The Husband Killer:
The Story of Chicago Murderess
Tillie Klimek
Who comes to mind when you think of serial killers?
Ted Bundy? Jack the Ripper? And of course, John Wayne Gacy?
Before the days of Dahmer and after H. H. Holmes, an unsuspecting villain emerged behind Chicago’s closed doors.
We’ve covered a variety of topics here at the PONetwork–and none have been as grim, or as bizarre, as this month’s article. Today, we’re covering the grisly story of Tillie Klimek, and the path of murders she left in her wake.
Take a seat. Don’t take a sip. Politely decline any homemade recipes…and join us as we recount the tale of this notorious Chicago murderess who was practically best friends with the grim reaper.
Caption from back of photo: Member of suspected Chicago “Murder Trust.”
So ghastly and startling has become the poison dinner murder involving Mrs. Tillie Klimek and Mrs. Nellie Koulik, that asst. state attorney William McLaughlin has been assigned to devote his entire time to the so called Murder Trust composed of women who carefully worked out diabolical killings by means of arsenic. Already twelve people are dead as a result of eating food doctored with the poison. Mrs. Koulik is shown here being grilled by detective Segts Belata and Swenson, and Police Lieut. Willard Malone. The man at the right of Mrs. Koulik is Albert Koulik.
11-15-22 NY
Who Could Have Guessed?
Every good recipe calls for a little dash of poison–that is, if you’re Tillie Klimek. But Tillie didn’t start her killing spree at an early age.
After immigrating to America from Poland, Tillie lived most of her life in obscurity. With a husband of over two decades at home, she seemed to neighbors like an average hardworking woman of the early 1900s, and a dutiful wife.
Until she started having “visions.”
Unfortunately for her neighbors, these visions weren’t very beneficial. She couldn’t tell people the gender of their unborn child or predict who they would marry.
She could predict death. Very specifically, her partner’s death.
In 1914, Tillie mentioned to a neighbor that she was having nightmares…nightmares where her husband never woke up.
And she was right. Shortly after this confession, Jozef Mitkiewicz succumbed to a quick illness that led to suspected “heart trouble” (Premonitions and Poison). Tillie quietly claimed his life insurance check.
Those same neighbors she confessed to tried their best to look away as a new man entered the home. Just a few months after Mitkiewicz’s funeral, Tillie swooped up Joseph Ruskowski, a labourer that saved Tillie from widowhood. Freshly married once more, perhaps things would start looking up again for her. Tragedy couldn’t strike too often, could it?
It could. To most, Ruskowski’s death was sudden. How could misfortune shatter Tillie’s life again? For others, this fresh death was prime gossip. Hadn’t Tillie mentioned the exact date Ruskowski would die?
She had.
And just like before, she pocketed another healthy life insurance sum.
While some wives might spend time in mourning (after all, she now had two husbands to mourn), Tillie turned her attention to a lover. Joseph Guskowski entered the picture, heading with her to “a romantic getaway to Milwaukee (Premonitions and Poison). According to the article, she didn’t waste much time getting the dirty details off her chest. She confessed to Guskowski that her dead husbands hadn’t died due to coincidence or rotten luck.
It had been by her hand.
No Time to Mourn – Plenty of Time to Kill
This would give anyone enough reason to run for the hills. And Guskowski tried. “He refused to propose” and attempted to distance himself from the self-confessed killer (Premonitions and Poison). Yet Tillie was great at bullying her victims. She “threatened to have him arrested under the Mann Act,” a sentence that could throw him in jail for transporting her to another state “for the purpose of prostitution or debauchery, or for any other immoral purpose” (Premonitions and Poison).
Still, Guskowski wouldn’t give in easily. Surely, law enforcement would listen–if only he could get to them. In typical Tillie fashion, he was in a pine box before he ever made it to a police station.
And thus the trail of bodies continued. Frank Kupczyk, her next husband, married Tillie on February 17th, 1919. He was dead two years later–a longer timeline than the men who came before. But it wasn’t as if those days were full of matrimonial bliss.
Tillie started having her “visions” again, and this time, she was practically giddy in letting everyone know about it. She declared that Frank would perish soon, and made sure Frank knew this, too.
According to the article about Tillie Klimek’s eerie existence, she taunted her husband repeatedly as he lay sick:
“You’ll be dying soon.”
“It won’t be long now.”
“He’s got two inches left to live.”
She took up sewing, stitching macabre items like funeral clothes–making a point that Frank knew it was for his own. To Tillie, his illness was one long celebration…and she kept the festivities going even after his death.
With her Victrola blasting music, onlookers looked on uncomfortably as Tillie “reached into the coffin, grabbed him by the ear, and shouted, “You devil, you won’t get up anymore!” (Premonitions and Poison). Not quite a heartfelt sendoff by a woman gripped by grief.
It seemed like Tillie might keep adding to the list of unfortunate souls until she met her own demise. And it seemed like that was her plan, until her final husband, Joseph Klimek, arrived.
Klimek was a widower himself, and looked past Tillie’s questionable past to try to forge a comfortable life for the both of them. And while Joseph played the role as a dedicated husband, Tillie was already wondering what poison might best suit her new beau.
Scheming and villainry seemed to run in the family. On a whim, Tillie reached out to her cousin, Nellie Koulik, who provided her not with a wedding gift, but with rat poison. Nellie, too, had lost a husband–not as many as Tillie, but who’s counting? And like Tillie, fingers would later point to Nellie as the culprit.
Unfortunately for Tillie, the murder routine hit a snag. John Klimek took a look at his fading brother and brought in a doctor to examine him. Joseph wasn’t fighting a nasty illness. He was fighting against arsenic.
WHEN LIFE GOES OFF THE RAILS
The Story Comes to a Close – with Some Chilling Twists
The Chicago PD wanted answers. Tillie was more than happy to supply them.
She confessed that yes, she had poisoned Joseph–but what else could she do? According to her story, Joseph was “a cheater. A drinker. A brute” (Premonitions and Poison). With a string of corpses behind her, it’s no shock that her words rang hollow.
On October 26, 1922, Tillie was arrested, with her cousin behind bars not long after.
Suspicions just wouldn’t stay buried. The department turned toward graveyards and coffins. And thus began the great exhumation–bringing up the bodies of these past victims.
Frank was examined first, practically bursting with poision–”enough to kill four men” (Premonitions and Poison). Living relatives, even neighbors, put the pieces together. They had started feeling ill after eating or drinking something Tillie cooked up–and now, it all made sense. Sickening sense.
The final count for victims? 20. 20 souls who either perished or suffered to some disturbing degree. Most chilling? Suspicions swirled over Nellie’s infant twins, who had died years ago under “mysterious circumstances” (Premonitions and Poison). Perhaps death hadn’t randomly claimed them–far more believable, maybe Nellie had something to do with it.
Even with piles of evidence stacked against the two women, Tillie was only charged with both a single murder–Frank’s.
While the death penalty seemed like a suitable punishment, ultimately, Tillie received a life sentence instead. She died at Joliet Correctional Center in 1936. Nellie practically walked away unscathed. Despite supplying arsenic to her cousin, she faded away from the public eye and the department’s concern.
Photo from the Chicago Tribune. From Left to Right: Nellie Koulik, Tillie Klimek.
A Terrible Legacy
While Tillie Klimek’s name might ring a bell in some Chicagoan’s ears, she certainly isn’t as well known as some infamous killers.
Still, we’re curious. Do you have any information on…
- Serial killer Tillie Klimek?
- Her victims, Jozef Mitkiewicz, Joseph Ruskowski, Joseph Guskowski, Frank Kupczyk, or Joseph Klimek?
- Her cousin, Nellie Koulik?
- The men pictured in our November calendar image, Segts Belata, Swenson, Police Lieut. Willard Malone, or Albert Koulik?
Send details and photos to pon@ponetwork.com. Together, let’s dig deeper into history!
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