A Deadly Medical Dispute in Snohomish
A doctor in the Snohomish valley faces fatal violence after a long-standing property dispute with a local family spirals into a shooting.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
W. T. Northrup, a prominent physician of the Snohomish valley, in the northern portion of the territory, was murdered yesterday by Thomas McCoy, his brother Alfred, and the brother of a prominent citizen. Dr. Northrup had handled the disappearance of the McCoys by taking legal action. They confronted him yesterday when he went to his office and began firing on him with pistols and shotguns. He was armed but drew a pocket knife and badly wounded Alfred McCoy before he was fatally shot. The McCoys have been armed, and there is strong feeling in favor of lynching.
“The McCoys have been armed, and there is strong feeling in favor of lynching.”
This 1887 incident in the Snohomish valley highlights the era's volatile frontier justice, where legal property disputes frequently escalated into deadly private feuds. Much like today, these tensions reflected the high stakes of land ownership in the rapidly developing Pacific Northwest, though today's territorial battles are more often fought in courtrooms than at gunpoint.
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