Famous Last Words

The average human being has roughly ten thousand words in their vocabulary, daily we probably use barely a third, and most of which - if we're honest - are euphemisms, abbreviations or expletives. And yet, out of a whole lifetime of verbal communication the two sentences we have next-to-no control over fascinates everyone the most - our first words... and our last. 

My first words were "corrugated iron". Why? I have no idea. I just hope I can muster something more witty and imaginative for the final words than "Bus? What bus?!" (splat). 

But what follows is a fabulous list of famous last words by some of the world biggest celebrities, familiar references to murder in popular fictions, as well as some (un)inspirational quotes by the world's most notorious murderers. Well, this is Murder Mile after all. 

​Famous Last Words: 

• Elvis Presley - “I’m going to the bathroom to read” (he died on the loo, having a poo)
• Composer Jean-Philippe Rameau objected to a song sung at his bedside. He said “what the devil do you mean to sing to me, Priest? You are out of tune”
• George Orwell (author of 1984 and Animal Farm), his last written words were, “At fifty, everyone has the face he deserves.” He died at age 46.
• Nostradamus predicted, “Tomorrow at sunrise, I shall no longer be here.” He was right.
• Leonardo daVinci (genius, inventor, artist) modestly said “I have offended God and mankind because my work did not reach the quality it should have” 
• Louise-Marie-Thérèse de Saint Maurice, Comtesse de Vercellis let one rip while she was dying. She said, “Good. A woman who can fart is not dead”. My kind of woman. 
• Drummer Buddy Rich died after being prepped for surgery, a nurse asked him, “Is there anything you can’t take?” Rich replied “Yeah, country music.”
• Johnny Ace (R&B singer) died in 1954 while playing with a pistol during a break in his concert set. His last words were, “I’ll show you that it won’t shoot.”
• Richard Feynman (physicist, author, musician, professor), died in Los Angeles in 1988. His last words were “this dying is boring”
• Murderer James W. Rodgers was put in front of a firing squad in Utah and asked if he had a last request. He replied “bring me a bullet-proof vest.”
• John Arthur Spenkelink was executed in Florida in 1979. He spent his final days writing these last words on various pieces of mail: “Capital punishment means those without the capital get the punishment”.
• Convicted murderer Thomas J. Grasso used his last words to complain about his last meal. He said “I did not get my Spaghetti-O’s; I got spaghetti. I want the press to know this”
• Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, (creator of Sherlock Holmes) died at age 71 in his garden. He turned to his wife and said, “You are wonderful,” then clutched his chest and died.
• When Groucho Marx was dying, he let out one last quip: “This is no way to live!”
• Actress Joan Crawford yelled at her housekeeper, who was praying as Crawford died. Crawford said, “Damn it! Don’t you dare ask God to help me!” 

(Un)Inspirational Quotes by Serial KIllers:

• John Wayne Gacy - “Surely a clown can get away with murder?”
• Edmund Kemper - “Even when she was dead, she was still bitching at me. I couldn’t get her to shut up!”
• Peter Kurten (known as The Vampire of Dusseldorf) - “After my head has been chopped off, will I still be able to hear, at least for a moment, the sound of my own blood gushing from my neck? That would be the best pleasure to end all pleasure. “
• Edmund Kemper - “I just wanted to see how it felt to shoot Grandma”
• Jeffrey Dahmer - “I carried it too far, that’s for sure“,
• Albert Fish - “I like children, they are tasty.”
• Richard Ramirez (The Night Stalker was smart and could have done much good in the world if he’d had a decent childhood.) - “Big deal, death comes with the territory. See you in Disneyland.”
• Jeffrey Dahmer - “I’ve got to start eating at home more”
• Charles Manson - “Believe me, if I started murdering people there’d be none of ya left”
• Carl Panzram (Panzram confessed to 22 murders, and to having sodomized over 1,000 males. He was hanged for having murdered a prison employee at Leavenworth Federal Penitentiary in 1930.) - “Today I am dirty , but tomorrow I’ll be just dirt.” 
• John Wayne Gacy - “The only thing they can get me for is running a funeral parlour without a license.”
• Richard Ramirez -  “Even psychopaths have emotions, then again, maybe not.”

Murderously Fun Quotes in Popular Fiction:

• “It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.” ― Voltaire
• “Nobody owns life, but anyone who can pick up a frying pan owns death.” ― William S. Burroughs
• “The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers.” ― William Shakespeare, King Henry VI
• “Men should think twice before making widowhood a women's only path to power.” ― Gloria Steinem
• “I’ve always felt that the best place to hide a body is in the trunk of a cop car, with a note affixed to the body that reads, “I’m sorry.” ― Jarod Kintz, There are Two Typos of People in This World: Those Who Can Edit and Those Who Can't
• “When the Fox hears the Rabbit scream he comes a-runnin', but not to help.” ― Thomas Harris, The Silence of the Lambs
• “If it weren't for greed, intolerance, hate, passion and murder, you would have no works of art, no great buildings, no medical science, no Mozart, no Van Gough, no Muppets and no Louis Armstrong.” ― Jasper Fforde, The Big Over Easy

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Michael J Buchanan-Dunne is a writer, crime historian and tour-guide who runs Murder Mile Walks, a guided tour of Soho’s most notorious murder cases, hailed as “one of the top ten quirky & unusual things to do in London” and featuring 18 murderers, 3 serial killers, across 21 locations, totalling 75 deaths, over just a one mile walk.