Herman O’Hara Giant and Brutal Farmer Killed His Hired Man

Tomb Marked by a Stone Erected by German
Citizens of Auburn – Fiend Killed His Own Son
and Served Only Six Years in Prison
AUBURN, Oct. 9 – Near the town line dividing Scipio and Ledyard, in a straggling thicket of beech and maple saplings which skirts the Moravia turnpike, is a neglected graveyard. But few of the graves are marked with headstones. The marble slabs, which stand out in startling relief from the shadowy background of foliage and timber, in the main bear upon their moss-covered surface the names of honest and respected farmers who long since have been gathered by the grim harvester, Time.

By the gnarled roots of an ancient beech, however, rises a modest marble slab which marks the tomb of one whose identity for nearly half a century remained as obscure as on the day when he was given a Christian burial at the hands of his kind-hearted fellow countrymen. Thousands have penetrated the wayside thicket where the body of the unknown dead reposes and a beaten path from the edge of the timber heads directly to the grave.

Yet of all who have paid a visit to the tomb not one has been able to give the name of the youth whose bones lie crumbling beneath the sod. There is a tinge of pathos in the rudely lettered inscription upon the marble slab, which reads as follows:

It was some years after the death of the “poor stranger” that the marble slab was erected to his memory by the Germans of Auburn. The trial of Herman O’Hara in the spring of 1857 for the murder of his own son brought out all that was ever known concerning the dead stranger who met his fate at the hands of this notorious homicide, whose home fifty years ago was a terror to the peaceable law-abiding citizens of southern Cayuga.

Herman O’Hara, or “Harm,” as he was called by those who knew him, was a prosperous farmer residing on what is now known as the Allen Post farm. He was a giant in stature and strength, and but few cared to engage with him in a single combat. He was born and reared in Scipio township, and when yet in his teens married into the Wyckoff family, which was one of the most prominent in the county. Three sons and one daughter was the result of this union, all of whom are now dead.

From early boyhood O’Hara was noted for his vicious and revengeful disposition. Those who remember him as a man say that one glance from his cruel and malicious-looking face was enough to inflict terror in the spectator’s heart.

O’Hara frequently employed a hired man upon the farm, when he could get one. But few of these unfortunate laborers ever left his employ alive, it is said. They would work for him until the end of the season and then disappear. O’Hara found it easier to kill a man who had toiled in the fields all summer than to pay him the small stipend due him in the fall.

These were the stories whispered in Southern Cayuga fifth years ago. The town of Scipio is somewhat isolated, and in those days was more sparsely settled than now. O’Hara’s neighbors feared the man to such an extent that they dared not express their suspicions publicly and demand an investigation.

But few of the farm laborers in the neighborhood would work for O’Hara. Those who entered his employ were obliged to leave him owing to cruel and inhuman treatment, and the most of them in leaving carried with them remembrances of his brutality in the shape of wounds inflicted by the heartless taskmaster.

“Harm” was therefore obliged to go to New York every spring to secure a farm hand in the person of some newly landed emigrant. After working all summer, the unfortunate foreigner should he not succeed in making his escape in the meantime, would suddenly and mysteriously disappear.

IN THE SPRING of 1854 O’Hara brought with him from New York a young German whom he placed at work upon the farm. The youth was better dressed than the average emigrant. He was bright, active and intelligent, but could not speak a word of English and was given the name of “Dutchy” by his employer.

One day during the following winter O’Hara entered the farmhouse where he resided with “Dutchy’s” lifeless body in his arms. He carried the corpse into an upper chamber and there left it, at the same time warning his wife and family that if any of them mentioned the incident to the public he would kill them.

The body remained in the home for three days, during which time O’Hara continued in his work about the farm as if nothing had happened. The morning of the fourth day the farmer hitched up his horse and drove to Auburn to make some purchases. During his absence the terror-stricken wife notified one of the neighbors under promise of secrecy of what had taken place.

The body was removed by the neighbors before O’Hara returned, and it was buried. No formal investigation followed. Just how the unknown German met his death never was known. His skull was crushed in and the body was covered with wounds and bruises. “Harm” claimed that he killed the youth in self-defense and there the matter dropped.

The victim was buried in the little roadside cemetery nearby, and a few years later the stone mentioned in the beginning of this article was erected near his remains. The older residents of Scipio even to this day take delight in telling how “Harm” O’Hara once met his match.

SHORTLY AFTER the death of “Dutchy,” O’Hara went to New York after another hired man. He engaged a young Irish boy who had just landed at Castle Garden. The youth, after living with O’Hara for a month, during which time he was subjected to the most brutal treatment, managed to escape and made his way back to the metropolis, where he told the story of his wrongs to an older brother, who swore by all the saints that he would at once go up the country and kill O’Hara.

The man was nearly O’Hara’s equal in size and strenth, and true to his word he started on his missioin of vengeance. He made his way to Scipio and engaged as a farm hand with O’Hara. A week after his arrival the opportunity for revenge presented itself.

“Pat, shoulder that ax and come with me,” said hie employer one morning after breakfast. “Pat” did as directed and the two men went into the woods about a quarter of a mile from the house. O’Hara selected a tall, stately beech tree, which he ordered cut down. “Pat” obeyed. A log about fifteen feet long and fourteen inches in diameter was cut from the butt of the tree and squared under O’Hara’s directions.

“Put that piece of lumber to your shoulder and carry it up to the house,” commanded the farmer.

“Sir, I’m not a horse,” answered “Pat” as he leaned on the ax handle and gazed at the heavy, freshly hewed beech.

O’Hara became infuriated at this slight evidence of rebellion.

“Damn you, I’ll make a horse of you then,” he roared as he sprang forward with clenched hands.

“Stand back, O’Hara, or I’ll make mince meat of ye,” and “Pat” raised the gleaming ax high over his head.

“Alas, ye black-hearted scoundrel,” continued the Irishman, as his employer stood quaking before him. “Now I’ve got you at my mercy. I’m the brother of the blue-eyed boy ye treated so cruelly that he was obliged to run away from you. Pick up that stick and carry it up to the house or I’ll kill you.”

“I was only fooling, ‘Pat.’ Put down that ax and let’s talk common sense.”

“Sure I never was more in control in my life,” and flourishing the ax over his head in a threatening manner, “Pat” advanced upon his employer.

O’Hara pleaded for mercy but seeing hatred in his opponent’s eyes, he unwillingly raised the heavy timber to his shoulder and staggering under its weight started for the house. He had not proceeded far when he stumbled and fell uner his heavy burden.

With a curse he was commanded to arise, and with bleeding hands again picked up the timber. For two hours he staggered along, proceeding only a few feet at a time until at last the farmhouse was reached.

“You may thank God that you are alive, for I swore to kill you before I came here,” said “Pat.” “Now pay me my wages and I’ll leave you.”

O’Hara was completely humbled by this time. He acknowledged that he had at last met his master, and swore that if “Pat” would remain with him that he would treat him with utmost kindness and increase his wages as well.

“Pat” wisely declined all overtures of a truce, and receiving the amount due him and also the wages owing to his younger brother he departed with the ax over his shoulder.

This is the story told by old inhabitants of how “Harm” O’Hara for once met his master.

MRS. O'HARA'S life was anything but comfortable with such a husband. She and the children led a life of uninterrupted terror. There was no sunny side to this man’s nature. O’Hara would often come to dinner in an exceptionally bad state of mind, and after the food had been placed on the board would grasp the table cloth by the four corners and throw dinner and all out of the window.

This was the least harmful of his many diversions. The most atrocious crime of all, however, commited by the fiend in hurman form was the killing of his own son, Herman O’Hara Jr., for which he was brought to justice, although he did not receive his just deserts.

On the morning of the 28th of December, 1856, the bleeding and mangled body of the boy Herman was found lying on a pile of hay in a barn, two miles from his father’s house. The youth was still alive, although apparently left for as good as dead by his brutal sire.

The young man, although suffering the most excruciating pains was able to make an anti-mortem statement. His story seemed almost incredible. The preceding night the boy’s father, without provocation, assualted the youth with a pitchfork in the horse barn back of the O’Hara homestead.

The boy, bleeding from his wounds fled to the house. The father pursued him with a horsewhip. Heedless of the boy’s cries of mercy, the heartless parent applied the whip until nothing but the stub remained to his hands. Then, seizing a stove poker, he beat the youth into insensibility. The grief-stricken mother struggling with the inhuman monster in her efforts to save the youth, but was forced into another apartment and locked in.

Thinking he had killed the boy, O’Hara picked him up in his arms and carried him through the darkness of night two miles across the country to a neighbor’s farm, where he laid him on a hay pile.

When discovered the next morning, as already stated, the youth was still alive. His right ear was torn completly from his head, while his whole body was covered with marks of his unnatural parent’s brutality.

THE WHOLE countryside was stunned and aroused. The authorities were notified and O’Hara was arrested a few days later by Sheriff Edward Haskins at the home of the murderer’s brother, Henry O’Hara, where he had secreted himself. The boy lived for several days after the commission of the assault and died in great agony.

O’Hara was brought to trial in this city the following May, a true bill of indictment against him for murder having been found by the Grand Jury. Several days were spent in empaneling a jury, eighty-three jurors being called in all. Three days were consumed in examining witnesses and the case went to the jury on May 16, 1857. O’Hara was found guilty of manslaughter in the second degree and sentenced to six years at hard labor in Auburn prison.

O’Hara never showed any remorse for his terrible crimes. He served his full term in prison and then retired to his farm in Scipio.

His wife and family refused to live with him and he was shunned by all who knew him. He became involved in debt and the farm was sold on mortgage foreclosure.

O’Hara removed in the early ‘70s to Chicago where he amassed quite a fortune. He died a few years ago, detested by everyone.

O’Hara was said to have been strictly temperate and his crimes were not the result of a mind crazed by liquor. He was naturally vicious and possessed of an uncontrollable temper.

[NOTE: The Chicago Tribune, Oct. 13, 1887, reported the death of Herman O’Hara at his residence, 1324 Wabash Ave., in the 74th year of his age.]