Hattie Whitehorn—LeRoy Smitherman

Hattie Whitehorn’s marriage to LeRoy Smitherman followed the murder of her first husband, Charles Whitehorn, and became a focus of investigators examining who might benefit from his death. Private detectives and, later, agents of the Bureau of Investigation suspected that the marriage was part of a scheme to take Whitehorn’s Osage headrights and fortune. Their theory cast the relationship not simply as a new marriage but as a possible link between the killing and the control of an estate; the evidence recorded suspicions, however, not a proven finding of guilt.

Marriage and Suspected Motive

After Charles Whitehorn’s death, Hattie married Smitherman. Investigators learned that Minnie Savage, who ran a boardinghouse, had orchestrated the marriage. The private detectives suspected that Savage, Smitherman, and other conspirators had arranged the killing to obtain Whitehorn’s headright and wealth. Their suspicion gave the marriage its significance in the case: it connected Hattie’s position as widow and heir with a possible plan to benefit from her husband’s death.

The investigators’ theory also extended to Hattie herself. Some came to believe she was complicit, and one informant described her as a principal mover in the killing. Her spending some of the fortune soon after Whitehorn’s death heightened those suspicions, but did not by itself establish her role. The record thus presents the marriage as a suspected instrument of financial exploitation while leaving the alleged conspiracy unresolved.

Federal Investigation and Denial

When the first federal agents began probing the case in 1923, they likewise concluded that Savage, Smitherman, and Hattie were responsible. One agent wrote that the evidence gathered thus far suggested Hattie had caused her husband to be murdered to obtain his estate. Hattie denied involvement, while also warning an agent that she had been warned about him and that a confession could send her to the electric chair. Her response shows that she understood the danger of speaking to investigators, but it does not resolve whether the accusation was true.

Flight and Aftermath

Smitherman eventually fled to Mexico, taking Hattie’s car and a portion of her money. His departure left the marriage’s suspected financial purpose entangled with a concrete loss for Hattie, even as the available evidence does not establish what role he had played in Whitehorn’s death. The private detectives had developed a detailed theory but failed to secure enough evidence to prosecute the suspects; the federal agents’ later conclusions, too, remained accusations rather than a demonstrated conviction.

After Smitherman’s flight, J. J. Faulkner entered Hattie’s life and was suspected of exploiting information she had shared about the murder to blackmail her and gain control of her property. As Hattie became gravely ill, agents recorded that Faulkner opposed sending her to a hospital, while her sisters said he was taking her money when she was under the influence of a narcotic. This later exploitation does not prove the earlier allegations against Hattie or Smitherman, but it gives the relationship’s aftermath a stark continuation: Hattie’s wealth and vulnerability remained at the center of others’ efforts to control her.