The Disappearance of William Cantelo

Generally, there are few missing person cases that would capture the mind of historians as most are in the realm of true crime or not historically notable. There are a few cases though that captivate historians: the Princes in the Tower (we will probably do an article on this topic in the future), Amelia Earhart, The Roanoke Colonists in America, and Ambrose Bierce to name the top cases. There is one instance however that particularly catches the eye here at Seeking History and that is the disappearance of William Cantelo and his potential “reappearance” as noted automatic weapons inventor, Hiram Maxim.

               Around this time, military innovation was a focal point for those interested in mechanical engineering. Several inventors were rapidly advancing the firearms world with quick firing “machine” guns. These automatic weapons first saw use in the American civil war and started an arms race amongst the European powers to also have guns of their own that could give them an edge in the next European war. Enter in now our two inventors, William Cantelo and Hiram Maxim.

               William Cantelo was born on the Isle of Wight in 1830 and by 1870 owned an engineering firm, employing around 40 people in Southampton, England. He had numerous ties to his community and a wife and 3 children. He also owned an inn called the Old Tower Inn that connected to an old defensive tower constructed by the Normans. In the early 1880s, Cantelo, using his engineering background (along with his two sons, themselves engineers), joined the race to produce a homegrown automatic weapon for Britain, testing his weapon in the tunnels beneath his inn, working to perfect a recoil driven automatic mechanism. Although the family was closely guarded about what they were developing, they couldn’t hide the noise of a gun firing in quick succession from their neighbors and accounts of Cantelo developing a new “rifle” were repeated by locals. Sometime later (dates are unclear in this story) but still in the early 1880s, Cantelo declared his weapon perfected. The next part of Cantelo’s story is difficult to piece together, there are conflicting sources on what exactly led to his disappearance. One states that when he declared his weapon completed, he wanted to take a holiday or vacation to celebrate his success, leaving his family to never be seen or heard from again. Another account states that Cantelo, upon completion of his gun, left to market it to the world and find a buyer but both are consistent that he was to be gone for three months. There are other additions to the mystery with reports that a large sum of money was withdrawn from his bank account, but records can’t say when or where this happened. The disappearance of Cantelo was out of character enough that his family hired a private investigator to find him and traced to him America, but from there, the trail died. Here we will temporarily leave Cantelo and go to our next inventor, Hiram Maxim.

               Hiram Maxim, an American born in Maine in 1840, was an inventor also trying to develop a recoil operated automatic weapon. Hiram, while born in the USA, moved to England in his 40s and became a naturalized British subject, possibly to escape a reputation of being problematic in his dealings with other inventors. Maxim was a prolific inventor, securing patents for steam pumps, curling irons, and claimed to have invented the lightbulb, amongst other items. His interests even extended into powered flight and medical inhalers, although he had a reputation for “stealing” ideas and plagiarism. This reputation is documented in letters stating that inventors were shy to debut new products to him due to fear of intellectual theft. Maxim created an arms company with Edward Vickers and developed his “Maxim” gun around the same time that Cantelo was developing his. Maxim completed his recoil operated automatic gun in 1884 whilst living in London and started to market his weapon to British imperial expeditions, such as the relief expedition of 1886 headed by Henry Morton Stanley, where it was used several times during a retreat. The weapon was adopted widely during the colonial wars of the late 19th century and variants of the design saw heavy use in the First World War and has remained in production. It has even been used in the Russo-Ukrainian war of 2022-present.

               Ok, so there two inventors living relatively close to one another in Britain, and both working to develop a machine gun at the same time. Interesting, but not necessarily remarkable. What is remarkable though is the claim that Maxim and Cantelo could be the same man, so we are going to break down the case for this and the case against this claim. Let us start with the case for Cantelo and Maxim being the same person.

               First off, the biggest point in the “pro” camp, is their appearance. Maxim and Cantelo not only invented similar weapons at the same time, in the same place, but also looked remarkably similar, with similar hair and identical large beards. So similar was their appearance that after Cantelo’s disappearance, his sons being on the look out for any mention of him in the papers, saw a picture of Hiram Maxim and were convinced it was their father, further encouraged by the weapon invented by Maxim sounding eerily similar to the one they worked on with their father.  They were so convinced that they tried to confront Maxim while in the UK but were unsuccessful, tracing him to a train station but not able to speak with him prior to the train’s departure. The newspaper they saw his picture in even captioned the image as Cantelo and not Maxim. Maxim also arrived in England around the same time that Cantelo disappeared. Could Cantelo have changed his identity, at a time when it was more possible to disappear than today, to escape some financial or personal difficulties, then remerged in England shortly after as the American born inventor?

               Now the case against: Maxim obviously existed in the United States 40 years before Cantelo’s disappearance. There is documented evidence of this and numerous mentions of him in papers and through personal letters. If Cantelo went to America (per the private investigator’s trail) then shortly returned to England as Maxim, the real Maxim either had to be dead or silenced in a way to never re-emerge. However, Maxim was aware of someone posing as him back in America, while he was in England, even notating this in his autobiography, claiming a double was impersonating him back in the States. Beards that Cantelo and Maxim both wore were very common at the time and the men were of a similar age, which could lead to a visual confusion even by those who knew Cantelo best. Additionally, Maxim is documented as visiting Southampton, where Cantelo was last seen. Someone trying to hide with a new identity probably wouldn’t take the risk by visiting the town he lived in, potentially being spotted by people he knew. Lastly, inventing a weapon that would essentially change the way humans fought each other would draw huge amounts of attention to its inventor, which is not something that someone trying to hide would be interested in.

               The more likely scenarios of what happened to Cantelo is that he met a grisly fate while marketing his new weapon, committed suicide, or purposely vanished to dodge personal or financial problems. The case of William Cantelo’s disappearance has unfortunately gone cold in the 140 or so years since his disappearance and continues to fascinate historians and true crime enthusiasts today.