What Happened to Thomas Steele? A WV State Pen Story

WV State Penitentiary Source: WV History on View

In April of 1959, a letter was received by the Wheeling, WV police, addressed to Sgt. Elmer Hehr. The letter was from Francis W. (Chicago Red) Brassell, written from Brassell’s jail cell in El Paso, Texas. Brassell was in the county jail, currently awaiting transfer to a state facility in Huntsville. He had been sentenced to 50 years for armed robbery and decided that now was as good a time as any to confess to an earlier crime. In the letter, Chicago Red Brassell admitted that in 1952, while incarcerated at the WV State Penitentiary for (you guessed it) armed robbery, he had killed a fellow inmate and made it look like a suicide. 

Brassell had been sent to the West Virginia State Penitentiary on November 19, 1947. He had received a ten year sentence for armed robbery in Kanawha County, but had served his sentence, and was released April 17, 1957. Two years later, he found himself sitting in a Texas jail cell for the same thing. Instead of ten years, however, he was being sentenced to 50 years with the added ‘benefit’ of working on a prison work crew, affectionately known as a ‘chain gang’ in the oppressive Texas heat. 

It is theorized that Brassell wrote the letter, hoping to get transferred back to West Virginia and serve out his sentence there. So, he made up a story that in October of 1952, he had strangled fellow inmate, Thomas G. Steele, then hung his body over the cell door to make it look like a suicide. The warden at the time, Donivan E. Adams, sent the Marshall County Prosecutor, Everett Fox, and a WV State Trooper, H.E. Robinson, to Texas for an investigation.

Thomas G. Steele was from Mason County. He was sent to the penitentiary in April of 1947 to serve out a 1-10 year sentence for grand larceny. In July of 1952, he decided he had had enough of prison life. While working at a prison work camp in Gypsy (Harrison County), Steele escaped. He was missing for 12 hours before he was found six miles away in a poison ivy patch. He surrendered peaceably.  However, there were consequences to his actions. 

Steele, along with Brassell and 2-3 other ‘incorrigibles’ were placed in Death Row cells so that the guards could better control and monitor them. It was in this cell block where Thomas Steele was found on October 4, 1952. His death was ruled a suicide and he was buried in the prison cemetery. He was just 23 years old. 

Thomas Steele’s story probably would have ended there, if Brassell hadn’t had the bright idea to take credit for the death. But, this grand plan of being sent back to West Virginia would not come to fruition. The only person who believed Brassell had been responsible for Steele’s death was Everett Fox. Trooper Robinson, Warden Adams, and former Warden Orel J. Skeen, all believed the story was made up. Skeen, who was warden at the time of the incident, claimed that Brassell definitely had the mental capacity to commit murder, but didn’t think it was physically possible. Brassell was a small man, weighing in at only 126 pounds. It would have been difficult for him to have strangled Steele, then hoisted his body up before being found out by the guards in their more secured setting. 

Officials went on to say that it didn’t really matter, either way. Even if they had believed there was sufficient evidence to suggest Steele was murdered, they wouldn’t bother to extradite him from Texas. And therefore, Steele’s official cause of death remains ‘suicide’ and Brassell presumably served his time in a Texas prison. 

From a paranormal perspective, I find this case extremely interesting in regards to its potential for producing ghosts. Both suicide and murder victims are largely believed to stick around a location after their untimely death, but what if you were falsely accused of taking your own life, and your name was never cleared? To many, that false narrative is a really big deal, and the hunt for justice that is never going to come is more than enough reason to stick around and haunt a location. 

And what about Brassell? What really prompted him to confess to murder? A popular trope in these types of stories is that he felt compelled to finally admitting his crime by being haunted, either literally or figuratively by thoughts of Steele. Or, did he really just prefer to serve out a murder sentence over an armed robbery sentence if it meant being back in West Virginia? Could that draw to West Virginia actually be enough to cause his spirit to return to the old prison, despite dying beyond its walls? As an interesting side note, he’s not the only prisoner I’ve read about who desperately wanted to be at WV State Penitentiary! We always hear about how violent and filthy and overcrowded the prison was throughout much of its operation, but inmates such as Bill Dorsey (story HERE) purposefully tried to be re-committed, and even Charles Manson has his infamous letter to the warden begging to be transferred. 

It’s undeniable that the former West Virginia State Penitentiary in Moundsville is a powerful place, with an energy that is all its own. Whether that energy draws you in, or causes you to run screaming from within its walls is a whole other mystery…