The Smuttynose Island Murders: Did They Hang the Wrong Man?

Smuttynose Island is a 27-acre island located in the Isles of Shoals 7 miles off Maine’s coast. Named so because sailors claimed that when viewed from their ship, due to the amount of seaweed that would clump at one end, the island looked like the smutty nose of an enormous sea creature.

In 1868, a couple named John and Maren Hontvet immigrated to the United States creating a homestead on the then uninhabited Smuttynose Island. Soon after, John bought a fishing boat and named her the Clarabella. Within a few years, John would manage to turn his fishing endeavor into quite a business for himself and it would soon become too much to handle alone.

Enter Louis Wagner

Luckily for John, it was around this time that he met a 28-year-old fisherman named Louis Wagner. Louis was described by the locals as an imposing figure of Prussian descent, thick accent, and muscular build, and thus had become something to speak of in the small fishing community where everyone knew everyone. 

John and Louis would quickly become friends, with John often inviting Louis over to the house for meals and soon offering him a job aboard the Clarabella and even a room in his cottage as this would be much easier on the two men from a business perspective. 

In the summer of 1871, Maren’s sister Karen came to stay with her after the death of her boyfriend, quickly finding work on Appledore Island. Months later John’s brother Matthew and Maren’s brother Evan along with his new wife Anethe would also find their way to the island. Evan and Matthew were quickly put to work aboard the Clarabella, as Anette helped Maren around the house.

The Motive

Louis now felt the new members of the household were encroaching on what he and his friend John had built together and by November of 1872, had moved out of the cottage and off the island. He took a job as a deckhand with another fishing boat known as the Addison Gilbert though the move proved to be short-lived as the Addison Gilbert would later wreck and sink off the coast of New Hampshire, forcing Louis to take up work at the wharves in Portsmouth. Now Louis was being paid just enough money to cover his room and board and little else and by the spring of 1873 was nearly destitute, a perfect motive to invent a perfect crime.

On March 5, 1873, Louis would be on the docks in Portsmouth when the Clarabella arrived. John, Matthew, and Ivan were forced to wait as the train carrying their bait was running late. John would later testify that Louis had asked him three times if the men would return home or the women would be left alone on the island that night.

Louis believing that John kept as much as $500 at the cottage and now assured that the men would be stuck on the mainland for the night, stole a wooden dory and rowed to Smuttynose Island hoping to rob the cottage while the women were asleep. 

A Not-So-Perfect Crime

When Louis entered the house, his movements woke Karen who was quickly struck with a chair before she could recognize him. Maren awoken by the commotion was able to drag her sister into Anethe’s room and barricade the door. Anethe attempted to escape by climbing out of a window but stumbled directly into the path of Louis who had by then already exited the house. Upon recognizing the attacker Anethe cried “Louis! Louis! Louis!” just before Louis reached for a nearby axe and struck her in the head. A scene Maren witnessed from the window. Upon Louis re-entering the house Maren climbed through the window and quickly ran to another part of the island and hid, although unfortunately, Karen was unable to recover from her assault in time. Louis who had combed the island but was unable to locate Maren returned to the cottage for whatever money he could find and then left Smuttynose Island. Later in the trial, Maren would provide this testimony which would ultimately lead to Louis Wagner being convicted and sentenced to hang for the murders.

Was It A Set-Up?

While awaiting his execution, Louis would receive many visitors. They came convinced of his guilt only to leave in doubt as he would charismatically profess his innocence. He would point the finger at the one he would claim was the real killer, none other than the very person who had put him on trial, Maren Hontvet. Louis told visitors that John Hontvet would often complain that all the things the people at his house were eating were costing him money. Purporting that John and Maren themselves had motive to commit the murders.

Many people would come to believe that Maren Hontvet was the real killer as she was covered in blood and the only living witness. During the trial, it was pointed out that the axe wounds were not heavy or deep enough to have been caused by such a strapping young man as Louis Wagner but felt more like wounds that could have been delivered by a much smaller, frailer woman. 

On June 25th, 1875, despite pleas from members of the community, Louis Wagner was hanged.  “I didn’t do it” he cried, just before falling through the gallows’ floor.