Albert Fish

The Xray of Fish's Pelvic region showing the 29 needles he had inserted into his Perinium

Albert Fish was born as Hamilton Fish in 1870, but changed his name to Albert after an older brother who had died. Convicted and executed in 1936 (the oldest person ever executed in Sing Sing Prison) for the murder of ten year old Grace Bud, whom he gutted and ate over a period of ten days.

While Fish was only charged and executed over the murder of Bud it is thought that he possibly had involvement with over 100 horrific child murders over the span of 40 years.

Why is Fish pertinent to BME?

While we cannot, in any way, condone child murder, or any murder for that matter, Albert Fish did engage in acts that do have relevance to Body Play:

• Play Piercing; Fish would insert sewing needles as a form of a game underneath his fingernails; he would also ask if he could do this to others (Piqueur Acts).
• Sounding; Fish would insert rose stems into the urethra of his erect penis and admire how it looked.
• Anal Play/Torture; Fish would insert objects into his anus and on occasion would insert alcohol soaked cotton balls and set them on fire.
• Castration; Fish had constant fantasies about castration on himself and on others (one of the other acts Fish is suspected of is the genital torture of a teenager).
• Piercing; While not body piercing as we understand it today and not play piercing because the result was permenant, Fish nevertheless inserted over a period of years, 29 sewing needles up into his pelvic cavity through his Perinium (see photo Top Right).