Editing Patty Cannon (section)

==Biography==
Cannon's date of birth is unknown; various accounts have her born in 1759, 1760 or 1769. She may have been named Lucretia P. Hanly. She had two daughters by her husband Jesse Cannon before his death, reputedly from poison. One of her daughters married blacksmith Henry Brereton, and the other married tavern owner [[Joe Johnson]], who became Cannon's most infamous partner in crime. 

Johnson and Brereton were both involved in the illegal slave trade, kidnapping free blacks and selling them as slaves. Brereton was eventually convicted of kidnapping for his role in this business in 1911 and imprisoned. Escaping from prison, he met up with Cannon and another associate, [[Joseph Griffith]], and the three conspired to rob a rival slave trader named Ridgell at Cannon's bar. Cannon got Ridgell drunk before Brereton and Griffith ambushed him. In the ensuing fight, Ridgell was shot dead. Brereton and Griffith were captured and hanged in 1813, but Cannon escaped prosecution. 

After Brereton's execution, Cannon and Johnson formed the Cannon-Johnson slave gang. The gang would trawl local waterfronts looking for victims, luring blacks they came across onto their boat with offers of money, alcohol or work before selling them as slaves. They would also use other tactics, such as simply grabbing free blacks off the street, hunting down fugitive slaves or abducting slaves from nearby plantations. They would keep captured slaves chained up in the tavern's basement and attic, and in secret rooms built for this specific purpose. Once they had enough slaves, they would march them to slave states on a chain gang and sell them at slave markets. According to victims who were able to gain their freedom, Cannon would urge Johnson on as he whipped captives, saying it "did her good to see him beat the boys". Local authorities were reluctant to take action due to the gang's reputation for violence, and the gang were able to escape across state lines whenever they were close to being definitively linked to the slave trade. They have been credited with abducting and enslaving over 3000 blacks and murdering around 30 people.

In 1822, an investigation by politicians Joseph Watson and John Andrew Shulze led to the indictment for kidnapping of several gang members. Several gang members were imprisoned or fled the state, including Joe Johnson. Cannon herself avoided indictment until 1829, when a labourer on her farm in Delaware found a chest buried on the property containing the skeleton of a rival slave trader who had gone missing nine years earlier. Following this discovery, Cannon was arrested for murder. Cyrus James, a black accomplice of the gang who had been bought as a child by Cannon and raised to help lure the gang's victims, was apprehended and agreed to testify against Cannon. According to James's testimony, Cannon had murdered multiple slaves and rival slave traders were buried on the property. The bodies were dug up, and included a black infant. According to James, Cannon had murdered several black babies, allegedly holding one over a fire; one, believed to be the one found on the property, was taken away by Cannon after being injured and never returned. 

Cannon herself confessed to having murdered 24 black captives after her arrest. She died in unclear circumstances while in custody. Several contemporary sources attribute her death to suicide by poison, but others claim she died of an illness. Sources are also divided on whether or not she was convicted and sentenced to hang before her death.
[[Category:List]]
[[Category:Female]]
[[Category:Deceased]]
[[Category:Early Modern Villains]]
[[Category:Serial Killer]]
[[Category:Gangsters]]
[[Category:Imprisoned]]
[[Category:Deaths in prison]]
[[Category:Slaver]]
[[Category:Sadists]]
[[Category:Abusers]]
[[Category:Kidnapper]]
[[Category:Xenophobes]]
[[Category:Supremacists]]
[[Category:Destroyer of Innocence]]
[[Category:Partners in Crime]]
[[Category:Greedy]]