Perry Smith In Cold Blood

In Cold Blood by Truman Capote is the first true crime novel to ever be written. A true crime novel is a non-fiction work that explores the events and details of an actual crime that has taken place. In Cold Blood looks into the murder of a family of four in the rural town of Holcomb, Kansas in 1959. The murders were not supposed to happen, but when the original plan to find the nonexistent safe failed, one of the murderers seemed to have a psychological breakdown which led to the family's demise. This person was Perry Smith, the guy who actually killed the entire family. However, Perry’s past is so terrible that his actions may be justifiable although murder is not acceptable. His childhood was very traumatic, including: abuse, lack …show more content…
He grew up with three siblings and moved around often due to his parents being rodeo performers. Unfortunately, this kind of lifestyle often caused him to sleep in their vehicle and eat things that contained high contents of sugar, which caused Perry to be malnourished. Malnutrition is a condition caused by a lack of sufficient nutrients in the body and can lead to digestive conditions such as wetting the bed. Perry suffered from this condition all through his childhood up until he was an adult. He claims that as a child, his condition often caused him to catch unruly beatings by nuns, quite often, once he and his siblings were placed in an orphanage. In the book, on page 93, there is a part that describes this, “...in a California orphanage run by nuns -shrouded disciplinarians who whipped him for wetting his bed. It was after one of these beatings, one he could never forget (“She woke me up. She had a flashlight, and she hit me with it. Hit me and hit me. And when the flashlight broke, she went on hitting me in the dark”)...” If one evil orphanage was not enough, he was sent to a children’s shelter operated by the Salvation Army soon after, in which one of the persons who worked there, attempted to drown Perry. Apparently it was because he was half-Indian and his digestive issue. It’s clear to see that he was very much so abused throughout his childhood, …show more content…
His parents were very misleading, although it was mainly his mother. His siblings also set bad examples for him and one even shut him out of her life! When he was a child, his mother and father quit being rodeo performers and his mother turned to alcohol. His parents fought to the point of divorce and his mom ran off with him and his siblings to San Francisco. This was very bad for him both psychologically and physically. His mother ordered their school teachers to never allow his dad to come and see them, but he still managed to, occasionally, and even though Perry’s mom told her children not to speak to their father, most of them minded, but Perry did not. He favored his father and this often caused him to run away from home in search for his dad. He hated his mother for being an alcoholic who gave herself away for money and could barely support the family, which is why the children ended up in an orphanage. After becoming sick in the Salvation Army shelter from the woman that tried to drown him, his father finally took him away to live with him, but their lives together were not easy. His relationship with his parents was a bit strained, but if that was not bad enough, he seems to believe there is something wrong with his family because of the way they have died, like a curse. “I think there must be something wrong with us,” Perry observes, and the