1. Charles Whitman, the “Texas Tower Sniper”, murdered his mother and wife before killing a further 17 people from atop the UT tower
Charles Whitman (b. 1941 CE) was a former U.S. Marine who in 1966 was responsible for the massacre at The University of Texas at Austin, becoming known as the “Texas Tower Sniper“. Trained with firearms from a young age, with his father, Charles Whitman Sr. a collector, he became an accomplished marksman described by his father as able to “plug the eye out of a squirrel by the time he was sixteen.” His father was also highly abusive, demanding perfection from his family and punishing ruthlessly those who failed to adhere to his standards; enlisting in the Marines in June 1959, it is believed Whitman did so in response to a particularly severe beating from his father a month earlier after he returned home drunk after celebrating graduating 7th in his class from High School.
Enrolling at The University of Texas at Austin in 1961 Whitman’s fascination with the iconic campus tower was morbid from the start, noted as commenting in 1962 that “a person could stand off an army from atop of it before they got him.” In May 1966, Whitman’s mother separated from his father and sued for divorce; during this time, Whitman began abusing amphetamines and experienced debilitating headaches. Seeking to relieve his mother and wife of their worldly troubles and grant them salvation in heaven, on August 1, 1966, Whitman murdered his mother and placed her body peacefully in her bed; whilst the exact method is unknown, it is believed he rendered her unconscious before killing her with a single stab wound to the heart. Whitman then returned home and murdered his wife by brutally stabbing her repeatedly whilst she slept, before compiling his suicide note and heading to the university. Armed with a hunting rifle, Whitman shot and killed 17 people, and wounded a further 31, from the 28th floor of the UT tower, before being shot and killed by police; it remained the deadliest mass shooting in the United States until 1984, and the deadliest school shooting until Virginia Tech in 2007.