Photo by Senta Sundberg

On Sunday evening, December 22, 1799, 22-year-old Gulielma Sands -- known as Elma Sands -- disappeared. That same evening, she had told her cousins, she was to wed a carpenter, Levi Weeks, who was boarding in the same house. Elma had been living in the home of her cousin Catherine Rings, along with Catherine's sister Hope Sands, for three years. Levi later denied the engagement, claiming he would never wed without his elder brother Ezra's permission.

On Christmas Eve day, two boys found Elma's muff floating in the Manhattan Well near Spring and Greene Streets. The well had been dug for Aaron Burr's Manhattan Company, to provide city water -- and challenge the banking monopoly of Alexander Hamilton's Bank of New York. Elma had been missing over a week when the well was finally sounded on January 2, 1800, and her disheveled, badly beaten corpse was discovered and hauled out.

Suspicion naturally fell on Weeks.

Witnesses had seen a sleigh that may have belonged to his brother Ezra near the well. Some testified to hearing a woman's voice cry out "Murder!" Weeks' alibi was less than perfect.

Fortunately for him, Levi been working on a project in Harlem Heights with his brother Ezra, a successful builder, for Hamilton, who'd been Secretary of the Treasury under George Washington -- who himself had died only eight days before Elma's murder. Hamilton Grange was to outshine Richmond Hill, the country home of Aaron Burr, located not far from the Manhattan Well.

Hamilton agreed to defend Weeks. The defense team was joined by Hamilton's rival, Aaron Burr, and Brockholst Livingston, who would later be appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court. The prosecutor, Cadwallader David Colden, a future mayor of New York, was hopelessly outmatched. Elma's character was besmirched -- common today, to blame the victim, but an unheard-of tactic two hundred years ago -- and it was suggested that the young woman, prone to bouts of depression, had committed suicide. Chief Judge John Lansing stressed the circumstantial nature of the case, all but instructing the jury to acquit Weeks. The trial lasted two days; the verdict was reached in five minutes.

When the acquittal was read, Elma's cousin Catherine Rings allegedly rose, pointed at Hamilton, and said, "If thee dies a natural death, I shall think there is no justice in heaven!"

Four years later, on the cliffs of Weehawken, New Jersey, Burr fatally wounded Hamilton in a duel which destroyed Burr's career and fortune as well. More of that in our next installment.

In 1829, Judge Lansing vanished without a trace.

Levi was driven from town by the suspicions of its inhabitants, finally settling in Natchez, Mississippi.

The well now sits in the basement of 129 Spring Street, a popular restaurant called the Manhattan Bistro.

Should you, while dining, spot a young woman dressed in late 18th Century garb, dripping wet, it could be Elma, who continues to wander Spring Street, looking for justice that will never come. Or it could be someone coming home from a party.

# Gordon Linzner is a horror writer, former editor and publisher of Space and Time magazine, story-teller, and professional tour guide. Once a month, usually the second Friday, as Doctor John Seward, he explains the secret vampire history of New York (register at glinzner@hotmail.com ). On October 28th, just before Halloween, he conducts a haunted walk through the streets of East and Greenwich Village (register at www.92y.org and click on Greenwich Village ghosts Code: T-LP3CW08-01).