A young housekeeper found brutally slain — her death remains one of Orleans County’s grisliest mysteries.
It was a cold evening in Carlton, October 18th, 1894 — harvest season nearly finished, the air heavy with the scent of turned earth and woodsmoke. The Van Camp family had left their farmhouse for a short visit into town, leaving behind their trusted housekeeper, Emma Hunt, and a hired man, William Lake.
The house must have been still that night — the faint ticking of the clock, the creak of the timbers settling against the chill. But by morning, the quiet of that home would be shattered forever, and the name Emma Hunt would become synonymous with one of Orleans County’s most horrifying murders.
While the family was away, Lake asked Emma to accompany him to an event in Albion. She refused. Lake pressed her — why not? And Emma, perhaps tired of his drunkenness, his idle work habits, his constant presence, gave him a sharp truth that would seal her fate. She told him, “Because you are a loafer… and a drunkard.”
Those were the last words she would ever speak.
Enraged, William Lake stormed out to the barn. He took up a hammer — a common tool, heavy in the hand — and returned to the kitchen, where Emma sat unaware of the horror to come. Without a word, he struck her across the skull, once, twice, then again, until the blows caved in her head.
But it didn’t end there. He went to the pantry, pulled out a butcher’s knife, and slashed her throat. Then, in a final act of unthinkable brutality, he disemboweled her, leaving the once orderly farmhouse drenched in blood.
When the Van Camps returned home later that night, they opened their door to a scene from a nightmare. The body of Emma Hunt lay sprawled on the floor — a candle still clutched in her lifeless hand. The local newspaper called it “the most ghastly murder this county has ever known.” And few argued otherwise.
In Lake’s room, investigators found a handwritten confession — penned before the crime, filled with fury and twisted devotion. It began:
“I know of many girls that I like, but there is but one that I ever loved. I would have done anything for her. She knew it. She proved false to me and I have sworn I will kill her and then kill myself… People will say I am crazy, but I am not. My brain is on fire…”
He ended the letter by warning:
“The body of the girl you all can find.”
But of his own, he promised, “You shall never find it.”
For three days, the sheriff and his men scoured the countryside, posting wanted notices and offering a $300 reward — a small fortune for the time. They finally caught him in the barn of Mrs. Richard Hoag in Waterport, filthy, hungry, and eerily calm.
When his trial opened in February 1895, it was less a court proceeding and more a public spectacle. Over three hundred people crowded into the courtroom — families brought lunches, and townsfolk treated the grim affair like a social outing. Lake’s defense, led by Thomas Kirby and Thomas Hughes, argued insanity. Witnesses claimed he suffered from headaches, strange moods, long silences. His adoptive mother, Eunice Ross, wept on the stand, describing his sickly childhood and the torment that haunted him since youth.
But the prosecution told a different story — not of madness, but of jealous rage. They painted him as a cold, calculating man who murdered out of spite when he could not have what he wanted. After days of testimony, including reports that Lake’s favorite songs were “I Murdered My Own True Love” and “The Gypsy’s Warning,” the jury took little time to decide. On February 16, 1895, William Lake was found guilty of murder in the first degree. The sentence: death by electrocution.
On April 4, 1895, just after noon, Lake met his end at Auburn Prison. He became only the seventh person in America to die in the electric chair — the same device that would later kill President McKinley’s assassin. Witnesses described the scene with a kind of cold fascination. Lake, weighing over 200 pounds, was dressed neatly in a dark suit. His right leg was exposed for the electrode; a wet sponge pressed to his scalp. The air smelled faintly of ozone. When the switch was thrown, the current surged through him — a flash, a jolt, a hiss. His body went rigid, then limp. Within minutes, he was declared dead.
The papers called it “a most successful execution.”
Before his death, Lake maintained that he had not planned the murder, claiming instead that something within him had simply “broken.” His last words were calm, even resigned:
“I did not expect many kind words from the earthly judge, but I believe I shall receive mercy from the Heavenly Father — and that is enough.”
After the execution, Lake’s body was turned over to science. Professor Fish of Cornell University examined his brain, searching for physical evidence of insanity. None was found. But perhaps no scalpel could reveal what truly drove him — the years of neglect, the violence of his upbringing, or the dark obsession that consumed him.
Emma Hunt, remembered only in brief newspaper columns, became a cautionary tale in a time when women were expected to endure quietly, and men’s violence was too often excused as madness.
Today, the farmhouse is long gone, but the story lingers. Locals say that on cold October nights, when the wind rattles through the empty fields, you can still hear the echo of Emma’s scream — or perhaps the whisper of Lake’s final words.
The county called it justice. But in Carlton, the air still holds the weight of that autumn night — when love, jealousy, and rage turned a quiet farmhouse into a house of horror.
