enforcement was now confident they had found all the evidence they needed to convict this evil killer, after finding the bodies of Asta Eicher and her three children as well as that of Dorothy Lemke.
An autopsy was done on the victims which revealed the two girls and their mother were strangled to death. The small boy’s head was bashed in with a hammer. Dorothy Lemke was the last victim discovered and she too had been strangled to death using a belt which was still around her neck. The police found love letters in the trunk of Powers’ vehicle. From the many letters Powers had written back, it was evident he planned to lure even more unsuspecting women to their death for the purpose of stealing whatever money he could get from them and would have done so had he not been stopped that night.
Harry F. Powers was immediately arrested and taken to the city jail. Shortly after his arrest, Powers ended up with two black eyes and extensive bruising allegedly from falling down a staircase during his questioning. It has always been believed that this story was incorrect, but no one came forward or filed a complaint.
On September 20, 1931, a lynch mob demanded Powers be handed over to them. Firehoses were utilized by law enforcement as well as tear gas to disperse the crowd. Powers was terrified as the took him from the city jail to the morgue to view the bodies.
Powers’ only response was to say, “Isn’t that awful.” He was still denying that he knew anything about the crimes, but after a long night of endless interrogation, he finally broke down and exclaimed, “I did it. Give me a chance to rest a little and I’ll tell you all about it.”
Twelve hours later, he signed a brief confession admitting he was the one who killed the five victims. It was just two hours later that the men who had been digging constantly at Quiet Dell brought in the fifth body.
“She’s from Chicago, but I don’t know her name,” he mumbled, as he squinted at his cards and asked that his game not be interrupted.
Gradually investigators pieced together from letters, matrimonial agency files and information Powers gave reluctantly, the whole strange story of the man’s love racket activities. He had been carrying on a nation-wide correspondence with widows and divorcees. He made ardent love to all of them and proposed to dozens.
Powers’ arrest brought a flood of complaints from women in all parts of the country who claimed they had been jilted or robbed by the glib-tongued man who culled technical terms from scientific books and romantic phrase from love stories to use in weaving his net around his victims.
Several weeks before Christmas his trial began in Clarksburg’s old Moore Opera House, within a block of where Stonewall Jackson was born. On a stage once trod by famous actors, Powers sat and chewed gum while a jury was chosen. Only once during the trial did Powers’ shell of immobility break. That was when he wept as he mentioned the name of his “dear wife,” the woman who had remained loyal to him while he was sending impassioned love-letters to a long list of “prospects.”
John Ross, a retired farmer from Iowa testified, saying, “I thought he would kill my horses. He would trot them while plowing and never was kind to my stock.” He said that Powers had “a terrible mean streak.”
“In a month, he could understand all English. We treated him like one of the family. Took him everywhere we went. But he would not go to church. He would take little things about the house that he liked. In fact, everything he wanted and put it in his box.”
This was quite a contrast to the story told by Cort Delger who had come from Holland on the ship with Powers and was now a prosperous farmer living near here who migrated to this country with Powers.
Numerous witnesses testified to the evidence in Powers’ home, that he had been with the victims and picked up their luggage, and so on; Powers also testified for himself. His only defense was that the crimes had been committed by “two other fellows.”
The trial lasted five days. Judge Southern presided over the trial. On December 12, 1931, he was sentenced to death. The townspeople who jammed the sidewalks outside the opera house cheered when the verdict was announced, but Powers heard his doom pronounced in silence.
He remained unconcerned during a futile effort to win a new trial. Those close to the case expected him to go to the gallows that same way—as if he were bored by the whole proceeding. He was hanged on March 18, 1932, at WV State Penitentiary in Moundsville, WV.
In October 1933, Powers’ father, Wilko Drenth became his sixth victim when he committed suicide by shooting himself through his chest.
His grandson, Everett Schroeder Jr., coming home from working in the field was the one who found his grandfather slumped on the floor and clothing surrounding the wound smoldering from being ignited from the shot, which apparently fired at close range. The coroner, F. C. Koch, of Waverly was called, but considered there was no need for an inquest, the circumstances being clearly that of suicide. He was 71 years old.
God bless.
Patricia Richards Harris
Doddridge County Historical Society