Read an excerpt from James Polchin's book, 'Indecent Advances,' that explains why that term was an easy excuse to kill gay men
a British citizen and steward on the Queen Elizabeth steamship, was found in the Hotel Belvedere in New York City. Martin was set to leave town the next day. Police would soon arrest two cowboys from Wyoming, who were in the city to perform a rodeo show at Madison Square Garden, for the crime. “Rodeo Performers Tell Police They Beat British Seaman for Improper Proposals,” thedeclared in its headline.
Reports of their confession claimed that Murphy, who knew some of the men, had served them “coffee and sandwiches, but declined to give his guests beer or lend them money.” The men alleged that Murphy made an “indecent proposal” to the navy veteran, which enraged him. But rather than leave Murphy’s apartment, he instead hit his host and then “chased him around the apartment” until “knocking him unconscious on the bed,” presumably while the other men watched.
Named the “New York Torso Killing” by the press, the crime gained attention well beyond New York newspapers. “Broadway Beau Held in Murder,” declaredin Dahl’s native Minneapolis. The article described him as a “nattily dressed hanger-on in Broadway circles,” adding that he killed Harger with a hammer after a heated “quarrel over their strange intimacy.
Louis Kenneth Neu, a 26-year-old cabaret singer of Savannah, Georgia, left, went on trial in 1933 for the murder of Sheffield Clark Sr., who he killed after Nue threatened to out him as gay. Photo credit: AP
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