Cause of death Syphilis Ethnicity African American | Occupation Cook, valet Name Henry Peavey | |
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Born March 3, 1882 ( 1882-03-03 ) Died December 27, 1931, San Francisco, California, United States | ||
Henry Peavey (March 3, 1882 – December 27, 1931) was the cook and valet of Hollywood silent film director William Desmond Taylor. Peavey worked for Taylor for six months prior to Taylor's murder in 1922.
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Employment by Taylor
Prior to working for William Desmond Taylor, Peavy was employed by the wife of director Christy Cabanne. Peavy was hired by Taylor after he dismissed his previous butler, Edward F. Sands, for forging his signature on checks.
Three days before Taylor's murder, Peavey had been arrested for "social vagrancy" and charged with being "lewd and dissolute". On the day following Taylor's murder on February 1, 1922, Taylor was scheduled to appear in court on Peavey's behalf.
Taylor's death
Peavey discovered Taylor's body at 7:30 on the morning of February 2, 1922. He was repeatedly questioned by police and reporters for possible leads, but was of little help. Some Hearst reporters suspected that Peavey was withholding information, so they kidnapped him a few weeks after the crime and attempted to scare him into a confession. In a 1930 interview, Peavey expressed the (widely unsupported) opinion that Mabel Normand had been the person who killed Taylor.
Death
A few months after the Taylor murder, Peavey left Los Angeles and moved to San Francisco. In 1930, he was admitted to the Napa State Hospital with general paresis due to an untreated case of syphilis. He died there of tertiary syphilis on December 27, 1931.