to New York. There were four men on the boat, including Captain George H. Burr, brothers Oliver and Smith Watts, and Hicks. It was nighttime as the boat neared the "Narrows". Captain Burr and Oliver retired to their quarters to sleep. Smith had night duty and Hicks joined him on deck, politely taking a turn on the wheel. Hicks saw something and pointed it out to Smith asking what it was. Smith didn't see anything. Hicks said look again. Smith turned his back. Hicks grabbed a sea axe and struck a blow to the back of Smith's head, felling him to the deck. Hearing the commotion, Oliver Watts stuck his neck out through the cabin hatchway. Hicks struck again, decapitating Watts. Hicks recalled that the body slowly sagged downward and the head rolled onto the deck, now sprayed with the blood of two brothers. Hicks carried the bloodied axe into Captain Burr's cabin, who was by now alert. The Captain was a tall, strong man and the ensuing fight lasted a while, with Burr almost strangling Hicks to death. Eventually Hicks managed to slash the captain with the axe, slicing off half his face, including an eyeball and nose left hanging on the axe blade. Exhausted from the struggle of killing Burr, Hicks searched the living quarters for loot. When Hicks returned onto deck, he saw a movement and was shocked to see Smith on his feet moving towards him; he believed it might be an apparition. Hicks forced the injured man overboard but Smith grasped a rail and hung on with a death grip. Hicks swung the axe and chopped off his fingers, which fell onto the deck; the rest of Smith slipped into the water. Hicks threw the other bodies and the axe overboard. The A.E. Johnson had been running unattended and struck another ship, the schooner J. R. Mather, breaking the Johnsons main mast and bringing down her rigging. Hicks set out to sink the ship, along with the evidence of the killings, by drilling holes through the keel. He then took the money, about $230, and the possessions of the murdered crew and abandoned ship in a yawl, rowing for shore and landing about daybreak next to a farmer's field on Staten Island just above Fort Richmond (Battery Weed). Believing that he would not be caught, he made his way back home to Manhattan, stopping at